How to Become a Walking Revival | with Kevin Myers

If you're here at the Heights this last weekend, you got to hear his message. We get into a bunch of topics, including father wounds. How do you deal with your father wound? How do you not just forgive but restore? We have an incredible conversation about the importance of mentors and how to be a great mentee. You're going to enjoy this episode, and if you want more episodes like this, please like or subscribe below. You're listening to Open Bible Open Life with Pastor Kyle Mercer. At Two Cities, we're passionate about making and mobilizing disciples, and that doesn't end with Sunday. We're here to bring God's Word and work into your week so you can be equipped to be sent wherever you go. All right, Kevin Myers, welcome to the podcast. Welcome to Winston Salem. Thank you. Before we turn the cameras on, you were telling me actually upstairs that this is not the first time that you've been to Winston Salem. So when was Lawson? You're here. Second time. 1997. And you actually, we put you up. We didn't know this in God's providence. We don't live in coincidence, but in God's providence, you're staying at the same hotel. You stayed at 30 years ago. Yeah, deeply, deeply spiritually significant for me, for my wife, for our church. So yeah. Well, that's interesting because a lot of times you're from Atlanta, but a lot of times when we're inviting somebody to Winston Salem, we have to kind of describe it.

We have to be like, well, it's, so we're wake forest universities and people go, oh, yeah, or they'll always say, is it the triangle or like, no, it's the triad. It's a little smaller or let's go. It's an hour north of Charlotte. But you, when Pastor Dave had the first conversation with you, you immediately are like, this is a significant place. Now, I want to talk to you a little about that, but you also may, because by the way, we're recording this, as you know, but our audience doesn't, we're recording this just a few hours before you're going to launch our Heights conference. Are you going to tell the story of Winston? I am. I am. Remember that story. It's too good not to give. Okay, I want you to. All right. So if you have your list of this podcast and you haven't listed this army, you go listen to it. Okay. So I'm a more personal question to start. How long have you had a mustache? True. Absolutely. Best question. I mean, you're ready. Look at that thing. That is part of your persona. Go ahead. I was 16 years old. No, you didn't.

I grew one. I was so proud of it. Now you got to go back, man. I'm old. I'm old. My dad had a mustache. Okay. Until about 10 years ago. 16 years old. Grew it a little bit fuzzy, not impressive, but I was so proud of that thing. It has never been shaved in my entire life. The eraser has never been above these lips. Between the lips and the nose. Never had a razor. Come on. Come on. How bizarre is that? And my kids won't let me. Like my youngest son. He's 23 now. Just got married this last spring. He's like, Dad, you cannot. Not while I'm alive. I was thinking you were going to say, Hey, maybe in like the last decade or something like that. I've threatened it. I said, man, it's time to get rid of this. No, it's too iconic. Okay. Yeah.

So it'll mess people up, man. So, yeah. I noticed it right away. Obviously. Oh, no. It talks to you. So what the other thing that we just did, I just showed you the video that our church is going to see on this Sunday. So by the time this comes out, it'll be there a little seen it, but it's a 14 minute video. You saw it. History of our church. I showed that to you in part because I wanted you to understand who you were speaking to. I want to hear a little about the history of the church that you planted. So in 1987, I was living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and I was three years old. How old were you? Three years old. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Was that necessary? Tell me. What were you doing? You and Marsha, you were married at this point. We were married. Okay. Were you in full time ministry already? When you decided to plant a church, tell us, tell us kind of the background that you deciding to plant a church because I know you had a phrase. You wanted to reach unresolved spiritual, spiritual, spiritual, and resolved people. Okay.

That's a very specific phrase. Tell me how you got there. Yeah. Well, you want the long story and the story. I want the long story. I'll give you the long story. Here's the moment. My parents divorced when I was about 12 years old, wrecked my life, and my told her brothers and my dad left for all practical purposes. So I'm left with the single one. How old were your older brothers? The one was three years older. Okay. The next was in between. Okay. So we're a year and a half apart and then three years apart. Wow. Okay. So they leave with that. But the three most influential males in my life exited. Dad was too busy. Mom became single mom. High school dropout. Never had a job. We lived in government subsidized housing. I mean, it just wrecked my life. But mom was so devoted to believing that God intended to walk with her to the most difficult seasons of her life. So she was serious about Christ. My dad, not so much.

Yeah. [BLANK_AUDIO] She kept encouraging our faith. When I was 16 years old, I had this sense. And Kyle, I don't even know how to explain it to you. I could now as an adult, I couldn't at 16. I had this sense like, "I think I'm supposed to be a pastor. "What does that even mean?" I don't know. I mean, I'm reading my Bible every day. I'm praying every day. But I don't know what that means. I don't know how to process that, but it just keeps coming up in me. But I wanted to be an attorney. So I wanted to go change the world, be in the term and make a lot of money, get out of poverty, get out of scarcity, go make a difference. I was in debate. I was in forensics, which is a speaking thing. So I'm in all this stuff and I'm like, "God, I," so on November 13th of 1977, I said to the Lord, "If you want me to be a pastor, "you're gonna have to tell me in a way that I can't deny it." - Yeah. - I gotta know this, the way I'm wired, I just gotta know this the rest of my life. - Yeah.

- So if you would, and this is so dumb, nobody's gonna promote this. I'm like, "I'm gonna take my Bible, I'm gonna drop it, "I'm literally that guy, I'm gonna drop the Bible, "put my finger on it." If it says, "I'm supposed to be a pastor or minister," I'm in, I'll sign on. If not, I'm gonna be an attorney. Now, let me just be super clear unless anybody translates from this, like this is good theology. I look back at how I don't think I authored that idea. So I don't recommend it, and I don't believe I authored it. We have a sovereign God, he knew what he was doing. Anyhow, the Bible opened, put my finger, opened my eyes, and read, "You will be called the ministers of our God." It was Isaiah 61, it was the passage that is the prophecy of Christ and is calling. Anyhow, it, I fell on the floor, I wept, I signed my name, I still have the Bible, I have where I signed it, November 13th, 10, 55 p.m., 1977, and I still have that Bible. - Wow. - So Kyle, I knew behind a shadow of a doubt that God wanted me to be a pastor. And then I had a couple of visions, I don't get a lot of them. I actually probably had three visions in my whole life, don't know how to describe them, but they happened in that same season.

One of them was, I'm standing at the top of a fun house. - Okay. - And all the people are coming to the fun house and they get on the slide and they slide down the slide and it's part of the fun house. And we, this was something that was familiar to me, you know, from the Cedar Point Park. And what became obvious in this bizarre vision is that I'm supposed to stand at the top of that slide because people are sliding to hell and they think it's fun. - Wow. - You're not supposed to stand at the gates of heaven. You're supposed to stand at the gates of hell that you're calling. - Yeah. - Plan a church. That's where Spiritually Unresolved came. - Okay. - I'm supposed to do this for Spiritually Unresolved. Then I got a vision for a church of thousands of thousands. I even had this, this 11,000 like it's a bizarre vision. You ever try to describe something, you feel dumb the longer you talk about it? - I feel dumb. - I mean, I've always felt dumb. - I think everybody's in religious. - I've always felt dumb. I feel like I don't know.

It was weird to me. I drew it out on a piece of paper. I explained it to my mom and there's this massive auditorium of thousands of people. And I'm expecting my friend who I know is already called the ministry to step up. And he was in the room. And then I watched myself step up. And- - Interesting. - Spirit said, you're to lead a church of thousands of thousands. And 11,000 was in my head. I can't even apply it. All that settled at 16. I mean, that is so- - 10 years before you're going to have to take it- - Fantastic. And so unsettling. - Yes. - Is it fantastic? I don't know. Yeah, it is. But is it? - Yeah. - Because it set me up. 'Cause when I planted the church in 1987, I got all this behind me. - Yeah. - And so I've already decided what God was going to do, how God was going to do it. And sort of made some deals with him he never made with. - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

- So what I see your 10 year anniversary. I'm in there like- - Things happen a little quickly. - Yeah, yeah. That's not fair. God loves you more. You're a better leader. Blah, blah, blah, blah. By the way, if all the people are listening to this, you don't have to agree with me. You know Kyle better than I do. So however they feel about it. But- - Anyhow, there's the setup. You ask. - So the setup, no, no, that's good. So what are you doing right before? Are you living? - Yeah. - So you move to Atlanta? Where are you living? - So you just mentioned Cedar Point. My wife, just above Detroit, we met in college, which was in Indiana. We got married, went to a church just outside of Grand Rapids, Michigan, and passed her there for five years. It was a church plant that was three years old, running about 125 people. In that five years, it grew to about 1,200 people. So in our little kind of circles

of holiness movement denomination, history of John Wesley, that kind of side of the tracks, it was the fastest growing mind blowing, oh my goodness. So of course I was taking credit. I'm not the senior pastor, so let's be super clear. I am taking credit for what God is doing through the senior pastor, but I had everything to do with it. So again, I have a sense that, oh, I'm experiencing as anointing in his favor, and then it's time. So it's time to plant the church, and they said, well, we'll help fund you. And all of that looks like did anyone go with you? Ah, man, that was- - Were you even more parachuting in? - Yeah, when you were three years old, so you're not gonna understand what I say next, but there was no church planting system. - No, I get, there was no books, there was no books, there's no system, there's no leadership, there's no organization, there's nothing. - Him, Hallard in right center, church, and everything I've done. - Nobody, nobody, nobody. - So we sold everything, and you know, I think- - How did you provide for yourself? - We sold everything, not that we had that much at 26, but honestly, this scarcity mindset stuff, I mean, we were devoted, just put money together,

bought a house, we did okay, so I had a house, I had two new cars, I had money in the bank, and then I raised funds, probably $125,000 back in '87, so that was nothing, and moved down here, got a couple of friends, some of my friends, to go with me, in other words, I met 'em in some of them, so I made 'em friends, but they hadn't been for years, you know how that goes, right? - You're my friend now, 'cause you're this guy. - I'm not sure it lasted that long, although we're still friends today, but so they raised their funds, we all went down, just started knocking on doors, I mean, I literally moved into an apartment, and walked out of the apartment, and just started using it on doors, the Holy Spirit, back to the, He made it undeniably clear to me. Gwynette County is where we planned the church, in a prayer time, I said please tell me where I need to go, so I asked him to tell me where I need to go. - Was this an other vision? - It was not a vision, but curiously enough, my mom moved and lived with her sister for two summers in Gwynette County, Georgia, and I had to live with her while I was in college and did construction work, so I knew where it was, and I said, you gotta tell me where, and I wasn't saying Gwynette, but I'm like, I don't care where it is,

it can be right here in Grand Rapids, it can be in Arizona, it can be in Gwynette County, Georgia. I was just naming places I'd been, but you have to tell me, because this is probably gonna cost me more than I think. And if something doesn't work, I wanna quit. So if I know it's you, I'll stay in. So please tell me. Anyhow, there's a beautiful way that God worked at, and again, he orchids trading things, he's sovereign, he's gracious, but our denominational circles called me up, and said, hey, here you want to plant a church, we had a plant set up in Gwynette County, Georgia, would you be open to moving that far away? - Wow. - So we literally jumped in the car, drove down to test it, crossed the county line. My wife and I looked at each other and said, we're home. I went back, sold everything, drove down. Just, it's so dumb. This is so-- - It's faith filled, I like it. - Okay, there's faith filled, and then there's just dumb. - Well, and then I'm guessing the name 12 stone is from the 12 stones from Joshua, and we didn't even start with that name. - What was your name at first? - Crossroads Community Church. - Okay, not terrible name.

- Yeah, no. - If you were in the joke, if you planted your church in the eighties and nineties, you used the word community, and if you, after 2000, you used the word city. - Yeah, so there you go. - There you go, yeah, okay, why'd you change it? - The whole online, we were gonna become a multi-campus congregation, and there was no way to own the URLs we wanted to own. There was no way to identify ourselves, and we said, it's time to change our name. - Okay, I wanna hear about the launch of this, and I think you might tell some of that story. - I am gonna tell some of it tonight, but-- - Tell us this, good. - Well, go ahead. - I was gonna ask you, I was gonna chase a rabbit trail for a second. So your parents get divorced at 12, and now you're in Gwynette, and you're about to plant this church. What is your relationship? filled with all about is there ever reconciliation? From probably mid college season. I know I was done with my dad. Okay. So 40 years before we talked again, you and your dad? 40 years. What was last time you talked to? At 58. I initiated a reconciliation. Why? Because God made me. So that was just eight years ago. Yeah. And that was 40 years of not talking to. Yeah,

he'd never met his grandchildren. He wouldn't know Marsha if you bumped into her. How did that attempt at reconciliation go? Incredibly well, he'd been praying for it. He got his life back on track. There's a lot of, there's a lot of ugly underneath that would be too complicated. You know, but you know, I wouldn't have let him into the life of my children. I couldn't let my children. He would he would successfully get them to love him. But they didn't know him. Yeah. Anyhow, it would have been unhealthy. But that excuse is gone. And I was. See, I'm sold. I got stories, Kyle. Come on, I want to hear. I'm doing an interview with Jeff Foxworthy. Yeah, for a Sunday, the comedian for a weekend service. And in between takes, he started talking about his dad and his dad situation was worse than mine. So we're, we're trading stories like, Oh, my life was, what was your like, back and forth? Like, man, we're both messed up guys. Yeah, we are. And then he talked about all the stuff he did with his dad and how he cared for his dad and helped his dad. And I was stunned. I mean, Kyle, I'm like, Okay, stop. Time out, we're not on camera. Why? After the way your dad treated mom family details, like I help me. He said, well, he's my dad. I said, yeah, but not really, he's your biological donor. Yeah, not not your father. You still wait. You only that only dad I have. Yeah. He said, and God can, I mean, God help me. Yeah, forgiven restore. I'm like, God, good for you. I didn't walk away like I should do something. I bought away like good for you. That's for you enough. Maybe that helps your comedy. But if you knew my situation, I wouldn't. But I'm in a season where I'm fasting and praying to say, God, I want more of you more of you more of you. So anyhow, to make a long story longer. The Holy Spirit mess me, he said, if you want to

be if you want more of me, you're going to have to be more like me. I'm like, how am I not like you? I mean, come on, I'm in my 50s, I've been doing this a long time. He said, I forgive and restore. And you just forgive. Like, I don't even know what that means. And he made a list of three people. And I said, you're right, I don't and I won't. Yeah, yeah. I mean, shouldn't have honest conversations for that. Yeah. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. It was it was unsettling. I'm like, you are right. I will, I will not, there are three people. I will not restore. I forgive them. Like, I don't hold bitterness anger resentment. He said, well, if you want more of me, be more like me. Wow. And that took two, three months of me just to get my soul to a place where I would initiate with all three of those people. And one of them was my dad. So RT Kendall, who I'm sure you've heard of before, he ended up pastoring after Martin Loo Jones. He wrote the book Total Forgiveness. It's about the story of Joseph. And one of the arguments he makes in that book is the deeper, the forgiveness, the deeper than anointing. And what you see in the life of, you already said you had forgiven not restored. But I just think about the life of Joseph and, you know, he was so anointed, but in every season of his life, he had to forgive somebody, his brother's pot of his wife, the guy who forgets about him in prison, all that kind of stuff. How about your brother? I was reasonably close to my oldest brother, but long distance because he's in in Michigan. So just we were close from a distance, so to speak. And then and then my other brother not so much. He had a lot of his own challenges. Yeah, just really difficult life and eventually passed away at 40. Okay, I'm sorry, so it was rough. Yeah, wow. Do you would you say that you

had a father wound? Do you know what I'm saying? People talk about that? Absolutely. And how does that what would you say to men who feel like they have father wounds, you know, be Jeff box worthy for somebody else right now. being a good father is part of your healing. Yeah, I've seen that with guys. They get to be for their sons and daughters, what their dad wasn't for them. But what would you say about a father would and how do you speak to men who go? Man, that's, I don't know exactly your dad's story, but I've got something like that. Yeah. Well, if at first I said I don't have a father wound, I'm fine. He has a problem. I don't. And that's obviously not true. I just wasn't self aware. Yeah. When I had children, which we started our family down at Lana. When I held my boy the first time, I could get emotional now. I'm like, wow, I have felt like I never successfully earned my dad's love. Only now do I realize I wasn't supposed to try. That's right. Well said. Kids are not supposed to try to be loved. Yeah, that's right. They're supposed to be received and loved. We were created for that. It comes unconditionally. Yeah. And every kid wants, their kids come in the world wanting to have the best relationship with their parents. They're wanted for it. Yeah. I think that's all they want. Divine design. That's all they want. Yep. And the idea that we can reorganize divine design and still be okay, I think is at best faults. Yeah, you can't. If not more. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So then you're going to have to go back to how God designed things. And I'll tell you this. I said, I never talked to my dad. He called me once. When my son was two or three years old, and he said, I'd like to know my grandchildren. I mean, it was just a random call. I don't know. I got my number, probably one of my siblings. And I said, dad, I said, you can't skip a generation and have a relationship. Interesting. Yeah. So two things, and I'm not sure I handled this well, Kyle. Yeah. I don't even fall. I should say this. I'm old enough to just this is open Bible open life. Yeah. I said, dad, now that I have a son, I have no idea how you discarded me. None. I couldn't do it. That says something about you, not me. Secondly, if you're going to know my children, you'll have to restore the relationship with me and do all the work. And I'm not sure you're prepared for that. And that was the end of that call.

Did he say anything? Not really. Wow. And at that point, you're in your early 30s, so you won't talk to him again until I'm 58. Wow. Yeah. Well, thanks for sharing. I know it's not always easy to talk about it. I just when you just there was such a moment when you said the three men that were most influential in my life, all, I don't know if the story to use, but they all abandoned me at the same time. Well, yeah, I have a 12-year-old son. I have a 10-year-old son, a 12-year-old son, 14-year-old daughter, but I'm just thinking about my son as well. We would destroy him. Unbelievable. I mean, you walk away from your son and you, I have any time you say, you know, you're in 12 with such a significant, I mean, oh, all your manhood is about to be formed. All of this transition into to your early teen years, the middle school years is where you form identity and clarity and stability. And then you start, you know, leveraging your capacity and your gifting and high school and all of manhood. I think it's, you know, the foundation is in the early stages, but it gets formed in that season. And so, yeah, father won't. I'm going to say something about the father won't. Yeah, please do. I don't think this is true for everybody, but I'll give my answer. I've never been healed. Never. There's a hole in the soul that can't be fixed by somebody else. Yeah. God will fill it, but not fix. I'm going to go my experience. This isn't even psychologically great, not necessarily theological. I'm just to say this, as long as I stay in the vine, he keeps me whole, but I don't own the healing. Yeah. So if I drift the speed at which I can get back to drivenness, insecurity, selfish ambition, rely on myself, all of the haunting stuff that you would hide, it comes back at high speed. And I have found that men who do not have a father won't don't know what I'm talking about, because they default to security and stability and unconditional love, which I trust my children default to. So they don't even know what I'm talking about. I never found that interesting. Yeah, because healed would mean it's it's it's not going to return. It's not going to occur. It's just going to be settled. So there's no doubt he healed me, but I don't own the healing. I just I'm trying to even define the father wouldn't for a lot of guys. It's almost like I end up looking everywhere else. This is how it could manifest itself poorly. I end up looking everywhere else for what I should have gotten from my dad. And whether it's you know, I've got to prove myself. This is you mentioned like a maybe a selfish ambition to drive. I've seen guys I need to make a certain amount of money to prove myself or whatever it is. Yeah, all of it.

You had to parent yourself. Yeah. You had to redefine manhood and become that thing. So you're going to be driven. You're going to have to prove. You're going to have to keep earning. You're going to have to keep accomplishing. You're going to have to hide the insecurities. Yeah. How much do you how much have you talked about this publicly? So you were pastor preach preacher openly congregation knows this. So this is just part of how do you think about what to share? Like not just that in general. How do you think about as a teacher preacher of God's word as a public figure and servant? What how much to share about those things publicly? Yeah. Do you have a taxonomy? A bit. A bit. I don't I don't share it publicly until I've processed it deeply enough to be past it so it doesn't undo me. That's good. So that God can get honor and glory. There's a fine line between telling your story and how God helped you and telling your story to get help from other people. Yeah, that's good. So you can start talking in such a way that get people to feel sorry for you. It starts becoming about you. You start excusing yourself from your story. And I always wanted to say in such a way that it could explain me but not excuse me. Yeah. And so I have to be past something before I'll share the story. That's good. Yeah. And it's usually a sign of health that you can talk about it that you you know, I think for most people. If you can talk about it, you are probably in a healthier place. Jordan Peterson, not a Christian but clinical psychologist, he talks about if you still cry about something that happened more than 18 months ago, it's because you haven't properly processed it. And part of you is still back there. You know, you know, I'm sure you've had the same experience. I'll talk to people about difficult things in their past father, whatever. And they almost they might be a let's say it's a 35 year old guy in the conversation with him. He almost becomes 17 years old when he talked to him again. Like it's that part of him stuck back there is what I'm trying to say. The little boy. Yes. Did not grow up. Yeah. And he hasn't solved the little boy. Yeah. One of the things I'll if I if it comes to mind, it's in my intention. When I talk tonight is going to be God, God taught me to pray like a boy to lead like a man to figure out how to bring the boy to God, not bring the boy everywhere else. And then come out of the time was the Lord. So that I could lead according to the word God's done in me so he can do something through me. And whatever part of a human being is immature, that's the stuff you need to be bringing to the Lord. Bring your little girl, bring your maturities, bring your weaknesses, bring bring the hidden stuff, bring the private

stuff, get all of that work through with God for the for the whole of your life. I almost think that that we've said devotional life and now I'm rambling. That devotional life is just it's just 100% read God's word, worship God, talk to God about God, celebrate God, pray for other people, maybe put some of your concerns before the Lord. I'm like, yeah, okay, agree with all that. And then I have a whole segment segment, call it a third of it, where I am a narcissist. I come before God to process me because he's my father. Holy Spirit is with me. I got God's word. Where am I in this? And I'm pretty honest about anxiety, worry, fear. Help me see vain conceit in this. Where is my motivation in this? I want the Holy Spirit to give me self awareness and process what I call the boy. So that I can go out and lead like a man. It just phraseology. It just helps me define it. Well, I've heard it said praying. because you are the most, not you, I'm saying. - Yeah, yeah. - He's the most needy, selfish, weakest, sinful person that you know might as well start praying by yourself. 'Cause otherwise, you really can't get to everybody else, 'cause honestly, you start praying for them, you think about yourself. - Right, and you're caught up in yourself anyway. - That's right. - Pretty soon you're praying for other people over your issues. - That's right. - So you're like imposing them on everybody else. I know what everybody's going through. No, that's just you. - That's true, that is true. If you don't process your issues, then, especially as a pastor, I have to make sure I'm like, I'm not mad at anyone, I'm not, I have no secondary agenda in talking about this,

'cause then that can affect your preaching and teaching. - Yeah, and if I do go get it, taking care of there. - That's right. - So if I get it, if I get that managed with God in private, then I'm pretty freed up in public, but it is a challenging job, let's just be honest. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Because you're standing up there and you're talking, no, first of all, nobody has it that together. - Yeah. - You, me, none of us, nobody has it that together, but you can be authentic. - That's right. - And you need to be ahead of others. - Yeah. - And honest about where you're stumbling or get that fixed with the right people, so to speak. - Yeah. - Yeah. - That's good work. So you're, you plant, 'cause you're gonna share some of the stories. - Yeah, I'll get it out. - Yeah, we'll pause it 'cause I'm gonna get to some things I don't think you're gonna talk about. So 1987, you plant first five years are really hard. - Yeah. - Let's just summarize. - Summer, let's go ahead. - Opening Sunday.

I'll say this, it won't matter, they hear it again. We had 104 and I expected at least 450 to 500. - Yeah. - 'Cause we had 800. - You're having visions of 11,000 people. - Well, it's got, look, if you're gonna get to thousands, you gotta start big. - Yeah. - And if God's called you, he's in it. And if he's in it, it's gonna work. So you're under anointed favor. Come on. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - You can't have that many visions, that much of God. - Yeah. - Come on, you're in full obedience. - So you're all green light with God. God's gonna be all green light with you. So he did not. So I successfully grew it to 82 after three and a half years. - Yeah. - So it's a gift. (laughing) - Larry Osborne tells a similar story of, you know, over three years, four or less people were going after three years. - Yeah, they're all funny unless they're your story. - That's right. - And maybe you can laugh about it now. But yeah, you've got that. - No, it wasn't funny then.

And it wasn't funny for a long time. - Yeah, I bet. - Yeah. So it was six years before we hit 200 people, past 200 people on a weekend. - Did you then have a season of, was it, so Larry Osborne, who I think you know, in California, he talks about like in general, I kind of had, he would just say, I had boring, consistent growth after the first couple years of like five to 10% every year, but compounding interest kind of thing. How did your growth happen? And we didn't clarify. We know churches grow numerically. They grow spiritually, they grow organization, they grow missionally. We're talking about the overall growth of the church, but it's gonna manifest itself in one of the ways in numerical growth. - Yeah, it is, fair enough. We got to 900 to 1,000 in our 10th year. So six to 10 with some notable growth for us. - I was gonna say, and 1,000 people, you know, it's, how would I say this? - So if you're 1,000 people, what, you're 10, you're nine, you said, six to nine? - Yeah, 10, you're 10. - So I mean, in 1995, 1996, a 1,000 person church is massive. - Yeah, we went somewhere.

- I mean, I'm just saying like, 'cause I remember, there was a church in Pittsburgh. So I came to Christ through an assembly of God church. Shout out to Allison Parker, assembly of God. But then, because it was close to my house, all my friends went there. I started to go to North Point Community Church, led by Jay Passivant. He passed away a couple of years ago. It was a purpose driven life trip, whatever. It was, I'm thinking in the early 2000s, it was no more than, this is big, but it was no more than 2,503,000. - Oh, that's huge. - It felt enormous. This is before multi-site was, I mean, you had to build a really big, this is before people, most people weren't doing Saturday night services. They were doing model service, not necessarily. No one was doing Thursday night. No one was doing more than two services on a Sunday. No one was doing venues. So I'm just saying-- - You at least have the memory. - Yeah, I understand. - I get this, I get this. I was like, when somebody says the church was, Calgary Baptist Honor them, Calgary Baptist Church in our city.

Under the leadership of Mark Courts, I think at one point, this is in like the early 90s, 'cause he was like, he was like the David, I don't know if you heard of Mark Courts, in the Southern Baptist Court, he was like David Platt kind of stuff. Like, mission statesmen. And I think they were 2,800 or 3,000 in the mid 90s. And that was, they were doing three Sunday morning services. And if you saw their building, it is enormous. And there was nobody, maybe in the state, doing something like that. Now you're seeing churches because of technology, so I'm just saying for you to be in your house, - We arrived somewhere. And the biggest church I'd ever heard of was John Maxwell's church in California, which was 3,000, and just passed 3,000. - Yeah, so. - Okay, how did, we'll see if this is a right question. - But I will say this, we were stuck. - You got stuck, you hit a little bit at 3,000. - We hit 900 push, like, like, there are lids. - We hit 900 fast from moving in our first building in our sixth year. We hit 900 fast. - Let me guess, I'm gonna guess. Normally to break a thousand, this is more modern, but you would have to, you're already doing multiple services.

So usually there are the two most painful things that you have to do, and this is probably part of your store, I'm guessing. You either have to raise a lot of money to find a bigger facility or build more. And you have to make leadership changes that are very personal and painful because of the people that have been with you the whole time, is that the story? - Or both. - Or both. - And you forgot the third one. - What's the third one? - Move to a bigger church, just leave. (laughing) - People do that. - Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. - Oh no, no, there were offers. Like you immediately get a shot at just leaping the frog, by taking, some people make, some pastor make a career of that, they do. - Yeah, they do. We probably shouldn't have said that. - No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, you're telling the truth, okay, so, but you had to do those two things, but so the church, here's the thing, so the church ends up, you end up, we're gonna get to talk about succession a little bit, but you end up pastoring there until 2023.

- Well, let's just go right here. - Go ahead. - Winston Salem hit right there. - When you, so this is- - At the spot you just described, of kind of stuck at 90 or 2000. - Yes, and you're here, sorry, you made 1990s. You're around a thousand people, you come here, and that's when you're gonna tell the story tonight, but you meet John Maxwell. - And I'm just telling you, everything changed. Everything changed. So the trajectory of the church shifted by our experience in Winston Salem. - And is the trajectory of our church changing today as you come once or something? - I can't tell you. - Have you done a vision about this? - I can't tell you. - I can't tell you what he's gonna do. I can tell you this. The moment I got the call from David, he doesn't know it. I was so messed up, the Holy Spirit said, "Go tell that story." - Why? - What about my story told? I started something there. - Wow. - Yeah, because we- - Tell him I can do it again. - I love it. - 'Cause we didn't necessarily know you super well. - No, no, no. - And the pastor Dave knew your executive pastor,

but it's like, you know, I was grateful that you did, but when you said yes, I was pleasantly surprised. - I, okay, let's go back to Peterson. If you go back to a story that was painful and you still cry, you didn't process it. If you had a move of God on your life and you still cry, good for you. - Well said. - 'Cause you should not be past it. - That's good. - You should never get comfortable with the kindness of God when he chooses to move on you. - That's right. - You should, don't get familiar. It is precious. - You're gonna share it tonight, but can you, maybe just a minute now, what happened in Winston? Is it, was it your, 'cause I don't know, you haven't told me this before yet. But is, it was your mentoring relationship with John Maxwell? - Yeah, I did not know John. I just followed John from a distance and he was the only leadership guru I knew. - And we have to just remind everyone, give younger people a little sis. There was no podcast. - No. - There was, it was so hard to get content back on you.

This is why R.C. Sproul had Ligonier Ministries and you had to get on a plane and fly there and sit in the classroom. - Yes. - And you had like two opportunities to do that. - Yes. And so my chance to get to John is whenever he did a conference, close enough that I could afford to get to. - And Winston was one. - And Winston became one of them. - Wow. - And so we went to the conference and I'll detail it and always a move of God is greater when you know the greater detail. Like you understand the depth of what God did when you can get into the details. But that said, John asked me if I'd like him to mentor me. And specifically he said, the Holy Spirit just told me to mentor you. - Unbelievable. - Now the reason that is wildly significant and I'll give it away now 'cause I don't care. But I'll give it its due tonight. I think he asked me to do so I'm gonna do it. Three and a half years into the church, I was closing the doors, I was done. We were 82 people, I'd grown it down successfully.

And we'd lost everything. I mean, we lost our house, we lost our cars, we lost, I was doing odd jobs. My wife had to go back to work, we lost our health insurance, our kids ended up in Children's Hospital. I mean, if it, I'm like God just didn't, you'd sent us and then you didn't go. It's just cruel. Uh, when in a prayer time, again, I'm short storying this. He, he necessitated me to stay Kyle. He, I could not stay in favor with God and in obedience and quit. Close the church. So here's what I did. I said, I'll pass the church of 80 to the rest of my life. If that's what you want, but I no longer believe the visions you gave me and I'm done. I'm done and I'll never pick it up again until you do something so wildly stupid that once again, I'll know. Yeah. And you would have to have John Maxwell. Ask to mentor me and I will never say a word to him. And when he does, I'll pick it back up. And then you come to Winston Salem and I come to Winston Salem. And you'll tell that story through through some events that otherwise wouldn't have happened. They've told me a version of this, but I mean, but you now, you meet John Maxwell, by the way, while he is John Maxwell, but he's not yet the John Maxwell that we will all know, yeah. No in love and 21 ever.

Futable this and yeah, you know, all that kind of stuff. He's top three goo international worldwide leadership gurus based on all the studies they do, which is fascinating. I'm like, seriously, I mean, earlier, we're talking about the law of the live, that's a John Maxwell principle. He is, he is everywhere. And his equip organization, I've been on the board for 10, 12 years. We reach over a million people for Christ every year. And I mean, salvation, name, phone number, address, confirm, not hands. You know, in, in, in an. So yeah, before he was all that, but he was still becoming. No, he was, well, you're telling me he's leading a three thousand person church in California, you know, and churches don't get that big. What's the key to being a good mentee? You know, we, we live in, I don't know if you've heard of this. So they call my generation actually, I'm a, I'm a geriatric millennial. But the generations on this, so it's called the eigen. OK, Gen Z, whatever we call it, they are been called the mentee generation. This, this conversation is kind of coming out. One of the reasons is because they don't have dads. Yeah. And so they are looking for to be mentored, you know, and so, but a lot of people don't know what does it look like to be before it can be a mentor. I need to be a mentee. And what does it look like to be a good mentee? What, what's that looking for you? Because obviously you're still friends with John on his board years later. Yeah. I mean, we just literally stayed at their house a couple weeks ago, yeah, for three days, three, four days.

I love it. I mean, we're friends. We hang out. We, yeah, it's who would have thought. Yeah. Yeah. Who would have thought? But, OK, a few, a few things. I'm going to put it in the, can I put it in the church context? Yeah, to make sense of it because because I wasn't looking for a mentor. To replace my father. I was looking for somebody who was ahead of me to help me get somewhere. If that's the context in which I can answer being a great mentee, you have to be wanting to go somewhere, whether God's called you to it or he's confirmed it in you. You have to be going somewhere. You, you have to have decided, I'm, I'm going to devote myself. I'm going to abandon myself to use your language. I'm going to go sacrifice. I, I'm going to choose sacrifice over comfort. I'm going to put myself in a spot where this is going to be inconvenient, something bigger than me and it needs to be more than bigger than you. It needs to be for somebody more than you. So, so if you, if you have that in you and you're devoted, then a mentor can help you. Otherwise they can't put that in you. Yeah, that's right. You got to show up with that. Yeah. So, so that's its own thing. So now let's assume you're showing up with that. Well, then you have to respect that they paid a huge price.

To know what they're about to give you. So respect it. Yeah. Don't, don't assume you understand until you've given it enough time. You don't have to agree with everything they say. You don't, you don't have to do everything. But you better know that they paid a price. And so first seek to understand their context and what they learned and what they're passing on to you. If you're going to ask questions and process leadership or development or whatever business or life of the church, however you know or finance, just pick it or marriage and family, just pick whatever arena they're helping you. Know that they paid a price. You be devoted to learning. What did they know? What did they find out? What are they transferring to you? Secondly, do something with it. So I would come to John with questions. John did not set the agenda. John would say, I'll meet with you as often as you want. Okay, John did not set the agenda. I would come with questions. I had my questions like, you know, notebooks of questions. I'd have them prioritized. I'd ask them, I'd take notes. I would dialogue about I seek to understand it. And then I would not go back to John until I did something with it until I was far enough along that I was starting to make a difference. I could tell them my own leadership. I tell them the impact of life, the church and life of others, etc. In fact, John would often call and say, Hey, are you going to call me back? I sound not ready, John. Yeah. I haven't applied enough to come get the more that you have. So the return for John started to increase. Like all of a sudden, this is blessing John as much as it's blessing me because now it's feeding into the life of another person, but it's transferring to the influence of really eventually became thousands of thousands of people. And so that commitment to not only respect and appreciate what it costs him to know what he knows, but to demonstrate that by sincerely implementing it. So I took notes and it doesn't drive me nuts when I talk to people and they don't take notes drives me nuts. So you can remember all this. Well, nowadays they're just they're just using a lot of recording. And I'm fine. You record it. I tell them, go ahead and record it. And then you go find the best parts. But then I tell them, when you get done with this, you have to tell me what are the most salient

points things that you learned and what are you going to do about it? And the sooner you get it to me, the sooner I'll be willing to meet with you. The again, the longer it takes you to send it to me. The next time you ask for a meeting, it'll take me a long time to respond. I will move at your speed. You be diligent. You be on it. You be devoted. I'll keep pouring in. You keep demonstrating you're using it. When I'm no longer of value to you, comfortably say, Hey, I got all I need. Great. Let's move on. Yeah, it's good. So give a return. Just give a return to the person who's mentoring you is there. So this is a critical moment you establish your relationship, John Maxwell, your church. Is it is obviously it's influential, both personally and professionally for you? As you look back on that season, is there a certain thing that John told you? Is there something that you saw in his life? Like, is there like, when you I know there's going to be lots of it. But like, is there early on? You're like, yeah, we meet, we talk. I'm taking notes. This is my big takeaway. This is my next step, my first step. Do you have one of those early on? Well, I have a couple. First one is you're not as weird as you feel. That thing you have in you is called the gift of leadership. And you have been around people with the gift of administration. It's OK. That's good. It's OK. He kind of freed you up to lead. Oh my goodness. He broke chains that were all over me that were defined as holiness and godly and honoring and staying in the system and being contained in that this is what it means to be a pastor and he just removed all of it and said, be godly and leverage the leadership gift with godliness, but administrative leaders tend to like boxes and you don't like boxes. Yeah, yeah. And I do not. So that's the first thing, gave me freedom. Second thing, he reparented me. He said, dude, you are messed up. You got father wounds. And so he said, I'm just going to help you think different. He didn't, you know, play father. I get it. We didn't go into the wounds. We didn't talk about all this is what got broke. He just said, you have a scarcity mentality. You lead out of fear and scarcity. We can do better than that. Yeah. So lead out of faith and lead with just a bigger generosity mindset. I started. I remember this weird. This won't even be understood. But I'm just going to say it. I started setting goals of how much could I give someday? I set stupid goals instead of not how much could I earn? How much could I give someday? And that was his influence. And that was his influence. How much could I give away? How many people could I help come to Christ, not just out of what

we do, but out of other places that God is moving. And he got me out of my small little thinking that my church is it. No, I'm, I'm just one style. across all styles, and wherever the scripture is at the heart of the church, let them have different personalities, different styles, get freed up, the kingdom's bigger, look where the Holy Spirit is moving. Be able to embrace others, learn from others, appreciate others, bring yours to the table, don't let it shrink you and don't lord over. And your answers are yours, but they're not everybody else. I mean, it just broke these constraints on my life. And, oh, Kyle, changed my life. - So this happens in the mid 90s, and then let's, for sake of time, let's, you're in a passion. No, no, I love this. I love this, but there's like two or three other things I wanna make sure we at least touch on. So you end up pastoring for how many years? - I always seen you past for 36 years. - 36 years. Church, when you leave, when you come there, church is 104 people, as you pass it off in 2023, roughly how large is church? - Oh, wow. We have the COVID thing. We were running about, oh, let's see, we peaked at probably 18,000. But since seats on a weekend,

we weren't much into online at that point. Maybe we called it 40,000 on our connected list. So we would have 40,000 different people a month. So we tracked it by a month. How many people do we reach a month? - Yeah, 'cause people say they come to your church and they mean they come like once and a year. - Right, right. So we reach about 40,000 people a month. We'd have about 17, 18,000 butts in seats. - Yeah. - Probably by time we hit COVID, that was easily in the top three worst pastoral seasons. - Yeah. - For me, we were a multi-ethnic church and I thought we were going to shine. - It was already a multi-ethnic church is no question. - And it just divvied up in ethnicities. - Yep. - It was... - That's the story that we were trying to find. - I wept so many times, Kyle, during COVID, friends. I mean, just. - Yeah. - And I remember, I stood in front of the church by September and we'd already opened. So here, when we did our first opening back, three months in, we were at church of 16, 17,000, 6,000 people showed up butts in seats. Three months later, after COVID, you're like,

where is two thirds of the church? - Yeah. - And I knew where 10,000 of the 40,000 went. - Where? - Everywhere but here. - Yeah. - They were done. If I will not step up and take a far right political position and name a politician, if I will not step up and honor Black Lives Matter, if I will not step up and I got so many fill in the blanks. - That was such a hard time 'cause there's, you have COVID so you have the mass, don't wear the mask mask recommended, a mask required, you have the George Floyd, you have the 2020 election. I mean, it is. - But we had. - It was a nightmare. - We were a multi-ethnic church. - Yeah. - It were the campuses. - When you say that, what percentage of your church was minority? - Well, let me give it to you like this. When I moved into the territory, it was 95, 94% white. Today, it is 30% white in the county of a million people. - Wow. - 30% white.

- England at county. - Yep. 30% Asian. - Okay. - See. I think it's 40%. - 35, 40% black. - Okay. - And then the rest is manic. - Yeah. - Yeah. - I might have the percentages. - No, but I don't want the idea. Yeah, and so was your, would you say you were a multi-ethnic? I believe you, I'm saying. But what percentage of your church was non-white? - It's, you have to go by campus. - You have to go by campus. - You're at your main campus? - Yeah. - Probably 50-50. - Wow. - Main campus, 50-50. - Yeah, and after, after COVID, I mean, it's all another podcast. After COVID, after it all, I most, every church I knew that was like that is no longer like that. - Yeah.

No, we're really grateful. We probably are at, well, we leaped in online. I don't know, online went crazy for a while for us. So we were 30, 40, 50,000. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. seats and probably 1520,000 online. Yeah. So, so we come back and it came back. The ethnicity strength of our church returned. But it's a it was a long hard. Yeah, yeah. And it's beautiful. I think the kingdom. I mean, no, that's your community. Yes. See, I just I just I'm not in the group that says, Oh, you have to build in a multi ethnic stop. You need to reflect your community. Yeah. Yeah. That's it. That's it. That's it. Did is COVID one of the reasons that you retired when you did COVID pushed it up about 18 months to two years for God, the head. Yeah. Yeah. Because COVID needed vision to come out of COVID. And now I'm in my 60s. And if I cast the vision, I should complete the vision. Mm hmm. So we needed somebody new to stop and go you knew it. I already had the guy. I he knew it. Yeah. All right. Had the guy I've been we had been building relationships and training leaders. And we have a huge residency. And we have next generation leaders. Frankly, we're church churches really been pretty good at that. That's right. So we have quite a quite a large next generation population. So I knew that he was ready. And COVID changed the timeline. So I made succession the vision because I was convinced in my spirit that it's leadership, right? Holy spirit confirmed it in me. The only one slightly lamenting with me. Yeah, makes sense. Last question. We live in a time when you're

seeing less and less. What would we say? Maybe healthy succession transitions of leadership. Guys, I mean, again, you don't want to speak. John MacArthur is amazing. Okay, and he's with the Lord now. He's a full charismatic now. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. Don't be cutting. I'm kidding. I've learned so much from John MacArthur. I just, you know, those who know that. Anyway, but my whole thing is John MacArthur, you know, from what I know, there was no succession plan. I mean, he's still preaching. He was preaching until he couldn't preach anymore and 87 years old or 92 or whatever. That would be one extreme example. But you're seeing a lot of guys and they, they can't pass it a while on. You know, I mean, a couple reasons are for some guys, it's a financial decision. They just don't know what they would do because whatever, for other, for other guys, it is so much in their identity. For other guys, they don't have anything else to go to because they sacrificed their family for the church. And so if they don't have the church, they also now don't really have their family. I mean, may they do it symbolically, but not really. Why do you see guys not make the decision? You made that decision at 62 years old, or it was completed at 62. You made the decision at 60 or 59 years. I mean, so lots of guys aren't doing that. Yeah, not that everyone has to do it by 65. There's not a magic number, but what would be some other reasons? Well, I I'll just rattle stuff off and I've explained it. Yeah. First of all, the next generation, I believe has to be the primary focus of the church. So just take the sentence, the next generation, whatever age you are, you should be pouring in the next generation. Yes, your 40s, you should be pouring in the next generation. That's how it grows. That's why parents

pouring to their kids. To pretend that becoming a spiritual grandparent is somehow less than being a parent, misunderstands the design. So it is natural to be a parent, raised children, have them become the adults, have children, you celebrate your grandchildren, you have a completely different but deeply significant role in their life. Always. That's right. That's right. Always. So I believe that for the life of the church. And it's funny, people my age want their grandchildren in church, but they won't let the church design it around their grandchildren. What is that about? Because my grandchildren need a guy who's about 40 some. Yeah. And that's what Jason was. Yes. Embarrassing your pastor. Yes. Like they, they need a guy who I have trained and poured into, who is spiritually and he will keep the family, the center of the church and he will keep driving next generation. - That's good. - I can't do that. I don't even think that way anymore. - Yeah. - So I'm biblically solid. I'm perhaps as mature as I've ever been if there is such a thing. - Yeah. - So leverage that to pour into the next level of leadership and call the entire church. And I mean the entire church. I said to my generation of thousands of people who are in my age and stage, you helped build this church,

become spiritual grandparents. Your Abraham's pouring to Isaac for the sake of Jacob. - Amen. Well, I was just thinking the day about how David gives the most significant gift to build a temple that he won't end up building and he will never see. And we need that in every generation of the church. We're willing to be all in for the next generation. I told you last question, but here's the last question. And when we're done. In about two hours you're gonna preach. First time back in Winston-Salem in 30 years. First time at Two Cities Church. Welcome, we're glad to have you here. - Thank you. - What do you hope happens tonight? - Well, do I hope? - Yeah. - I get to tell my story. This is different for me. Usually you grab scripture, you do your exegetical work and you deliver that and God awakens things. And you've got two or three things you're fired up to say. I think I'm supposed to tell the story so I'm going to. So what I really hope is that the thing, the couple of things that God did in me in that season that I've not fully learned, but they're defining. And I hope he ignites that.

- Come on. - I hope that the weight and the significance and the meaning and the depth of awakening that captivated me captivates Two Cities. I know people are just, and I don't think, oh, I'm going to say it in such a way. When the Holy Spirit awakens someone deep inside and taps the pieces of their life and generates clarity for this thought into that space of their life. And now they're on fire differently. Because I see I don't think revival, I'll probably say this out. I don't think revival is a bonfire that happens out there. Oh, we're praying for revival. We're praying for revival is out there, out there somewhere, somewhere. I think God ignites and sustains a fire in you. And you become a walking revival. And if you're on fire and you help the person next to you get on fire that all of you are on fire, that ignites the bonfire. - That's right. - That's the bonfire of revival. I think we have this idea that revival has to like never happened because we didn't see the same thing that happened with the, you know, I would pick a John Wesley. So I'll go back to the John Wesley's. - Yeah, yeah. - I'll pick the apostle Paul John.

We can pick a lot of them. Yes, that's mighty. But God does, how could you, can you really say God is not demonstrating revival, light kingdom stuff right now? - Yeah, that's right. - And two cities church, I think that's short sighted. - Yeah. - And so I hope to awake, seek out, awaken some things and then the fire, to spread and the possibility that maybe a little bit of, no, I say differently. Maybe what he did 29 years ago was a forerunner. - Come on. - Was just a little bit. - Yeah. - And he's gonna now tell the church that he already has his anointed covering on, his favor is clearly over your church, over your people. And it'll just be a reminder that something before you, for a moment happened and then we drove away, your turn, your time. - Amen. Thank you, Pastor Kevin. Excited for you to be here. - My glory. - Exciting your message tonight. Thanks for the podcast. - Thanks for tuning in to Open Bible Open Life with Pastor Kyle Mercer.

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