EP299 - Steve Addision, Jason Morris, and Historical Movements of God

There's a cause that Jesus came for and, you know, my understanding is it's multiplying

disciples and churches to the glory of God from where we are to the ends of the earth,

every people, every place.

Welcome to the Church Digital Podcast.

Through this podcast, we'll talk about the technological innovations within the church.

But more than tech for tech itself, we'll address deeper questions.

Is disciple making possible digitally?

How should we approach the digital mission field?

Can a biblically grounded church operate in digital space?

Oh, and where does the metaverse and artificial intelligence fit into all of this?

Whether you're a big or small church, the Church Digital's goal is to help churches like yours

learn to be a multiplying church digitally and physically.

And now here's your host, Jeff Reed.

All right.

Hey, everybody.

Episode 299, 299 of the Church Digital Podcast.

We are one podcast away, one episode away from 300.

You're going to do something special for 300?

I have.

And that's what I was about to say.

Jason Morris is cutting me off like midstream.

So it's six weeks until episode 300 actually airs.

And as I sit in this chair, Steve Addison's coming on here.

In a second, I'm literally, I'm like, Steve freaking Addison, you know, one of the modern architects

of movement is my guest for 299.

What am I going to do for 300?

Like I kind of painted myself in the corner.

Wow.

What am I going to do to make 300 more epic than what 299 is going to be?

Thank you very much, Jason, for calling attention to that in this moment.

So we're excited to have Steve Addison literally from another continent.

Church Digital Podcast brought to you by Riverside once again, which by the way, the beauty of

Riverside, I am, I am looking at Steve Addison in Australia and I am getting 1080 video coming

to me and recording and the podcast and like everything's going to be epic and it's going

to be flawless, even though this dude's literally on another day.

We're recording this on a Wednesday night and it's, what is Thursday morning?

Steve Addison, what does Thursday morning look like for you right now?

It looks beautiful.

We're, we're coming into autumn in Australia and I can tell you that the world has not

ended, um, that you've, that Thursday has come.

Awesome.

That, that's good to know.

You will make it to Thursday and so Friday is not promised people, but Thursday, Steve

Addison, Australia, uh, says it's okay.

That's why we're, we're in Australia.

We just want to be the first when the Lord comes back because he'll pass over, he'll pass

over New Zealand for sure.

We'll be resurrected.

Awesome.

Our friends in New Zealand, I want to publicly apologize.

Any hate mail, go ahead and send it to Jason, J-A-S-O-N at thechurch.digital.

He can take care of that for you.

No, I, I, I'm going to open confession hour here.

Uh, so Steve's on, we're going to talk about, um, uh, movement and, uh, he recently came

out with a book, Acts and the Movement of God.

I just happened to have a copy right here, which happens to be signed by said Steve Addison.

Very, very proud of this.

Um, met Steve, um, was at a E3, no place left event here in Florida, West Palm and, uh, happened

to meet Steve there.

And it was, um, and we're just talking offline, both Jason and I reflecting back on like Steve's

books and his writing on movement and, and how that was very influential in, in our, in

our lives.

Um, you know, it, for myself, really, it was reading pioneering movements.

That, that was, that was the book.

I, there were two or three that I was, um, flipping through.

Um, it was honestly, it was like a decade ago and I, uh, my memory's bad.

Um, but, um, it was pioneering movements was the one that was just cover to cover, just

ripping through it.

And, um, and it's just so good for, and honestly, for me, as I was, um, it caused me to question

things and it really started to, to validate some of the questions.

Like, uh, we had Leonard Sweet on to do the podcast a while back and Leonard Sweet was the,

was the podcast that it was like, okay, Leonard Sweet thinks the way that I think like Leonard

Sweet validated all the craziness that was in my thoughts.

Cause, cause he, he was doing it.

Uh, the church 2.0 guy.

Oh my gosh, I'm blanking on his name.

Um, Jason.

Neil Cole, we had Neil Cole on and, and Neil Cole and, and you, Steve, like both of you

kind of, kind of shot for shot were, uh, so your book, Steve was handed to me by a pastor.

Neil Cole's book was a book that I found on my own.

Um, but, but the two of those really started to get me down this road of questioning what

I thought was, was correct, normal.

Um, you know, a 15 years church staffing, not, not apologetic on that.

Um, you know, I had been discipled in my life and then I, I went and worked on a church

staff and threw everything out the window and forgot everything that I'd learned in the

years previous to that.

And so now, uh, to be honest, you know, talking about movement and working with the church digital

and pioneering these movements that, that we're, we're, we're working with, um, man,

your book becomes more and more, more and more prevalent, more and more necessary.

And I'm going to be honest.

This is what I wanted to open up with.

This is probably the most you're going to hear me talk in this podcast, um, because we

got Jason Morris in, in the conversation.

Jason, uh, is, uh, very, uh, versed in this area.

And even just some of the pre-conversations, I know he's excited to get into this.

I'm kind of poking, I'm making fun of him here a little bit.

It's my podcast.

I can do that.

Um, but, uh, the, the heart of the heart of this thing is we're really looking forward

to this conversation and, and digging in.

Um, and Jason, why don't my, man, why don't, do you want to share a little bit of maybe how,

uh, Steve's influenced you kind of historically?

Oh yeah.

Big time, you know, listening to the podcast and reading the book.

The, the next one was rise of movements, which I honestly, after reading that book, I thought

that that was going to be your magnum opus by the way that it was structured.

Because it was, uh, it gave such a wonderful overview of the life cycle that I feel like

was so helpful for people to understand, oh, I'm in this certain phase of the life cycle.

And if I just go business as usual, I will hit the decay and decline if I don't watch it.

Um, and then my favorite part of the book though, because there's a lot of structural

talk, um, um, was the appendix.

Not very many books I could say that about, but the appendix was awesome.

Um, and we actually ended up using a lot of those ideas from the appendix in the church

planning movements that we did all around the world and got me connected to the types of

ideas you were talking about.

So it was interesting how the book had very high, the rise and fall of movements.

I got a high level view through the book and then a more nuts and bolts practical idea of

how it could get expressed in the appendix.

And I thought, this is it, you know, what else do you need to write?

But apparently, apparently there was something else, right?

And I mean, I'm just curious, um, how did you get from rise and fall of movements to acts?

What was the journey that got you there?

Just out of curiosity, we can get to the other questions we have, but he's already taken over

my podcast.

We are not even on question one yet.

That's awesome.

I just love, go ahead, please.

How'd you get to, uh, from rise and fall, uh, to, uh, tax?

Well, rise and fall was written pretty much, uh, 20, 25 years ago, but it, it was the second

half of my first book.

Um, you know, we, we did the characteristics of dynamic movements and then we said, well,

let's show you the life cycle.

And then I realized that this was actually two books.

Um, and so it, it sat there on my computer drive for about 20 years and what it was waiting

for was, you know, we can learn a lot from organizational life cycles, right?

But this is the movement of God, it's not some organization, you know, um, so it was the

realization that's what's driving the rise and fall is the degree to which we move towards

or away from the life and ministry of Jesus as, especially as it's expressed in the gospel

and, and, and, and acts because acts that, so that automatically leads you to acts because,

um, and, and this was a big, another big aha moment was realizing that Luke wrote acts because

the story wasn't finished.

So the story about Jesus continues, you know, this is not just some history of the early

church.

This is what Jesus continues to do.

Once, once he's won his victory and he's ascended, well, he, he sends a spirit.

He, you know, confronts Paul on the Damascus road, you know, the risen Lord is still leading

the way.

So the patterns in the book of acts are not, are not just, gee, didn't they, weren't these

guys smart, you know, well, they weren't, they, they were defeated.

They were, you know, even, even 10 years down the track, Peter, Peter is clueless at Cornelius's

house.

This is not some brainstorming thing from the apostles.

Um, the Lord's still in charge.

And, and so here we go.

We look at the rise and fall throughout the scriptures and history and the principles, but, ah, well,

that means we, this is the story of, of the rise of a movement here in the book of acts.

Um, and the wonderful thing, once you've got the paradigm of the life cycle is you realize

even Peter is going through that, even the church of Jerusalem, which is like heaven on

earth.

It's 10 years since the commission was given.

They've gone off, they've filled Jerusalem, uh, with the knowledge of Jesus.

There's, there's, there's movements throughout Galilee and Samaria and Judea and Jerusalem,

but they still haven't intentionally gone after the, um, the Gentiles.

You know, the mission is, they're in danger, you know, where they're at the peak of their

success.

And now they're in danger of falling off the cliff, even in the midst of, Hey, we have a

mega church or whatever, you know, and Peter, I'll be the senior pastor of the mega church.

Well, no, he's out on the fringes, um, where God gets ahold of him and says, Hey, there's

a whole new life cycle here.

Um, and it's bringing Peter and, and that church in Jerusalem back to the life and ministry of

Jesus.

Um, so seeing that, you know, these, these patterns, I mean, we can draw a life cycle.

That's just one way of communicating it.

What we've got to go to is the actual story of the book of Acts.

And, and the, the big aha moment is, uh, God, father, son, and Holy spirit is the main character

in this book.

Therefore, the patterns, the lessons that not, not the finer detail.

It's not like, well, we better just walk around on foot.

We can't use motor cars.

And when we travel long distances, it's got to be ship, you know, that's, that's silly

stuff, you know, but the sort of patterns we see, this is what, um, this is what God does

in history and what he's still doing today.

So we better, we better not build a wall of separation between our, our life and ministry

and that book of Acts and just say, well, that's them back there.

Well, we know better now.

I tell you what, that's, that's a really beautiful picture.

Um, even backing up a little bit, getting to Peter, describing, you know, Peter out there

on the fringe, um, because we're dealing with the church digital.

We're dealing with a bunch of square pegs that don't fit in the round holes.

Um, you know, I, it's funny, I, and even Steve, I think I told you that the joke that

we often call ourselves the, you know, basically the Island of Misfit Toys, um, because that's,

that's this weird oddball collection of, of, of, of who we are.

Um, you know, I was funny.

I was, I was recently told it, told it like, this is new since, since I, I met you, Steve.

Uh, but I was, I was told a story recently of, of a guy, uh, in a, in a Eastern,

in a, in a European country.

I'm not going to say what country, you know, I don't want to, I don't want to out the guy

without publicly knowing I can share the story, but, um, he, he, he came into the, our discord

community on the church digital, uh, did discord.thechurch.digital, by the way, open a web browser.

Uh, but what he, what he did was he started meeting us and ended up booking time with me and

I'm looking at him face to face and he's telling me a story and he has this passion to, to plant

a, he loves relational disciple making.

Um, he's got, I don't know that he's, he's, has depth defined movement in him, um, but he's

understanding some of the basic principles of movement.

And, um, and what he wants to do, he has this crazy idea of doing a microchurch model, but

digital.

And so he's really wanting to start to explore this digital microchurch.

Now, you know, in, in my world, there's half a dozen people that are having that same exploration,

but outside of the Island of Misfit Toys and the fringe people, um, well, um, you know, he

was told that idea to his church and, uh, his, his European church basically started laughing

at him and mocking him and making fun of, of, of what it was.

And, and dude went to discord to find, or excuse me, went to Google to start to find resources

and community for encouragement.

And that's when he stumbled upon us and we brought him in and working with them and, and, and,

and building relationships and helping them on the journey.

That's, that's one story.

Uh, but to be honest, that's the, that's the paradigm.

Like that's the, I can tell that story to you 25 times.

And so this, this idea of, Hey, there's this guy that's, that's on the, that's, that should

be doing the mega church thing, but he's disconcerted enough to not be in the building

and, and he's disenfranchised walking around.

He's dealing with the fringe stuff and dealing with the fringes where God like slaps him on

the head.

Um, dang, like that, that preach to me, I haven't even gotten to question one yet, but man, I'm

ready to wrap this thing up and call it done.

Uh, that was beautiful.

Um, all right.

So, Hey, look, let's, let's, let's, let me put some.

Boundaries on the, on this conversation.

Um, you know, Steve, I sat around with you and, and scuba, Steve, uh, Steve, uh, Carswell

here in Florida and some other guys in West Palm beach.

And we're, and we're talking like at, uh, master level masterclass movement, like college

master's degree, doctorate, like advanced level stuff.

And, um, we're the, the, the, the people probably listen to this podcast are probably a little

more, uh, one-on-one two-on-one intro level.

We're new in this thing.

And so, you know, for some of my questions, if you're listening, it's like, oh my gosh,

Jeff got Steve Addison.

What's that like?

What's going to be the answer to life that Steve's adding and share?

I don't know that that's going to come.

Maybe, maybe it does.

Uh, maybe this is going to be a little rudimentary.

Uh, because my first question is, well, Steve, like help us define here.

What exactly is a movement?

And, you know, maybe your world will get rocked by this answer, but, um, hold on and let's

find out.

So Steve, question number one, uh, what exactly is a movement?

How do you define a movement?

Well, in its simplest form, a movement is a group of people committed to a common cause.

Uh, so the fact that it's a movement doesn't say whether or not that cause is right or wrong,

whether they're good or bad or mix, but whenever, and when we say commitment, I don't mean they've

signed up some membership, but they're pursuing that cause together.

Um, and so the, that's the engine room of history.

Uh, you know, we can all think of the movements that have influenced us, uh,

throughout our lives and development or shape the world we're in.

We can know how sadly, you know, there's a couple of movements going, you know, hammer and

tong head, head to head in the Middle East at the moment and other parts of the world, you

know, in, in, uh, around China and Taiwan, their movements, um, uh, that, uh, pursuing rightly

or wronging what they're committed to together.

Uh, when, when, when we think of, um, well, what did Jesus come to do?

Uh, cause it's a neutral concept, a movement.

Um, you could be nuns or you could be fascist, you know, um, but you're both a movement.

There's, there's, there's a cause that Jesus came for.

And, um, you know, my, my understanding is it's, it's multiplying disciples and churches

to the glory of God from where we are to the ends of the earth, every people, every place,

uh, that just in a short, um, sort of, we may not get into the detail of that, but we do need

to, and that's why I wrote a whole book, what Jesus started, you know, so what did he come

to do?

And then what does the risen Lord continue to do, um, throughout the book of Acts?

And we've seen the epistles.

So you've got to define what's our cause, what's the outcome.

And then you're a movement if you're committed to that, if you've set up organizations to serve

and facilitate that, but they're now living for themselves to perpetuate themselves rather

than the cause.

Well, that's an institution, a movement that's become institutionalized.

And the way you renew, if it's possible, that institution is you get back to the cause.

You, you get back to, um, the founding, you know, dream and vision.

That's, so you've got to go back before you can go forward.

Wow.

Um, so good.

Now, what you're describing in context of, of movement, um, like, I'm going to be honest,

like even, even the first story, you're, you're talking about how Peter should be in, in the,

the mega church.

And instead he's, he's out on the, on the fringe.

Like, I know a lot of pastors that want their mega churches.

And so honestly, what you're describing with movement, and oftentimes it does feel counter

cultural to, to what the, at least in, I don't, I don't really know the Australian church,

at least what I see in, in, in the United States.

And so like specifically or generically, how are you going to answer this?

How are movements different than the established church?

Well, even the established church are the fruit of movements.

Um, this is why I think we've got to get back before we can move forward.

Get back to your history there.

I've, I know, I've read the history of the explosion of the Baptists and the Methodists,

uh, sort of a funny idea, exploding Baptists and Methodists, but there they are on the U.S.

frontier and their movements, um, you know, uh, the, the, the more established, the Episcopalians

and for a long time, the Presbyterians, Congregationalists, they, they, they've all got their multiple degrees,

guaranteed salaries and congregations, and they're on, on, you know, on the, the East Coast.

But the reason why those movements of Methodists and Baptists just took off for, you know, decades until they settled down, um, was they got back to some of the, the basic practices that Jesus modeled and, and demonstrate that this is a grassroots movement.

This is a, people committed to a cause, making progress, um, you know, and it, it went exponential for, for a couple of generations, um, and, uh, before they, they settled down.

But, so it's good to remember that, that typically, you know, even the Pentecostal churches, it, it began in a barn in Azusa Street.

It had been a Methodist meeting place, but it'd been used as a, a horse stables.

And there you've got the, the son of freed slaves, one-eyed black preacher, William Seymour, with a vision for a movement of God.

Um, so great institutions, not just mega churches, but universities and, and, and, and the like, hospitals, all good stuff comes out of that.

At the same time, it's a, we call it the institutional dilemma.

You know, you've got to build some structure around what God's doing in order to facilitate it.

Um, but eventually it, they suffer from the failure of success.

And now we need to protect the institution because way back then we risked everything for a better future.

And the vision that we had, now we've achieved it.

So we better not mess this up.

We better maintain our position in the culture.

Uh, we better make sure our universities and hospitals are well run and our, our seminaries and the like.

And meanwhile, God's doing something new on the fringe.

Um, and, uh, wherever, wherever we see multiplying movements today, they're not necessarily well-educated.

They're not necessarily well-educated, wealthy people.

Um, they're men and women of passionate faith and a biblical faith.

Um, and, uh, they're, they're, you know, blazing a trail, whether it's in, in Africa or India, um, China, these places.

Uh, God is on the move.

To your, to your point, um, where, for whatever reason, we used to see movement, because I love the way that you're framing it.

We used to see movement in the developed world, in the Western world, in ways that we don't see movement in the Western world today.

But rather, we're seeing it in other places, like Africa, like Asia.

Um, that's where the movement is happening internationally.

Two questions on that.

Why do you think that is?

Um, and secondly, what could the Western church that has been institutionalized from a previous movement, how, what's the easiest path to recapture that momentum?

Um, so that, because today, um, as good as the institutions are, from the movement that happened in years gone by, today, we're not keeping up with our own population group.

So we're losing ground overall, while internationally.

We're losing our children and grandchildren.

That's what we're doing.

We're not even retaining, um, you know, unless you're, I think you should be doing pretty well, um, doing that.

But, um, here's the wonderful thing.

It is incredibly simple.

Um, it's as simple as saying, you know, what should I do?

Well, go for a walk.

Go for a walk.

Meet some people.

Pray as you go.

Lord, lead me to prepared hearts.

Go for a walk around your neighborhood, down the street, next door neighbors.

And it's as complicated as this.

Just ask someone, you know, or someone you've met for the first time.

Hey, I'm just out walking and praying.

Is there anything I can pray for you?

And just see what happens.

You know, what did Jesus do?

You know, he, he does engage the institution.

There's, there's a tension there, but he's not trying to reinvent it structurally and institutionally.

And let's get inside this thing.

So what does Jesus do?

He calls historic Israel to join.

They don't, and they can still identify as where, this is our background, but to join what he's doing.

And how does he do that?

Well, he finds a couple of, you know, young guys and, and, and, and also women at times travel in the group.

And he just said, I'll tell you what, here's the deal.

All right, come follow me.

So everything that that entails.

Okay.

Well, let's keep it simple.

And what I'll do for you is I'll teach you how to fish for people.

And that's what a movement does, follows Jesus and it fishes for people.

We've forgotten, we've neglected that.

And, you know, it really is.

I mean, just looking outside my window right now, around the corner, there's a great church.

And I know the pastor.

He got all stirred up and he just said, Steve, why don't we go out visiting the thousand homes around our church,

offering to pray, sharing the gospel, inviting people to read the Bible.

So now that's, and people say, oh, that's door knocking.

That won't work.

Well, you always know when, when something's about to come in vogue, when everybody else says it doesn't work.

It's because they haven't done it.

Jason, we're, we're weeks away, man.

It's, it's going to happen.

But it's not just for that.

And it is a minority of people who are ready to do that.

There's more people than you realize.

But you also train everybody in the life of the church who wants to learn.

So next time you're talking to one of your kids who's far from God and, and you know, you can't preach.

They've heard the gospel enough from you.

And you ask them at a key moment in their life, you know, a new birth or a struggle or a tension.

And you just say to someone you've known your whole life, can I pray for that right now?

You watch what happens, you know, put aside all and, but you've also got to train people, not just to, we call that the early offer of prayer, because it's always earlier than you think you should do it.

But also, well, what happens if I encounter someone who's responsive?

Well, I'll do what Jesus did.

What did he do?

He tells them a story.

He teaches them some content.

And he calls for someone to learn to follow him and fish for others.

So that's happening throughout the whole sort of ethos of any movement, you know, and so there are movements on American soil.

It's just, you're going to have to go to prison to find them.

Texas prison system.

There are hundreds of groups forming that function as churches.

They can't officially be called a church.

It's being led and spread by insiders.

It started in maximum security.

And all they do, you know, is they offer prayer.

They share the gospel.

They read the Bible.

They learn together how to follow Jesus in a prison.

And God is doing marvelous things in that environment.

So I wouldn't start, I wouldn't say, what are we going to do with the Western church or the American church?

What is that?

Where's the headquarters?

Who represents it?

Who, you know, it's not a person.

It can't do anything.

So it starts with Jesus tapping you on the shoulder and say, come follow me.

I'll teach you how to fish.

That's what movements.

And Jesus is building that and he's still living in a creative tension with the institution.

But he's saying, come and join me.

You know, the whole parable of the Good Samaritan, the pinnacle of that is not the son coming home,

but the father outside with the Pharisaic older son saying, come and join.

Come and join the party.

And so that's what he's doing the whole time, even with the Pharisees.

Come and join.

And you look at the early chapters of Acts, they're saying the same thing.

You know, when they get put on trial, they're preaching the gospel and say, come and join what we're doing.

Well, they didn't.

And so judgment came in AD 70 and Jerusalem was destroyed.

So while, so the critiques are fine, but it's not a movement.

A movement is when you start following and fishing.

For us, you know, part of what we're doing is this idea of creating movements or helping people, mostly bivocational people, but people create movements digitally.

You know, talking about fringe, but it's, you know, reimagining what a movement can look like in a prison system and doing that.

You know, for us, it's reimagining what church is in a digital ecclesiology.

What is, you know, you're talking about, hey, go take a walk with your neighborhood.

You know, we've got, I can tell you stories of guys that are witnessing and sharing Jesus while playing video games or on Discord together or in a Facebook group on the community.

There's a guy that runs a church.

His name's Andre.

What's Andre's name?

Andre Anderson.

Barbecue Church.

Dude, like, shares Jesus.

Barbecue Assemblies of God.

I don't think it's a real Assemblies of God church, but he calls it Barbecue Assemblies of God.

And it's, everything's barbecue and everything's Jesus.

And he just is constantly, he's got thousands of people, like, tracking because he's a barbecue nut.

And, and, and, and, but he's, he's a hardcore Jesus follower and, and is, and is, is creating disciples, utilizing this niche target.

But, and the challenging thing for us is, is really, and this is something that, that I, I wear as, as a badge of honor, is, hey, we can't go so explosive with innovation and ideation.

We can't reimagine the church so far that we forget what we're supposed to be, that, that we, we, we lose, you know, what the early church was.

And, and it's, and it's constantly challenging us to, to go back to the book of Acts, you know, to, to talk, you know, you know, 3, 3M, no place left to talk to church circle.

Hey, Acts 2, 36 to 47, what do you see that, what do you see the church function?

What are the 11 functions that the church doing in this context?

How are we doing that digitally?

What is worship?

What is prayer?

What is teaching?

What is, you know, and just, just rolling through all of that.

Yeah.

Communion is going to look different.

Baptism may be challenging, but that doesn't mean that you don't do it.

It means that, that you, that you innovate in that space, you know, and, and I've just.

The, the anchor point, you're right.

The anchor point has to be, you know, for us, Acts 2, 36 to 47, this, and the church is the fruit of the outpouring of the spirit and the proclamation of the word.

So word and spirit is driving this mission and the fruit we see at the end of that first day of the life of the church, that, that this is what church is in any age.

And so if we're going to sort of contextualize and experiment, we, first of all, we've got to build it off Acts 2, 36 to 47 and everything else in the New Testament, the gospels that supports that.

And that gives us the freedom to say, well, is, is that church, you know?

So, so, I mean, this is years ago, we, we trained Joy Meng, and she had family on the far northeast of China, not near the border with Korea, I think, North Korea or something.

They, they didn't have internet, but they had telephone.

So we're training her how to share the gospel, how to read the Bible for discipleship and all of that, giving her those skills.

And without telling me, she's on, on the phone to her family in this isolated, frozen village in, in northern China.

And she turned up to the training and said, Steve, did I do the right thing?

I said, oh, what have you done, Joy?

And she said, I baptized my brother.

And I said, yeah, how'd you do that?

Because I knew he was way up and she's in Melbourne, you know?

And she said, well, I got my mum to get, because she's already, and the mum's already a believer, a big bucket of water.

And then I said over the phone, I baptize you in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

And mum poured the water over him.

Mum dunked him.

That's awesome.

Now, some people are going to be horrified.

Was that immersion?

You know, all of this sort of stuff is, and I'm thinking, a lost person got saved and baptized and is now meeting it for discipleship, you know, learning how to read the scriptures together.

Joy's trained them.

And they're the first family in that village who are believers.

So I'm saying, well, Joy, you don't need to do the next baptism.

As long as they're a baptized disciple, they can do the next one and the next one.

So you keep fueling that work of God.

So we're trying to work out what it is, but it's still what we see in the book of Acts.

You know, Joy doesn't have to get on a plane and fly home in order to do the baptism.

But the next one, it would be good if it was person to person, preferably, but it doesn't have to be if it's impossible.

Let's, I mean, I don't want to get lost on this, but I'm going to speak for my friend, DJ Soto, VR pastor, virtual reality.

Actually, he was the first pastor in virtual reality.

He did a virtual reality baptism.

This was maybe a decade ago.

Wired Magazine did a story on it.

He was on Fox News.

He was on Comedy Central.

He was read publicly by a lot of the talk shows.

And so, like, he knows the good and the bad centered around that.

We've all experienced that at some level with some of the different ecclesiology pieces.

But let's do this.

Let's dig in.

Because, I mean, we've been talking about Acts.

You wrote a book about Acts.

You know, let's actually talk about this.

I love the book.

It's, I feel like it's half biblical commentary.

I feel like it's half explanation of movement.

And then it's actually half of modern movements.

And you're paralleling what we see in scripture to, you know, some things that are happening globally.

Not even just, you know, you're in Australia.

So, but there's, you know, India and a lot of other nations and representation in there.

So, you know, maybe talk to us a little bit.

What's your take on this book and the power behind it?

Well, I think, as you might have mentioned, the big shift for me was to realize it's a movement of God.

Nothing.

There would be no Christian faith.

There would be no movement unless Jesus had risen from the dead.

Taut is just grounded them in the purpose of God throughout scripture and then sent the spirit and set them loose.

And, and all of a sudden a great weight should lift off our, our shoulders.

This is a movement of God.

So let's study this book and see what are the recurring patterns.

You know, we probably don't select leaders by casting lots anymore.

Well, that was a one-off because they're replacing one of the, the original 12 apostles and they want to make sure this is a God thing.

We've got two candidates.

They're both equally qualified.

So that's not a repeated pattern.

So we don't have to do, although John Wesley gave it a go.

He would select just for a while.

See, how does that go for our group leaders?

We'll just select them by luck, you know.

But it's not a biblical mandate, but is it, you know, the other things, you know, this is the life of discipleship.

This is what it produces.

And then you think, well, it's just getting humming in Jerusalem, but already this is a flowing back to the Jewish diaspora already.

You know, we don't even know who started the church in Rome, would have been ordinary believers from Pentecost, most likely, who've traveled back home after coming to Jerusalem for pilgrimage.

So already this thing's overflowing.

So we should be looking in that and, first of all, despairing because it's not happening.

You know, we're waiting for the Holy Spirit to tell us we should be involved.

It's in the Great Commission, someone told me.

You know, it's just a Logos word at the moment.

We want it to become a Rhema word before.

Say, well, do you love your wife?

Are you waiting for a Logos, a Rhema word for that?

A word from the Spirit to love your wife or not beat your children or not?

It's there in Scripture.

It's all Scripture.

So that drives us to despair because, like the first disciples, we're way off the mind.

Off the mark.

And despair drives us to dependence on God.

Remake me.

I mean, one of the worst moments in a man's life is when God speaks through his wife.

And that happened for me with Michelle.

I'd written my first book and it was very successful.

It still is very successful.

She said, this is a great book.

I'm expecting praise.

The next thing out of her mouth was, but when are you going to do something?

And the worst thing about that is, that was a word from God.

You know, how unfair to go through my wife.

She led me back into the harvest field.

And all of a sudden, you know, God's bringing people across our path.

People are coming to mostly internationals, Iranians, Chinese, Koreans, or whatever.

And into discipleship and into church formation.

I had to feel the gap between my experience and the book of Acts and feel uncomfortable.

But then I had to take a step of obedience with some simple training with somebody else.

And now we know what True North is.

True North is the end of that first day of Pentecost.

Disciples and churches, because it's overflowing from Jerusalem, to the glory of God.

And so what happens is some of us camp on the first part of Pentecost.

The Spirit comes in power.

So we've got the upper room.

Some have upper room ministries.

It never ends.

We're always in the upper room, 24-7.

Well, how long between the Spirit falling on them in the upper room and the Word hitting the streets?

Was it five minutes or was it 50 minutes?

So you've got the live video feed of the upper room.

The only trouble is the Holy Spirit's left the room and is out there.

It's inspiring all of God's people.

Peter got up.

But the Spirit comes to set everybody free, to proclaim the goodness of God.

So every believer is a witness.

They may not be an evangelist, but everybody can proclaim the goodness of God through Christ.

So some are camping there and not realizing the Spirit comes to bring glory to the Lord Jesus throughout the whole world.

You don't need a rhema for that.

That's the living Word of God speaking.

Some people camp with the Word.

So, Peter, let's have a convention.

Just preach all week, man.

And it's all about the Word to the believer in the service or the seminary.

Well, there's not a single recorded message in the book of Acts in a church service.

There's one message to the elders, and all the other messages are in evangelistic situations.

So this is a dangerous word.

It's not a word you contain.

It's a word that is on the road from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.

And the whole time, you want to know what's causing the multiplication?

It's the Word that multiplies and grows and spreads.

Well, how do we know that's happening?

Because the fruit of the Word and the Spirit are disciples and churches to the glory of God in ever-growing circles from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.

So this is a God thing, but it's going to unsettle us.

It's – and you think the Word is always triumphing in Acts.

It never takes a backward step.

It's never overcome.

It's total victory.

And you think, well, that's just triumphalism.

Yes, it is, because it's God.

But the flip side is the messengers are harried, harassed, lacking finances, beaten up.

They're in prison.

I mean, you think of Paul.

You know, here is Paul.

You've been in prison a couple of years.

You're going for more prison.

You'll be on trial.

And in the middle, you get this nice Mediterranean's cruise.

And the greatest apostle since ever, apart from Jesus, is in a hurricane and he's about to drop into the Mediterranean.

He probably can't swim and there's no lifeboat.

Now, he's got assurances from God he'll get, but how is this a good use of his time?

You know, how is this?

So, here you are, this, he's, and you think, why, Lord?

You know, Stephen, one of the greatest leaders in the early church, he gets murdered.

And, you know, well, why?

Well, because we follow Jesus.

The triumph of God, the power of God, and yet earthen vessels.

And he's glorified through Paul's surrender in the Mediterranean Sea.

And then there's a snake waiting for him on the beach, you know.

But he gets to run.

He gets to run.

The good news is we're asking people to create digital movements, not to get on boats or.

Oh, don't worry.

Trouble will find them.

No.

Yeah.

I promise.

Exactly.

Trouble will find them.

If they're doing this stuff.

Yeah, there's snakes everywhere.

Waiting.

And how does Stephen triumph in death?

Because Jesus is with him.

Not because he's courageous or tough.

You know, how does Paul triumph?

Because in his weakness, he finds the Lord Jesus.

And for sure, if you're pursuing this on the digital world, yeah, trouble will find you if you're making disciples and forming them into churches to the glory of God.

And in the midst of the trouble, you will find him.

Well, I know it's true because I've lived it.

You know, it's this weird intersection where I feel like it's almost a cycle where there is that desperation that you describe of the – it's like the delta between what I'm living and what I see in the book of Acts.

So that's what gets that motion started.

But as obedience occurs and God is with you and things happen, there's another kind of desperation that occurs.

And it's from all the dangerous scenarios that Jesus is calling you into.

And all of the fear of rejection or the fear of reprisal that comes with that.

And sometimes it happens.

I've got a crooked nose to prove it.

And, you know, that's just one of those things that happens.

But it keeps you in the mode of desperation and dependence on the one who is with you and the only one that matters.

So, I mean, let me ask this because, you know, we as within the church digital, you know, I talk a lot about movement – about multiplication.

You know, I don't know that – and the movement of the digital church is very new.

We've never seen a digital church multiply at this point.

At least if it's happening, it's happening not to my awareness.

J-Mo, I think you would agree with that.

It's not happening yet.

But we're teaching it.

We're reinforcing it.

We're casting vision, apprenticing, contextualization.

We're praying in faith so that it will happen.

Exactly.

It is going to happen.

Yes.

And so, like, we're always multiplication, multiplication, multiplication.

And now we're, you know, in the same breath.

Now I'm hearing, oh, yeah, like, you know, Satan's roaring lion and tragedy is coming and hardship and that.

How do you balance, like, hey, like, you know, you're opening yourself up and at the same time now you're trying to apprentice and bring someone in to that same vulnerable position.

Hey, yeah, I do need to be dependent on God.

And sometimes being dependent on God means I'm sacrificing my safety or I'm sacrificing some things around me.

And in 2024, that's a harder pill to swallow than in the past, or at least it's harder to get people to see that.

What's that dependence on releasing control and even, like, multiplying through some of this?

Is that making sense?

Well, yeah.

One is to remember this is a movement of God.

He's already at work.

And I'm just thinking of Robert.

He's in Kenya.

He's online and he's looking with a lot of other Kenyans for help with the ministry and all of that.

But he's, God's had him on this journey.

He was, like, in a Pentecostal movement.

He was a bishop with a lot of responsibility and God called him out just to go do pioneer mission work in southern Sudan with a lot of refugees.

So that's already, he's been tested and he's proved faithful.

And when he goes, by the way, he has seven kids and a wife.

Now, he's online, he's on Facebook, and there's some guy, Austin or Ewan or something in England.

He's on Facebook and he's saying, oh, okay, here's three or four Kenyans who were looking for training and coaching and input.

I know Joey in Nairobi.

And so he flips into Joey.

And Joey's a mate of mine.

I've just done an interview with him.

And he filters.

Who's God working in?

These guys.

And they're not dishonest guys, but some of them are looking for a salary.

They're looking for finance.

And so he filters.

I don't have money to give you.

This is the deal.

We'll be brothers.

We'll go the journey.

But, you know, I'll train you and you'll do it.

And Robert's the only one who turns up.

And Joey and his mate Justin trained Robert.

And, again, Robert's selling secondhand clothes to provide for his family.

And he was a denominational supervisor with an income and all of that.

But God shaped this man.

And so when Joey and Justin come along, it's not just, guys,

what can you do to Robert to make him motivated and godly?

And, you know, they can train him.

They can give him skills.

But, no, they've actually already filtered out.

We're looking for somebody who God has his hand on and who we can trust.

Well, it's early days.

But there's 60 churches planted.

You know, just simple reproducing churches.

But what Robert's done in this more isolated place of the country, he can help and is already now training and helping others multiply.

Well, a lot of their relationship, Justin and Joey with Robert, is online.

But this is, I think, a principle.

If you find a Robert, because I've got others, you know, I've got New Zealanders that have found a Filipino.

And they're filtered.

And he's the real deal.

And he's doing this stuff.

Well, they just hopped on an airplane.

You know, after working with him for a year or so, seeing his faithfulness and fruit, and they've gone on the ground.

They've got people in South Africa, people in Thailand.

So Joey and Justin have gone the five-hour journey.

It's not that far.

It's just Kenyan roads.

They've gone the five-hour journey.

They've hung out with Robert for a week, training, going out into the harvest, training the workers.

So the principle is technology should be, it shouldn't be a substitute.

It should be a supplement.

So if you're looking to see movements and you start finding the Roberts out there because you're looking for a certain type of person.

I mean, you can train anyone online, but these are people you're investing in.

You do what Jesus is and choose them carefully.

Well, you may have to get on a plane or get in the car and drive across the country or whatever so that there is, it's not just all digital, but the two are serving one another.

And so, you know, someone's got digital church.

Okay, can you get a face-to-face church started in your neighborhood or with your family?

So it's not always just a substitute.

Yeah, and that's interesting.

That's actually what we encourage, and we are seeing that, where a digital does spur up a micro model, a digital micro, where now, you know, churches are happening in homes and in orphanages and after-school daycare centers and prisons and, you know, other missional areas.

And people are following their calling and they're utilizing digital to complement that.

One of the things that we're actually doing, and this is kind of, this happened, I was telling our leadership this morning, this happened organically.

And I didn't realize, oh my gosh, this is what God's doing until it was like done, where we started engaging with, we've got what we call our movement leaders.

And these are the people that are, you know, actively, aggressively trying to do movements.

We had about three in our system.

And I was like, hey, for this new season, I want to onboard some others.

And I just started randomly writing down names and started asking other people, hey, what are some names and trying to figure out who we're going to recruit in this next season.

And it's, you know, the guy in Germany that's doing a digital planting network.

And, oh my gosh, now I've got a guy in Finland that's looking for somebody.

Hey, Germany guy, could you connect with the Finland guy?

And I've got the guy in Nigeria, and now there's another guy in Nigeria that wants some coaching on digital evangelism.

Hey, Nigerian guy, could you talk to, why don't you guys like figure it out on your own?

And, you know, a lot of what we're seeing, you know, is a lot of the contextualization of where it's not this face and this person trying to travel the world.

But it's more of, hey, let me connect you with somebody in your area, even if it's another country, at least maybe it's on the same continent, to understand some of the contextualizations.

I tell this story.

There was a woman, she may be listening to this podcast.

And so I told this story multiple times, and she knows I'm telling it.

But she was, she wanted to start a South African virtual reality church planting network.

Like they wanted to plant a serious number of churches in virtual reality in South Africa.

And so she approached me, I'd read a book on this, I'd spoken publicly on it, like whatever.

And she approached me though, and she said, hey, Jeff, my, whatever the religious leader was, it was a word I didn't recognize.

But the religious leader and I would like you to be the face and the leader of this virtual reality church planting network in South Africa.

And I had a good chuckle.

And honestly, I remember looking at her, I'm like, that is the stupidest idea I've ever heard in my life.

I don't, I am not the face for virtual reality.

Like even in avatar form, I'm, I don't know anything contextually about South Africa.

I've never even been on your continent.

Now, why don't we equip you to be the, the, the, the face and the voice?

Why don't we empower you with some of the knowledge and so that you can supply your passion to, to really spearhead this.

And so the, the, the nuancing and contextualization is very, um, for, for digital, it's very important for us.

Um, even to the context of, like, I can tell you a virtual reality churches that meet in physical space once a year.

Like they met in, in San Francisco in 23 and in 24, they're planning on meeting in London.

Um, and, and so like as, as a team, um, we're even trying to figure out how to, to meet physically together.

When, when Jason and I am in this, like, we're in two different time zones at this point.

Um, and so like when we actually get together, even though we're digital guys, like it's awesome to be able to sit down and talk face to face and to share and to dialogue.

Honestly, I feel like we're more productive physically than we are digitally.

That kind of goes counter-cultural with what you hear, but like, we just, we just nail through stuff, um, in, in, in, in physical.

Um, but I don't know that it cheapens what we can do digitally either, because there are people that we're engaging with and people that are having conversation.

I can tell you the story of, of a guy, um, that, uh, hadn't been in church in 10 years, uh, but accepted Christ in, uh, on a platform called Twitch, um, because he was going to what he, what was actually a video game church.

And, uh, the reality was, is this guy that hadn't been in a physical church building in 10 years because of, of abuse issues.

He didn't even know that video game church was weird.

He thought it was normal.

And so, you know, from a missional implication and arguably even from a discipleship, man, we're just really excited to be on, on the cusp and the curve of this.

And not everybody understands it.

Um, you know, I, I, I jokingly tell people that one day I'll stand before God and I'll be like, okay, God, where did I get it wrong?

Cause I know we're, we're, I'm flying so counter-cultural to what the established norm is.

I'm sure there's something that, you know, the angel.

That's going to happen to all of us though.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I, I, I fully expect that, but, but it's like, there's so much radicalness in this, but I'm, I'm trying in the, in this.

I don't know if it's so radical, dude.

I mean, granted, all you got to do is go to the new Testament and replace letter with, um, online chat.

That's all you got to do.

And what, what is interesting though, and I think, uh, Steve is touching on this is the tension that, um, a movement leader feels with remote ministry.

And that tension is, um, we, you can find it in first John verse, um, 12, where John saying, you know, I'm writing you pen and ink.

I long to be with you face to face so that our joy can be full, but that didn't stop him from writing the letter.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I don't think John had a concept of the reach and the longevity that that letter would take.

When he thought he was just talking with his friends and you find that same basic paradigm of people, the apostle Paul doing remote.

remote church planting, remote leadership development with Titus, with Timothy.

And then he's sending people from one country to another to help and resource and do all of these things, making these connections using letters while he is stuck in prison.

Yeah.

And so he figured out a way to have that, um, that impulse of, well, am I just going to be here depressed because I'm stuck in prison or am I going to do what I can with what I have?

And the reality is we have more resources at our disposal.

We can do so much more with the abundance of what we have.

We just need to start using it to make the same connections and remotely spark movements all around the world.

I don't know why we're not, I honestly don't because it's not, it is, it is happening.

Um, you know, Kenyan goes to England, it is happening.

Back to Joey.

It is.

You're right.

It is.

And, and their training, if a lot of it is on, you know, on online like this, uh, but they're also going to get down and, and hang out with him.

Yes, yes, yes, but an awful lot is, uh, is happening.

Uh, sometimes we can't say, uh, I'm even just through, uh, WhatsApp or signal, um, or I got a great story.

I mentioned in the book on acts, a case study in Rajasthan, um, you know, there were many factors that led to the breakthrough.

I think there's like quarter of a million people have come to the Lord over 15 years.

So it's a solid movement, but one of the key breakthroughs is an SD card with the auto Bible, the on, on, cause they can't read, but they've got a phone and it's a real basic thing, real basic phone.

And now we're going to listen to the Bible.

We're going to answer the questions and we're going to learn how to take this to our neighbors.

So they don't, they can't afford internet, but they can afford a real basic phone with a little, and so it's an SD card, but now they have the Bible in their language, you know, text for those who can read or audio for those who can't.

And then a pattern of, you know, this is how disciples live.

So, and, you know, let's look at acts two 36 to 47.

Now, can you begin doing that in your community with your household?

And so hundreds of thousands of people have turned to the Lord, not just praying a prayer, okay, not just putting a hand up.

These are disciples overwhelmingly in an unreached place, hundreds of thousands.

And a key to it, it's not the, it's not the cause, but it's a key, just like those letters were a key.

It's just a bit of plastic.

Let me ask this.

Probably the biggest, or let me say this, I don't know what's the biggest.

The most consistent problem that we see across all digital churches is the idea of funding.

Like even within just transparent, I had this conversation with leadership at the Church Digital today.

Hey, y'all, we are a bivocational ministry.

You know, Jason Morris here on the webinar is, or excuse me, on the podcast, weird, is on leadership.

And he's contracting, and we pay him a stipend.

We pay him not what he's worth and not what he contributes.

We pay far less than that.

And there are, you know, contracts that we have, and we typically, confession hour, like we typically pay our leadership for the Church Digital.

I've said this publicly.

I have not taken a penny from the Church Digital, especially since we've pivoted towards this new, the movement model.

You know, some of the work that I've done previously and some of the contracts, you know, I ran through that.

But that was more of like a business transaction, not donor money.

And so, Steve, really what we're wrestling with is this idea of bivocational.

Now, you mentioned earlier, hey, like we're training some people.

They needed to get vetted.

There were three people that were interesting.

Two of them wanted money.

One of them, you know, stuck around to actually do it without.

I'm actually curious, like, how do you fund a movement?

You know, we're talking bivocational.

You know, there's operational and minimal level of payment for leaders.

But if I got to pay every movement leader, if I got to pay every group leader, like, money kills movement.

And it's just I said that to my leadership meeting today and I said that I've said that in other contexts.

Like, and so I don't want to I don't want to kill this thing.

I've seen it kill movements in Cuba and other South American countries.

But I don't want to fund this thing so little that it doesn't get anywhere and we can't even, you know, pay the pay the rent.

Or I've got some guy that that, you know, can contribute 40 hours a week and is doing incredible work.

But now he's doing five hours a week and his movement dies because we weren't able to get him the funding that he needed.

And he's freaking out because he can't pay his mortgage.

Like, how do you balance managing a business, starting a movement?

Like, I just this is this is the thing that I lose sleep on at night is is really the financial aspects of of what we're trying to do.

Any like, is there a biblical grounding, coaching, advice, thought like I would love insight from you on.

Yeah, there's some certainly biblical principles.

First principle is no one should be paid to do what an ordinary believer should be doing.

So typically in movements, someone starting a new church, you're not going to pay that.

That's what it should be so structured that, you know, it's a commitment, but it can be done.

Then the next principle is if you're going to fund, you fund a multiplication.

So in the sense of someone's just maintaining a local church, well, we're not taking responsibility to fund that.

The local church should if there needs to be funding or it should be a role that can be done by vocationally.

But if someone's, you know, a Robert's emerging and he's already showing faithfulness, effectiveness as a disciple maker, church planter and helping others do the same.

Well, funding becomes a bit of an issue and it probably already is.

He's still selling secondhand clothes to support his family.

So what do we see?

Well, we see in the scriptures, Paul, he will work at times, you know, but in those years of imprisonment, he couldn't work.

They're not going to give him a sharp tool.

He's chained to a soldier.

You know, here's this tool so you can do your trade and people come and go.

It was expensive.

Paul paid for his accommodation for two years in Rome and it was the most expensive accommodation.

I mean, Rome was in the whole world.

So he had access to funds that he didn't earn by tent making somehow.

It says he paid it out of his own pocket.

We don't know where from.

We know that funding can come, you know, say from the Philippian church.

So churches, Paul's, where there are strings attached, he's not taking money or where he's doing pioneer evangelism, he's not taking money.

But he's got a partnership with the Philippians and they're supporting him.

So there are a whole range.

People say it has to be bivocational.

Well, Jesus wasn't bivocational.

A lot of the time, Paul wasn't bivocational because he wasn't allowed to work or was only there for a matter of weeks and couldn't set up the business.

So there's a whole range of options.

But it means let's focus on the multiplier, on a Robert who's stepping up, a man of character and a man of effectiveness in mobilizing and multiplying disciples and churches.

Let's have a conversation about that.

Now, it's still early days.

But interestingly, Joey and Justin connected him with some of their contacts in Nepal and over the Internet, you know, digitally.

He's so there's Nepal because there's a movement of God in Nepal, you know, over a million new believers.

It's wonderful.

And he's speaking into that because he's living in a more rural village sort of situation.

And they invite him to come.

Well, he's poor.

And somehow, I'm sure Joey probably helped or Justin, but somehow, you know, it was local believers and local churches that gave.

And he got himself to Nepal and God used him marvelously.

So it's an ongoing now, but, you know, is this a long-term solution for him?

I shouldn't sort of personalize just about Robert, but it is a dilemma.

And it just means you've got to be very careful and because mixed motivation, well, let's just link him to some American churches.

Well, now you've got to come and do a tour of America to raise that money.

And some guys like Robert can handle that and not get corrupted, but not everyone can because, you know, you're elevating them out of their culture and their economic level of and it's ruining them to go back and be in there.

Not, but some multipliers like Robert have been able to do, you know, Western funding and it's served them well.

So there's no tight, find some major donors.

That's the other thing, who understand how strategic the work is.

I'm curious, how much are you or a movement leader fundraising for the people within the movement or connecting and networking them to money outside of?

Like, how much are you?

Yeah, I don't do a lot of that.

There are other, like the guys I work with in North India and Nepal, they're weighing that all the time.

And they have contacts and, and they, I would bow to their wisdom.

There's no, there's some principles, you know, but I don't really handle that direct supervision of those sorts of guys.

And I, I race, I, I'm funded by, by a team of supporters.

The, the, uh, anything I do towards the books or getting translations out to the developing world that comes out of the proceeds of sales.

So that's my fighting fund.

So, so I've had to sort of juggle and I'd never call it fundraising.

These are people who've, some of them have committed to me now for 20, more than 20 years.

Um, so it's a wonderful experience, you know, that, uh, there are people who believe in me and, and, and believe in the work I do.

Uh, it's harder in a field like Roberts, but then again, he's working amongst people who are at that level.

But what happens when God starts using him in other parts of Africa, which he will do, that's when you've got to step in and, and, and just weigh it carefully.

Um, but at least you're doing it with a man of character, proven character and effectiveness.

I appreciate that.

Um, if you don't call it fundraising, what do you call it?

What's your term?

Partnership development.

Partnership development.

Okay.

So they're partners.

Just that koinonia, the, the Philippian word.

This is, this is, this is, uh, my ministry and I'm, I'm inviting you to partner with me.

This is God, I'm helping them make a stewardship decision, which means the answer might be no, and that's fine.

But this might be what God, there are people out there who, who are motivated to give to this sphere of work that you're doing.

You might say, well, a lot of people don't understand it.

Well, some do.

So part of that is, is to find those people, um, and, uh, to, to draw them in as partners.

Yeah.

That's good.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

We're, uh, that's, um, a pain point for the church digital.

Honestly, that's a, that's a pain point.

I've had that conversation.

I would every now and again, and this has happened on, on my, when, especially costs, you know, we had to do a major rebuild of everything a few years.

And I, people gave thousands of dollars because they, they, they believe in the podcast, the website, the books.

So none of that came to me personally, but it, it's the fighting fund.

So I, we're doing another rebuild at the moment.

And, and, and so find, let people know that not just a major potential, major donors, but even just people listening to us today, every, you know, at least every year you ought to have a campaign and say.

Um, and I always feel like the, the first protocol is these expenses, you know, I, I'm happy to volunteer.

I just don't want this.

I don't want to lose money if I can, um, would you help me?

And this will be the outcome, you know, we'll rebuild the thing or we'll take it to the next level.

And there are a lot of people out there that we've never met personally that have been, um, supported.

Okay.

Wise words, man.

I have loved the time here.

Uh, went a little longer than, than I was thinking, but this has just been a great podcast and a great conversation.

Jason's shaking his head giddy.

Uh, and so, so good.

Thank you for that.

Um, you know, we're going to land the plane here and wrap up, but just briefly, Jason, on your, on your end, any closing thoughts?

No, I, I'd love the return to, and, and I, I, I love this refrain that I kept on hearing from Steve was that it's God's movement.

And I, I feel like the pressure that we feel, um, we're putting it on ourselves because Jesus said that he would build his church.

Yeah.

We get to join him.

Not the other way around.

Yeah.

Matthew 6, 33, 34, say first God, and then the hearts of your, things of your heart.

So be good to you.

Don't worry about tomorrow.

You know, uh, it's so good.

Um, and even in my own life, trying to, you know, figure out the, even the finances of this thing.

It's, it's, and that's, that was echoed in some of the conversations from the meeting this morning.

It's like, that's, you know, this is not the stuff you should be worrying about.

This is, it's God's problem.

Let God figure it out.

You just got to get in the position where you trust God towards it.

So, so good.

Uh, Steve, as we're wrapping up on, on your side, any, any closing thoughts from Australia?

Well, just probably take it back to that.

Come, come follow Jesus and let him teach you how to fish.

It's as simple as that.

That is happening all around the world in, in some pretty tough spots.

And, um, and that's, if, if that's his promise to us, um, no social trends can stop us.

Um, and, you know, tomorrow we could have a major war and the whole internet gets, collapses

in on itself and the movement of God would continue or not.

We still pursue it using these tools he's given us, but come, come follow Jesus.

Let him teach you how to fish.

I love that.

Awesome.

Steve, uh, thank you for the conversation.

Um, acts and the movement of God.

We'll put a link in the show notes.

You can grab that.

Uh, if, if you're interested and we'll link to some of these other works as well.

Um, JMO mentioned, um, the one that he, rise and fall of movements, rise and fall.

Right, right, right.

And the one that I had as well.

Steve, uh, Steve, this is so good.

Thank you so much, uh, for being part of the conversation, but we're going to land the plane.

So, uh, for Steve, for JMO, uh, this is Jeff, uh, with the church digital.

Thanks for jumping here on the podcast.

We'll see you next time on the show.

Y'all have a good one.

300 coming up next.

I have no idea.

Uh, and so stay tuned next week because I'll be like, Hey, this is what I'm doing for 300.

300 because as of now, I have no clue, but 300 coming up around the corner.

See you then.

I'll be like, hey, this is what I'm doing for 300.