Eyes on Jesus Podcast episode 35: 7 church trends that will disrupt 2024 part 1

In this episode of the Eyes on Jesus podcast, we dive into an examination of church trends projected to disrupt the church in 2024. We specifically discuss the diminishing presence of ‘stable churches’, the growing presence of millennials, the incoming influence of Generation Z, and the increasing importance of digital components in discipleship. We emphasize the need for churches to adapt to these trends, engage with younger generations, and utilize digital media for discipleship. Be sure to check back next episode for the second part!

For the blog we reference from Carey Nieuwhof go to https://careynieuwhof.com/church-trends-2024/

Below is the transcript from the show, it may not be completely accurately translated

For the video episode of the show, go to https://youtu.be/Ui-_uhlSi5M?si=dLz4yXLWwT3NEvMA

You can find the Eyes on Jesus Podcast with Drew and Tim on Spotify and Apple Podcasts

Episode 35- 7 church trends part 1

[00:00:00] Tim: Well, welcome to the eyes on Jesus podcast with Drew and Tim. We’re so excited to be with you today. We have an exciting topic for you, a two parter. So yeah, we encourage you to listen to today, ask questions, give us your comments, but we’re going to dive into an exciting topic for trends for this year for churches.

And we’ll talk more about that. But before we do Drew, how are you doing today? Good to see you.

[00:00:24] Drew: Good to see you and good to catch back up with you after the holidays. I’m doing well. It is a cold but sunny day here in North Carolina. What’s it like in Arizona?

[00:00:35] Tim: Right now we’re like at 70 flat, so

[00:00:38] Drew: it’s pretty nice.

Yeah. 70 and it’s sunny. Cold days

[00:00:42] Tim: of 50s, but now we’re back in the 70s. Cold

[00:00:44] Drew: days of 50s. Yeah, so it’s 50s, so 50s the high today. And this weekend, you know, we’re talking about church trends this weekend, it’s going to be like 19 degrees. When Sunday service happens. And so we’re going to have some hot chocolate for people because the church trend would be to wake up, find out it’s cold outside and not come to church.

So we’re going to, we’re going to get that. We’re going to get that ready.

[00:01:09] Tim: There’s a lot of times it closed down this past weekend because of the snow in Texas and all over the place. And then I saw a video of the, what was it, the, one of the games, the bills game or something with the family, like pushing through like these, you know, thick snow in the seats.

And I shared that and I was like, man, I wish Christians were more, you know, that eager to come to church as the fans were. Right. All these comments are like, Oh, you don’t need church. And I can be a Christian and not go to church. So that led to some interesting conversations, but

[00:01:41] Drew: I’m sure. Yeah. I never have understood what people can push past for things that.

Ultimately will be irrelevant, but that’s another, maybe we could do that as a podcast episode sometime today we’re talking about something really cool. We’re talking about, like you said, church trends and I’m really looking forward to getting into this because I’m curious as to what you’re seeing and curious as to.

Not just what’s happening at your church, but what you’re seeing, you know, globally here. And are we like in alignment with where church is going? Am I seeing things you’re not seeing? You’re seeing things I’m not seeing? Does this article see things that maybe we need to get a move on? So yeah I’m pretty pumped about our conversation.

[00:02:24] Tim: Tell us about your cat allergy.

[00:02:27] Drew: Oh, yeah. So I just did mention that. So your cat came in the room and I told you about my cat. So last Sunday. This is great. Last Sunday, I got done with with the second service and you know, like I do I’m hugging people, you know, giving fives to people, shaking hands, kissing babies, all that fun stuff, right?

So I get to the back and start talking with this young lady and she says, What’s up with your eye? And I was like, well, what? She goes, what’s up with your eye? And I was like, I don’t know what’s up with my eye? She was like, it’s really red. I was like, oh, geez. And I turned and looked at somebody else and they were like, gosh.

They were like, go, your eye is so red. I was like, okay, hold on. I’m gonna leave. So I was, in my mind, I’m like, did I just do a sermon and stand in front of everybody with like a huge eye? I was like, what are we doing? So I ran to the restroom, looked in the mirror, and dude, like, watering, and as red as can be, swollen underneath, and then, like, my tongue started swelling up, and I started feeling like an itchy throat, and I’m like, oh my gosh, I’m having an allergic reaction to something.

For the life of me, we couldn’t figure out what the allergic reaction could have been to. Like, was it a perfume that somebody was wearing? Whatever, right? So I’m sitting now on the bathroom floor with a washcloth around my neck because I think I’m going to pass out. That’s the level I got to. And out of my eye, I pull out a cat

hair.

I hugged someone who owns cats, and it was on their clothes, and somehow, I’m a short dude, so when I go in for the hug, sometimes I’m only shoulder level, somehow, a cat hair got literally in my eyeball. And I swear to you, I about, like, blacked out, like, I, I about faded. It put, this little cat hair put me on my butt so fast, and it was such a great reminder of.

How strong I think I am, but ultimately how weak I can be. And yeah, like volunteers had to come and help me stand up, like had to help me get to my car. I had to make sure I was good to drive, like all these things. It was a, it was an ordeal. It was certainly not something that I want to do again. But yeah, like dude cat like I can’t do the cat thing.

I can’t do it. So whenever somebody says hey Drew do you want to come over? Do you want to do dinner? Do you want to hang out something like that? I have two questions. The first one is do you own a cat and then the second one is what are you making? That’s it. That’s how it works. So so yeah, that’s my cat story.

But anyways

[00:05:14] Tim: That’ll humble you a little, a little hair. will just take you down a little hair at the gym and start like sniffing some cat hair a little by little and grow to the point where you can take one in the eye and not let it take you.

[00:05:27] Drew: No, I want nothing to do. No, I want nothing to do

with it.

Yeah, nothing to do with it. Routine. No.

[00:05:34] Tim: We got away to Colorado after Christmas and it was beautiful. We went to little town called Silverton. It was a 600 person town. Like it was just super small and surrounded by these mountains covered in snow. Little ski resort town. And the tricky part was that there’s these passes to get there, like one coming up from Durango, that’s an hour and one coming up from Telluride on the other end, that’s an hour.

And these, this pass was like sheer cliff, icy cliff, no guardrails driving through. And thankfully there wasn’t like a blizzard because they can shut down these roads. And once you’re in the town. Like my mind is like a planner and sometimes fearful and I’m like, there’s no hospital in this town.

There’s no car repair place. Like if we get stuck or if we have to, if we meet, have an emergency, we get to drive an hour through the pass to Durango in the middle of the night. Right. So anyway, apart from all that, it was very beautiful. Recommended. It’s like one of those towns you look at it. Looks like it belongs like in a hallmark movie or in a postcard.

Yeah. I saw your

[00:06:37] Drew: pictures, man. And some of your videos looked beautiful.

[00:06:40] Tim: Yeah. And then we went over to four corners and stood in four States at the same time. And that was interesting, but also a very quick and you have to pay to do it. And I drove to pay to go stand somewhere. Yeah. To stand in the middle of a circle and say, Hey, I’m in four States at once.

Now I’m going to leave. And I drove up and it’s like 8. And I’m like, well, okay, whatever I get up to pay. And they’re like, how many in your car is like four? And they’re like, okay, that’ll be 32. Oh my goodness. Like I was okay with paying 8 for the car, but I’m not okay paying 30 for it to literally walk up like five minutes and then walk away.

So anyway,

[00:07:19] Drew: yeah, I’m all set on that.

[00:07:20] Tim: Can say I did it, but that’s what you can expect if you are thinking about going to four corners. So what we’re talking about today comes from Carey Newhoff’s blog and he actually does this every year. I’ve not really followed it other years, but he has links to the blog.

We’ll put a link in the show notes. He has a link to all the church trends every year. He kind of comes out with these are the trends he’s seeing. And the title is seven church trends that will disrupt 2024. So these aren’t just like, you know, Church is going to grow. The church is going to read the Bible.

The church is going to preach about Jesus. Like, obviously things are going to still happen that have happened, but these are disrupting trends that are going to take place in 2024 supposedly. And so, short of having Carey on the podcast, which, Hey, if you’re listening, you’re welcome. Anytime to come on.

Absolutely. I love his podcast. It talks to church leaders and It’s really, it really one of like my top five that I listened to consistently. And so he has people on during the month of January talking about these trends. And so I thought, Hey, why don’t we talk about these trends? Since no one asked us, we’ll give you our opinion on them.

And So we’re going to do a two parter end of part two, we’re going to share our thoughts on some trends that we’re seeing. And so stay tuned for that as well, but any thoughts before we kick these off?

[00:08:33] Drew: No I’m ready to dive in. Let’s hit the first one.

[00:08:36] Tim: All right. First one.

[00:08:37] Drew: So he mentions the stable church has become an endangered species.

Now, what he’s speaking to here is. Usually, if a church is like plateauing, staying consistent that can be a good sign. In fact, there’s many churches that’s their story. They run, I mean, most of the times that I’ve seen it, they run 70 to 150 and every year they lose 10 or 12 people and they gain 10 or 12 people.

The next year rolls around, they lose 8 or 9 people, they gain 8 or 9 people. And so all the bills are being paid, people are being blessed, communities being impacted. So we’re all set. We’re all good. And what Carey’s saying here is that. Is an endangered species and ultimately is going to shift to that kind of church is going to lose ground.

And so churches in 2024, they’re either growing or they’re declining. And it sounds to me based on what he wrote here, there’s really no in between.

[00:09:46] Tim: Yeah, it’s not just business as usual for churches. You’re either in a state of. incline or a state of decline. And one of his stats is 54 percent of churches are in moderate or significant decline.

And that means over half of American churches, the writing’s on the wall. So if you’re in the decline phase like what would you do if you’re, if you’re decreasing by that much, either moderately or significantly as a church leader, what do you do?

[00:10:13] Drew: Well, I mean, if you, Really seen decline, then you have to ask yourself, and these are hard questions to ask yourself as a leader, but it has to start with you, right? Like you’re the leader of the church. So the first question’s gotta be to yourself and you need to ask yourself if like, you’re the guy at that particular place.

To lead the change so the change is inevitable if people are leaving then it’s like, okay Something’s got to change you got to start with yourself. Am I the guy? Right to lead that change. Am I going to be the best one to do that if the answer is yes Well, then cool, then you got a great news Now you have to figure out what the appropriate change is and get that rolling And so I think that’s where I would start different churches are going to have different answers But yeah, that’s where I would start.

What about you? What do you think is important to think through in that?

[00:11:10] Tim: I think, yeah. Assessing yourself first and not just blaming whatever, but like just. Do some really inward looking thoughts on what’s happening and is it related to you? And have you changed over time? Cause if you’ve been at a place for too long, you can just get complacent.

And I love Craig Groeschel has a leadership podcast. He talked about decision makers. What do decision makers do? And one of the things that I’ve been thinking about for a while now, since the podcast came out a few weeks ago, is that what, Is to ask yourself, what would someone else do if they had your position tomorrow?

What would someone else, what would a good leader do if they took over your position tomorrow? What would they do? And so I was thinking like, what, you know, Craig Groeschel, if he comes into my church and leads it. What would he do tomorrow that he would come in and be like, why the heck are you guys doing this?

And that’s a good way to just think about, you know, and I always tell my team at church, you know, to always ask, why do we do what we do? Is it because we’ve always done it? Is it because we’ve just This is just what we do for 10 years now. But does it actually make sense? Does it actually make sense for where we’re at as a church and the vision that we’re going into have those tough conversations.

And so if that means you need to cancel a program that’s been going on for a decade, then that’s what you do. You need to hire someone. Someone that, you know, someone’s doing the job of three people. And if you need to hire somebody and he’s like, well, we don’t have the funds for it. Well, you better get the funds or you’re going to burn that person out or you’re not going to have those programs anymore.

And so when you think about if someone else takes over your job tomorrow, if someone else was the husband in your family, if someone else was the CEO of your job, like what would they do differently if they took over tomorrow, if that person’s a strong leader. And I was also talking to a church leader as well recently.

And he was moving on from the church and I was asking him like, Hey, you know, there’s growth. This church is like going where you I have kind of vision to it. And he brought up that he’s kind of like Moses, like he brought it to a point, but he can’t take it into the promised land.

Yeah. And for him to be able to say that and have that awareness of his abilities was a bold move was something to be lauded. And so I think when, if your church is declining to really assess first what are we doing? What are we doing wrong? What are we doing that maybe we did with some veracity five years ago, but that’s kind of died off.

And then after that, if you’ve done that, then you can start to assess like the culture, the area you’re in the programs, the overall deconversion of. America. I mean, there’s a lot of societal trends that will start to affect churches that are declining.

[00:13:51] Drew: I will say this. One thing I’m encouraged by is the stable church becoming an endangered species to me means that relationships are going to be important because like a relationship is always moving forward or backwards.

It’s not just like, oh yeah, no, like we’re just here. Like if you’re pursuing, you’re either pursuing someone or you’re not pursuing them. Yeah. And so I, what this tells me is that. Like, people are going to start having needs for true, authentic community and relationship, and if they’re not getting that, they’re going to leave.

So there is no, like, coming and sticking around and sticking it out to see if, you know, eventually this will all work out. It’s like, no, like, it’s kind of the uh, Tinder style of the dating world. It’s like, we’re going to swipe left. Or swipe right and you’re either the church or you’re not And that means for us like every sunday and everything we put out on social media and everything we do Not saying that you need to have a spirit of excellence But you do need to have a spirit of like this could be the tinder profile This could be the swipe left swipe, right?

This could be the decision maker that somebody has and at the same time like it should put some weight To what we do. Yeah. So, and you know, I’m encouraged. I mean, personally, I’m encouraged by it kind of scares me a little bit to trying to grow a church and there’s a couple Sundays over Sunday that you don’t see growth and you’re wondering, Oh man, am I declining?

But ultimately, like our role as leaders is to cast vision. And once we’ve topped one mountain, we point to the next mountain. So, you know, this is going to require great leaders and churches that don’t have great leaders are probably going to be in the decline.

[00:15:48] Tim: And it really depends, like I said, a lot of where you’re at.

Like if you’re in a liberal city that is rapidly declining, then you really have to have different goals for your church. Like you’re going to be more evangelistic in nature. Maybe you’re going to get out into the city and serve more instead of just like, Hey, we have a building. Why aren’t you showing up?

Right. There’s a part of understanding where you’re at and not expecting just people to cater to you because of the. stigma that church has in a lot of people’s minds right now. And so that’s why there is a de churching, but that’s also why the church needs to step up. And a lot of church growth that is labeled is often because you’re stealing from other churches, right?

Like, a church just closed and like, Hey we just gained 30 people. Well, those were already Christians. That’s not the great commission of converting people to Christ. So

[00:16:32] Drew: we’ve got about 300 percent this year,

[00:16:36] Tim: but two churches closed down. And so you just absorb them. But you know, if you are declining, like look at other churches, like play nicely, but the churches in your area, maybe you can have a partnership.

Maybe you can pull your resources together and have one church. If you’re both declining, like that’s not a bad strategy. Like it’s almost like. Partnership would be great. Almost like, yeah, building the kingdom together. And one of, one part in here too, that Carey said is that many are simply moving from dying churches to vibrant churches.

And so, yeah, if you walk into a service and it looks dead and people aren’t greeting and people aren’t loving and people aren’t even clapping their hands and raising their hands and worship is just going through the motions and people leave. What’s going to keep, what’s going to bring an 18 year old who’s seeking answers for life, what’s going to bring them to your church?

[00:17:24] Drew: Yeah, dead faith is not attractive. Yeah, there’s nothing attractive about a dead spirit, dead faith. And so, you know, our role is to be driven. And our role is to you know, whether we’re in the waiting or whether we’ve been told what’s next, our job is to worship with all of that we have. And be the light of the world, be the salt of the earth.

And if we’re not able to gather together. And get past coffee and donuts, it’s going to be a tough time to really excite people about anything.

[00:18:00] Tim: Cool. Number two, trends that will disrupt 2024. Millennials are the new core of your church. So one of them. Now, are you a millennial? Yeah. Oh, it’s technically.

Yeah, I think the cutoffs 81 and I was born in 80. So is that the cutoff? I have to look it up real quick.

[00:18:17] Drew: I don’t know. I, depending on where you look. Decides if I’m a millennial or not. So I was born in 1986. And my wife was born in an earlier year and she’s in, she says she’s not a millennial, but I am.

[00:18:36] Tim: Yeah. I’m technically Gen X. Millennials are 81 to 96. So millennials have embraced church attendance faster than any other demographics surpassing their attendance levels back in 2019. So millennial attendance is surging, especially among non white millennials. According to a Barna survey, 30 percent of white millennials report attending church regularly post 2020 up from 26 percent pre pandemic, but non white millennials have returned with even greater zeal fully 40 percent of non white millennials say they are attending church post COVID up from 31 percent pre pandemic.

So that’s a good trend. I mean,

[00:19:15] Drew: you know, we’re doing everything we can here

as the spokesperson for millennials, we’re doing everything we can.

[00:19:23] Tim: Yes. What brings you to church, Drew? Like you represent all the millennials. So.

[00:19:29] Drew: Yeah and honestly, like if you look at our church, we are full of millennials. We, honestly, we’re not only full of millennials, but 30 percent of our congregation is under the age of 25 right now.

So we’re also very much gen, is it gen, it’s Gen Z is the next one, right? Yeah, so like we’re, yeah, so we’re very much full of that as well. But yeah, I mean, this just means that this means that things are different when it comes to how you communicate means things are different when it comes to technology and we’ll talk about that in a little bit and and things are different with how you communicate.

Outside of Sunday. And to be real with you, like, you know, the millennial behavior. Okay. I’m part of the millennial behavior. The millennial behavior is anything we look at. We think that there’s a better way to do it. Just being real. I can walk into a restaurant having never owned a restaurant.

And I think I know the best way to run that restaurant. I don’t. Now the difference is I keep my mouth shut. Some of the more famous millennials. Don’t and so that’s how, you know, we just get branded a certain way. Also purpose is really important to us. It’s really important.

That’s one of the reasons the workforce is having such a hard time is because we’re trying to hire millennials and we’re trying to hire them in businesses. And what we’re speaking to is if you’ll put in this much work, you’ll make this much money. What we want to know is what’s the impact. So, yeah.

And I’m, you know, of course, I don’t know how everybody feels, but I think that’s. That’s something that’s got to be made aware to our churches.

[00:21:09] Tim: And I think from, you know, coming off of Gen X and the boomers I think there’s with Millennials. There’s more of the why of why do we do what we do? Like I said before, and not just my parents did it.

My parents did it. And it’s just something we always have done. I think there’s more of the questions. There’s more of the questions of, okay, let’s. Let’s dive into this a little bit. Why do we believe this? Why did I grow up this way? Am I just Christian cause I was born in a Christian household. Like there’s a lot of probing questions that I think need to be addressed by the church and sometimes topics that are avoided.

And so to get answers. You find them in other ways. You find them on social media. You find them asking your liberal friends. And then all of a sudden you go down this path of deconstructing is the word now, you know, we’ll actually talk about that on a future episode because it is something that, you know, what spurs that on is usually a foundation.

That’s not rooted. And Jesus said to build your foundation on him. And when the winds and waves comes you’ll maintain you’ll stand firm. And so if your foundation was never strong to begin with, if you were just riding the coattails of your parents faith then yeah, when the waves of life hit and when you’re faced with the health diagnosis or someone dies, you start to question what is the point of life?

Why am I even here? And if there is no God, then I’m going to just live for myself. And get everything I can. And you know, this trend also talks about that millennials will face one of the biggest wealth transfers in human history. And so they’re going to, and they have been inheriting money.

So they’re going to be a very wealthy segment of society and based on where their values are, is where they’re going to put their money. And so they’re going to invest in things that they relate to. So churches should be nice to your millennials. Cause you know,

[00:22:50] Drew: yeah, absolutely. Yeah, those are all great points.

The third thing that he brought up. I think is really important Gen Z will start to reshape the church. That’s fun to say Gen Z Will start to reshape the church and anyone listening to this is going cool. Yeah. No, that’s great. Okay So, so what that means is you’re going to have to lean in, you’re going to have to ask some questions, you’re going to have to find out what they want, you’re going to have to put them into like opportunities of ownership, you’re going to have to give them responsibility and what happens.

You know, this is part of it and I think one of the best things and listen, I’m, I love bragging on my church. I do. Not because I think I’m getting everything right. I just think our people have saved me from myself a little bit. Like they are, they’re incredible and so I love bragging on our church.

One of the greatest things that we’ve done is the first Sunday of every month. We do what’s called student takeover. This is where students literally do everything. And I mean, everything. Yeah. I had a 16 year old preach a message. The students lead worship, the students do production. The students do guest experience.

The students are with adults in kids ministry and we do it. Every single month the first Sunday of the month and man you want to talk about big Sundays You think easter is important have mom and dad come look at little johnny singing on stage Have mom and dad come watch little johnny serving in the parking lot.

We get moms and dads Grandparents aunts and uncles. They all go to different churches. That’s fine But they show up that Sunday and they know that when we say we believe in reaching the next generation and setting them up and discipling them and trying to make them successful, they know we mean it.

Cause we don’t just say stuff like that. We show it. And now I’ve got like, I had a student pull me to the side the other day and ask if like he could with his phone on Sundays do some social media stuff for us. I’m like, please do. Because I don’t understand TikTok. So I’d love that. Had another guy pull me to the side, Hey, my fellowship of Christian athletes meets on this Tuesday.

And because of some things that I’ve been able to do here at the church, I finally feel confident enough and bold enough to speak. So will you pray for me Tuesday morning? Because I’m going to be speaking to about a hundred kids at my school and telling them about my faith. I’m just like, what? I didn’t do any of that.

I just gave them, I just gave them a place. I just gave them an opportunity. What they do with it is up to them. So yeah, you’ve got to lean into that or we’re gonna have a lot of churches You know, this was my story too Where mom and dad goes to church, the student goes to church, then the student is old enough to make their own decisions.

They don’t come to church anymore. Right. And we can’t have that. I’m just telling you, we can’t have that. I’m so sick of it. That happened with my generation, almost everybody I know, had a story like me. I grew up in church. Something happened. I didn’t like it. I went away from the church and now they’re either still away from the church or now they’re back And i’m just telling you like it’s not going to happen like it’s not going to happen It can’t happen on my watch.

It can’t happen on yours can’t happen on our watch So right we have to lean into gen z and that means we got to be okay with them doing some Things that are questionable and maybe we wish they wouldn’t have done and then correcting when it happens. That means that we got to be okay with letting go, right?

And and that’s what great leaders do. Leaders let go, right? Leaders let go. Managers don’t let go. Managers tell you how to do things. Leaders let go. So, hopefully that’s what the church does.

[00:26:57] Tim: That’s really good. Both in church and in business world. Like if you’re going to micromanage something, you’re going to be stressed out and you’re going to work extra.

But if you start growing leaders who can do this stuff that, that you’ve done for so long, if you can let that go you’ll not only have peace, but you’ll also be in a position where you can step away or take vacation or turn over the company if you need to, to somebody else. Yeah. Like it’s just a win.

And I think in church to Carey Nieuwof, have talked about this as well. He had some young leaders on the podcast and he really, I didn’t even think about this, but you know, previous generations, kids grew up, , working in factories at young ages, right. Which is not good, but they were entrusted with more at a younger age.

And now we’ve kind of turned into, Oh, you’re 30. Well, let’s give you another 10 years before I give you something to do. It’s like, what?

[00:27:44] Drew: Yeah. What is that by the way? Like what, why is that? Because I that was my experience and I just don’t I wasn’t smart I’m still not smart like so i’m not saying like somebody should have given me something because I was like a smart kid But I didn’t even think there was a chance At church growing up that I would do anything other than like whatever my parents wanted me to do.

[00:28:10] Tim: Yeah, I think it, it just comes down to control, like feeling like you have to control it and not trusting people. The thing is, you know, when you look at someone, you’re like, they can’t do it. But you’re also not being willing to mentor them and show them how to do it. Thank you. You’re just diminishing them before they even had the opportunity.

So it comes from a place of laziness and just, I think, distrust. But it is, I think it’s weird how ages kind of work now where 50 used to be old and now it’s like, you know, the People that look 50 60 today look like they did in their 40s before and now people in their 80s look like they did when they were 60 back in the 80s.

And it’s just a weird thing with ages and how people have kind of maintained their youngness with right. Right. And it’s causing that. But my point is that You know, as people get older and can, you know, not just retire at 60 or whatever they’re trying to hold the keys and the reins instead of releasing that to the younger generation.

And I think that both can happen, but I also think it’s dangerous where you know, the average senior pastor in America is turning 60 this year. So that’s not a healthy model. If those people retire, pass away, move on where you haven’t grown.

Carey has this tweet to Gen Z doesn’t just want to seat at your table. They’d like a voice and a vote and they deserve one.

[00:29:33] Drew: Yeah. And I don’t. I’ll be honest with you. Like, I don’t want to, I don’t want to like lead a church till I’m 60. I’m not saying that I don’t want to be like an advisor. I don’t want to be involved somehow, but preaching every Sunday from now when I’m 37 till 60, what a boring existence that seems like.

Yeah.

[00:29:54] Tim: You can move on and it would be something you’re more passionate about or more.

[00:29:57] Drew: Can I get a challenge? Do you know how easy it is to write a sermon when you’re 60 and you’ve been doing it for 20, 30 years? Come on, man. Like, give me a challenge.

[00:30:07] Tim: Five, five plus years of sermons, and you guarantee that no one will remember a sermon you preached five years ago.

Yeah. I’m gonna preach, right? I’m

[00:30:13] Drew: just repetition baby. Yeah. I, yeah, I can’t believe that stat of they’re gonna turn 60. Gen Z does need a voice. Now I will say this is my own criticism because I don’t want to just sound like, you know, oh, I figured it out with this whole student takeover thing.

My own criticism to myself is this sometimes., I will hand the keys to someone and I haven’t taken the time to teach them how to drive. Right? So sometimes there will just be a car and I’ll be like, Hey man, you want to do that? Here are the keys.

And then you blame them. And so, and there you go. And then they wreck the car and I’m like, what are you doing wrecking the car? It’s like, well, I just. I just took the keys man So we have to be intentional And we and honestly one of the best things i’ve done is i’ve just explained that to students and young adults I’ve been like, hey, can I just be honest with you for a second?

Sometimes in the past i’ve had a hard time With handing people too much responsibility without giving them direction So I want you to hold me accountable in that I want to make sure that you ask really good questions I want to make sure when I say do you know what I mean? You really know what I mean?

I want to make sure when I say questions like so say that back to me you can do that You’re ready for that kind of response and I want to make sure we’re on the same page because I never want to set you Up to fail. So here are the keys Let’s talk about how to drive and then it’s not like me teaching them pressuring them Lording over them.

They understand the backstory like i’m here for you. I want you to be successful But, you know, I haven’t always done that well in the past. I want to do that well this time.

[00:31:51] Tim: That’s an awesome caveat. I love that. So yeah, include Gen Z. They’re needed, they’re wanted and churches that don’t need or want them will not have them.

You’ll have churches that are 60 plus average attendance and Good luck finding a younger generation to come in. That’s a dying church right there.

[00:32:07] Drew: And for me, like Gen Z is going to be leading my kids. So they better be right. Like they better, we got it.

We got to get it. We got to get it. Cause I need my kids to get it.

[00:32:19] Tim: And real quick, like going back to understanding what your church. is involved in and how it’s responding to the community. Like understanding the age ranges and structures of your church is so crucial because if you’re not serving one of those generations you’re going to lose them.

And we’ve seen that time and time again. I mean, seniors, like there’s so much value in seniors and the wisdom they have and the fact that, you know, they’re not going to maybe run circles around you or be there 40 hours a week, but they don’t have to be, they can mentor, they can have. You know, wisdom and say into the next generation as well.

And so don’t discount your seniors either. So next one, number four is discipleship has a growing digital component. My favorite one. No. Yeah. I love this one too. You know, Churches that are changing really starting with 2020 when it’s like, Hey, we need to do live stream. Let’s figure this out where so many ignored it for years and years, even though many churches were doing live stream, it came out of necessity and what churches are finding digitally is that the more that you ignore it and the more that you act like social media doesn’t exist, the more that you’re going to be left behind when people try to find resources and they can’t find you.

You’re exactly right. Thank you. And this specifically is talking about discipleship, not just social media. And that’s a component of it. But what do you think drew just your thoughts on discipleship, specifically digitally you know, normally discipleship in churches would be a group, a life group some kind of in person function separate from Sunday morning, maybe a one on one mentorship or an actual group itself.

How do you think that can translate to.

[00:33:59] Drew: Well, first of all, in a lot of ways, but I think you got to start with what you define it as. As a church, we throw out a lot of terms community, discipleship and then someone comes along and goes, Oh, what is discipleship? And you go, well, you know, discipling others and it’s like, Oh, what is discipleship?

Does everyone in your church know what discipleship means? Does everyone in your church know what community means? Chances are they don’t. So you have to define discipleship. Our friend on a podcast recently said discipleship is discipling people to disciple other people, right? I think that’s a great definition.

If you want to rework the words and make it a Facebook post, go for it. Discipling people is about discipling other people, not getting necessarily in a group and teaching them. That’s teaching. We want to disciple people so that means that whole gen z that you were talking about we want to disciple gen z So that they can then go to college and have a bible study in their dorm room So we don’t want to just teach them.

We want to disciple them so that they can then disciple others So if that’s the definition that we’re going to go with that changes then what digital components look like of discipleship because If you just look at what most churches are doing Their version of digital discipleship most churches. I’m not saying all churches, but most churches Their version of digital discipleship is here’s our sermon from this past sunday Here are three instagram reels during the week of what our pastor said this past sunday There’s a trend if you haven’t noticed and and then here’s this, collage of pictures from this past sunday we post something like Sunday was great.

Sunday was fire. Sunday was amazing. God really moved. That’s my favorite one. God moved in such a special way. God moved in such a unique way. God is in the building. Well, that’s great stuff, right? But is that discipleship? Well, no that’s marketing. That’s celebrating. However you want to look at it.

But that’s not discipleship. So what that means is as hard as this is to hear, and as hard as this is, even for me to live out, because I’ll be honest with you, this is my favorite one. The reason this is my favorite one is because we do not do this. Well, we will give me six months. We’re going to do this really well.

But if you’re going to be able to do a small group at your home, then you can do a small group on zoom. If you can do a small group in the church, then you can do a small group on zoom. If you don’t have childcare at your church, then you can do a small group on zoom. Everything you can do in person, you can do on zoom.

Now I get it. Hey, face to face is different than screen time. Oh, absolutely. Screen time is draining. Face to face is almost energizing. I totally get it. Then you better figure out a way to get energized. You better figure out a way to get energized from the screen. If you can’t figure it out, you’re going to lose.

And so that’s where it’s got to start. And then who else is talking during the week besides your pastor? So I’ve got three, we’re going to put up three reels of how good the sermon was Sunday. Is that all you got? That’s all you got. So you got one dude. You got one dude who loves Jesus and teaches the Bible.

You don’t have anybody that’s willing to go live during the week. Set up an event, create an event, go live during the week and engage with the comments. Are they too scared? Are they worried about production quality? Are you worried nobody will show up and talk in the comments? You just have one dude.

[00:37:43] Tim: All that will happen by the way. All that happen. Everyone will happen.

[00:37:48] Drew: At first. Yeah, everyone will happen. That’ll always happen at first. But if you make it a priority, what I can promise you is you make it a priority, give it 30 days, do it every week. Like if you say Tuesday mornings at 7 a. m., I’m going to have coffee.

Will you have coffee with me? We’re going to talk about the sermon from Sunday and I’m not the pastor. Okay, cool sit do that do it for 30 days and I guarantee you on that fourth tuesday of the last month There’s going to be five or six other people that are sitting down with their coffee And they’re going to engage with you and they’re going to want to know what you thought about the sermon and they’re going to tell You what they thought yeah, and then next thing, you know, you start bringing them onto the camera And you talk with them and then they bring up and so round and round we go So anything you’re doing in person, you got to think through the concept of what does this look like digitally

if not, you’re going to be one of those churches that 10 years from now goes, you know, we really should add a contemporary service and I’ve never heard more dangerous words spoken.

[00:38:48] Tim: Let’s have a service that appeals to every group that comes to our church. Yeah, no, that’s dangerous, but that’s what’s happening, right?

Yeah, that’s what you said, because it really is about stepping out of your comfort zone. Like it’s not comfortable to jump on live. It’s not comfortable to try to interact with the digital resource you’re not familiar with. And you know, if you’re a pastor, if you’re senior pastor if someone in the church is not doing that, maybe you can step in if you have a say in their life to, to offer that up or to offer to set up stuff like, Hey, literally all you have to do is show up to this couch.

And talk for 20 minutes and I’ll even give you a topic and I’ll hit record and you have to do nothing like you could do that. That could be helpful. But I think this is really an untapped market. And for as much as I’m on social media, like I, even for our church, like we’re still. Doing the in person groups.

And I love what you said about zoom groups, because why not? Why not offer that like, yeah, so much of a all or nothing approach. And you know, when Carey Nieuwhof talks about social media, it talks about, it’s usually done as an evangelism thing or a growth strategy. You know, we’re either trying to grow our current group or we’re trying to evangelize.

And those are the two ways you see social media. Not just growing, but what about discipling? What about offering something? You know, we have a pastor talk podcast we do to kind of dive deep into a subject that we may not be able to cover on Sunday. You know, but also with that, like the pastors that are out front of this, the ones that are The ones that are tweeting or X ing the ones that are doing little short, you know, two minute, like, Hey, here’s me.

I’m walking to the gym. I just want to encourage you today to make sure you don’t give up on the goals you started for the year. I think this was a year or two ago. I did uh, I was challenged to do something like a five minute video or maybe a two minute video every day for 30 days. And so I did a daily discernment thing and.

That was very tough, you know, to push yourself to not miss a day and to do, to come up with something. And turns out I came up with something and turns out you can come up with something. If you’re listening, you have that in you. God’s given you abilities and giftings to, be able to share his word to talk about what you’re learning.

And so maybe you do that personally. Maybe you you know, started my own ministry to encourage people on social media a while back. So maybe it’s not just under the context of a church, but if you’re listening and you’re like, I don’t have an avenue for that. You have a phone, you have a way to encourage others.

And if you can partner with your church and do that.

Well

[00:41:17] Drew: that was four of them and that was fun. And now

[00:41:24] Tim: part two, we must end for now.

[00:41:26] Drew: Yeah, we must end for now, but part two is going to be next week. Right? So that’s going to be really exciting. And so if you enjoyed part one, we want to hear from you. You can always email the podcast.

You can always reach out to us. On social media. But anyway we can hear some feedback from you. That’d be great. You can email us at eyes on Jesus podcast at outlook. com and always can hit up Tim on discerning dad or you can look up drew Barker and mine’s like drew S Barker, which is, yeah, I mean, whatever, just find it.

Drew’s Barker, whatever. And that’ll probably need to change. And Hey, and share the podcast, like, and share the podcast. We’d love to know what your church is looking at going into this year, but as always go with God, grow in discernment and keep your eyes on Jesus.

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