EP020: Jeff Moore & The Strategy of Discipleship

Hey there, welcome to the Church Digital Podcast. My name is Jeff, and I'm glad you've decided to

join us for episode 20. This is episode 20, and we are excited about it. We've got a great episode

for you. We're going out to Austin Ridge Bible Church in Austin, Texas. Now, disclaimer,

I used to work for Austin Ridge. I was their communications director, and I loved my time at

that church. And even from afar now, seeing what that church is doing and how they're growing people

is awesome, and so I love seeing it from a distance. But we wanted to have a detailed

conversation with their discipleship pastor and actually one of their worship leaders. His name's

Jeff Moore. Now, if the first thing that jumped into your head is songs like Good Old Ranger and

Tano, Laurel and Hardy, Batman and Robin, and Snoopy and Charlie, I got to disappoint you. It's not that

Jeff Moore. I know I'm disappointed as well. I've always wanted that friendship and that relationship

because, you know, we all need friends like you. But at the end of the day, it's a different Jeff

Moore. If you got no idea what I'm talking about, about Jeff Moore and Laurel and Hardy,

Google it. Jeff Moore, 1990s CCM Christian Contemporary Music, and prepare to be enlightened and or

disappointed. But we want to talk about discipleship in context of church online and even the church.

Now, Austin Ridge Bible Church doesn't have a strong church online. They do broadcasted services on

Facebook each week. But when it comes to creating biblical community, when it comes to discipleship,

when it comes to fostering those online relationships, honestly, they really just haven't gone in that

direction. Not saying that's good. Not saying that's bad. It's just the direction the church has chosen.

And so as a result of that, I don't necessarily want to have this conversation with Jeff talking about how

to do church online discipleship, but even just as a general rule, how to do discipleship

in your church. And so that may be two different things, but one needs to be grounded in the other.

And so what I do know about Austin Ridge is they are a very, like many of you, they are a very busy

event-driven church. They do lots of things with women's ministry, with men's ministry,

for parenting, for life groups. There's always something going. As a communications director,

I can tell you, there is always something going on in the life of Austin Ridge. But they've managed to

make D groups. They've managed to make discipleship groups. They've managed to make discipleship

stand out in context of those things. And even now, we're pushing towards a larger church-wide

campaign, driving people towards a deeper discipleship understanding. So how does that

tension work in the midst of everything else? What's the strategy that funnels people towards

discipleship? We may not have all the answers, but what I do know and love about Austin Ridge is

they're willing to experiment and try it out. And so we've had conversations about discipleship

recently. Episode 19, we talked to Jared Kirkwood from Mariner's Church and also over the rooted

material, which is a nine to 10-week study on creating a disciple. Austin Ridge took a different

approach where they actually wrote personally within the church a 350-page book that's tied to the mission

and vision of their church. By the way, if you want a copy of that, we've got a couple chapters of it

available online. Check out the show notes where you can download and see some of what that material

looks like. So Austin Ridge spent some intentionality. Why? What did that look like?

Jeff Moore, what lessons did you learn from this process? It's questions like this and more that I

really want to unpack. Here, as I bring to the table, Rady Armis, co-host, and of course, online pastor

at Christ Fellowship Miami. Bring Jeff Moore, discipleship pastor from Austin Ridge Bible Church,

myself, Jeff Reed, the church digital, in a conversation focusing on the strategies of

discipleship groups. Hey, everybody, here you go. I'm the odd duck. Well, it's funny. The first week

that JD and I, in fact, the first meeting, I think JD and I had one-on-one. I didn't remember what we

were talking about, but he says something to the effect of, you're the first worship leader I've ever

actually understood what you're talking about. Yeah, I can see that. This is true.

Is that a logical perspective or just in general? Like, what are we saying here?

No, it was, you know, it was, how do I say this? The lack of diva-ness. I mean, in grand scheme of

things, like, he was very grounded. You mean Jeff did go for the gravitas voice where he starts

speaking really airy and weird pauses? I don't know how to do that. Well, I mean, they told me for

weeks, hey, we're interviewing Jeff Moore to come in and lead worship. So you thought we're in the

distance or what were you doing? Dude, I was totally excited for it to be some home run or a friend like

you. And then this bearded bald guy shows up and I'm like, it's amazing what Photoshop can do and

oh, wait, no, that's not you. Dang it. I even had like albums ready to get autographed, but no, no such

luck. It was like a logically grounded guy coming into lead worship. It was just, it was such a

disappointment. No, I'm kidding. Good God, CCM has failed us again.

So does that still happen? I mean, seriously, like, like, do people, uh, and I'm trying to remember

what it was, but it was literally like somebody having lunch with me and they were kind of in

their own mind convinced that I was that guy. And I just like time and get the best of me.

Right. Now, Jeff, in all honesty, and I don't mean this in any bad way or form. It's just such a

niche genre. Did you know who Jeff Moore and the distance were before folks started calling you

that or like what happened? No, I'm, I'll be 47 in September. So I definitely knew who Jeff was. So

I traveled, toured, did that whole thing for about six years. I actually went under my middle name,

Jeff Wade, because that was like 95 to 2000. And that's when Jeff Moore and the distance were in

their heyday then. Right. That's when he was co-wrapping with Stephen Curtis and all that stuff. So we

actually did a couple of camps together where I was a worship leader and he was the concert artist

they brought in. His real name is Jeff Fenwick. Huh? Yeah. Jeff Moore is not his real name.

And I actually asked him, I was like, dude, of all the names you could choose from, Jeff Moore was the

sexiest thing for CCM radio you could come up with, you know? Yeah, pretty much, pretty much.

Exactly. Identity theft. Exactly. Nobody ever thinks about like the people who were born with those

names, right? They're like, oh yeah, yeah, Jeff Moore would be great. Jeff Moore, that's awesome.

Yeah. Nice guy, but, you know. How does Austin Ridge define discipleship? Discipleship is,

and I kind of borrow this from a guy named Daniel M. You read his book, No Silver Bullets? Fantastic book.

You haven't read it yet. He defines it as, you know, it's that, it's that lifelong trajectory direction

towards Jesus is what a disciple is. Somebody that's on that journey. So when we're making disciples,

we're helping people make that next step in that journey. So it's not something that you arrive at.

That's why we like to refer to it as disciple making instead of discipleship, because discipleship

seems to just, because it's a term that we're so familiar with, it's a, it's, it's something that

you've done or something that you do, something you complete versus disciple making is just that

ongoing progress where you're bringing others with you as you are moving towards Christ.

That's awesome. So for you, and I like this idea of the, of the long term. And so it's, it's an

interesting, the switch between like a discipleship and disciple making are contextually the word

discipleships lost a lot of its value in that you probably get 10 people in a room together and ask

them what discipleship is. You'll get 15 answers back, just the varying levels of that. But it's,

it's very clear in context of disciple making. Now, a lot of people, and we had episode 19,

the last episode, we had Jared, Jared Kirkwood on, and he's with Rooted Material, which is out of

Mariner's Church. I don't know if you're familiar with that. It's a really great content. Yeah, I was

really enjoying digging into that. But, you know, and he, and he defines discipleship and there's many

different ways. And I agree with that, but it was disciples are people who make disciples. And so there's

like a repetitive process for that. A disciple, someone is capable of making other disciples. With, with

Austin Ridge, what does that, what does that look like? I think the reality is that everybody's making

disciples whether they realize it or not. So it's, if you're going to, if you're going to be doing it

anyway, you might as well do it well. So we've created that curriculum to help people, you know

what I mean? To help people start. Because what we find is, I think most people, whether they,

I don't think most people want to be disobedient on purpose. So I think if scripture tells us that

we're to go and make disciples, you know, teaching them all I command you, baptizing them, you know,

so on and so forth. I think most people, once they realize that, they want to do it. Now,

whether or not they have the courage to step out personality wise, whether it's insecurity,

whatever it is, they want to be obedient. So if we can help them be obedient, uh, by giving them

kind of a toolkit that they can work with, uh, that at least will help some people get started in that

process. So we created that curriculum or a handbook is kind of what we call it, instead of curriculum,

because it's got a connotation to it, obviously. But, um, you know, what we encourage them to do,

hey, you know, you take, you know, three to five other people through this handbook over the next

nine to 12 months. And when you're done, they will have been equipped to do what you just did with

them. So there is no pressure for you to be great at it. You were, you were one among equals, right?

You know, you're all trying to pursue, move towards Jesus. You're not supposed to be an expert teacher,

uh, an expert, anything. You're supposed to be a disciple. You're supposed to be someone who loves

Jesus, wants to see other people love Jesus and understand Jesus, and then live for Jesus. So if

you can do that, if you're willing to, to risk doing that, here's a toolkit. Now, the next time you take

somebody through this, you know, shape it a little bit, you know, what I mean. So if they haven't done

it before, like here's some guardrails in the, you know, each subsequent time kind of make it your own

work. Over time, this is just one tool among many that you have. So that's one way to do it. Uh, I think,

you know, through the teaching on Sunday morning, I think is a way we do it. Um, I think one of the

things we're doing now, uh, we started this whole equipped, you know, category of things around here.

They're, uh, you've seen the round table, uh, videos online. So we have this equipped department

now where we're offering two-week classes on knowing Jesus, on how to study the Bible, and how to share

your faith, uh, rolling out some other class environments on science, on apologetics, on some other aspects

of studying God's Word, things like that. So we're trying to provide some things that are, uh, very

unstructured, uh, with some, with some tools to use in the unstructured environment, but more

decentralized. That'd be like a D group. Uh, these classes, obviously more centralized, master teacher

oriented. Um, so we're trying to stay away from saying, you know, one is better than the other,

but here are various options to take advantage of as you grow as a disciple and make other disciples.

So that was a really long answer to like a one sentence question, but it's kind of somewhere in

all that is kind of what we're doing right now. Sure. Well, and the one thing I know just even from,

from working at Austin Ridge is, is you guys, um, you have a lot of, of, let's call them discipleship

options that not, they not, you have a lot of grow options. Let me use your language, uh, available

with that. So you've got, you know, you've got the men's ministry, you've got women's ministry,

you've got small groups, discipleship was, was kind of a, of an out shoot of that. Um, what,

what is the, what is the relationship as, cause what I see now from the outside is discipleship

has seemed to have gotten more, I'm using the word structured, not as has gotten more value

in importance maybe over, over the past several years. Um, so like, well, how is that tension

of, okay, do I need to be in a men's ministry and discipleship or discipleship? What, what's,

how does, how does somebody who is in your church, how do they navigate that to find the right place?

One of the things that we're learning right now is honestly how to do that. So the D groups

ministry, which is what I'm overseeing with this handbook and everything, we're really just going

public with that for the first time, you know, i.e. lead pastor Brad talking about it, uh, things like

that. We've had, you know, 50 plus groups going with that without people really even knowing about

it. Really? Yeah. So it's kind of like, let's prepare for whatever might happen once it really

goes public. So with that, now we've got kind of four buckets. We've got D groups, we've got life

groups, we've got men's and women's discipleship, disciple making, equipping, all those things kind

of run through all those environments. What makes each distinctive is obviously men's and women's are

very gender specific, but they're going to be more kind of step one for a lot of people. Uh, you know,

it's going to be something that's kind of given to you. You're kind of going to feed your own soul

to build some relationships, uh, kind of in that order. Life groups will be more build relationships,

feed your own soul. Right. And then in, in the D groups, we're, we're giving you the tools to

train up others so that they can train up others. So they kind of all have, uh, the same things,

but just in different orders of priority. Right. I know it's difficult to gauge, but our folks who

are, who are looking at D groups, are they looking at that as, Hey, I'm being trained to be sent out,

or are they looking at it for the sense of, Hey, let me get, let me kind of engorge as a Christian

and let me gain more knowledge and that kind of thing. It's messaged over and over and over again,

that you're being equipped to equip. Now what they hear and how they process that over nine to 12

months, obviously a lot of people are just going to do what they want to with it. And they're going to

one more Bible study is what it's going to turn into for them. And, uh, that next step may not be

equipping other people. So we kind of have to just trust the spirits at work in that over a really long

process and not that 12 month process that we would like to, to great, you know, uh, in, in our

database. Um, but, uh, you know, one thing we have seen is a lot of people, and we, we do this on purpose,

even with the people that have been in it so far as this is something that you can do alongside what

you're already doing. Like this shouldn't pull you out of serving, being in a community you're

already in, like for you to, to be disciple, to make disciples, it's going to make you better at

what you're already doing. So don't stop doing that. Uh, you have to maybe take it on the chin a

little bit and do a little more the next nine to 12 months. Uh, but this will make you better,

more effective, more grounded, more able to do the things that you're already doing.

Do you guys, do you guys promote that to the church at large? Or is this for like folks

that you're like, you're eyeballing and you're like, this is the right kind of person that

we're looking at for this.

Up until now, it's been more of the eyeballing, uh, and really like me working through our

moons and women's, uh, leaders to, to find the right people. Uh, one, not only to leave,

two, to actually be in the groups, like who are the best candidates for this kind of thing. Uh,

starting though, well, I guess this next month, it'll be promoted alongside all our other

environments. So we'll see if that waters it down and makes it better or worse. Uh, if it makes it

harder, I just don't know right now, uh, cause even with 50 ish groups across three campuses,

you know, you can see that out of that, probably half of those are really like at the point of the

spear that we want them to be. The rest of them are constantly trying to bring them back, you know?

So if you, you know, triple that to 150, I would, you're probably still seeing about a third that are

on point and focusing. You're having to constantly bring those others back. But, um, you know, the

worst thing that's going to happen is somebody is going to be equipped with some basic theological

understanding, you know, basic, you know, tools of how to study the Bible on their own and some

basic, hopefully outlooks of how to better live for Christ and understand who they are. If that's the

worst, it happens. No, it's not a terrible thing. Inacceptable loss. For real. Is it tough to resist

the temptation to take a new believer through this? Cause obviously they're like the most excited

about their faith. They're the most like on fire. Perfect candidate for this. I think a believer,

uh, I think that's one step too few. Sure. And of course, a lot of people, they're just naturally

bent towards evangelism. Like, Oh, I'd love to take my enslaved neighbor through this. I'm like,

if they're willing to sign up for this commitment, man, Godspeed, but there's no way they're going to

finish this thing because it's just going to be so much, uh, unfamiliar territory for them. But I

think a new believer that, uh, is unformed spiritually, you know, they're still in that

spiritual formation process. I think that's perfect. Uh, because what you find is, uh, the people that

honestly have the hardest time staying on track with something like the whole D group experience is

somebody who's been through, you know, 15 different women's studies or men's studies or life group

studies and their natural gravitational pulls back to what they've already done. So you've got to

constantly retrain them of, you know, this is different. This is good. Use what you've learned,

but don't try to make this that. Right. See, that's the challenge that I've seen, uh, is so for

instance, my dad is a teacher at Bible study fellowship. I'm sure they got some of that where

you're at. And so, you know, uh, almost, I would almost rather send a new believer from our church

to undergo something like that, where it's like, no, you're going to be in the word and, and you're going to be

accountable for like what you're learning there. And there's going to be, yeah, there's going to be

some homework, but there's going to be a lot of challenge. And as opposed to, Hey, let's fix you

into a group where it's going to be, and, and this isn't to mean to demean anything. Cause I run my

small group based off of video, video based curriculum or anything like that, where it's going to be more

consumption as opposed to more challenge. And, and it's going to help the believer over the longer

haul of their life, you know, like we're equipping them to go do the things that Jesus called them to do,

not just to absorb content. Right. Yeah. The biggest, I say one of the biggest tweaks we've

made to this handbook is taking a lot of questions at the end of the chapter out of it. And the goal

of the group time when they meet each week is that each person in the group is supposed to bring

observations and questions they have to the table. So week one, the, the job of each person in the group

is to bring themselves to the, to it, you know, uh, versus that, okay, question one is X. Well,

that's what every group does. We have plenty of environments that go through question. One is X,

but you know, Hey, Steve, what are you thinking about? Like, what did this draw out? And what

didn't you understand? Um, you know, just those kinds of things to where it's more, it's more

heartfelt. And now the call for the leader then is to really be light on their feet. You know,

they got to be able to kind of go to their left a lot, so to speak in that, but, you know,

to really let the group drive the conversation so that they learn how to articulate, uh, not only

what they're learning, what they don't understand. Cause that's as big a part of being a disciple

is anything is being able to just honestly say, I don't know, I don't understand this. Can you help

me? You know? And so if we can equip people to just be more comfortable doing that, that's a huge

win. As, as a communications director, when I was at Austin Ridge, I, I struggled, um, with this

D group mentality because it was, and, and, and I've, I'm going to confess right here. I've,

I've had a brain shift and I understand it probably better than I did when I was there. Um, but what I

struggled with is actually the same things that I see a lot of other churches struggle with is,

okay, so this is another thing. Do we want somebody to be in a D group and a men's or slash slash small

group? Like, is this another thing that we want of them a week? Or if I had to choose between a

men's women's small group or a D group, like what, what's the, why would I choose or what is the option

that I should choose there? When you talk with people who have that, that tension, who feel that,

like what's your response to something like that? Biggest thing I try to do is really spell out what

each environment offers kind of the same while ago. And then just give them the freedom to use what

they want to do. I mean, at the end of the day, it's up to them to own their faith. Uh, we actually

got an event coming up, uh, in August, own your faith. It's, it's an equipment event. We'll have

hundreds of people there in the, at the end of the night, their assignment before the night's over is

to spell out the next three months, six months, 12 months. What are your steps, um, that you're

going to take in your faith and whether that's, uh, and we've, we've, we've kind of created a tool

for them to assess where, where they are, like where their, where their weakest point is right now,

based on our core values. Um, and you know, is that something that you really want to see changed

in the next 12 months? Okay. For the next three months, here are your options. Six months,

here are your options. 12 months. Now pick one race. There's plenty of freedom there. You know,

this is a long, this is a long road mindset that we're trying to take here. You know,

you're not going to fix yourself in the next 12 months, but what's something you can grow in?

You know, uh, you're still human, but you're still made in the image of God and you're filled

with Christ spirit and in Christ, you are being sanctified and all these things. So what is that

sanctification process? How can we come alongside you as a church in the next three months,

six months, 12 months? Uh, but you got to do it. We can't do it for you. So that's good.

Trying to take a step back to answer your, I think answer your question is, you know,

if a men's group does it for you best, uh, man, get after it now, get after it, you know,

but if it's a D group or a life group, or if it's a, um, you know, maybe you're in all these

things already and you're not serving anywhere. You don't know how to share your faith. You know

what? Take this two week class on how to share your faith and a conversation setting. Do that.

That's huge. Uh, serving it in a men's group, but you're still scared to share your faith.

We've got to call time out here and let's, let's talk about that. You know what I mean?

So it's not a, it isn't a priority necessarily. It's like, it's all these things, you know,

it's the, um, yeah. And that's what makes it fun. I think the more we can, uh, help people

understand what we offer them, why we offer it to them, and that there's freedom for them

to choose among those things and then just get after it. Uh, we, you know, we hope that more

and more people will take us up on that. So, okay. So let me add, let me ask this because

you've, what you, what you've got is a 350 page book for nine to 12 months. Like that's,

that's a, that's a huge commitment. Um, a lot of the other curriculums that, that I've looked at,

you know, um, we last week or recently we talked with, um, rooted and rooted. It's like a 10 week

thing. Uh, I've got experience with Timothy initiative. Um, uh, David Nelms, it's roughly

attended. I think it's a 16 week, but we would chop it in half and do it and do it in eight weeks.

That's a huge commitment time-wise of nine to 12 months. Um, I'm guessing there was intentionality

on making it that long. Why did you choose to be a little more aggressive on the time to stretch it

out that big? Sure. Well, I mean, you could almost break it up into four studies, you know, because

we, we built it around our model of a disciple, which is a lifelong learner and follower of Jesus

who knows who God is at section one, knows what Christ is in section two, knows who they are in

Christ section three, and then knows how to live for Christ section four. So if you look at it that

way, it kind of is for 10 week, you know, serious kind of thing. Um, but you know, we tried to build

it to where we kind of took the approach of, and I say we, this is a large group of people going back

about four years when all this started. So I didn't do this single handling by any stretch. I have,

I have some fingerprints on it. Uh, but me, TJ Morelli, a few other guys on staff, uh, started working

on this concept about four years ago and basically just decided, okay, what are some theological

tenants that we want a disciple who comes out of Austin Ridge, uh, to, to know, you know, we want

to be able to, as best as we can understand, you know, what the Trinity is, what God's character

attributes are, how God's revealed himself, you know, those types of things, but then connect that

back to real life. You know, why do these things matter? Where do they matter? When do they matter?

And how do I articulate that stuff? Uh, moving on from that, you know, what Christ has done

really understanding sin, really understanding faith, really understanding these things that

we kind of take for granted, but really being able to articulate that stuff and find it in

scripture and be able to walk through passages on their own for that, you know, who we are in

Christ, the fact that we are forgiven, the fact that we are just, you know, we are justified,

sanctified, we will be glorified, those types of things. Where does that show up in

scripture? How do I study that for myself? And then based on all that, you know, if you

go through all this stuff and you don't have a desire to live differently for Jesus, then

you should start over. So assuming that once you get through those three sections, you just

have something that you feel like you've got to do now. Okay, let's end with how we live

for Christ. And then looking that, you know, that actually starts with abiding, uh, that

looks at the example he gave us, uh, that moves on into the great commission and unpacking

that in many different ways. Um, that sort of thing. So we decided instead of kind

of, and even doing that, I mean, not until much, you're still skimming the surface of

a lot of that stuff. You're not doing a dive on the Trinity in a week. You know what I

mean? You might be going further than they've typically gone, but I had a seminary prof

tell me, it's like, well, since we can't spend six months on this, the next 20 minutes

will be fine. You know, so again, I had to take that approach. Like you can't cover any

of this stuff exhaustively, but you can hopefully do it enough to at least give us some

language, give some terms, give some connected tissue from, uh, teaching to being able to

find it in the word for yourself to being able to teach somebody else how to find it in the

word and then teach somebody else, that sort of thing. Um, you know, and all along the way,

also developing spiritual disciplines. So daily time in prayer, specifically for, uh, lost people

you, you regularly encounter with them for opportunities to have spiritual conversations,

praying for a specific missionary or country, and then praying for workers for the harvest.

So we call it what we call the missional big three here. Um, you know, so when you talk,

when, so that's when you start looking at trying to develop habits and spiritual disciplines,

that takes longer than 10 weeks. Then the job of the leader is, you know, you start every

group meeting with, okay, guys, you've been in the word daily for yourselves. What are you

learning? What did, what did you see? Have you been praying the missional big three? Okay.

Before we go any further, let's do that together. Who are we praying for? You know, who have you

had spiritual conversations with, et cetera, et cetera. So that's, that's why we decided to make

the, all that as much as we could structure it happen for somebody over nine to 12 months.

You got some groups that want to spend four weeks on the Trinity. I discourage them from doing that,

but grown adults are going to do what grown adults are going to do. If they want to do that,

that's fine. But you're going to be in this thing for like two years. That's a long time.

Yeah. And so another thing we did too, I mean, JD, I'm talking a long time, sorry, but you know,

Brad's led these groups for 20 years and his typically go 12 to 15 months. And so that doesn't,

they kind of gave us freedom to not try to do a 10 or 12 week study. It's like the Brad does a

discipleship group for 12 to 15 months. Let's write something that they can do in nine to 12 months.

Kind of batteries included. So did you ever consider like not writing your own or, or was the vision

towards, man, we want to so tightly integrate this into our strategy. We just, we need to do it

ourselves. That's why we did that. Yeah. We want it to sound like us, feel like us. If somebody goes

through partnership and here's this thing, you know, about what a disciple is at Austin Ridge and they go

through our disciple making materials that it all lines up. So, cause we looked at like Greg Ogden's

stuff, uh, actually basics, whatever that was called. Uh, we looked at some stuff that watermark

had, we looked at stuff that village had, I mean, this is all great stuff, but we'd have to tweak it

so much to feel like us. Uh, let's just start from scratch. And it really was a neat, uh, experience

because at the end of the day, man, you probably saw the credits page at the end of that, Jeff, but

there's, you know, 20 different writers that staff and volunteers. There's eight different editors,

staff and volunteers. Uh, you know, so it really is a collective effort that, uh, you know, right now

it's great, you know, three to five years from now, we'll probably go, well, that was a dumb idea.

And we'll be on to something else because it's a church and we, we learn and grow and that sort of

thing. So we're not telling people this is the Bible of anything, but you know, it's anything but

that, you know, this is just a tool to come alongside God's word, to come alongside the

spirit at work in you and to come alongside the community that you, you need to be in. Uh, but

as you're in community in God's word, as the spirit works in you, this is a tool to use in this season.

Well, you know, and I love the thing that I've always loved about Austin Ridge is, is their ability

to, to do these astronomical, these, these huge projects without even like blinking an eye just,

okay, this is what we need to see infrastructure. Like I'm even just thinking back. I don't even

know if you guys do it anymore, but time with God, there was this like daily devotional that was

essentially volunteer produced. Uh, I think there was like one person who was an editor who was like

part-time staff who put it together, but essentially it was volunteer and staff written for years like

that, that, that went on. Do you guys still do that? I'm just curious.

I actually just pulled the plug on that, uh, back in the spring.

Yeah. And just, I mean, what, but what, what I loved about it was, yeah, Hey, let's, let's do this.

And, and maybe it wasn't the best place to pour the resources into, but I love the church's

vision towards, Hey, this is a great idea. That is a resource. Let's create it. You know, I look at,

I look at the book that you guys have created. It's 350 pages. Like that's no small feat, even with 20

writers and putting that together, keeping everybody singular focused on this and, um, and, and generating

that and getting it done. And this is what I think I saw somewhere. This is like version three.

Yeah. We didn't start off with a 350 page book in mind. Uh, what it started off as is a more of a

typical, that's a bad word, but you know what I mean? More of a traditional kind of small group thing

where here's the topic, here's some passages. What do you see? What does it mean? What do I do?

Kind of stuff. And there was like five or six days of that for each topic. So the idea was somebody

will do this in 15, 20 minutes per day in addition to their normal time. Problem is, uh, you're assuming

a lot of the leader, uh, you're actually going to get the right, get to the right place with nothing

but a little explanatory note and some verses, you know, that that's a lot, that's a lot to ask. So,

uh, we fleshed it out a little bit more and we fleshed it out one more time. And that's how we

got to where we are now. So really, if you look through most of the weeks now, there's about

four to six headings. So we still kind of kept those same basic headings from that original version.

We just added a little more meat in there so that it kind of walks somebody through.

Um, it doesn't give them all the answers, but it kind of walks them towards the answer.

I'm not a numbers guy and we talk not, we talk a lot about how I don't like numbers, but this is

just the numbers you've told me. You've got 50 groups, three to five people.

So bad math, 150 to 250 people going through this. When you look at discipleship and you're

rolling out new campaign where fall 2019, you're going to be pushing discipleship instead of a,

Hey, let's pull some people aside. Maybe this is more like beta underground,

but you're making discipleship more of a public presence out in front of the people, getting

them on board. Um, when you look at discipleship, is it, Hey, we're just going to see where this

thing goes. Do you internally have goals or things that you want to drive to and say, okay,

the goal is to get this many people in discipleship. As you've talked about discipleship growth in your

church, like how do you guys treat that?

Yeah. I mean the, kind of the soft goal is that I think it's reasonable to look for a hundred and

hundred and fifty groups this next year. Uh, and out of that, you know, a third to a half of those will

probably, uh, finish really well. A lot of those, uh, kind of leaving the tracks a little bit. We'll

have to get them back on, but it's kind of those things of, you know, I won't, we won't really know

if this is successful till we get down the road three to five years because if we don't see groups

multiplying, uh, if we don't see groups ending in nine to 12 months, and then, you know, at least

one of the four to six people, two of the four to six people going on to lead others, uh, whether it's

in a D group or some sort of format, then, uh, then in my opinion, we haven't been successful,

uh, at least with the stated goal of disciples making disciples. Um, but it's really, you know,

kind of asking two to three, four years if it's working or not, um, because it's just going to

take time, you know? And, um, yeah, I mean, that's the, that's the unfortunate answer. You know,

at the same time, it's only Holy Spirit can change a heart. Only Holy Spirit can really guide us in

the truth, you know, the Holy Spirit, uh, the Holy Spirit does what he's going to do, which I believe he

will. Then the next step is will people be obedient to what the Spirit's doing in their heart? We can't

control that. So that's good. I've, I've talked with, with churches and actually, um, you know what

long hollow Ray, I'm blanking on the guys named lead pastor. Uh, yeah. So I've listened to Robbie,

Robbie Gallaty's podcast on this and actually I credit him because he's the first guy that really

put this on my radar. Um, you know, there, there's a, there's a tension between a, like a one-on-one

and then a one to multiple, um, one to three, one to five. I think you guys are three to five. You

said Robbie actually leans towards in his podcast and we'll link it in the show notes. He leans

towards a one to three model. Um, I just was wondering what life lessons have, have you learned

as you've been developing this? Why have you landed on that three to five range? Have you experienced

anything one way or the other? Uh, man, I think a lot of this personality during, I mean, personally,

I'm more comfortable in a one-on-one I'd rather just get, you know, roll up our sleeves with,

with one other guy and just get after it. Uh, I think there's a place for that. I think there's a

place, uh, for the kind of the four to six person group. That's more, I think you get the accountability

piece is different in each. I think that just that formation piece is different in each. Um,

I don't know that we, uh, like right now I can think of three groups that are one-on-one,

uh, that, you know, a particular individual wanted to lead, uh, just one other guy because he had,

uh, just made a great relationship. He's already discipled this guy and he just wanted to use this

tool. I'm like, great. There's no rules, no rules against that kind of thing. Uh, you know,

it's almost the, the duplication ratio. You know, if you have four to six people go through it, if

one or two of those, you know, go on to do it again, you're just getting more people through the

system. Uh, practically speaking. Um, I think that's honestly why it's just a basic numbers thing.

If we can get 300 people to go through it and we get, you know, 75 to a hundred of them to take a

next step versus if we get 50 people to go through it, we get 10 of them to take a next step.

So you've mentioned a couple of times, cause I, and I know discipleship and what I've seen from

the outside. And by the way, what I've seen, I love, um, you mentioned equip, uh, a couple of times

and, uh, and what equip, why don't you define what equip is in context of, of Austin Ridge? Let's,

let's park on that for a little bit. Yeah. So Joey Ryder, who's our life groups and equipment,

equipping pastor, uh, he kind of threw this idea out. It was probably a couple of years ago now.

And what it started off as was, uh, kind of event-based, uh, targeted to the things that we

just don't cover in a Sunday morning. Typically, you know, the felt need oriented things, uh, you know,

we're not going to do six weeks on marriage money and finances like a lot of churches. Those are

good. It's just not us. Uh, but we need, we need an environment to do that.

Uh, you know, we realized that certain ministries, like our care ministry was doing these great

marriage classes or marriage events or parenting events, things like that. And they'd have,

you know, 60 people show up. That's great. Unless you're a church of 4,000 people and 60 people

drop in the bucket of what would have come had they known about it. And so, uh, Joey kind of created

this engine, uh, to come alongside environments or events like that is like the first marriage event.

They did, they had like 300 people show up versus 60. Uh, so it was like, oh, wow, this works. So we did

marriage, we did parenting, uh, we did an apologetics thing. We brought in Robbie's group. Uh, one of these

guys from Houston came in, uh, did a couple of things in each one of these, you know, we're having hundreds

of people show up versus, you know, dozens. Uh, and so since that was working, um, now we're offering

some classes and again, do the same thing. It's, uh, it offers environments for things that, uh,

we don't either cover in messages or we still have another environment to do it. So I mentioned earlier,

we have the kind of the knowing Jesus. So just basic intro to Christianity, one-on-one kind of stuff.

Uh, I'm leading a class on how to study the Bible. And again, very intro oriented. Uh, we're going to

have another one on how to share your faith. Uh, those are going to be Sunday mornings and cap

them at two weeks. So that's where those are. So now we have like the one or two, you know,

big event, you know, Sunday night type things. We have the two weeks, Sunday morning classes.

We're going to offer, uh, starting to follow this Tuesday night, uh, longer format, uh, like 46 week

classes where, you know, somebody comes off like a Sunday morning parenting class, but they really need

more. We're going to offer a six week. That's more in depth. Uh, it's more kind of triage

oriented for the families that really need that, you know, marriage, finance, faith and science,

those kinds of things. So starting this fall, we'll have kind of three, that three pronged approach

of events that are going to be a little more infrequent now because we have some class environments

to do some of that. Right. Events, the two week class and the 46 week class. And, uh, again,

they're not targeted to everybody. They're targeted at a subset by their very nature. But

what we're finding is that subset is for a lot of those things, a lot larger than honestly, we wish it

was, we wish that many people's marriages didn't need that kind of help, but they just do.

And, uh, and that sort of thing. So offering that, we hope that, um, those become really

feeder systems because people get either a excited, they get, you know, some tools or they get some

help and some healing and they want to step into, okay, well, where can I get back? Well,

you know what D groups or life group leadership or men's or women's, you know, those kinds of things.

So we hope that all these things kind of, kind of feed each other and ask me two or three years if

they are, I'll tell you. That's cool. I like that just because, you know, Jeff, every time I reflect

back on the way that many of us were brought up, I feel like there's an aspect that the church is

missing in the absence of Sunday school. And I feel like what you're doing there brings a lot of that

back because, you know, folks sometimes just need some time to sit in a classroom setting to kind of

digest some of the things that we're talking about. A small group isn't always the best environment for

that. Sometimes they just need that teacher kind of aspect to receive kind of information that you're

talking about. You know, some, many churches just think of that in terms of like, we just, uh,

got done talking in a past episode with somebody from Dave Ramsey, with Ken Schaefer from Dave Ramsey

organization, you know, and that's one aspect of that, but in marriage and raising kids and so many

different areas, I think folks need that kind of environment to just absorb the information.

Even that's going to run out at some point. Some people are going to need even more than that,

but you think about if a four to six week intensive can't sufficiently meet the needs. Yeah, a small

group leader, lay leader with an hour and a half each week and with, you know, a meal included,

doesn't have time to dive into that, nor do they have the skill set. So it allows them to play to

their strengths, which is relational. You know, it allows a digger to play to its strengths, which is,

you know, biblical, theological, and relational. Men's, women's groups, those sorts of things. So as

opposed to one or two environments having to be everything to everybody, hopefully we can just

create more opportunities. Again, the challenge is not to let each of these things try to do

everything because that's the natural pull of everything. We'll say, man, you know what, if this

marriage group just became a small group, it'd be all fixed. No, we already have those over here.

They need to jump out of this, you know, felt need-based thing into this more general community where

they're, you know, just going to be with people and not with a situation, you know, that sort of thing.

Um, so we're, we're going to bump our heads into some stuff, but it's neat that we're in a season

right now where we've got the freedom to kind of experiment with some of those things and see what

works and then keep those things and push off the stuff that doesn't work and then make those things

that are working better. Yeah. Yeah. I love how there's, there's strategy that's intentionally

in place for this working on your strengths, uh, a small group, a biblical community cannot be

the catch-all for this because you don't have the opportunity to dive in into a smaller, more

deeper relationship. The group leader may or may not be capable of that. Um, even getting into the nuances of,

of, of a divorce recovery of, of a, of a single parenting of, uh, you know, the issues that'll come

up with there and having the separate classes to hone in on that, looking at what Austin Ridges

developed in the intentionality towards this growth department, this area that now they're saying,

here's this option of groups. Here's this option. If you're looking for something deeper, here's this issue.

If you just need help, uh, equipping or working through felt needs, like it's, it's really starting

to see, okay, there's a, there's a path here that people can work through while on that path.

You're not hindering the growth of that as well. Um, the last thing, and it's one of the things that,

that I love that we heard from, um, from Jared Kirkwood is, is you don't want,

you don't want your small group to become a, a therapy where a therapy session where you're

continually stuck in a circle. We've all had these groups where they just continually

move all around and they're, they're stuck because of a certain person that's going through a certain

issue. And, and those issues are important to get solved, but as a result of it, you don't always

have the opportunity to take the entire group forward because of the issues that are stuck with,

with the individual person. So setting up a model like this, that can dive into the felt need

is so good. And so like, that's such a, um, an awesome option. Now I want to totally ask you

about the church online implications of that and how you're utilizing this. Uh, but I know you guys

aren't there yet with Austin Ridge. I love you anyway. Um, but what I do love that you're doing

online with this is the idea of this podcast, um, that, that you've set up where you're, you're high.

You know what, instead of me like talking about it, Jeff, just tell us a little bit about how you're

using, uh, uh, the round tables, the podcast, like what that looks like for your church.

So the round table, uh, well, okay. So the quip, uh, they had a podcast already and it would,

it was creating follow-up resources for the events. So they already had the podcast channel

established. The round table thing was a second idea, um, that, uh, Nathan Jennings, actually one

of the guys, our communications department, video guy kind of jack of all trades came up with. He's

like, we need something where we can talk about the stuff that we don't talk about anywhere else.

Like where there's behind the scenes stuff or addressing a particular issue or, you know,

theology one-on-one kind of stuff. He's like, would you guys be interested in doing that? And of course,

Joey Ryder and I were both like, yeah, absolutely. So that got us working together on that. And what

we've done is, um, create, I think we did 20 episodes kind of season one, uh, which is way too

many episodes, obviously, but it's kind of got on a roll. So we just kept going with it. But what we

did, we did some theology. We did some, you know, kind of the, kind of behind the scenes of how

ministries function, why they do what they do, kind of what they're going for. Talk to, you know,

some different leaders from different campuses, try to involve some lay leaders, uh, and just

kind of experiment with, experimented with some different things. Um, and we're getting, you know,

mixed, um, kind of mixed reviews on like, you know, format, so to speak. So for instance, we've learned

that, uh, we get far fewer views on online, uh, videos, media, social media, than we get podcast

listens. Uh, like we get, you know, 60 views, we'll get 300 listens. Okay. We're going to put our

energies more into making sure we talk about, or we talk about these things in such a way that just

the audio makes sense without having to watch the video, you know, little things like that that we're

going to do for this next season. Um, but yeah, I mean, it's been neat because it's given a great

outlet for a lot of ministry leaders to talk about, um, you know, whether it's a particular issue

it's important to them or a particular thing in their ministry that, uh, you know, unless you're

on staff, you're never going to know some of this stuff. And so it's been kind of good to do some of

that stuff. One by-product of that is it created a, uh, kind of a collaborative, uh, energy between

not only me and Joey, but then other staff as well. So like the first one we did was me and our

missions guide down elsewhere talking about, you know, missions and disciple making and, you know,

are they two sides of the same coin or the different coins, things like that, that,

you know, to have that conversation, you got to have a conversation, right? And that's what most

church staffs don't have the luxury or the opportunity to sit down and do for a long enough

time to really start peeling back some layers. And so that's given us an opportunity to do some of

that, which is really leading to some neat conversations kind of in the hallway of around

some other things. So it's been neat. That's cool. Well, and by the way, we're going to link to that,

that podcast with, with you and Don, uh, I love Don. I love, I like you. I don't necessarily

love you, but no, I love you. Um, but, and the, the wrestling with that was cool. But the thing

that I really like about this and audience is what I want to kind of focus on here is, is that the

podcast gives your ministry leaders a voice in a realm that isn't necessarily utilized, let's say,

well, now all sorts of people will listen to a sermon podcast, but transparently there's dozens of

dozens of different places to listen to the same sermon podcast, everything from multiple services,

any given weekend at multiple campuses. There's probably a church online broadcast. There's

probably a Facebook broadcast. There's probably something that's eventually uploaded on, on YouTube.

And so like a lot of energy in the average church in America, go into a technologically savvy

average church in America goes towards launching that podcast for the sermon. Uh, but what we're seeing

here is, is you're utilizing the podcast as an opportunity to highlight ministry opportunities

and other things that are happening to the church to pull people in and creating it as a, as a shareable

content, linking to it on Facebook. And all of a sudden now the people who are listening have ways to

have shareable content that'll pull people into the ministry of your church, not just through Sunday

services with that. And so you're trying to get somebody involved in a, in a group. There's a

podcast on, um, parenting, which I know is one that I, that I've heard recently. And so you've got

somebody who's struggling with that and maybe it's a single mom that you want to share. You share that

resource in an audio format. That's a front door that gives the person sharing an opportunity to pull

them into the church that gives the church an opportunity to receive somebody, um, into the

ministry. And so like, I love the idea of, of talking about the ministries and utilizing podcasts,

you know, put the podcast on a blog post. All of a sudden, now you've got an easily web-based

shareable format. That's got podcast audio on it that can pull people from the outside into specific

areas of your church's ministry. So like when I saw that, Jeff, I got to tell you, and I got to,

I got to, uh, I think I did. I texted him immediately. I was like, this is incredible. Well done,

but, uh, definitely want to see more from that. Well, man, this has been a great podcast. Like,

I just, I'm excited about seeing what God's doing at Austin Ridge and even this shift of discipleship

that even within the past, um, you know, so many years, um, I'm not saying it happened because I left,

but conveniently, I think I left. And then there was this shift that happened. Uh, but as a result,

we're seeing, um, more of this and more intentionality with that. So, man, this has

been great. Ray, as we're landing the plane, any, any questions or thoughts here?

Yeah, Jeff, I just love that you guys are treating discipleship more like art than science.

You know, it seems like you guys are really just taking a look at this and saying, no,

people have different pathways to get to discipleship and we're going to help them find their best path,

but we're not going to tell them which path to take. We're going to help guide them along the way.

In the grand scheme of creating a single path or creating multiple paths that will get people to the

same destination. I, I, I think the one thing that Austin Ridge does well is they figured out how to

create multiple paths that funnel people, uh, eventually to the same destination. And so that's been

really exciting to see that, that develop in recent years. Jeff, man, any, any closing thoughts as we're,

we're wrapping up? No, man, I'm excited about what you guys are doing. I'm curious to see where the

church online platform, uh, platforming, all those things, uh, kind of where it goes, you know,

I'd love to have another conversation online or offline. Um, you know, just about all that stuff,

because I'm, I'm sure that, you know, as we, you know, as we get into year two, year three,

month three, who knows, uh, with just this whole D group idea, uh, our disciple making efforts,

uh, there's going to be a, an itch for how else. Yeah. And fill in the blank. And, um,

yeah. So I'll, I'll just be curious to see where that goes. So I'm excited to be a part of, uh,

this with you guys. So it's fun to still be in ministry together, even though you're in Florida,

I'm still in Austin, man. I love it. And, uh, I've got a, I got to figure out a time when I'm

flying back out to Austin to, uh, to stop by. I, there was, there was a business thing. I thought

I was going to be out there all the time and, and, and, you know, it just didn't work out, but, uh,

no, we're definitely, um, excited about what's happening at the Ridge. It's interesting.

And then I'm going to, I'm going to put this bug in your ear for, for online. And then I'm going to

say this, a lot of churches will look at church online as, Oh, this is somebody who's abandoning

community. Uh, and so, uh, I'm an isolationist. Uh, I don't want to be around people in church online

is my opportunity to escape the world around me and just isolate myself and do church and on a couch

in my underwear. Um, and while that may be an option, and once again, you can't force people

down any one given direction. Um, I challenge churches to look at it, not as the abandonment

of community, but potentially discipling someone to the place that they birth a new community.

Uh, and so it's kind of looking through it. Maybe it's looking through rose colored stained glass

glasses. I don't know if that's the rose colored stained glass glasses. That's the right thing.

Yeah. It's a song somewhere about that. Uh, or maybe, maybe it's just the reality of,

Hey, this is what could be. This is the, the, the pipe dream down the road, but that's more of the

challenge I think before us. And, and we've blogged about it and talk about it, but the challenge before

the church to do discipleship, uh, online, because I mean, you and I, Jeff, we're in two different time

zones. Uh, Ray and I live in the same city, but I'll be honest. I see Ray once a month in the physical

space. And so, you know, even in that context, uh, it's learning how to utilize this, not as a

replacement of community, but as an opportunity to empower and to create new communities where our

people are. That's the dream anyway. So we, I would love to offline a conversation about that. And, uh,

I'm sure we could probably make another podcast out of that too. So, Hey man, I wrote down disciple

making without pants is all I wrote down. Nice. Somebody buy that.com right now. Disciple

making without pants sitting in your underwear doing discipleship. I'm like, Hey, that'll sell.

I might buy that in redirect. Oh no, he will. He will. I think, I think I will do that. Let's go

ahead and do it in the show notes. It's how confident I am. This has me too written all over

it, bro. Disciple. That's awesome. Man. That's why I miss Jeff more. All right. So, Hey, for, uh,

for Ray, for, uh, for Jeff, Hey, this has been Jeffrey with the church digital. It's been a great

podcast looking forward to what, Hey, we've got elevation coming up next. I'll go and plug that

next podcast. We've got, uh, elevation. We've got Danny, Danielle Hicks, who's the pastor of watch

parties. That was, that was her title, right? It was watch parties. The only pastor in America who's got

parties in her job title. Um, I got to tell you, I'm a little envious of that, but we're going to be

talking about how, uh, elevation uses church online to create, to cluster these people together, to

create discipleship, physical discipleship groups scattered across the country. So it's a great,

uh, conversation, especially tied to a church anywhere. So Jeff, thank you. Uh, Ray. Thank you.

Audience. Thank you very much. We'll catch you next time here at the church digital podcast.

Y'all have a good day.