Episode Transcript
Well, Pastor Jim, I want to thank you so much for hanging out with me today and agreeing to record an episode of the Revitalize My Church podcast. How are you doing? I'm doing great. We actually had a refresher weekend this weekend. So we get three of those a year and celebrate it, our granddaughter's first birthday. So I'm doing well and had staff meetings this morning. Mondays are my day off and then Tuesday are time to gather what happened in the weekend. So I'm doing well. Yeah, doing well. One of the things that I admire about you and I have followed you for quite some time is that you are definitely a person, from my observations, that has some pretty significant patterns in your life. You're a person, I think, that looks like you have a pretty structured life. That's the word I'm looking for, structured. But you also, because we're friends on Facebook and I see your social media posts, You do have a lot of time that you pull away and do time with family and grandkids and kids and that sort of thing. So you've spent a lot of time in ministry. We're going to talk a little bit about that today. I think what I really admire is that you seem to have at this season in your life, a pretty good balance between ministry. how you need to pour into your staff, your team, your church to do ministry, to keep everything moving the direction that it's going. But at the same time, not forgetting that you have a family, you've got kids, you've got grandkids. Oh, and you have a wife with whom you love to spend time. So, uh, Some pretty cool stuff, and I'm sure that we'll dive into a little bit of those things as we get going. But for our audience that may not know who you are, I've already introduced you as the pastor of Grace Community Church in Goshen, Indiana. Why don't you tell me a little bit about how you ended up at Grace? Twenty nine years ago, I was a student at Grace Theological Seminary in Winona Lake. I was in my next to last year ministry and I was the student body chaplain actually there at Grace Seminary. And I was looking down the road. uh, and thinking about what's next as every guy who is in seminary. And I had a, uh, one of my friends who now, um, actually leads encompass ministries, um, contact me and say, Hey, Jim, I know this church for you. Um, you should consider it. It's in Goshen, Indiana. And, uh, I had never heard of Goshen other than it was land flowing with milk and honey in the Bible. And back in those days, there was no quick way to Google it either. You could not Google where it goes. No, before internet and cell phones and all those good things. So I kind of honestly dropped it because it's kind of like when someone says, hey, I know the girl for you. That normally isn't a good thing either. But knowing I was getting near the end of my mentorship, my last year, I had to be in ministry. I began to explore it, went to department head of Grace Theological Seminary at the time, who was Ken Bickle at the time, and said, hey, you know anything about this church in Goshen? Long story short, I didn't realize that he had pastored this church previously before he came. So he got on the phone. Hey, I got a guy here that's seminary, wants to know more about the church there. And he made a phone call. So they set up this meeting. And And I wanted to be part, my wife and I wanted to be part, we had two kids at the time, four and two. We wanted to be part of a church that loved Jesus, had a heart for their community, and was willing to do whatever it take to reach them. Um, so anyhow, they, this search committee, um, I was working construction. I'm a home builder by trade. So I spent 10 years of my life building homes. And, um, so I was working construction, going through seminary, paying for my education. And then, um, So I decided, Bart, that if I'm going to be part of this church or any church, they must be willing to accept people. And so they better accept me. So honestly, if you were to see me, I normally have a pair of sneaks on. I love basketball, sports. I'm a runner. I just put on a ball hat, a pair of Dita high top sneaks, took a shower, got my Ford F-150 truck. And I figured I'm going to go to this meeting. I'm just going to be me. And if they can't accept me, how would they accept anybody in the community? So drove north Goshen 29 years ago, 28 years ago, and went into this meeting and soon found out that it was a small group of people that were the pastor was retiring. He was 67 and they were looking for someone to lead them for didn't know how to get there. but were willing to take a chance on me. So this for cell phones, it's hard for the generation today to imagine that. I remember leaving that meeting thinking, Ann and I, my wife Ann, we were open to anywhere in America. Lord, we'll go California, we'll go New York, we'll go Florida. And I remember driving home from that meeting thinking, oh my gosh. this might be the church has called us to now, let me back up our first Sunday here. There were 60 people, 63 people, two children, our two children, double the children's ministry. And, um, and half of our congregation of the 60 people were 55 or older, and it was a church in decline, beautiful group of people. Um, so. Honestly, I would have never picked this church if I had a selection. There was no way I would have picked this church. But God called us and we ended up there. And that was 28 years ago. And boy, it's been an amazing ministry ride since then. That was back in 1996. So I remember taking my truck north. um my first sunday I was preaching in a double-breasted suit I don't wear suits anymore um but the lord has done some amazing things so that was a long time ago by word of mouth god directed they were here's here's the other thing too bart I'm grateful for this this church gave me a chance I I've never ministered anywhere else I've never been a pastor anywhere else except for right here in goshen indiana they were willing to take a chance on someone who had never been a pastor before. And that was a huge step for them too. And I'm grateful they did. Yeah. So it wouldn't have been the church that you picked, but they picked you. Yeah. There's a lot to be said about that. Those God-ordained connections and moments. That's very, very cool. Describe a little bit about what the church looks like today. We hear what it looked like in 1996, you know, 60 to 70 people. Mostly folks that were middle-aged and older, not many kids in the church. Flash forward 28 years and describe the ministry that you're blessed to lead today. I'll preface this by saying this. I tell people a lot. I pastored every size church. When I came, I was the janitor. I answered the phone. I was on call. I went to a building by myself. Um, and you know, so progressively through the years, God has, um, you know, grown our church and it's been his work. And so I've continued to pastor different sizes of churches, um, you know, and moved and seen God direct us even from congregational led to elder led to staff led to, um, and so today it's much different. Um, there's a lot, but. Big church, I don't know, 2,600 people running around on Sunday mornings. We have a campus in Elkhart now, praise God, Pastor Tannen Peters is leading it. We have a campus in Quibitaro, Mexico that we just started up and Pastor Oscar Mata is doing a tremendous job there. So we're one church in three locations. But the same thing is true about our church. We live in a blue collar community. It's the RV capital of the world, Elkhart County. And so we have all generations. It's not uncommon for a grandchild, a great grandchild, a mom and a dad, and all four generations coming to church together. We have blue collar, white collar, and I would say no collar. 20% Hispanic community. It's a very entrenched community. history of Mennonite community. We have tons of men, Bart. We are known by many in our community as the man church. uh we target men and I believe if you get the man you get the family you get the community you get the world for jesus our men are highly involved in serving even in our children's ministries we have 400 plus children ministry volunteers 200 of them are men so our men serve and are very visible so if dad's coming to church the family's coming to church um so Very similar, but just more. And it's it's a fun church to be part. It's very familial, like very much a family. And and people feel welcome when they come. They're loved on. They're cared for. And I and. I started with one employee. We have about 40 employees now. And so I've made a lot of mistakes, but I sure have learned a lot. And the church that I lead today is much different than it was in 1996. Now, I want to talk a little bit about the journey that you've been on because the journey to me is more important than the result. So I'm throwing a caveat here because what I want our audience to hear is that the purpose of our ministry and the purpose of this particular podcast is not to say every church needs to be a church of 2,000 plus. That's not the goal. The goal is not to create mega churches or big churches. The goal is to create healthy, disciple-making churches. And It doesn't really matter, you know, the scale or the size, as long as the heart, the intention and the culture behind what you're doing is God honoring. And so I know I've heard your story before. We've had conversations about this. And I know that, you know, you've told me that before. I've pastored every size of church that you can imagine. Well, yes, you have, you know, nothing smaller than 50 or 60 people. But otherwise, yeah. You've pretty much every size of church, but you've only pastored one church, which is a really cool story. Not many men can say that. So with that caveat, the goal is not to take every church and make it a big church. The goal is to take churches that are stuck or stagnant or in decline and help them to find a healthy way forward. I believe that every church ought to be making new disciples, discipling those disciples and sending and equipping those disciples. And when I look at your church, that's what I see you doing. So I want to rewind a little bit and talk a little bit about the journey. Talk a little bit about some of the cultural challenges that you had through the decades that you've now been almost 30 years, almost three decades. Maybe describe a little bit of some of the cultural shifts that have happened in your church and maybe even in the community of Goshen over the course of those 30 years and how you kind of navigated some of those cultural shifts. Yeah, I would begin by saying, I personally believe that there's two engines that should drive the local church. And so I would say prayer and evangelism. And I believe if your people are on mission praying to God, and if your people are on mission sharing about God, sharing about Jesus and the gospel, when I say that where that becomes a priority, like everything, every meeting that you have, Everything that you do is birthed in prayer, is precipitated in prayer. That's where the life change comes because it's not in a program. It's not in something that you're bringing in, a speaker or a guest. So that was one of the early things that I really, and I would say then we collectively as an elder team went after was prayer. we did some of the basics. Like we still have Wednesday night prayer encounter where we, we commit an hour to prayer and, and we'll have 50 to 75 people that are committed to Wednesday night, just praying for the church, praying for people, praying for ministries. And, and Bart, I would say that as we look at how the Lord has worked, the primary reason that God is alive and active and working in Goshen is because we We're a church that prays and not it's not the prayer. It's the God we pray to. So culturally, how things have changed initially tradition, very much a traditional church. That thing means that that means so many different things in so many contexts. But we I. I long for us to be a worshiping church when we we got here and a church that was on mission evangelistically and a praying church. So we made some changes, some really hard changes. And what I mean by that is we emphasize those. So so how has it changed through the years? Culturally, same people. But if you walked into Grace Community today, our people share their faith in the workplace. They're inviting people in their homes. It's there's a sense of it. We expect not demand or presume that we're going to see change lives and people are going to come to Christ. And there might be someone sitting beside you that Sunday that have invited someone that's seeking God. So it's not uncommon to have people searching, seeking new believers. I love I tell people I love dirty diapers. There should be we should be changing diapers a lot with new believers. And honestly, that's what keeps my fire high is seeing new believers come to Christ. So in light of that, you have to have ministries that then disciples. So One of our primary ministries is Fight Club, and we do that twice a year for our men. And so 10-week journey at a time, two times a year. Every day they're reading a chapter in the Bible. They're memorizing scripture. They have challenges and assignments that they're sharing their faith. They're living on mission. They're loving their families. They're held accountable. They're in squads. They have accountability partners. Same with our women. And same with our children and youth. there's an emphasis on reaching the children too. So there was a shift that took place in, I would say in our church, people cared about lost people, but people really care about lost people now. And so that's a real emphasis for us, Bart. Let's talk a little bit about dirty diapers. And, you know, I'm going to make some presuppositions about the church that you were called to because a lot of the churches that I get a chance to walk a renewal journey with look like the church that you took on 28 years ago. And one of the things that I know about a lot of these churches is that typically there isn't a whole lot of obvious mess. Things typically are relatively organized. Relationships might be long time, but a lot of times they're relatively surface level. There aren't a lot of people attending or participating in the church who are walking in with a whole lot of baggage that sort of creates the mess that we talk about. Certainly not a lot of unbelieving or pre-Christian people in the room. So as you were leading your church, perhaps from a church that looked relatively tidy, somewhat traditional, pretty organized, everybody sort of knew their place and had their place. They all had their pews that they sat in every Sunday and they knew which Bible studies they attended and which ones they didn't, which translation they were going to read and which ones they weren't, you name it. As you started... encountering people who brought maybe some more challenges, some more mess, some things that sort of started to stir things up a little bit. How did your congregation respond to that? How did you help them move from being a group of people that was maybe a little more inward focused to actually having this outward facing heart and posture to be accepting of people who didn't necessarily live and look like them? That's, man, that's a great question. I think If we can get our church to that point, and I think it's possible, I would begin. I don't think it can happen unless the lead pastor or the leadership team is living a life on mission. Instead of talking about it, we need to be doing it. So I would pray that it was a prayer of mine. Lord, let me lead someone to Christ today. And so a couple of things I did personally, I found out that our community, when I moved here, they loved NASCAR. I mean, they were nuts about NASCAR. And so I realized if I'm going to connect with the men in our community, I better become a NASCAR fan. So I became a Jeff Gordon fan, start watching races and soon became as committed to them as some of the other guys were. I wanted to be involved in the community. So I started coaching baseball, basketball and football. It gave me an opportunity. I have there are people come to grace now that still know me as Coach Brown. So it. Instead of just talking about living on mission, I knew I asked God, God, show me how I can. And so then I asked, Lord, please, God, give me stories that I can share from one on ones or Sunday mornings of how you use me to bring. And so God gave me some pretty messed up people and. we invited them to church and NASCAR fans, just name it, you know, parents of sports team neighbors that I live with. I led three of my neighbors that in our street, you'll hear them. They can tell the story. Pastor moved in. They didn't want anything to do with me. So I started helping them cut wood and, you know, doing yard work and give me a chance to lead them to Christ. So when I started me by God's grace, it wasn't me. It was God. leading people to Christ and me invited them. It's like that made it much easier for other people to come. And so we celebrated that. So all of a sudden they started seeing these new faces and that, that creates a momentum and excitement. Like, Oh wow. Like these people can come to Christ and maybe I can lead someone to Christ too. So I'll go back to what initially said, it's got to start with you. And yeah, You know, Smith Wigglesworth, who's not part of our, in fact, I just ordered his biography. Guys like him challenged me. He prayed every day. God, don't let me go to bed at night until I lead someone to Christ. He led 365 people to the Lord. And one night he didn't lead someone to the Lord. It was 11 o'clock at night. And he said he had made a commitment. God, I'm not going to go to sleep until I lead someone to Christ. So he went down to the bus station, sat on a park bench, and God brought him someone. So I think it's got to begin with us. And so because it was, they were coming because Pastor Jim invited them. What are they going to say? well, pastor brought these people, so we better love them. So that was one of the ways. Did you have concerns in the early days when you were reaching people who were far from God and inviting them into your spiritual family experience, inviting them into a church service or inviting them into relationship with other people in the church? Did you have concerns about how they would fit in or what their perceptions might be? Oh, sure. I think you do initially. Part of it, you want to protect them. Yeah. And so, yeah. So but throughout a sermon, I would I would often say, hey, I got James with me today. Hey, he's my neighbor. Make sure you say hi to him. And so I was. unbeknownst to them, I was saying, Hey, he's accepted, accept him and love him. So I really worked hard to, um, guard and protect these new seekers or believers. And, um, so yeah, I, um, I, I didn't want them to come and like be judged or, you know, be looked down upon because they got whatever it is. Everyone has their thing, their clothing, their dress, their I can remember leading the guy to Christ. He was a local realtor and he started coming and for about six, seven weeks he was coming. And finally he made a decision for Christ. And back in the day, I used to greet people when they left the church. And I remember a Sunday, because we had, we progressed, our church was getting filled with these people that were far from God. He left the service that day, shook my hand, there's people in line. He said, hey, pastor, that was a hell of a sermon. And that's him. And it probably was for him. And he didn't think anything of that. But in that moment, I knew that we had arrived at an accepting community when no one in that circle said anything about that. They were just grateful he was there. So, yeah, it took time and it doesn't happen overnight. Birth in prayer and then celebrating the new lives. I think that's important, too. I'm going to kind of detour us here and ask you some questions about something that wasn't on the notes that I sent you in advance, but you're good at this, so you'll be able to handle this. You brought up the fact that while you were preaching, you might mention the friend that you brought. This is one thing that I've noted about your preaching over the years is that when you preach, it is obvious to me that you have an expectation that there are people in the room who are not yet following Jesus. Right. So a lot of pastors and a lot of preachers coming out of seminary, coming out of their homiletics classes, coming out of the churches that they've been in, which may not have ever had seeking or pre-Christian people in them. Their sermons tend to focus primarily on the person who is already following Jesus without a whole lot of regard for people in the room who might be there kicking the tires of faith for the very first time. Can you talk a little bit, I mean, I know because I've known of you for so long and we've been acquaintances for so long. I just know your heart is motivated to reach people who are far from God. So I know that that's built into what you do and why you do it. But can you talk a little bit to the pastor who's out there who's maybe never really... it contemplated how to craft a sermon that's designed to accomplish both things, disciple the disciple, but communicate to the person who's still exploring what it means to be a disciple of Jesus. Yeah. I would say one of the ways that we began that, this, that is even before the Sunday morning, I will often say in meetings that I'm in that someone needs to have the voice of the lost, right? And there was a time, Bart, actually, where we would bring an empty chair into meetings, any meetings that was grace that one Sunday I had people come forward and write the name of a lost person on this chair in silver Sharpie. And we carried that chair sometimes even out in the community to restaurants. And then we were as we were planning our week or planning our event or our ministry arm online. would say okay we're speaking to save people someone needs to speak with the voice of the loss what would be something they would be asking about this meeting what would be something that they would be asking about this gathering and so we tried our best to walk into that sunday morning or walk into whatever we were playing in that event and say how would a lost person respond to this So there's already been built into us this piece that, okay, we've thought about how can we craft this? Well, Jesus spoke to saved and unsaved people at the same time. And so naturally speaking, that's something that I think about all the time, knowing full well that we're not just here, my opinion is we're not just here for a holy huddle, but we're supposed to take what we know to someone else. So I try to bring a real life illustration. and and I try to tell my story or someone else's story that was far from god and then help someone that's far from god say oh yeah that's where I'm at and then talk about the gospel and how the Jesus changes us. So I I've been doing it for so long that I don't even realize I'm doing it. It's just a part. It's become part of my life that my wife will tell you, Jim, you could lead a fence post to the Lord. You're always thinking about. But but I'm always thinking about it. So it's become just natural in my language. Like this morning when I got up. pray with my wife or headed out, Lord, let me lead someone to Christ today. So I think about that as I'm prepping my sermon, I'm sitting in my desk right now and I'm thinking, I wonder how a Christ follower or someone far from God would understand sanctification. Can I say it in such a way that doesn't have the sanctification on the end of it? We have these big words that we use that The people far from God have no clue what they mean. And you can say them in a modern way that helps them understand. Yeah, I appreciate that. My wife and I, at this time, we're part of a church plant. We're hosting a Bible study in our home. We had a new couple that joined us a couple of weeks ago for our Bible study because my wife met them and invited them because that's what she does. And they came in and they sat down on the couch across the room. They came to a Bible study without Bibles. And when they didn't pull out the YouVersion app, I knew that... that they were newbies to this. I handed them some extra Bibles that I had sitting there and it became crystal clear that they were going to need a page number to find the text that we were reading. And after having done this Bible study that we were doing for a number of months and everybody in the room already being a Jesus follower, all of a sudden I realized that the context of everything that we're doing and everything that we're saying has to change. Um, and which is the desire of my heart. The desire of my heart is to always have people in the room who are not yet following Jesus. If, if I ever get to the place where the only, the only people that we have gathered with are people who are all already following Jesus. I don't feel like I'm doing my job as well as I should be as an evangelist, as a, as a servant of the Lord. I always want to have that eye out for people who are far from God. And, um, but a lot of the churches, um, that are going through a season of renewal, a season of revitalization, it's probably been a long time since they've had people in the room who are truly unchurched or pre-Christian. They might have people who are churched but not yet following Jesus. That happens quite a bit, right? People who are doing the right things but aren't necessarily believing the right things. And So I appreciate your heart in that. And I'm going to link in our show notes to the sermon page on the Grace Community Church website, because if there are younger leaders who are still working on their craft and really trying to develop sermon content that can hit both audience, I think you're someone that... I think you're someone that does that well. And I'd love, but by the way, if you ever listened to one of Pastor Jim's sermons, don't be surprised that he talks loud and gets really energized, excited and emotional in his sermons, which I'm sure is one of the reasons that people come back. You were a very passionate, very passionate person, very passionate leader. Consider this for a moment. And this is something I often thought about, you know, it's God that draws, God that saves, right? And he started all this, he sent Jesus. And Jesus' mission was to seek and save the lost. I believe, this is my opinion, that God is looking for greenhouses or churches that are going to share the gospel so that if the gospel is presented, whether it's in a men's group, women's group, children, youth, or adult setting, that lost people, there's an assumption made that you're going to share somehow with your life. Why would God send people to churches that that aren't greenhouses to share the gospel and people often ask me why how come so many people come to christ at grace community I said because god sends them there because he for some reason he believes that if I send a lost person there That they're going to hear the gospel and they're going to have a chance to respond to Christ. Why would God send lost people that he sent his son Jesus to churches that aren't going to share the gospel and give people a chance? Like he gave his life for it. So he so picture if you can. I've often wondered as God looks down, he's looking for churches, gatherings, greenhouses of people. That will share the gospel. Otherwise, why would he send lost people there? So I pray, Lord, may we always be a place that you look at and say, I'm going to send lost people there because they're going to hear the gospel. That is very, very well said. I love that. Absolutely love that. And I think, you know, you're you're man, you're on to something there again. We're we're not the ones that manufacture things. Salvation, right? It's the Lord that brings the harvest. We're just called to be the workers in the harvest field. But we've got to show up when we're supposed to show up. We've got to have the tools in our hand that we need. And we have to have the posture towards the people that God is bringing so that we can effectively receive them and lovingly and graciously share the gospel with them. Wouldn't you do that? I mean, for your own children, if you wanted your child to come to Christ, And you would do whatever it took. Why would you send your children to a place that you know would never get an opportunity to hear the gospel and get a chance to be called to it? I'm going to send them somewhere that they're going to hear it. And so I believe God looks for churches like that. Yeah. I'm going to, as we get kind of close to our time ending here, I want to kind of fire just a few little one-off questions to you about your time there at Grace Community Church. And again, I didn't prep you for these questions, so we'll see what kind of answers you give me here. You look back on your 28 years. Can you think of a time or a season in which you realized that you were on to something or that the Lord was really anointing your church and blessing you in a way that maybe you hadn't expected? Is there any particular season where you just kind of woke up and went, wow, this is turning out differently than maybe I expected? Yeah, I go back to a really hard time when I'm a very highly relational person. a person and I value my own family, my children. I love face to face. And there was a season in our ministry here at Grace where we had a membership Sunday and people came across the stage that were coming in for membership. And I remember Bart looking and thinking, I know who they are, but I don't know them. And it was hard for me. And at that point, God gives us all gifts differently. I remember names and I probably at that point, we were about a thousand people and I knew 90% of the names of people in our church. I work hard at remembering names. Um, and also send birthday, uh, greetings to everyone on their birthday on social media. But I remember looking there and thinking, Lord, I don't know if I can continue. Um, because I don't know these people and it was really hard. That was a hard. Um, and so I went home and grappled with that and talked to my wife and I said, honey, I, I don't know if I can continue on because I want to marry these people and bury them and know their children and pray with them and for them. And it's too big for me. It's too big for me. I can't remember and know them. And so I prayed that week and I actually thought about resigning. And I thought if it was up to, honestly, if it was up to Ann and I, I would pastor a church of 100 people because I know all about them. And, you know, I love them. family relationships. And that week I prayed and I fasted and I just, Lord, you don't have to speak to me. Maybe you're calling me to go out and plant another church and start again. And so that Sunday, the following Sunday, the Lord spoke to me that week. I sat on the end of the stage and I told our people, I said, I want to let you know, I thought about resigning this week. And here's why. Because I I realized I can't know you the way I want to know you. I long to know your children, your grandchildren. I look forward to marrying them and burying you, but I can't do it. And I realized in that moment, that God had finally said, Jim, you got to push outside of yourself. And he told me that week and through scripture reading that I would lead those that were leading. And so that was a turning point for me, Bart, a real big one, and almost freedom too, of developing leaders that would lead others and realizing that it's okay, Jim, that you don't know everybody. And that from that moment on our church just took off. Um, I released a whole bunch and it w it was good for me personally. And still there's moments like, um, I wish I knew him better, but that was a freeing time for me. Um, and, and I would say another pivotal time was any time, um, I say this, we must be willing to look stupid for God. And what I mean by that is when we plan something, if God doesn't show up, then we're going to look really stupid. So a lot of our planning for events is okay. we can program we can plan and we know this is going to happen but in order for this to happen god's going to have to show up and if he doesn't show up we're going to look really stupid and there have been sundays where we have planned for an altar call evangelism sunday and I go into the service thinking I'm going to look really stupid if no one comes and I finally got over that fear of it's not about me it's about jesus and I think a lot of pastors struggle with that fear That what if no one responds? Listen, pastor friends, whoever's listening here, it doesn't matter what people think. God is the one that draws. Just be faithful. And I remember we started seeing an altar responses like this is all credit to God. Like we had 237 people respond to Christ at Easter this year. And we bought 300 giveaways. But we would look really stupid with 300 giveaways on stage if no one came forward. So that's when I began to see, wow, God, you're doing something special here. And may I lead well. I'd point at maybe a principle in both of those examples you just shared and say, I think what comes to my mind is we have to remind ourselves that it's not about us. Amen. So as you're going through that season where you realize you, Pastor Jim, do not know everybody by name. You don't know their kids' names. You don't know what they do for a living. You don't know what part of town they live in. And God says, Pastor Jim, it's really not about you anyway. I've called you here to do the best that you can to shepherd them, to steward that responsibility to the best you're able. But as I think you shared there that, you know, your staff has grown from one to 40. And now you have very close, tight personal relationships with a staff that you have an opportunity to lead. And it's through them that a lot more ministry is able to be done at a scalable level. Now, not every pastor that's listening to this podcast will lead a staff of 40. Some of them may lead a staff of four. Some of them may be solo pastors in their pastorate from now until the Lord calls them home. That's not the point. The point that I want to make is that none of this is ever about us. And I do love the fact that you said, sometimes we have to be willing to look the fool, not be foolish. There's plenty of scripture that tells us not to be, but sometimes in our fervor and in our faith, You know, I think sometimes the testing that God puts us through is to demonstrate that we're willing to do whatever it takes to help people come to know him personally, even if we don't look our best in that moment. And there are a lot of lessons I regret that the Lord has had to teach me in my own personal ministry and personal life journey there. But yeah, I appreciate you sharing that. Now, you almost resigned from your position because things were going so well, according to world standards. Things were going really well. Was there ever a season that you thought about resigning because things were not going well? No, I can't say there has been. There have been really, really tough seasons. I think the most challenging thing, and I would say for my wife even more so, is when Church to us is a family. And, you know, we left family East Coast and left Michigan. I left Maryland. And so we left grandparents, cousins, you know, siblings and moved to Indiana. And so our children grew up without grandparents around, without cousins. And so our church became our family. And so when people move on to other churches. For us, it's like family's leaving. And so to them, it's just they're hearing from God. And so those were always challenging times as people move on. And I would say harder for my wife. I adjusted better for it. uh better with it because I just it's just a part of the reality but for her that was really difficult when she my 25th um anniversary year she was putting together a photo album of all the events of you know the 25 years and she started seeing photos of people who were no longer with us and and bart that was really hard for my wife um probably one of the toughest seasons she had ever been through and me too and I remember That season, she has told me this often. She said, she said, Jim, I don't know if I can go on because people just keep that I've known are moving on and have moved on. And I told her, I said, honey, I will leave ministry for you. And if this is too hard for you, then it's too hard for me. And I wanted her to know that that she's my number one. And that was a defining point. For us in ministry, unbeknownst to me, that statement I made, which she has alluded to often, really let her know that she was still my number one. And that was the most important thing, that ministry wasn't more important than my marriage to my wife. I think that's something that every pastor, every church leader needs to hear and be reminded of, that we have a responsibility and a stewardship of home first. And the investments that we make in our marriage and in the relationships that we have with our family are really the relationships that give us, outside of our relationship with Jesus, it's foundational for our ability to do ministry and to be doing ministry. sustainable ministry. I think that's the, I use that word sustainable a lot when I'm talking to pastors and church leaders, because there are a lot of things that we can do for short spurts. You know, you're a runner and I think you run longer distances, which is very different than sprinting, right? Yeah. When you're running long distances, you do have to pace yourself. You do have to recognize that I've committed to a certain duration here in a certain period of time. And I can't burn all my gas at the beginning. And I also have to prepare for the fact that maybe there are going to be some obstacles or things that come up along the way that I wasn't necessarily prepared for and be able to respond and react to those things in a healthy way. When people leave the church, Regardless of whether you're pastoring a church that's going through a season of revitalization or a season of significant growth, I don't know any pastor whose word is salt who doesn't feel that a little bit personally. Sometimes people leave because of job changes, vocational changes, health changes. There's all kinds of reasons that people go. There are always people that leave, and you always sort of feel... that maybe they're leaving because of you. There's something you didn't do or something you did do. And it's really difficult. It's really difficult to not take personally. And I like to remind myself in those seasons that, the pain that I feel, the sorrow or the regret or the sadness, the frustration, whatever it is, whatever the emotion is that is attached to us, I feel that way because that's the way that God feels when people reject him. I have to continuously remind myself of that, that these emotions that I'm feeling, I'm feeling because I am made in the image of God. And God has a grieving heart for anyone who rejects him, who walks away from him, who isn't responding to him favorably. And it isn't about me and I don't ever want it to be about me. I want it to be about my redeemer, about Jesus, about pointing people to him. But I know that the emotional experience that I'm having, I'm having because I'm made in his image and I'm feeling it on a microcosm scale for the way he actually feels it. Right. So I think that's a very interesting thing because, you know, if you're revitalizing a church, you're turning a church around, you know, you might be leading a church of 15 or 20 or 30 people right now. The statistics will probably tell you that five, 10, 15 years down the road, most of those people will probably not still be with you. You know, I'm coaching a young man right now who's basically got an elder in his church who's part of the elder team that called him into this church, but is already telling them he's probably going to move on because, well, he would prefer sitting under preaching under a different translation of the Bible than what he's getting. And it's kind of hard not to take that personally. It is. It's hard not to take that personally, but at the same time, we can only control what we can control. And we can control our prayer life, our worship life, our integrity, the choices that we make. And I think that you've kind of spoken to a lot of those things today. As we wrap up, let me ask a couple more questions of you. As a leader and someone who has been growing in your own personal leadership for decades, decades now. Who do you listen to? What do you read? Where are the places that you go to sharpen your own saw to be a better leader, to be the best leader that God has called you to be? I love to read. Here's a really simple one that kind of gets lost in I read our local newspaper. I read it every day. And I encourage our staff to, if we don't know what's happening in our own community, the very community that we're supposed to be reaching, there are times I pray through our newspaper. Something happened to people. So I've subscribed to the Goshen News. I have it on my phone. I actually read a literal newspaper that gets delivered to our house. But you'd be surprised, like I watch the sports section to see who hit hits, who hit home runs. I can talk to mom and dad and say, hey, your boy had two hits or your girl had two hits. That's my way to stay connected to the community. I what do I read first? I began with my hometown guys. Pastors read your local newspaper so you know what's happening. You know how to pray. That would be a big one. I i read um my goal was to read 50 books a year so I read a lot I've been reading a lot my whole life like right now I have three books I got the disappearing church by mark sayers wrestling war by ben stewart praying for your elephant by adam stat mount miller and I just ordered that smith's wigglesworth I'm a constant guy on amazon reading all kinds of stuff I listen I follow a lot of leaders on twitter x whatever you want to call it Relevant Magazine. I like Louis Giglio. I enjoy J.D. Greer. I love reading anything Mark Batterson has put to print. I think he has an understanding of the prayer world. I read a lot. I follow a lot on social media, Gospel Coalition. If you were to open me up, there's a whole bunch of a whole bunch of other people inside of me. I also love following people who preach and share are unashamed about sharing the gospel. And, you know, that that that make the call, like will make the ask. I tell guys this a lot. I'll keep this short. Why are we so afraid to make the ask when it comes to salvation? We do it for cars. We do it for homes. We do it for real estate. We do it for stores. But when it comes to closing the deal for evangelism, why are we so afraid to say, hey, would you like to follow Jesus right now? If so, let's do it. So there's a whole bunch of other people inside of me. I'm just a prolific learner and reader. I enjoy taking as much information in. I totally appreciate that. That's awesome. If people wanted to connect with you and they wanted to find out more about your ministry and things you're doing, and I know that you're really passionate about a fight club. We didn't really dive into the details of that. Maybe we'll do another episode sometime in the future and talk specifically about fight club and how your church is reaching men. Because again, watching from the outside, you're onto something and it seems to be transforming a lot of lives. How can people find information about that or connect with you online? well you can go to fightclub414.com you can go to our church website gc.church you can follow me on social media jim brown on facebook or brown bites on x or instagram you'll soon find out a lot of my posts are about family a lot of my posts are about people that I care about and and then a lot about grace community church Well, appreciate that. And I'll link to all of those things in the show notes of this episode. Jim Brown from Grace Community Church in Goshen, Indiana. Thanks so much for hanging out with me today. It's been a blessing, Bart. God bless you.
