Full Transcript for Is Multisite a Healthy Option for Churches? Jason Ishmael VS. Brett Kays

05:07.801 --> 05:10.463 Oh, I'm loving Jason. Jason's my man. 05:13.469 --> 05:17.236 Okay, there we go. Brett, uh, Brett Keys, founding minister and 05:17.268 --> 05:21.276 lead minister of South Point Community Christian Church in the Detroit 05:21.357 --> 05:24.806 area. Hey Brett, thanks so much for being on here. Uh, what do you 05:24.822 --> 05:28.890 think about the whole LeBron going to the Philadelphia thing? Any comment? 05:29.422 --> 05:31.827 No comment. Okay, that's all right, that's all right. 05:34.659 --> 05:37.835 No, what's that? I said I'm already going to 05:38.335 --> 05:40.514 get myself in enough trouble with the other stuff I'm going to talk about. 05:41.156 --> 05:44.348 So, but Anthony, you're a lifelong Lakers fan, right? 05:44.974 --> 05:48.279 Not lifelong, but long, long enough. Um, 05:48.423 --> 05:51.952 my Laker years with LeBron there just gave me 05:52.049 --> 05:55.385 indigestion. Like, I, I wanted to root for the Lakers, 05:55.417 --> 05:58.642 but I didn't really care to root for LeBron. So I, I was 05:58.706 --> 06:00.438 taking antacids every time they played. 06:02.732 --> 06:06.372 So I'm glad the 76ers gets to deal with the LeBron 06:06.484 --> 06:10.028 circus. And, um, yeah, I'm gonna leave it with them. 06:11.439 --> 06:14.566 All right, so first question I'd like to 06:14.647 --> 06:17.950 ask Jason and then Brett, and, and Jason's gonna 06:18.450 --> 06:21.590 take, uh, more of the perspective that multi-site is a— is, 06:21.943 --> 06:25.567 is typically a healthy option for growing churches, and Brett is going to take, 06:25.711 --> 06:28.750 uh, the other perspective. That it's often 06:28.799 --> 06:31.987 not a healthy position. So, 06:32.019 --> 06:35.074 Jason, what are you afraid of? And I'm gonna ask Brett the same thing. 06:35.350 --> 06:37.917 And this isn't a— this is a serious question. 06:39.098 --> 06:42.522 What are the legitimate fears here of if we don't get this question 06:42.538 --> 06:44.388 figured out? Well, what's at stake? 06:46.252 --> 06:50.029 I'll start with something that's pretty close in context 06:50.529 --> 06:54.353 to me personally. And I cut my teeth in a rural context, deep southern 06:54.853 --> 06:59.348 Illinois. A town of 6,500 people. The subprime 06:59.380 --> 07:03.115 mortgage crisis hit, recession comes, and our region said, 07:03.868 --> 07:07.619 what recession? It's been that way for 20 years here. That's— and so 07:08.119 --> 07:11.691 you think about impoverished areas all over our country, and one of the challenges 07:11.739 --> 07:15.346 that we have right now in the church planting movement is that 07:15.730 --> 07:19.658 most, if not all, of our attention has been paid to suburban and urban contexts. 07:20.379 --> 07:23.957 The rural context is desperately in need of 07:23.989 --> 07:27.022 movement. Uh, throw a dart at the map, uh, 07:27.359 --> 07:30.617 especially in the Midwest, and you're likely to, uh, 07:31.515 --> 07:34.388 come near

a town that is literally zero churches in it. 07:34.966 --> 07:38.512 Uh, we've got to get in there. We've got to fuel that, uh, fuel that 07:39.012 --> 07:42.765 growth, uh, fuel church planting in those places. And so I— for me 07:43.265 --> 07:46.167 personally, that's the, the biggest fear of all of this. If I were to lean 07:46.200 --> 07:49.586 into the multi-site, uh, debate in terms of things that I would fear, 07:49.602 --> 07:52.716 I would say there's a number of fears that I have from the multi-site side 07:53.216 --> 07:56.393 of things, uh, you know, that if— that we get to, you know, some sort 07:56.893 --> 08:00.230 of mini denominations, or that we, uh, have really closed, 08:00.567 --> 08:03.602 uh, really close fists around, uh, those, 08:03.859 --> 08:07.471 those, you know, campuses when they're planted, and an unwillingness to 08:07.889 --> 08:11.196 launch them independently, uh, or to let go of them, 08:11.405 --> 08:14.648 or to do independent churches at the beginning. Uh, you know, 08:14.697 --> 08:18.677 we're also seeing fewer platforms for 08:18.790 --> 08:22.287 training for preachers. I cut my teeth in a rural 08:22.335 --> 08:25.400 context, got to preach when I was 22. It was a huge benefit 08:25.900 --> 08:29.346 to me. And that poor church had to experience learning from me, 08:29.779 --> 08:33.566 or learning with me, you know, for those first several years. And so 08:34.432 --> 08:37.368 I would say though, that if I'm gonna be very specific and succinct here, 08:38.603 --> 08:42.069 the rural question's a big piece of this conversation for me. 08:43.747 --> 08:46.677 That counts significantly in our context. 08:48.424 --> 08:51.467 Thanks for that, Jason. Brett, what is a fear, 08:51.985 --> 08:55.607 uh, that kind of drives this for you? That— what, what is at stake here? 08:57.561 --> 09:01.031 Well, uh, I started the church in 1992 here, so I am a 09:01.531 --> 09:04.324 church planter, and I'm very pro-church planting. 09:05.067 --> 09:08.479 But we grew so fast that when we became aware of the whole multi-site 09:08.979 --> 09:12.105 model back in 2008, I jumped on board with it. And so, you know, 09:12.185 --> 09:15.853 many years ago, I would be the guy promoting multi-site as a good 09:15.901 --> 09:18.831 thing. In fact, I did that quite a bit. But now that I have so 09:19.331 --> 09:22.699 many years under my belt, we launched a second campus 09:23.199 --> 09:26.828 in 2010 and a third campus in 2015. But as of 3 09:27.328 --> 09:29.469 years ago now, we have been back to one campus again. 09:31.189 --> 09:34.781 It's not that I regret doing it. I just, I always had 09:34.830 --> 09:38.810 had misgivings about it, that sometimes it lapses 09:38.875 --> 09:43.151 more into pragmatism. Than what would be biblically or 09:43.651 --> 09:46.966 theologically sound behavior. Um, there's really no model 09:47.466 --> 09:52.985 for it in scripture. The idea of having no local 09:53.827 --> 09:57.048 leadership for congregations, often elders, one guy on 09:57.161 --> 10:00.539 a screen at various locations— that's really not 10:01.039 --> 10:04.460 how the Independent Christian Church started. That's not what we were about. And I'm afraid 10:04.960 --> 10:08.320 that we have begun to lapse into that kind of almost almost denominational 10:08.820 --> 10:12.239 kind of structure again, of becoming, you know, many churches 10:12.335 --> 10:15.580 under one centralized power and 10:15.725 --> 10:20.029 administration. And the truth is, really, we've seen 10:20.062 --> 10:23.194 now that you can say we're one church in 2 or 3 10:23.694 --> 10:27.451 or many locations, but it's really just the leadership saying that. The people 10:27.951 --> 10:31.675 themselves don't say that and don't feel that. You're really not functioning as 10:31.771 --> 10:35.080 one church. You know, how are you even defining what a church is anymore? 10:35.626 --> 10:38.754 It's a bunch of different churches with their own unique style, 10:38.770 --> 10:42.556 personality, focuses, culture, trying to perform 10:42.685 --> 10:46.166 as one church. And so even if you're sharing the same name 10:46.666 --> 10:50.208 and staff and budget, uh, you're really not one church. And ultimately, 10:50.240 --> 10:52.775 what's the endgame of all this? Where is it going to lead us? 10:53.593 --> 10:57.555 Um, you know, if we can have, uh, 3 campuses, why not 10? 10:57.619 --> 11:00.828 Why not 50? Why can't you have 1,000 11:01.328 --> 11:04.469 locations and still be one church? Isn't that what a denomination really is? 11:04.517 --> 11:08.161 I mean, Life.Church, probably one of the biggest ones. I think they have 45, 11:08.209 --> 11:12.287 46 locations, 85,000 people. Why can't 11:12.787 --> 11:16.880 you have, you know, 1,000 locations, millions of people all over the world, and still 11:17.380 --> 11:21.199 call yourself one church? I mean, where does it stop? So that's 11:21.699 --> 11:25.550 why— yeah, now that's awesome. So definitely a lot of fears there on 11:26.050 --> 11:29.372 that side. So, uh, thanks for that. Let's go ahead and let Jason 11:29.404 --> 11:32.934 give, uh, 5 minutes or so just giving your, your best 11:33.434 --> 11:36.798 presentation of why multi-site is a healthy option, 11:36.927 --> 11:40.037 and then Brett will, uh, do 5 minutes or so of why it is, 11:40.711 --> 11:43.116 it is not a healthy biblical option. Go for it, Jason. 11:44.543 --> 11:48.375 Well, I think first that the scripture in terms of church governance is 11:49.690 --> 11:53.714 not one that gives intense detail on how 11:53.939 --> 11:56.536 we are to do this, and when we just dig a couple layers in, 11:57.129 --> 12:00.733 I think we'd all— we're all going to agree here on locally autonomous eldership, 12:00.765 --> 12:04.119 a plurality of eldership that has one yes or one no together, 12:05.320 --> 12:08.592 every elder submitted to the eldership, those kinds 12:09.092 -->

12:12.349 of things. The question becomes, okay, how many elders are we supposed 12:12.849 --> 12:15.966 to have? Is an elder supposed to have 12:16.031 --> 12:19.638 term limits? Is it good to have break years? There are all these policies 12:20.314 --> 12:24.563 that are not bad things to work through, but each one 12:24.612 --> 12:28.190 of these groups of elders under the headship of Christ, 12:28.576 --> 12:31.853 uh, in the guidance of the scriptures gets to decide 12:31.869 --> 12:35.564 locally. And there might be decisions that are made in another 12:36.064 --> 12:39.645 locality, uh, that rub against the decisions 12:39.677 --> 12:43.066 of another locality but can both be scriptural. And so I think we're 12:43.566 --> 12:46.970 going to find that in— personally in this, that there's going to be some potential 12:46.986 --> 12:50.055 for liberty here. And I would, I would lean into a couple of things though 12:50.199 --> 12:53.813 in terms of a defense of multi-site First, 12:53.893 --> 12:57.326 biblically, I mean, I think we— when you look at the church in Jerusalem, 12:57.342 --> 13:00.936 for instance, in the book of Acts, over and again it is referred to 13:01.016 --> 13:04.497 as one church. Uh, we also know though 13:04.545 --> 13:08.203 that in, in reading the book of Acts that there's, there's no way that all 13:08.267 --> 13:11.540 of those people are meeting in one location all the time. We also see this 13:12.040 --> 13:15.390 happen in, uh, throughout the New Testament world, multiple house 13:15.890 --> 13:19.673 churches in lots of different places. Uh, the fact that they are 13:20.042 --> 13:23.106 meeting in separate places does not make them any less 13:23.234 --> 13:26.698 one or any more one. Uh, I think 13:27.198 --> 13:31.141 the real question becomes what, uh, what makes a church one? 13:31.510 --> 13:34.878 I mean, when I was in— I started out in a— and my position 13:35.378 --> 13:38.872 was actually firmly against multi-site church, uh, for the first 10 years of 13:39.372 --> 13:43.106 my ministry. And one of our challenges in our church was that people were 13:43.122 --> 13:46.876 upset that we had multiple services on Sunday morning because we couldn't fit everybody in 13:46.908 --> 13:50.213 the room on Sunday. And so we would have people say, well, it's a church 13:50.262 --> 13:54.067 within the church. We have multiple churches and they just happen 13:54.567 --> 13:58.193 to meet at the same place. And, you know, we could make the same 13:58.289 --> 14:01.725 kind of statements about their lack of oneness because 14:01.741 --> 14:05.096 there'd be times where some of them would never see each other. The first service 14:05.193 --> 14:07.601 would never run into the third service. Maybe if you went to the second, 14:07.617 --> 14:11.470 you'd get to be kind of that cohesive unit between everybody. 14:12.112 --> 14:16.094 But I think that the first time we step outside of one 14:16.206 --> 14:19.815 service, one time a week, We're going to find some 14:20.315 --> 14:23.566 of these unity problems and challenges. At the same time, we open 14:24.066 --> 14:27.589 ourselves to some potential. The way I like to see our spot, 14:27.653 --> 14:31.677 we're in a town of greater Cedar Rapids, 14:31.693 --> 14:35.732 around 250,000 people, and the surrounding 14:35.908 --> 14:40.012 area are rural towns. And our 14:40.512 --> 14:44.580 most successful ministry outside of the 14:45.080 --> 14:48.542 original the original spot is when 14:48.654 --> 14:52.312 we're able to find rural towns that are in desperate 14:52.812 --> 14:56.579 need of gospel movement. And what multi-site has helped us do is 14:56.611 --> 15:00.718 it broadens the skill set of who you could bring for 15:01.218 --> 15:05.162 a rural plant. I think it accelerates the growth of those rural plants because 15:05.595 --> 15:10.151 we have essentially a group that has in their culture and DNA the 15:10.651 --> 15:14.659 idea of pressing out, of flowing out all the time. They give resources to 15:15.159 --> 15:18.556 places that they, uh, that they may have never been before, uh, and as 15:18.589 --> 15:21.540 a result, that group gets to concentrate its impact, 15:22.021 --> 15:25.374 uh, and spread and point that in specific ways. 15:25.470 --> 15:28.598 And I think we get farther faster when, uh, when we're, 15:28.614 --> 15:31.758 when we're concentrating our impact together. I, I think it's 15:32.258 --> 15:35.752 important though that we realize that, you know, if this is about padding the ego 15:35.896 --> 15:40.131 of a single, of a single person to swell numbers or whatever Um, 15:40.387 --> 15:43.001 again, we can find that in, in traditional church models as well. 15:43.595 --> 15:46.930 Uh, and that pride is something that is, 15:47.203 --> 15:50.426 uh, creeping at everybody's door, uh, 15:50.731 --> 15:54.243 that does the kind of work that we do. Uh, I will say that 15:54.419 --> 15:58.204 I, I do enjoy some of the, uh, some of the pragmatism 15:58.704 --> 16:01.620 of this. Is it working? Uh, what's the best way for us to reach these 16:01.652 --> 16:05.580 places? And to me, it's always going to be, um, in all of the 16:06.080 --> 16:09.509 above approach. Our church loves to give away 16:10.009 --> 16:13.582 resources to places that will never be, uh, and, and to release them to 16:14.082 --> 16:17.334 other people. We also love to, uh, to have some 16:17.607 --> 16:21.824 even more accountable relationships where we're able to invest in some places that are 16:21.856 --> 16:24.999 not at the point yet where they're going to be independent. Now, 16:25.688 --> 16:29.088 one wrinkle in this for me is that I, I do have a dream of 16:29.588 --> 16:32.743 seeing these things one day be established as independent on their own, and I think 16:33.243 --> 16:36.810 that's a decision that locally we have to steward for ourselves, 16:37.376 --> 16:40.674 uh, what is best for our

fellowship and the mission 16:41.174 --> 16:41.968 as it concerns Eastern Iowa. 16:45.450 --> 16:49.007 Wow. Thanks, Jason. Appreciate that. So what we 16:49.507 --> 16:53.912 have here is someone who was firmly anti-multisite who actually 16:54.009 --> 16:57.125 has been convinced that it's, it's a very healthy model, or at least it can 16:57.174 --> 17:00.672 be. And we're going to hear from Brett Case, who uh, 17:00.993 --> 17:04.782 started out doing multi-site and realized, ah, this isn't really as healthy as 17:05.282 --> 17:08.459 I thought. So Brett, take it away, 5 minutes or so on your position. 17:09.486 --> 17:12.617 Yeah, well, I think Jason made a good point 17:13.117 --> 17:17.289 where he talked about the idea is you do want these churches to become independent 17:17.789 --> 17:20.580 at some point, but over the course of all these many years, 17:20.661 --> 17:23.390 yeah, that's not what I've seen a whole lot of. There, there have been a 17:23.890 --> 17:27.565 few churches that have un-multi-sited. They have taken Got a little bit 17:28.065 --> 17:31.423 of headlines for that over the past few years because we just haven't 17:31.923 --> 17:34.878 seen it work out in terms of what it was meant to be. I think 17:35.378 --> 17:38.921 we did it the best way possible in that all of our campuses were local. 17:38.986 --> 17:42.494 They were within 15 minutes of each other. Uh, 17:42.817 --> 17:46.035 you know, the— I as the preacher and the elders, 17:46.148 --> 17:49.624 we all rotated around, the staff rotated. So we actually 17:50.124 --> 17:53.768 knew all the people there. They knew us. Um, so it was more 17:53.880 --> 17:58.452 than, than just having a guy on the screen. And that's the deal, is your 17:58.725 --> 18:03.265 multi-site's only really going to work if you have one guy kind 18:03.765 --> 18:06.683 of in charge and on the screen. The video preaching is pretty key in all 18:06.715 --> 18:10.100 these massive multi-site churches. It becomes a bit of 18:10.600 --> 18:13.790 a cult of celebrity. Um, so when we 18:14.290 --> 18:17.849 had, you know, a campus minister at one location, another campus minister another location, 18:18.668 --> 18:22.266 Inevitably, those guys become the main lead guy at those places, 18:22.924 --> 18:25.831 and each develops its own focus and personality. 18:26.056 --> 18:29.734 And you never truly function as one church, even though the leaders 18:30.168 --> 18:33.284 feel like we are. So, um, yeah, 18:33.300 --> 18:36.865 that's— it's just inevitable that's what's going to happen. And certainly what happened with us, 18:37.701 --> 18:40.576 uh, one of our campuses we spun off after only 3 and a half years 18:40.608 --> 18:43.611 because it became so different. The leader there, uh, 18:44.190 --> 18:47.563 really became possessive and focused in whole different areas. 18:48.462 --> 18:52.558 Uh, the other one that was more long-term, uh, lasted for 13 18:53.058 --> 18:55.947 years. And, uh, that was a good one. That was a good, uh, 18:56.349 --> 18:59.706 un-multisiting. Uh, and it only worked because we were 19:00.204 --> 19:03.802 both the campus minister and I were good friends and we'd worked together for a 19:04.302 --> 19:07.930 long time, very loyal, but inevitably it creates a lot 19:08.430 --> 19:12.363 of complexity with a centralized, uh, staff versus campus staffs. 19:13.117 --> 19:17.189 It creates a lot of confusion. It breeds— 19:17.542 --> 19:20.796 you would think it would create fellowship, but it doesn't. It creates much 19:20.828 --> 19:24.692 more of an us versus them mentality. You always feel like an outsider 19:25.141 --> 19:27.995 at the other locations. And so why are we continuing it? 19:28.909 --> 19:32.757 And so I had already agreed to let the first second 19:33.257 --> 19:37.390 campus go a few years ago, but he wasn't quite ready. And finally 19:37.422 --> 19:40.661 he said, I'm ready because it was creating some frustration and tension 19:41.161 --> 19:44.320 because he wanted to lead it. His way with his emphases, and I wanted 19:44.820 --> 19:47.997 to lead it in a different way. So we blessed him and let him go, 19:48.013 --> 19:51.674 and that was a good thing. But inevitably, it would have led to probably 19:51.691 --> 19:54.918 a church split down the road if we had not released it. And that's what 19:55.418 --> 19:58.579 I see happening, is some of these churches get so big with so many 19:58.595 --> 20:02.353 campuses because they're often taking over small campuses, 20:02.690 --> 20:06.351 small churches, dying churches, rural churches where, 20:06.479 --> 20:09.129 yeah, they are struggling. And so they invite a big church to come in and 20:09.629 --> 20:13.523 take them over. Um, but it's— 20:13.539 --> 20:17.596 that's not like good biblical growth. That's just 20:17.853 --> 20:21.284 adding churches that already exist. Yeah, you may have some 20:21.316 --> 20:24.683 evangelistic effectiveness, but, uh, now it 20:25.183 --> 20:28.419 becomes about how big can we get with how many campuses. Used to be preachers 20:28.451 --> 20:31.722 would talk about how big is your church and they talk about numbers. Now it's 20:32.222 --> 20:35.699 how many campuses do you have. I can think of even one, one that I 20:35.907 --> 20:39.596 know not too far away that did that same thing. They started 20:40.096 --> 20:43.557 accumulating campuses by takeover. Again, it's— they were invited in. It's not 20:43.589 --> 20:47.117 hostile takeovers. And with the idea that they were going to release 20:47.617 --> 20:51.142 all these campuses eventually and let them go. And that never happened because they wanted 20:51.642 --> 20:54.670 to keep all those campuses. So there's a danger involved with, 20:54.814 --> 20:58.615 um, why are we wanting to get so big with so many campuses? 20:58.679 --> 21:01.854 Why are we wanting to keep them part of a multi-church 21:01.886 --> 21:05.783 instead of letting them go

independent? So, uh, for those 21:05.815 --> 21:09.119 reasons, I think it, it creates some negativity, some resentment, 21:09.744 --> 21:13.320 some, uh, confusion. Um, 21:14.170 --> 21:18.404 so overall, I just think it's not a healthy thing in either pragmatic 21:18.904 --> 21:22.349 way or practical way or in a biblical way, because there, again, there are really 21:22.849 --> 21:26.710 no New Testament examples of calling yourself one church in 21:26.823 --> 21:30.094 multiple locations. Each church had its 21:30.174 --> 21:33.715 own individual elders, and they knew the people. They knew their 21:34.215 --> 21:37.531 flock by name. But I'll concede, and we'll get to 21:38.031 --> 21:41.912 the conceding part, there are problems with the current situation as well without being multi-site. 21:45.263 --> 21:48.222 Hmm, interesting, interesting. Uh, 21:48.675 --> 21:50.940 Daniel, what do we got next? We got question round now. 21:52.541 --> 21:55.616 We do, yeah. So questions for Jason. 21:56.682 --> 21:59.665 From anybody here who's not— whose name is not Jason. 21:59.810 --> 22:03.225 So who's got a question for Jason? I'm not named Jason, 22:03.273 --> 22:08.709 so I'll take a stab. Jason, with the multi-site, 22:09.415 --> 22:13.745 is— do you find a challenge with the limits? 22:14.066 --> 22:17.754 And these are some of the limits that I hear Brett bring up, 22:17.834 --> 22:21.987 but as well those limits that I think of, which is a limited size 22:22.244 --> 22:26.223 of the other locations, a limited number 22:26.448 --> 22:29.060 of other locations? Is there a challenge with that? 22:31.207 --> 22:34.780 Yeah, I think that you get to the point where, you know, 22:34.796 --> 22:38.450 like you said, you get, uh, you know, is it— is 1,000— well, 22:38.466 --> 22:41.848 now it's, now it's a denomination, uh, and I think 22:42.348 --> 22:45.081 that that is a, uh, I think that's a sound criticism, 22:45.550 --> 22:48.864 uh, you know, you think about what's happening at CCV 22:49.364 --> 22:51.720 right now. Of course, this is in our brotherhood, Uh, go down to Arizona, 22:52.080 --> 22:55.260 uh, and, and, you know, we're talking about a church that— what is it now, 22:55.760 --> 23:00.260 in the 40,000 and 50,000, something like that? I mean, it's like mind-bogglingly 23:00.760 --> 23:04.940 huge. Uh, at the same time, they, they did baptize 6,000 people last 23:05.440 --> 23:09.500 year. Uh, and if, if, if pragmatism is 6,000 23:10.000 --> 23:13.120 baptisms, there's a part of me that is saying, well, that's, 23:13.620 --> 23:17.164 that's pretty cool. I'm very glad to see the movement Uh, in the forward 23:17.664 --> 23:21.464 progress. I do think though that we have 23:21.496 --> 23:24.945 to be so cautious around building, uh, 23:25.106 --> 23:28.202 simply around a, as you said, Brett, a cult of personality. 23:29.181 --> 23:33.176 And I think what we're gonna— what I personally think is the greatest limitation, 23:33.833 --> 23:36.898 uh, is you're gonna find this in leadership all the time. 23:37.523 --> 23:41.278 Uh, we've all got our own proclivities, and if it swells 23:41.294 --> 23:43.810 your pride to have your church grow, 23:44.499 --> 23:48.121 then it's going to be pretty hard to be 23:48.621 --> 23:51.374 an evangelist and, uh, and do so with pure motives. 23:51.871 --> 23:55.460 Uh, take every thought captive and make it obedient to Christ. That doesn't 23:55.476 --> 23:59.114 mean that you shouldn't do it, uh, but I think that there's something to be 23:59.614 --> 24:03.152 said for, uh, the crisis of credibility 24:03.489 --> 24:06.934 in, uh, in senior leadership across the country right now. 24:07.495 --> 24:10.690 Uh, and not just multi-site, but bigger churches 24:11.188 --> 24:14.674 do concentrate our risk in those situations. 24:14.739 --> 24:17.759 And I think it just underscores something I tell our church all the time. 24:18.128 --> 24:20.843 If you come to Antioch, uh, one of the first things you hear, if you 24:21.343 --> 24:23.944 come to like one of the new people things, uh, you hear us make some 24:24.040 --> 24:26.996 very specific comments on some important cultural issues, 24:27.575 --> 24:31.093 uh, around marriage and around what we do as a church and who 24:31.109 --> 24:34.675 we are. But I also make it clear I do not 24:34.724 --> 24:38.626 lead autonomously. I am submitted to our eldership. 24:39.380 --> 24:42.993 And I think that, that, that piece is a 24:43.493 --> 24:46.863 first layer of defense. Uh, and, you know, and again, you could say, 24:46.879 --> 24:50.218 man, is there a point where 1,000 churches is unhealthy, you know, 24:50.235 --> 24:53.221 for me to point lead in that sense? And I would say, yeah, probably. 24:53.269 --> 24:56.754 That's, that's a bit of a hyperbole, of course. Um, you know, 24:56.818 --> 24:59.387 but what's, what's reasonable? And here's where I, here's where I would go. 25:00.720 --> 25:04.651 Our, our current culture already has a pretty regional 25:04.827 --> 25:07.860 identity in the rural areas. Again, in the rural areas, 25:08.679 --> 25:12.674 when you look at a lot of these spots, they're having consolidated 25:12.690 --> 25:15.996 high schools where it's a county high school instead of a, of a 25:16.496 --> 25:19.767 town high school. And so their identity a lot of times comes down to where 25:20.267 --> 25:23.987 they're watching football on Friday night. And that community 25:24.019 --> 25:28.079 is already being built around, uh, you know, 2 or 3 towns. 25:28.674 --> 25:32.270 Is it reasonable for a church to lean into some of 25:32.302 --> 25:35.852 those same possibilities? I think so. I think 25:35.917 --> 25:39.449 that it can be helpful, and I think that there are opportunities for us to 25:39.949 --> 25:44.606 reach more people in those places. I also think there's a benefit to 25:44.704 --> 25:47.936 galvanizing purpose and mission. I personally, 25:48.196 --> 25:51.608

Brett, like, I really appreciate the warnings because 25:52.108 --> 25:55.615 I feel so many of those Uh, at the 25:56.115 --> 25:58.331 same time though, I felt them when I was in a single-site church as well, 25:58.702 --> 26:00.205 in the, in the exact same ways. 26:04.028 --> 26:06.011 Any other questions for Jason? 26:07.656 --> 26:12.641 Yeah, I, I would— I'm thinking in terms of multiplication 26:13.238 --> 26:17.001 being kind of the main metric, whether that be disciples 26:17.033 --> 26:19.988 multiplying disciples, churches multiplying other churches. 26:21.040 --> 26:24.994 And it would seem that if 26:25.010 --> 26:28.625 multiplication is the goal, that multi-site is 26:29.125 --> 26:32.804 maybe a step in that direction, but that it's not the best 26:33.078 --> 26:36.757 model. Ideally you'd be planting churches 26:36.870 --> 26:40.107 that have their own elders that then would go and plant other churches that would 26:40.607 --> 26:43.317 have their own elders, and that would be a truer sense of multiplication, 26:44.380 --> 26:47.778 so I very clearly hear 26:48.278 --> 26:50.826 the practical argument though. Practical argument being, 26:52.206 --> 26:55.935 look, we got so many churches here. There are resources here. We can make 26:56.435 --> 26:59.990 a huge dent in these areas, so I guess 27:00.039 --> 27:00.965 my question is, 27:03.689 --> 27:07.379 is there a good reason beyond the pragmatics of it 27:08.137 --> 27:13.053 to do multi-site when it would seem that it's 27:13.553 --> 27:17.464 falling short of the multiplication goal? Is there a good argument beyond 27:17.964 --> 27:21.028 the pragmatics of it? And again, I hear the pragmatics very clearly. 27:21.540 --> 27:25.088 I'm not really debating that because I, you know, I'm hearing it. But yeah, 27:25.346 --> 27:28.665 anyway, that was my question. Yeah, I think that 27:28.859 --> 27:32.331 when you look at eldership, I think a question that 27:32.831 --> 27:36.768 undergirds this is what— for 27:37.268 --> 27:41.600 American— Americans in a democratic republic, we tend to view eldership 27:42.100 --> 27:45.293 as representative government. It is not representative 27:45.793 --> 27:49.083 government. Uh, and we, and we hear this sometimes. Well, should we have an elder 27:49.583 --> 27:53.627 from every campus? That's, that's one of those thoughts that as if it would create 27:53.739 --> 27:57.705 a different kind of unity or a better kind of unity. I think that still 27:57.818 --> 28:01.816 falls short. Uh, you know, Jesus, when he prayed for unity in John 17, 28:01.848 --> 28:04.529 framed it as, Father, may they be one as you and I are one, 28:04.594 --> 28:08.158 so that the world may know that you sent me. Uh, that is an 28:08.254 --> 28:11.161 ultra-profound level of unity, given the fact that, you know, 28:11.402 --> 28:13.955 We still debate how to define the Trinity. 28:15.038 --> 28:18.415 And so I think for 28:18.915 --> 28:22.829 the— beyond the pragmatics of 28:22.861 --> 28:26.970 multi-site, the way that we define and look at eldership 28:28.176 --> 28:31.501 is core to, especially to the restoration 28:32.001 --> 28:35.670 movement. And I think it's something that we need to keep in mind. How long 28:36.122 --> 28:38.883 should it take? And we see the same thing for church plants. How long should 28:39.383 --> 28:42.448 it take to raise up independent elders? Uh, is, you know, a church 28:42.496 --> 28:45.913 that takes 5 years to raise up elders somehow in breach 28:46.571 --> 28:50.244 biblically, though they might be submitted to, you know, another governing 28:50.276 --> 28:53.725 body somewhere else? I don't know. It's— the scripture doesn't give us chapter and 28:54.225 --> 28:56.179 verse to be able to say, well, this is the day that it has to 28:56.679 --> 28:59.948 happen, except maybe we should say day one perhaps. But is that even possible 29:00.462 --> 29:04.247 in some of those situations? Uh, and so if, 29:05.177 --> 29:09.173 if we, if we get down to what eldership is, I think that helps define 29:10.651 --> 29:14.202 what that means for multi-site multiplication, because this is not just 29:14.702 --> 29:18.043 about decision-making at 29:18.543 --> 29:21.835 the top level. This is, and I think Brett, you hammered 29:21.883 --> 29:24.920 this point, and it's one that we need to hear regardless of church size. 29:25.901 --> 29:29.918 You sound like you have a deep heart for shepherding, that one of 29:30.418 --> 29:35.283 the things that comes in, that kept coming through in your description of eldership was 29:35.395 --> 29:38.218 the pastoral nature of it. Poimen, shepherd, pastor. 29:39.004 --> 29:42.068 And that is the part of eldership that I think, at least in my time 29:42.568 --> 29:46.079 in the last 20 years in church, is most neglected because 29:46.579 --> 29:49.993 it just becomes a group of decision makers. And I think 29:50.493 --> 29:53.843 there's a real danger in that. The other problem though is that 29:54.343 --> 29:58.062 how many people can a group of elders reasonably shepherd? 29:58.640 --> 30:02.762 You know, how big can churches be? Um, you know, I was never working 30:02.811 --> 30:06.436 harder than when I was serving a church of 300 people. Uh, 30:06.821 --> 30:10.158 the expectations pastorally on that are 30:10.270 --> 30:13.639 the most profound that I've ever experienced, uh, because there were fewer 30:14.139 --> 30:17.409 people to help carry the load and a very clear demand that if, 30:17.505 --> 30:20.233 if, you know, Marge is in the hospital, that I'm going to show up, 30:20.618 --> 30:23.922 uh, regardless of how many elders were, were a part of our church 30:24.422 --> 30:27.211 and leading our church. And so I'm going to stop rambling there. 30:28.069 --> 30:30.067 Thinking out loud, as you always make me do, Daniel. 30:32.017 --> 30:35.176 I tell Daniel all the time when I talk to him, he, he makes me 30:35.676 --> 30:38.803

think better. Sometimes just having him on the line, I get to 30:38.884 --> 30:42.172 thinking better. Uh, I have one more quick 30:42.672 --> 30:46.836 question for you, Brett, and, uh, I'm gonna use an analogy 30:46.869 --> 30:50.106 that I— it's gonna sound light, but, but I really want you to think 30:50.606 --> 30:54.040 through the analogy. Our city, we've got a major 30:54.482 --> 30:58.273 kind of road going through our city, and it's so congested. 30:58.321 --> 31:02.080 Murfreesboro is— I call Murfreesboro a big town. 31:02.514 --> 31:05.791 You know, everybody grew up together, knew each other, but it got so 31:05.888 --> 31:09.486 big so quick. We're not really a city, but it's 31:09.986 --> 31:13.326 a town. But anyway, because of that, we have some 31:13.519 --> 31:17.133 strategic placement of grocery 31:17.633 --> 31:21.359 stores and restaurants. I live between 31:21.632 --> 31:25.516 2 major roads, but I— there's 3 Publix 31:25.869 --> 31:29.303 within a 2-mile distance. I can go 2 miles one 31:29.400 --> 31:32.208 way from my house and I'm at Publix. I can go 2 miles the other 31:32.708 --> 31:35.803 way, I'm at another Publix. I can go 2 miles south, I'm at another Publix. 31:36.156 --> 31:39.655 But the way the interstate and the way the town 31:39.768 --> 31:43.764 is mapped out, a community may not ever 31:44.264 --> 31:47.455 come to that other side of town, and they may just see that one Publix. 31:48.017 --> 31:52.113 I just happen to be in the middle. So I say that with the 31:52.613 --> 31:55.728 company, the restaurant Whataburger. Whataburger just 31:56.228 --> 31:59.759 came to Murfreesboro. And when they first launched, 31:59.824 --> 32:03.309 there's a whole marketing piece. And they launched 3 32:03.679 --> 32:07.197 restaurants kind of strategically on this road. 32:08.016 --> 32:11.598 2 of them thrived, one of them did not. 32:12.208 --> 32:15.806 And that side of town is still a congested area. There's still know, 32:15.822 --> 32:19.155 we've got several Walmarts too like that. There's still a lot of that going on, 32:19.347 --> 32:22.920 but that particular Whataburger location just 32:23.017 --> 32:26.718 didn't thrive. In the multi-site dynamic, 32:27.279 --> 32:31.381 I think perhaps like the restaurants, like the grocery stores, you are looking 32:32.150 --> 32:35.659 at the demographics, you're looking at the area of town, you're looking 32:35.691 --> 32:39.714 to say, hey, there's no representation of a church in this 32:39.858 --> 32:43.980 rural area, we need to plant one there. Are there instances where, 32:44.189 --> 32:47.644 you know what, we tried it for 2 years and the market, 32:47.869 --> 32:50.376 you know, so to speak, was not beneficial there? 32:50.842 --> 32:53.082 How do you deal with those challenges with multi-site? 32:55.218 --> 32:58.747 I think it's interesting that you bring up all these different businesses because when 32:58.844 --> 33:02.082 I was kind of being sold the multi-site model 33:02.582 --> 33:05.648 many years ago, they really described it in terms of franchising. You were franchising your 33:06.148 --> 33:09.057 church. And the idea is like, we want to take the church to where the 33:09.557 --> 33:11.217 people are. And we knew that we weren't going to be able to reach all 33:11.282 --> 33:15.272 of our whole community with multiple hundreds of thousands of people from 33:15.336 --> 33:18.865 our one little location. So yeah, that makes perfect sense. Let's take the 33:19.365 --> 33:23.037 church to these various locations so everybody has a church just like South Point 33:23.502 --> 33:27.577 within just a few miles of them. And that's the only model 33:27.609 --> 33:30.545 that I see multi-site still being a valid, 33:31.202 --> 33:35.405 viable kind of option, is when it is used locally to, 33:35.774 --> 33:39.769 um, not really extend your church, your brand 33:40.212 --> 33:43.881 But church planting, I think multi-site has detracted 33:43.898 --> 33:47.615 from and really robbed a lot from the church planting movement because so 33:48.115 --> 33:52.678 many larger churches especially have invested themselves into extending their brand all 33:52.742 --> 33:56.341 over their city instead of planting a church and developing 33:56.374 --> 33:59.508 leaders and elders and preachers to lead those churches. And so, 34:00.458 --> 34:03.901 um, by, by saying 34:03.933 --> 34:07.226 we're going to put a church close close by everybody like us, 34:08.542 --> 34:12.107 I think we're doing more harm than good sometimes because we 34:12.476 --> 34:16.506 have not put in the effort to actually start 34:17.006 --> 34:22.029 a new church. We, we've— so in other words, multi-site is a good temporary transitionary 34:22.109 --> 34:26.412 kind of form until a church is able to have solid leaders, 34:26.781 --> 34:30.089 specifically elders. And I know as a church planter it took me a long time 34:30.137 --> 34:33.331 to get elders in place. So I'm not saying a year or two, it may 34:33.831 --> 34:37.009 take a few years, but it would have to be with that understanding 34:37.041 --> 34:40.542 that we are going to let this church become independent in 34:40.574 --> 34:44.188 just a few years in order to get at least a couple elders on site 34:44.688 --> 34:48.443 there and a solid preacher that can function as an elder as well, and then 34:48.943 --> 34:52.057 we can release them to be independent. But now that I've, you know, seen this 34:52.557 --> 34:56.344 for a couple decades now, that's usually not the way it goes, is they 34:56.377 --> 35:00.098 hold on to all of these different sites and continue to expand 35:00.114 --> 35:04.270 and accumulate their one so-called church when it's really not functioning 35:04.448 --> 35:07.990 as one church at all. It's a lot of different churches but with 35:08.490 --> 35:09.404 one centralized leadership. 35:13.058 --> 35:16.115 Um, any other questions for Brett? 35:17.344

--> 35:19.058 For those who are not named, by the way. 35:21.214 --> 35:23.952 And Brett, did you have a question for Jason? I want to give each of 35:24.452 --> 35:26.255 you a chance to ask each other a question. I don't know if you had 35:26.271 --> 35:30.079 one for Jason. Well, I empathize 35:30.111 --> 35:33.183 with the idea of rural churches because you're absolutely right. Church planting is all about 35:33.424 --> 35:35.869 suburbs and the cities. And, you know, I'm in the suburbs. 35:37.650 --> 35:40.960 So rural churches are having a very difficult time. And so if I were in 35:41.460 --> 35:44.752 a rural setting, you know, my church was struggling, I would certainly consider like, 35:44.897 --> 35:48.916 I want to invite in some church to basically take us over. 35:51.046 --> 35:54.871 But again, there's— I think there's just some danger in that. So I'll just go 35:55.371 --> 35:58.621 back to my original question about, like, really, how do you define a church? 35:59.264 --> 36:02.643 And how big should it be? How many campuses can you have? Is there a 36:03.143 --> 36:06.361 limit to, you know, do we stop at the county border? Or do we 36:06.861 --> 36:10.081 keep going? Like, some of these churches have campuses across the nation and across the 36:14.300 --> 36:15.092 That's kind of a question. 36:18.939 --> 36:22.758 Would you— do you have a line where you We'll go beyond that. We won't 36:22.774 --> 36:26.130 go beyond the county. I have— and I think these are going to be nebulous 36:26.323 --> 36:29.663 things, you know, how do you define what is, uh, a community? 36:29.920 --> 36:33.389 You know, Anthony, to your point, you know, is it the Publix that you go 36:33.889 --> 36:36.970 to? Is it your high school? Is it your elementary school? That sort of thing. 36:37.628 --> 36:40.872 Uh, you know, for us, uh, you know, I think 36:41.372 --> 36:43.473 it's something I, I perceive regionally. 36:44.051 --> 36:47.343 Um, this is just a personal conviction and not one that I could apply to 36:47.843 --> 36:50.715 someone else. Uh, that is in a different context, 36:50.972 --> 36:54.376 led by elders that are gonna have to make decisions for themselves. And then people 36:54.408 --> 36:57.812 willingly submit to them or not. Uh, and because ultimately that's, 36:57.957 --> 37:01.136 that's what, that's what gets to happen. We're not foisting this upon everybody else. 37:01.794 --> 37:04.990 Uh, we've got to make decisions and then live with the consequences of our own 37:05.022 --> 37:08.827 decisions. Uh, and for me, that's, you know, we have a campus that's, 37:09.020 --> 37:12.584 uh, that's an hour away. Um, and that actually 37:13.084 --> 37:16.656 feels really good. Uh, there, because it's, I know it was known 37:17.156 --> 37:20.999 as the meth capital of Iowa 5 years ago. And that fellowship 37:21.207 --> 37:24.684 is changing the spiritual landscape of their community. 37:25.213 --> 37:28.465 Uh, one of the things that I think is the biggest strength of doing this 37:28.594 --> 37:31.606 is that that group desperately needed, 37:32.103 --> 37:35.131 uh, support through some really, really lean years. 37:35.708 --> 37:38.897 Um, financially speaking, it was subsidized, 37:39.153 --> 37:42.329 uh, significantly. Uh, probably more than 37:42.377 --> 37:45.942 a normal church plant would have been, uh, subsidized. And part of that is that 37:46.231 --> 37:49.731 we had a very large stake in it. We had a vested 37:50.165 --> 37:53.617 interest. We had skin in the game. Uh, and I think 37:53.681 --> 37:57.117 that one of the challenges with church plants in the rural context is 37:57.214 --> 38:00.666 recruiting to them is so difficult. Uh, who wants to 38:01.166 --> 38:04.616 move to those places? Um, until you've lived there, you don't know how good it 38:05.116 --> 38:09.256 can be in some of these towns. Having come from a place that everyone laughed 38:09.756 --> 38:13.543 at and hated and couldn't wait to leave. Phenomenal people. 38:13.688 --> 38:16.915 It was a really tough community to live in, though. I mean, our unemployment rate 38:18.023 --> 38:21.074 peaked at 18.7% in America, 38:21.475 --> 38:24.975 in the Midwest, in our lifetime. I mean, it's absolutely 38:25.072 --> 38:28.781 wild. And so when I think about the, 38:29.487 --> 38:33.211 the real strength of be a multi-site, 38:33.419 --> 38:37.060 if you cannot get together, and I think about this from a leadership standpoint. 38:37.204 --> 38:40.476 So the guy who leads at, uh, at our Old Wine location, his name 38:40.976 --> 38:45.816 is Carl. And one of the great benefits to them being a 38:45.864 --> 38:49.536 part of something that's not just them is the encouragement that Carl 38:50.036 --> 38:53.000 is to us and that we are to him. Uh, it's one of my favorite 38:53.500 --> 38:56.930 things about, uh, our entire church is to see 38:57.430 --> 39:00.827 something happening in him and in that congregation, 39:01.405 --> 39:05.014 um, that encourages everybody else, that provides some degree 39:05.514 --> 39:09.313 of fruit outside of their context, and ultimately lets 39:09.361 --> 39:12.297 us do something that wouldn't have happened, 39:12.794 --> 39:16.339 um, from a fiscal standpoint or from a, 39:16.885 --> 39:19.644 you know, raising up leaders standpoint. Um, 39:20.430 --> 39:22.868 and will there come a day where, you know, we get to do that again? 39:22.996 --> 39:26.445 I hope, man. I hope that we get to just spread spark multiplication in that 39:26.945 --> 39:30.617 regard all over rural communities across Eastern Iowa. So is 39:31.117 --> 39:34.564 there a place, a point in time when you are going to release those congregations 39:35.064 --> 39:37.901 and let them become independent, or are you, are you going to continue to hold 39:38.401 --> 39:42.345 on to them? Well, this is not my decision independently, and so 39:42.874 --> 39:46.645 I, I, to answer that question definitively

would circumvent our 39:47.145 --> 39:51.513 eldership, which I'm not going to do. Uh, and so if If 39:51.610 --> 39:55.065 that— the way I look at this is this: if, if our elders decided 39:55.500 --> 39:57.777 that we're going to take the whole thing because the Lord told us to, 39:57.825 --> 40:01.531 we're going to grind it up and blow it 40:02.031 --> 40:04.575 out to the wind, praise the Lord, that's what we're going to do. Um, 40:05.074 --> 40:07.795 but I need to know that the Lord told us to do that, and, 40:07.908 --> 40:11.560 and I would not make that decision independently. And, and for me, I think one 40:12.060 --> 40:15.993 of the dangers in a lot of multi-site environments is single-point leaders that 40:16.493 --> 40:18.792 don't have elders at all, let alone elders in multiple campuses. 40:19.964 --> 40:23.432 And so for me, I personally would love to see 40:23.898 --> 40:26.949 more launchpads established. I mean, like, 40:26.965 --> 40:30.401 for instance, we've got to get into Des Moines, the capital of Iowa. 40:30.497 --> 40:33.740 It's a phenomenal metropolis. I don't see that being 40:33.789 --> 40:37.032 a campus of Antioch. That needs to be its 40:37.128 --> 40:41.126 own launchpad to reach the rural communities around Des Moines 40:41.640 --> 40:44.161 and to become another hub for church planting. 40:45.269 --> 40:48.772 So, so what I hear you saying is the eldership really hasn't 40:48.788 --> 40:52.050 thought this through. There is no end game. No, 40:52.066 --> 40:55.279 that's, that's— you're, you're putting words in my mouth. I did not say that the 40:55.779 --> 40:59.473 eldership hasn't thought, thought this through. Uh, it's a point of constant 40:59.973 --> 41:03.731 prayer and constant shepherding. Is the goal going to be to 41:04.231 --> 41:07.105 let them become independent churches if it's possible? 41:08.149 --> 41:11.843 Okay, that's, that's what I'm asking. Like Yeah. You want 41:12.343 --> 41:15.480 to stay multi-site and continue to accumulate campuses, or is the goal 41:15.608 --> 41:18.877 to let them go, to grow them to a place where they have leadership and 41:18.893 --> 41:22.210 then you let them go and they're no longer Antioch? It's an, 41:22.402 --> 41:25.270 it's an all of the above approach for me, because there's going to be times 41:25.367 --> 41:28.667 when the most appropriate thing, even pragmatically actually, 41:28.988 --> 41:32.145 is to release them. There's going to be other times to say this, 41:32.337 --> 41:35.766 we've not been able to grow this thing to independence in multiple 41:35.798 --> 41:39.529 levels, whether it's leadership, finances, missional health. 41:39.594 --> 41:42.435 I mean, there's a lot of things that, that come into the same bucket. 41:43.474 --> 41:45.698 But man, I would— to me, it's an all-of-the-above approach. 41:47.882 --> 41:51.116 No, no, one more follow-up. You're good. Oh, I was just gonna say, 41:51.132 --> 41:52.968 so for the ones that you say it's an all-of-the-above, 41:54.588 --> 41:59.116 is there a plan then that says we are going to keep certain campuses even 41:59.616 --> 42:02.532 though they could be independent? And why would you do that? 42:05.659 --> 42:08.871 I think that if I'm going to play out a hypothetical scenario here, 42:09.352 --> 42:13.095 there are times where if the, you know, 42:13.191 --> 42:15.054 I think distance plays into this for me. 42:16.403 --> 42:19.695 You know, and again, the Des Moines examples, probably some details 42:20.195 --> 42:24.578 here, it's 2 hours away from us. And to me, that's pretty far to 42:24.610 --> 42:27.983 be able to say, hey, we're like, we're in totally different contexts, 42:28.384 --> 42:32.113 totally different areas of the state. And to me, that feels like a rubber band 42:32.145 --> 42:34.688 that stretches a little too far. That's, 42:35.460 --> 42:38.705 that's my, my personal feelings. You know, when I think 42:39.205 --> 42:42.748 about Olwine, for instance, is there a time where that thing 42:42.878 --> 42:47.241 becomes strong enough to be independent 42:47.948 --> 42:51.323 in every way? If it had— I don't think 42:51.823 --> 42:55.076 it was necessarily planted that way. So both of 42:55.108 --> 42:58.921 the multi-sites, by the way, were started before I got here. And so 42:59.258 --> 43:02.831 some of it is strategically where you go. And if we were going 43:03.331 --> 43:06.181 to try to make a hub in that area, there's a town that's 10 minutes 43:06.681 --> 43:10.379 away that's actually a little better, uh, to serve for that, because where everybody goes 43:10.491 --> 43:13.760 to buy groceries is that town. Uh, nobody goes 43:14.260 --> 43:16.837 out to the town that we have a church in. Uh, but we happen to 43:17.337 --> 43:19.914 have an elder who grew up in that church, and they were closing down. 43:20.042 --> 43:23.071 I think 15 people came to the, to the goodbye. 43:23.616 --> 43:27.323 And they gifted that to the church. Now, if that place 43:27.823 --> 43:31.721 becomes— and those people become able to stand on their own feet, uh, to me, 43:31.801 --> 43:35.011 I— the model that I dream of is actually something, uh, 43:35.332 --> 43:39.249 I don't know if you've read Multichurch, uh, but you end up seeing more coalitions 43:39.281 --> 43:42.651 between churches that say, hey, we have independent leadership, 43:42.972 --> 43:46.262 but we are very closely tied together, uh, in a missional 43:46.762 --> 43:50.292 standpoint. So you get some of the pragmatism of multi-site without 43:50.792 --> 43:54.208 the centralized authority, um, and the dangers that come with that. 43:54.579 --> 43:57.850 Personally, I think it'd be phenomenal if, uh— I've heard it, I know some places 43:57.882 --> 44:01.000 in Indianapolis that are doing this right now that are pretty cool. Um, 44:01.522 --> 44:05.031 that of course has its own downsides, but I think it sounds pretty good. 44:06.780 --> 44:10.194 Cool.

Brett, here's a question for you. Let's say 44:10.694 --> 44:13.833 someone's listening to this and thus far they're saying, 44:13.946 --> 44:17.945 okay, fair enough, there are some weaknesses 44:18.121 --> 44:21.413 with the model, but it doesn't have to define the 44:21.913 --> 44:25.379 model. And we see a lot of success, a lot of, you know, 44:25.443 --> 44:28.157 the CCVs in the Southeast. And, uh, 44:28.815 --> 44:32.540 you know, still, I, I don't know how we— why 44:32.572 --> 44:36.554 we should argue against that kind of success. Okay, talk to that person 44:36.763 --> 44:39.749 who, at this stage in the conversation, that's kind of their, 44:40.199 --> 44:41.580 their main takeaway so far. 44:43.829 --> 44:47.186 Okay, so from a practical standpoint, usually you're 44:47.686 --> 44:51.829 starting multi-sites to, um, to grow, to grow your church. 44:52.728 --> 44:56.006 Yes, we're starting it in a new location, but it's still growing your church. 44:56.182 --> 44:59.283 And in fact, the way that we were taught multi-site 44:59.347 --> 45:02.512 many years ago was if you send out a bunch of people— because ours was 45:02.544 --> 45:05.837 local, so we sent out hundreds of people to start a church in 45:06.337 --> 45:10.238 a second location— that the idea was your original location would grow grow right back. 45:10.415 --> 45:12.711 You'd fill it back in. That did not happen. 45:13.707 --> 45:17.640 So we did not grow from doing that. We had a huge second campus start, 45:18.363 --> 45:22.377 but it quickly grew back down as well. So we didn't 45:22.877 --> 45:26.279 get any real net effect from that. Um, we did the same thing 45:26.375 --> 45:30.036 with our third campus. We sent out a bunch of people and our original 45:30.084 --> 45:33.488 site did not fill back in, and that new site 45:33.520 --> 45:36.282 really didn't grow either. So, um, 45:36.988 --> 45:39.588 you know, the idea of, are we really being effective? Well, 45:40.423 --> 45:43.858 would it have been better to start an independent church there with a church 45:43.970 --> 45:47.341 planter or a, you know, a, uh, some sort of group 45:47.841 --> 45:50.808 of people to go start a different church in those areas? 45:50.969 --> 45:54.741 So I question how much growth is actually taking place on 45:55.241 --> 45:57.983 a lot of multi-sites, because as I said, a lot of it is just adding 45:58.015 --> 46:01.916 campuses that already exist and making the one central church 46:02.044 --> 46:05.543 somewhat bigger. At the expense often of smaller 46:06.043 --> 46:09.956 churches. Because that, as you mentioned, that's a megachurch problem too, is the megachurch 46:09.972 --> 46:13.262 Walmart effect where there's one big church in the area and they grow not through 46:13.422 --> 46:17.386 conversion. Yes, there's a lot of baptism. We've had a lot of baptisms, but how 46:17.434 --> 46:21.157 many are genuine conversions of unbelievers versus you're 46:21.286 --> 46:24.656 drawing in the Methodists and Baptists and Lutherans and you're the, 46:24.880 --> 46:28.427 you're the big church in town with all the programs. And, you know, 46:28.571 --> 46:31.781 all the studies seem to show Megachurches really grow at the 46:32.281 --> 46:35.745 expense of smaller churches as opposed to actual evangelistic growth. 46:35.809 --> 46:39.067 And I think that's probably the multi-site effect going on as well. 46:39.677 --> 46:43.320 So I would caution people on that alone, let alone 46:44.074 --> 46:47.973 the biblical concerns about eldership unity, um, 46:48.728 --> 46:52.258 the, the idea of like we are in a sense adopting a 46:52.758 --> 46:56.447 bit of a denominational structure. Yes, it's in a baby small form, 46:56.976 --> 47:00.581 But again, you take it out to its logical conclusions and, you know, where do 47:01.081 --> 47:04.539 you draw the line on how far away you can plant? You know, you said 47:04.843 --> 47:07.808 we have one that's 1 hour away. 2 hours is too far. 47:08.753 --> 47:11.285 Well, there'll be a lot of people say, well, an hour is too far. 47:12.294 --> 47:15.996 And others would say, well, 2 hours isn't that far with all the technology 47:16.044 --> 47:19.264 we have. And that's why you have a lot of the big churches 47:19.764 --> 47:23.575 in the country have these huge internet campuses, because that becomes the local 47:24.075 --> 47:27.177 church. For a lot of people who don't go to an actual physical location. 47:28.920 --> 47:32.434 So it's hard to separate the multi-site from the internet church concepts. 47:34.972 --> 47:38.655 Brett, I've got another question kind 47:38.671 --> 47:43.258 of pointed to that and trying to get even more pointed to your perspective. 47:45.000 --> 47:48.554 So I got a friend who their church is 47:48.765 --> 47:51.845 effective. In the area. Uh, 47:51.925 --> 47:55.132 they, they are discipling church, they, uh, 47:55.276 --> 47:58.179 great worship ministry, great programs, etc. 47:58.740 --> 48:02.396 But then there's another local church, and you've talked about accumulating churches, 48:02.428 --> 48:06.229 but there's another local church further on the outskirts, 48:06.742 --> 48:10.109 um, you know, aging, dying leadership, 48:10.670 --> 48:14.503 uh, aging, dying young, you know, youth in 48:14.535 --> 48:17.421 the church. So it's, it's an aging and dying church, so to speak. 48:18.368 --> 48:21.771 Your perspective sounds like, and this is where you get to kind 48:22.271 --> 48:25.897 of sharpen it if I'm off, but it sounds like you would say, 48:25.913 --> 48:29.990 hey, well, let's train them, let's equip 48:30.023 --> 48:33.602 them, let's— if there are some who are interested in 48:33.618 --> 48:36.155 planting or someone who's interested in leading, hey, 48:36.460 --> 48:40.088 here's a place where you guys could go, but that 48:40.136 --> 48:42.640 particular church should not, 48:43.250 --> 48:46.685 hey, this will be our West Campus and we

will 48:46.717 --> 48:49.447 bring effective program leadership, 48:49.912 --> 48:53.300 teaching, discipling to that area in that 48:53.365 --> 48:56.560 dying area? As I said, there's— I think there's a couple ways you can go 48:56.592 --> 49:00.895 with that. You can go multi-site and make it a temporary transitionary 49:00.927 --> 49:04.845 thing and then let them go, but is 49:05.345 --> 49:09.277 that any better than— you're going to release somebody to go be the 49:09.777 --> 49:13.788 campus minister there, why not send them out as a 49:13.852 --> 49:17.638 church planter. You say, well, they can't, they can't do that. They're not as equipped. 49:18.970 --> 49:22.371 Well, I don't know. I've done both. And I don't know that there's that big 49:22.871 --> 49:25.852 of a difference. In fact, in the early days, they told us you don't need 49:26.028 --> 49:28.884 a really great speaker, communicator, 49:29.012 --> 49:32.557 dynamic person to be the campus minister there. You just 49:32.605 --> 49:35.685 need kind of a shepherd figure. And we did that and it did not work. 49:36.937 --> 49:40.033 They needed a communicator. They needed somebody dynamic there. 49:40.706 --> 49:44.135 And when we put somebody in there later to replace them, then it did 49:44.392 --> 49:48.077 a lot better. So, um, the idea of like, we're going to send 49:48.577 --> 49:52.036 out some guy to be a campus minister who's 49:52.536 --> 49:54.808 just a shepherd guy, he, you know, he can't really be a church planter, 49:54.824 --> 49:57.724 he can't lead well— well, it's not going to work anyway. 49:58.333 --> 50:01.859 You, you need a communicator and a dynamic person, whether they're 50:02.359 --> 50:05.961 a campus minister or a church planter. So my druthers, my preference would 50:06.461 --> 50:09.665 be plant it or revive it somehow, you know, shut it 50:10.165 --> 50:13.355 down and restart it. But, uh, the danger is going to be down 50:13.371 --> 50:16.575 the road going multi-sites. You're, you're maybe not going to ever want to let that 50:16.689 --> 50:20.154 go, or do you make them so dependent on your resources 50:20.186 --> 50:23.781 and your staff, your budget, that you are enabling their 50:24.461 --> 50:27.940 dependent behavior? Hmm. Okay. 50:29.979 --> 50:33.753 Jason, do you have a question? We're still talking about church growth, 50:33.801 --> 50:37.525 right? That I, I, I take a little umbrage 50:37.734 --> 50:41.441 with dependent behavior in the, 50:41.682 --> 50:45.165 the idea of being able to accelerate growth in 50:45.855 --> 50:50.365 certain communities that are under-resourced is— it's 50:50.865 --> 50:54.265 a really pessimistic way of talking about it. Uh, and I, 50:54.425 --> 50:58.422 I wouldn't think about my brothers and sisters an hour north of me as 50:58.839 --> 51:03.207 those of dependent behavior. They are, relative to what 51:03.707 --> 51:06.000 is happening in their own finances, are faithful people. 51:07.365 --> 51:10.817 But we're able to move resources from a place 51:11.317 --> 51:14.880 that has more than it needs to a place that is, 51:15.699 --> 51:19.472 is in need. And I, to me, that's just, that stood out 51:19.972 --> 51:21.704 to me. And I, and I don't know if that's the point you're making, 51:22.202 --> 51:25.502 um, but there are some good ways of looking at 51:25.569 --> 51:28.622 this. Uh, 51:28.737 --> 51:32.130 I think it goes back to behavior. Are you trying to make it a 51:32.630 --> 51:35.919 temporary transitionary thing, or are you trying to keep it a permanent 51:36.419 --> 51:39.992 thing? If so, yes, there's going to be dependency. You have 51:40.105 --> 51:43.511 robbed them of the ability to become independent by doing everything for them, 51:43.575 --> 51:46.949 providing everything for them. So why would they ever aspire to 51:46.965 --> 51:50.530 anything more than that? I know when I planted the church, I had 2 years 51:51.076 --> 51:54.347 to get off any kind of outside support. And I did it. It was 51:54.523 --> 51:58.115 very difficult. I didn't— it was— we were poor. We had nothing, 51:58.147 --> 52:01.722 but we did it. And that made us a stronger, better church because 52:01.770 --> 52:05.442 of it. Otherwise, you know, I was part of a church planting board in 52:05.942 --> 52:10.236 our state. I was on the committee for years, and I saw churches that became 52:10.736 --> 52:14.357 dependent and relied on the church planting finances to keep afloat for 52:14.373 --> 52:17.756 many years. Whereas if we had kicked them off after a couple of years, 52:18.093 --> 52:21.496 they would have learned to survive. Or they don't. But either way, 52:22.209 --> 52:25.933 it's not that kind of unhealthy situation where 52:26.433 --> 52:26.905 they're not really independent. 52:30.329 --> 52:34.023 Jason, did you have any follow-up question there? Well, they didn't, you know, 52:34.088 --> 52:37.523 they didn't. The or they don't possibility is very real. 52:38.838 --> 52:42.831 And, you know, most of my ministry time has been in the rural context. 52:43.219 --> 52:46.532 And it's pretty tough out there and 52:47.032 --> 52:49.348 it's largely ignored. It is not a conversation that is happening in church planning circles. 52:50.752 --> 52:53.323 Right now. Uh, and, and to me, 52:54.207 --> 52:57.534 a church that's locally established, that's regionally established, gets to 52:57.646 --> 53:00.590 look at those things and say, all right, what little towns are, 53:01.042 --> 53:04.721 are people forgetting about? Are we not seeing from a broader perspective? 53:05.221 --> 53:08.626 Uh, and from my standpoint, I look at that and think, okay, this thing— if 53:09.126 --> 53:12.715 I've got a thing that's moving, that's working, doubling down on 53:12.829 --> 53:15.833 that and concentrating impact there to say, hey, 53:15.849 --> 53:19.020 let's put some more fuel in this thing Uh, to have an even greater 53:19.036 --> 53:22.537

impact in, in that area. I, I would never say this is, 53:23.227 --> 53:26.310 uh, a thing where you say, well, you guys don't have to contribute to this 53:26.810 --> 53:29.489 at all. Uh, you know, we have— we all put in— put things in the 53:29.989 --> 53:33.327 same stream here. Um, but man, I would, I would 53:33.827 --> 53:36.554 want to double down. It— the one of the advantages of this is it allows 53:36.618 --> 53:40.376 you to concentrate some impact, uh, that you otherwise wouldn't 53:40.472 --> 53:44.354 in a place that most people would not invest. Uh, but because 53:44.403 --> 53:48.070 we've got a local footprint and a regional footprint, we're able to, to discern that. 53:50.931 --> 53:54.505 Was that a question? No, no, just, just responding. I, 53:54.893 --> 53:58.920 I love, uh, I love the rural church. I love the, the possibility 53:58.936 --> 54:02.391 of it, of its, of it thriving. Uh, but I think that there is 54:02.424 --> 54:05.651 some reimagining of what is, what is going to work, 54:06.119 --> 54:09.284 uh, in some of these communities, not in all of them. I don't think there's 54:09.784 --> 54:13.362 an all-of-the-above answer here, and I also think 54:13.378 --> 54:17.057 that the local churches get to make decisions for themselves 54:18.138 --> 54:21.481 and live with the positives and the negatives of that. 54:22.079 --> 54:25.295 I think it's one of the challenges in Scripture where we're not given every single 54:25.328 --> 54:28.916 detail about church governance. You know, as an Independent Christian Church 54:28.964 --> 54:33.125 guy that came here by choice, you know, I absolutely 54:33.206 --> 54:36.759 agree with our convictions around this, but I think it'll be interesting to see the 54:37.259 --> 54:40.943 way this plays out in our lifetime, as it concerns multiplication of leaders, 54:41.605 --> 54:45.353 um, let alone disciple makers. And I 54:45.853 --> 54:49.381 have 2 more very quick questions, uh, before we close this out. 54:49.851 --> 54:53.235 Uh, the first question is gonna be, um, Jason, 54:53.996 --> 54:58.020 what would you say is the most persuasive point that Brett made? And then Brett, 54:58.036 --> 55:00.588 what do you think is the most persuasive point that Jason made? 55:02.551 --> 55:05.835 Well, I'm a young guy who I'm grateful, 55:05.883 --> 55:09.217 Brett, to get time with you and to 55:09.250 --> 55:13.177 heed, uh, your warnings and experience. 55:13.257 --> 55:16.127 And I want to make sure that in this context, it's not really— if we 55:16.627 --> 55:20.151 were having coffee, I would, I would, I would have my hands like this 55:20.651 --> 55:22.988 to you saying, just keep, keep giving me, uh, 55:23.598 --> 55:26.900 advice. And so that's the posture that I would want to take. 55:26.964 --> 55:29.978 But I would say of the most salient things that I will come away with 55:30.170 --> 55:33.825 is Uh, the, the good of holding, 55:34.483 --> 55:37.320 um, you know, our collective feet to the fire, uh, 55:37.769 --> 55:41.119 on, on establishing, uh, independent churches. 55:41.232 --> 55:44.438 I think about, you know, some of the, the church planting movements of the '50s 55:44.518 --> 55:48.285 and '60s. So many of those churches are running their course right now. 55:48.911 --> 55:52.614 Uh, we're talking about just 60 to 80 years later, and, and so 55:53.114 --> 55:56.269 many of those churches are shutting down right now. Uh, some of them are making 55:56.381 --> 55:59.601 it Uh, but many of them are not. And I think that, 56:00.197 --> 56:03.823 uh, in the next phase, what does it look like to set another generation 56:04.323 --> 56:07.738 up to carry the gospel farther than us? And I think your advice is, 56:08.093 --> 56:09.703 is, um, is well-founded. 56:11.233 --> 56:14.759 Jason, thanks for that. You said you would like to hold 56:15.259 --> 56:18.663 your hands out this way, but for the podcast audience, 56:18.711 --> 56:21.939 they don't know if you're— if you've got your hands around his neck. They don't 56:22.439 --> 56:25.917 know. So what Describe it for the people who are listening. In line for 56:25.933 --> 56:29.902 that. Yeah, we're just audio listening, 56:30.577 --> 56:34.143 holding it out like, give me, give me more of this wisdom. Okay, perfect. 56:34.690 --> 56:37.839 Brett? Yeah, well, again, 56:37.887 --> 56:41.871 Jason, I was in your shoes 18 years ago. I was the guy defending multi-site 56:42.371 --> 56:46.050 because it was all new, uh, and for, for all of 56:46.550 --> 56:50.073 its cons— my concerns over the years I, I'm still driven by the 56:50.573 --> 56:53.573 same thing that you are. And yeah, you want to reach as many people for 56:53.589 --> 56:56.912 Christ as possible. Uh, and so to 56:56.944 --> 56:59.962 that degree, it's a good thing. Uh, 57:00.331 --> 57:03.590 I never want to squelch anybody's desire to try new 57:03.622 --> 57:07.282 methods or experiment, because that's what we do. We call everything 57:07.330 --> 57:10.043 an experiment, and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. 57:11.070 --> 57:14.409 Uh, and yeah, we'll see how this multi-site thing plays out. 57:14.538 --> 57:18.626 I, I think, uh, you you were— the most salient part 57:18.690 --> 57:22.151 of your, your point is like, we're trying to 57:22.651 --> 57:26.045 reach these communities that nobody else is reaching. And my fear is that, 57:26.157 --> 57:30.451 yeah, there's— over the next few years, because there is a great lack of 57:30.724 --> 57:34.185 preachers, uh, and church planters, that a lot 57:34.685 --> 57:37.261 of these rural churches are going to perish. They're not going to be able to 57:37.293 --> 57:40.738 keep them open due to lack of leadership and lack of funds. And so 57:41.238 --> 57:44.732 to the extent that multi-site is helping to save them and keep them going, 57:44.845 --> 57:48.084 I think that's a wonderful thing. My only concern is what's 57:48.584 -->

57:48.910 the endgame of it? 57:52.722 --> 57:55.845 And Anthony, the final question, and I'd love for you to take this home, 57:55.878 --> 57:59.567 is what is in black and white here? What do 57:59.665 --> 58:03.021 we— what can we all agree on here that we're gonna take with us? 58:04.742 --> 58:08.264 Guys, I think after listening to your passion 58:08.441 --> 58:12.102 and your love Um, the, the black and white that I see here 58:12.602 --> 58:16.175 is that you are both very passionate about the mission of 58:16.288 --> 58:20.252 Christ to seek those who are lost wherever 58:20.752 --> 58:24.871 they may be. Um, and, and you both have gotten the 58:25.339 --> 58:28.244 strategic angle to, man, how do we do that? But, 58:28.727 --> 58:32.347 but you're both following that, that mission passionately. Is that about 58:32.411 --> 58:34.840 accurate? Oh yeah. 58:35.190 --> 58:38.609 Yeah, yeah. Well, guys, we, 58:38.978 --> 58:43.136 we thank you here at Scripture in Black and White. Thankful to your 58:43.232 --> 58:46.828 perspectives. It seems like, Daniel, I've said this every 58:47.085 --> 58:50.408 episode— we've recorded a few episodes, but it— I say this 58:50.456 --> 58:54.084 about every one of them— you're not like fly-by-night, 58:54.228 --> 58:57.921 like you're not passing by this subject. You lived 58:58.421 --> 59:02.287 it, you work it, you've examined all of the implications. 59:03.219 --> 59:06.399 And you are resolved in your convictions. And so we appreciate 59:06.512 --> 59:10.030 you sharing that. I hope the audience has, 59:10.287 --> 59:13.757 has been able to hear even more in depth. I'm sure 59:14.257 --> 59:17.435 there are ministers, pastors out there that are struggling with this, 59:17.773 --> 59:21.146 that are on the brink. They're growing at such a rate to where 59:21.646 --> 59:25.419 it's, do we stay larger? Do we go multi-service? 59:26.351 --> 59:29.965 Do we try to secure a larger building? Do we go multi-site? 59:30.030 --> 59:33.886 So my prayer is that out of everything that you all have 59:33.902 --> 59:38.016 shared, that you've at least educated us and 59:38.516 --> 59:41.760 enlightened us on this subject. And so we thank you so much. 59:42.756 --> 59:46.259 And to our listeners, we thank you for listening through this. And hopefully, 59:46.436 --> 59:50.132 hopefully you have gained a bunch as well. Don't forget to like 59:50.308 --> 59:53.586 and share this with someone, especially those that you know 59:54.004 --> 59:57.698 that are considering multi-site. Or even growing at 59:58.198 --> 01:00:01.793 such a rate where the discussion is even at hand, be sure to share that. 01:00:02.178 --> 01:00:06.160 Follow us here on YouTube and all of our other podcast 01:00:06.674 --> 01:00:10.752 areas. Follow us at renewed.org. Be sure to get in 01:00:11.266 --> 01:00:14.702 much of our resources as well. So again, 01:00:14.718 --> 01:00:18.395 from Daniel and I and Britt and Jason, we thank 01:00:18.895 --> 01:00:22.478 you so much. Thank you for joining us on Scriptural. Scripture in black and