Sioux Falls Pastors Pt. 1

is trying to learn what it looks like to fully live and follow Jesus in the middle of real life. It is one thing to be someone on Sundays, but what about Monday through Saturday? And so here, we're going to talk about faith and making a difference in the messy, ordinary moments where it's often the hardest to live out. Some weeks, I'll share what God is teaching me. Other weeks, I'll sit down with leaders, pastors, athletes, friends. There's no fluff, just encouragement and truth for your life between Sundays. I'm so glad you're here. Well, hey, crew. Welcome back to Life Between Sundays. It is Adam and Emily here for episode 357, believe it or not. I'm 57. Grateful to be right here right now. I just said that right before we hit record. I'm so grateful to be right here right now. Why so? I feel like that's the high low buffalo. We're going right into it. So the last five weeks at Embrace, the church I'm at, we've been really sharing the heartbeat and vision of a new campus, which has been the high of just seeing God do only what he can do. It's just been truly amazing, blown me away. The low is, it has been brutal. It's been a challenge. And what I mean by that is anytime that you pursue big things for the Lord, you can expect pushback. And honestly, we actually haven't had much, if any, pushback from people. But spiritually, I've been feeling it. And so, honestly, the last couple of weeks, probably been two of the hardest weeks of my life for no reason except on the spiritual element. It's been hard. So the other high is that this series was wonderful, but we are turning the page and we are moving on to some more exciting things at Embrace Church. Great series, but the rest of the year is going to be great too. It's going to be really, really great. So I'm so thankful to be right here right now. That is my high low. I don't really have a buffalo. And it's also great because you get to hop on a plane and get it back out of that. Oh, Becky and I are just getting away for a few days. When you hear this, we'll be in Charleston. And I'm so excited about that just to spend some time with Becky. You've been in Charleston before, right? I've driven through, but I haven't really explored Charleston. All right. You've been to Charleston. Are you in Sam, right? We went last year. In the summertime.

In the summertime. It's really fun. You're like, you need to do this. No, there's just like lots of different areas that are really cool. There are downtown areas, just really awesome. It's like all different shops and restaurants and just super, super long street. That leads like all the way up to like their peer area. But yeah, there's lots of different like fun things. One of my friends is actually leaving for Charleston tomorrow too. That's awesome. That's amazing. Yeah, I mean, I'm just excited. The last month or so specifically, I feel like I haven't seen a ton of my wife. So I'm excited just to hang with her and to check out. It should be beautiful down there right now, hopefully. I can't wait. It's going to be awesome. So high low, no buffalo, but that's it. No buff loves. No buff loves. Great. Thanks for sharing all that. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, so we this week, we have four different pastors. Yep. You're yourself included. So it's you and three other pastors. Kind of talk to us about like why you wanted to put this interview together, what your goal was. Yeah, this, I can't wait for you to hear this for anybody listening. I think it would be really, really helpful just to hear a group of pastors share. Kind of good, bad, and otherwise. But specifically, if you're in South Dakota or in Sioux Falls, I think this is going to be really, really cool.

And why I wanted to, because first off, pastors can be really, really weird with each other. And maybe that's true with business leaders or just common people. Anyone in the same field. Yeah, I think maybe it can be like awkward or competitive. And so I just wanted to bring these pastors together. It's three pastors that I respect so much. I reached out to some other pastors as well, but for whatever reason, weren't able to make the date. So it wasn't just limited to this group. We reached out to other people as well. But these are three pastors that I respect big time. And there are so many great churches in Sioux Falls. Yeah. And so I was just so honored that they would come on and share. And I just felt like each of these three pastors just brought something totally different to the table. And so I'm so excited. If you attend these churches, by the way, of these other three men, like love your pastor. It's actually Pastor Appreciation Month the month of October. And so I'm not just saying this for me. Really just think about writing one of these pastors or your pastor a note of encouragement and just say, "Hey, thank you for doing what you do." Every occupation has its things and its struggles, but there's definitely some with being a pastor. So here's my favorite part about this episode. It is two parts. So today is part one.

Next week you're going to hear part two. Well, maybe a place to start, if you want to introduce yourselves, your name, your church, and this is a safe place to brag on your church as well. One thing specifically that you love about the church that you're at. So name, maybe like what church you're at, how long you've been there, and one thing that you just love about your church. So Tim, I'll have you start. All right. Yeah, my name's Tim Selbow, I'm lead pastor at Gloria Day, Lutheran here in Sioux Falls, and lots of things I love about the church, but my favorite time of the week, and maybe similar for you guys, I'm not sure, but is our worship time together. I mean, I just love that. It is multi-generational. I love it when we get our kids up front doing some singing or doing some drama and just throwing some kids, and it's an intergenerational place, and it just kind of fills me, and I think fills others too. So that's one of the things I love. One more thing I would say is that I just love the trust level that we have as a staff and as a team with one another, and then with the congregation, there's tremendous trust in our team and our staff, and so that makes my role a lot better and a lot easier. Oh, that's awesome. I could say a lot more. Oh, yeah. Maybe a follow-up question. How long have you been there? I've been at Gloria Day for 18 years now, this August, and kind of came from Mission Development Church in Scottsdale, Arizona, and so we were looking really necessary to leave Scottsdale to come to Sioux Falls, but God kept speaking and saying, you know, this is the place you need to be, and some good things are looking ahead in the future, and it's been a great ride.

It's been a great ride. And your time, as far as being a full-time pastor is coming to an end? It's coming to an end. I've announced my retirement last January to the congregation, and they had their request to give some time so that we could get in on a search for a new lead pastor and to have some overlap. So we've been in that interview process and call process, and they're kind of narrowing it down, going to move forward with a few candidates, and I've been a little bit part of that, but so if this happens soon, which it might, I could be there for a few more months, or if it doesn't happen soon, I could be there for another year or so, but I am going to put a limit on it. There you go. No, but it's been a great run. You sound like our former mayor of Sioux Falls, Tin Hinkins. Yeah. That's kind of what he said. Maybe two weeks. No, that's great. No, that's great. Thanks so much. Thanks. Phil, if you want to share. Yeah. I'm Phil Tag. I'm lead pastor, founding pastor of Ransom Church here in Sioux Falls. I grew up in the area, moved away, came back. My wife and I moved back August of 2009, so 18 years ago. We started March of, excuse me, August of 2008. We started March of 2009, so we're 17 years old as a church. I've tried to leave.

I don't know how many times, and the Lord just keeps putting his finger on. We keep re-up. And the favorite thing about my church is, frankly, how messy it is, and how much of a reflection of our total community it is, and the willingness of our people to walk with people in any stage of life, any situation, any age, we're very diverse in that way. And I just love that about us. I love that I'm proud of who we are. I love that I'm proud of what we stand for and that we are a reflection. This might be the season where Ransom Church is as close to what I dreamed it could be as it ever has been, and so I'm really excited about that. That's great. Yeah, so that's us. You're kind of your backstory as far as ministry before. Really quick. Before Ransom. Did not want to go into ministry, fought that call, ran from that call, ended up turning back to the Lord really fully surrendering in that call. Really wrestled with some lordship issues. We went to North Carolina for about a year and a half, right out of college, and then ended up getting a call to come back to Mitchell, and we were in Mitchell for about six years doing youth and worship, and all the other things. The miscellaneous was in my job title, and so lots of different things started at college ministry there, and then felt that call the plan of church and been doing that ever since. That's great. That's great. No, same questions. Yeah. Church, how long you've been there? Yeah. One thing, or several things that you love.

Yeah. lead pastor celebrate church here in Sioux Falls been on staff for But my favorite thing about Celebrate, one of our core values is seeing the protocol come home. And I just think that's who we are. We don't just talk about being about the protocol coming home. That's what we're about. And so kind of like you talk about film, messy people, broken situations, like the whole idea of the protocol implies they've been in the mud, they've been where they shouldn't be with people they shouldn't be with. But it's not just that we teach this is that our people are embracing these people with messed up stories and backgrounds. And we've developed this reputation for broken marriages, especially that's been really neat to see. Got to heal so many marriages and relationships in the last several years. And so I love that we're about messed up broken people, realizing that we all need Jesus. That's great. That's great. And you might have said, how long have you been in your role? A year and a half. And baptisms have been taken place. You want to share about that? I feel like that's been so cool to see from across town. Yeah. I mean, we're seeing so many decisions for Christ. And in the last year, we've seen over a thousand people make a decision for Christ, which is mind boggling just to even think about. And that's not me trying to pat myself in the back of the grace of God is just all over this church and the people. And so we're seeing people make decisions for Christ. But we decided to double the amount of baptism service. We have so many people making decisions. We're like, we'll do twice as many baptism services a year. And so instead of two a year, we'll move to four. But we made that decision. The next baptism service we had, we had to open up baptisms for all three services, which is the first time we've ever had to do that. And so not only twice as many services, well, we have to do it all three services because so many people are getting baptized. And we haven't even had a guy. An older gentleman who got baptized at this last one, because he really wanted to communicate to his whole family. It's never too late to follow Jesus. You know, this is the most important decision you can make. And on a Sunday, he got baptized on a Thursday. He went home to be with Jesus and it marked his family and it marked our church.

Wow. That's awesome. That's awesome. No, and it's been so fun for me to see a young lead pastor in Sioux Falls, like at a larger church. And I talk about you honestly, almost every single day. And just all three of you, I got so much respect for you. Phil, I feel like you've walked alongside of me through hard messy seasons. And Tim, I was talking about you specifically with my wife last night. I'm like, he's just a picture of like calmness. I told Noah, if I look as good as you and I get close to retirement, I'll be thanking Jesus. I'm like, come on Lord. But just honored to sit down with you guys. I only answer the questions myself. So Adam, Adam Brace, been here, will be 20 years in September. Things that I love, we don't take ourselves too seriously. I feel like I can really be myself on Sunday mornings. I just got asked on a podcast yesterday. When you come home, are you still pastor Adam? And I'm like, well, I don't know who pastor Adam is first off. But I'm like, I love that on Sundays, I can be my same, you know, messy, skeptical self, even on stage. And so that's probably the thing. And then the church, I feel like embrace has always been willing to say yes to things, to reach one more person for Jesus. And so that's what I really, really love. This is a question. I'm just going to open it up. If you want to answer it, you can, but you don't have to feel like you need to respond to this one. So what is a challenge your church is currently navigating. And I'll go, I'll go first just to give you a little bit of time to think because it's a little bit of a messier question. And again, there's no pressure to ask to answer. I would say one thing we're currently navigating is having more seats. So we're, I believe this September, for sure, by December, there will literally be no seats available at embrace. And with that, our, our giving is an area that we're constantly trying to navigate. We have an outside accounting firm. It's called Dime. They're one of the best in the world. And they just said again to me this last week, I don't think I've seen a church this, this, this size, this young, reaching people this far from Jesus. And one of the areas that you see that is your giving. And so that's an area that's really been, we're just constantly trying to navigate what that looks like as we're growing, just to how to, how to lead people and show them the joy of generosity and try and just, it doesn't always make sense on a spreadsheet that we're thinking about X, Y, or Z. And so that's been one of the challenges that we're trying to navigate. I'll toss it up. You can, you can, I don't even look at any of you. If you want to share a challenge, your church is currently navigating, you can share that, but you don't have to as well.

Yeah, I'll go. I mean, space and finances are our problem for us as well. But I think we've been and try to just drill. time. The places we did not disciple people well are coming back to bite us. You know, all this on that I recently was challenged with with the thought, just because you taught something didn't mean you trained people in it. If you train people in discipleship, you'll be teaching about discipleship, but you can teach people about discipleship and not train them and discipleship, whether that's reaching people for Christ, whether that's, you know, taking spiritual responsibility of the places and spaces God put you, whether that's being a good financial steward or being generous. Those are all kingdom principles that we teach about, but we have not done, we are going back and training our people on the things we've been teaching them for a decade and a half. Yeah. And starting to see the fruit of that. But that's probably the biggest thing for us. Yeah. It always stinks when it's like, there's nobody that you can really blame because I've been here the entire time. That's right. Who's the pastor of this place? Yeah. And I would be quick to say, none of these things are things we did wrong. They were things we could have done better. Yeah, that's good. Right. We weren't doing bad things. We were doing good things while we could have been doing better. And yeah, there's never too late to go back and clean that up. That's so good. Tim or no, when I answer that question, a challenger currently navigating. I can go. I mean, mine's a little different. We're navigating specifically on Sunday mornings, what our services look like and completely reconsidering that because the spirit's just been moving in some unusual ways in our services. And I mean, so two weeks ago, I preached on repentance and sin, which is everyone's favorite topic to come to church and hear on standing repentance and restoration, right? And I opened up at the end, I talked about confession, you know, James and five talks about confess your sins to one other that you'd be healed. And so I talked about, you know, God forgives you when you repent, confess it to someone else and watch God heal that part of your life. And we brought a prayer team up. I was like, maybe no one will come and get prayed for. I don't know what this is going to look like, but we're going to give you the opportunity. And we, I mean, we had lines of people waiting to confess their sins and be prayed over. And so we've been seeing things like that where it's like, well, with, if you're doing a hard and fast hour long service, and you have to turn over a parking lot and all these things really quickly, it doesn't really accommodate that. But I'm, I'm reevaluating like, do I want it to look like that?

Yeah. Or like, do I want to try and manage what a whole Sunday morning service looks like? Or do I want to give space for people to actually interact with this God I'm preaching about and we're singing songs about. And so that's the tension right now is like, we're at two services in the summer, we're normally at three. And I'm like, do we go back to three and then have that tension? Or do we, I don't know. So just wrestling with what the spirit's doing and our services and our worship time has been powerful. Thankfully in the church, everybody will agree with every decision you make. Oh, that's right. It goes in all your churches, right? That's, that's such a, we even feel that tug of war too of like, what's the, I mean, do we want, do we need more space? Like, just constantly wrestling with that. Tim and your ours are, are similar. We talk a lot about going deeper in faith, deeper in ministry discipleship and wider and outreach at the same time. And some, sometimes we get a either or do we, and my preference would be, let's have a healthy church going deeper in faith and ministry and outreach and discipleship. But I have come in and really tried to say, why not a both and can't we do a both and reaching people. So we're, we're experiencing growth issues, we moved into our, our current campus back in 2011. And I didn't think while I was here that we would be needing to expand and we are, we're needing to expand and add services and some of that. So that's awesome. That outreach and certainly in a growing part of Sioux Falls. So our challenges are around some growth challenges, but also working with people in terms of really deeper in their walk with Christ on a day to day basis. What does that look like? We have one of our pastors who's not only teaching a class on discipleship, but gathering groups and then they're getting groups together, looking at some of Bonhoeffer stuff and a number of things to say, what is it that can help put our faith into action instead of just teaching it and talking about it, but living it out and what the challenges are to that. I mean, it's a joyful to follow Jesus. I tell our team all the time, it's never boring to follow Jesus, but it's not always easy either. And so deeper in faith wider and outreach and making sure we have a good back. your transition in that being a challenge that you're facing. It's a challenge. We've worked hard at that with our leadership team. We call it a church council, not a board, but it's a it's a council leadership strategic that's turned into our strategic planning team. Yeah. And we've worked at that and they were wise enough to say, hey, whenever the time comes and we'd love to have you stay 10 more years 50 there, you're very good about it. But whenever the time comes, let us know so we can have enough time to really work this. And so we've been open and honest with the congregation.

We've done staff retreats to say, hey, this is maybe what you can look forward to. Here's ways in which you need to embrace the the new pastor. And so that is a challenge. But but I think it's gone very well. It's it's the first time I've ever had a year between and saying kind of goodbye to people for a year. That's a little that's a little different. I will say that but but it's been very good. And so while that's a challenge, I think our leadership team has and staff has met it met it on pretty well. Yeah. Well, that's great. Thank you fellows for sharing. Before we go any further, there are just some awesome partners that make life between Sundays possible. Adam, who do we have for our partners? Yeah, I love our partners so well. The first is the Tyler golf group. Over the last 20 years, I have bought and sold three different houses through the Tyler golf group. I'm actually in the process of selling our Airbnb through the golf group as well. They are incredible. I know Tyler, he's one of my, honestly, he's one of my very, very best friends. And the team as a whole is phenomenal. And so to buy and sell a house, go to tylergoffgroup.com. Don't go anyplace else. Tylergoffgroup.com. Our second partner is Vernide Mitsubishi. Vernide is a growing employee owned faith based company that strives to deliver dreams and transform lives in all of that they do. I was able to break on a bunch of Vernide staff this last week. And I was just like, don't talk to anybody else except these guys right here. Becky actually was in a group chat the other day with a group of friends and they're like, who do you go do for cars? And Beck literally dropped in Jared's contact from Vernide. So if you are looking to buy a vehicle of any kind, whether it's an Acra Ford, Honda, Mitsubishi, whether you're looking for a tractor, a snowmobile, a boat, don't look anyplace else. Vernide.com, you won't regret it. Vernide.com. So next set of questions, it'll be interesting to see where this goes. Why are churches so competitive and weird with each other? Like, and I think just to acknowledge, I think businesses are the same way. And any kind of gathering of people, I think it's easiest to highlight churches. But we are followers of Jesus, maybe this should be a little bit different. So why are churches so competitive or weird with each other? And then maybe the second question we can discuss, however we want to, what does it look like for the church to be united in Sioux Falls? And like, what does that actually mean? Like when people talk about like, the church should come together. It would be interesting to see what we all say. But why is the church so competitive and weird with each other? Well, I, you know, I go back to, there's a passage in the Gospel of Mark in chapter

nine, you know it. But I think it's John, one of the disciples who says to Jesus, "Hey, we saw some people casting out a demon and they weren't part of our group." So we told them to stop. You know, that was kind of the way. And Jesus, you know, I can, I just try to picture Jesus kind of going, "Really? You told them this to stop?" No, no, no, no. I mean, he corrects them, you know, and says something like, "Hey, they're doing great healing in my name, in Jesus' name. What are you guys doing? Let's, if they're not against us, they're for us." I think that's how it says it in Scripture. And so I've always tried to look at that. But I do understand the churches can get competitive. Maybe it's ego stuff. Maybe it's thinking there's a lack of people resources. So boy, we better get them for our team. Maybe there's a theological arrogance that goes on. I'm not sure. But I don't think that's the way Jesus calls us to be. And so, I mean, I've been to all of your churches in worship. for one another, celebrate one another. And I've done that publicly, sometimes named names, named your church's names in our worship services, saying, "Hey, we've got a wonderful ministry going on around Sioux Falls, not only in our Lutheran world," and I named some of the other Lutheran congregations, but also in the Christian world and non-denominational world and doesn't matter where and name your church's names in our prayers and lift you up. That's one thing, but maybe doing some things together. I mean, we just did a big feed my starving children event this last weekend and two days long and packed 108,000 meals and was talking to some of our people saying, "Boy, we could extend this to another day or two if we could get other congregations to say, let's come together and do some of those kind of outreach projects." So just some ideas. Mission Haiti, I know, is one that I know you guys are involved with. We're involved with maybe to do some things together, I don't know. But I think churches do get competitive. I don't know exactly why, but I think it's a better to come at it from a more positive view and say, "Man, look at what God is doing in and around Sioux Falls and the state and country, whatever you want to do," and celebrate that. That's so good. Phil or nobody have anything on. Do you have any thoughts? I mean, to the first question, why churches are competitive and weird is because pastors are competitive and weird. And pastors lean churches, right? The gospel saturation primer talks about the three things that divide churches are ego economics and ecclesiology. We think differently about some things. We're worried about paying the bills and growing my churches now synonymous with paying my staff, paying the bills. And there's a lot of pressure there that if it wasn't there, imagine if the church had unlimited money, how the dynamics between that competitive would go away.

But then the biggest one is just ego. I was doing a prayer day with God recently and I made the mistake of writing in my prayer journal. God, am I actually humble? And the Holy Spirit answered really quickly and said, "It depends on which way you're looking." And he said, "When you're focused on what I called you to lead and you're leading it, absolutely. When you start comparing yourself to the Facebook posts and Noah's, I saw they like, and why isn't that happening? Now Envy, it's just human ego. It's because we're humans. So I think that's why we're divided. How we come together, I am all for ecumenical events and I think there's value in that. But I also think we all represent a unique slice in the kingdom pie. Dan Ryland from 12 Stone Church in Atlanta used to say, "The church is to be all things to all people, but no one church can be." And I think one of the things that helps us be unified is when I know what you're doing, what you're great at, that awareness. So when someone comes to me and goes, "Man, this is not a fit. Ransom's not a fit for me." I can go, what is your heart desiring? Oh, you know what church does that amazing? You know, a church has that program? You know where you could be really involved and to help them find a home in the kingdom and not build my castle. Yeah, that's good. At what point did that change happen in you, if you're willing to share, like where you were willing to openly say that? I mean, it's happening every day. I am working on that. Yeah, I mean, it's a work in progress. But I mean, it really happened. And I think we're happy for a lot of pastors is COVID, you know, and you're just forced to go. It's amazing how when God is sending you tons of people, they're his people. And then when they leave during COVID, they were my people that left my church. And I'm personally offended. And he's like, "Why are you offended? They were never yours." You know, it's just wrestling identity stuff out there. And yeah, just going, you know, if the kingdom wins, that's a win. Yeah. No one you want to take a shot? I have lots of thoughts in my short time of ministry. I think the biggest thing that comes to my mind is just relationships and people are messy. And I think I've been around pastors in our city and outside of our city long enough to know someone's going to say something I don't like. I'm going to say something someone else doesn't like like, and we're going to misunderstand each other, and unity is costly. Well, what happens when you rub each other the wrong way, you know, um, because I don't think we see, we don't see direct implications of our unity in our local

church. And so like, I can grow a couple thousand member church without having relationships with pastors in my city. Like I could, I could view it that way. Maybe not healthy, right? Maybe I wouldn't do as well, but I can think that way and very independent mindset. Or I can realize if I'm in this for the long haul and if I'm, if I'm in this for the kingdom, I actually need these people and we need to be on the same team. And so I think relationships are just messy with people in our church. We're willing to fight for the bond of unity. Like scripture talks about, because well, I don't want to lose their serving. I don't want to lose their money or they're in my seat. Yeah. But what about someone who's at a different church, you know, where I can just start ignoring them or avoid them or just feel insecure about what's going on in their church. Man, again, thanks for answering for me. I think the ego end of things is huge, people are messy, pastors are messy. I think also just to acknowledge it, like, I don't know if you guys would agree. When you lose a family in your church that you love, it hurts. And maybe that will go away at some point. It hasn't gone away for me yet. Just when there's a, when there's a family that you're like, you're such an embraced person, you know, just their heartbeat, who they are. I'm like, oh my gosh, and one of those people leaves, man, it's just painful. And so I think that can bring a lot of opportunities for Satan to start getting twisted thoughts in your brain and whatever else you just need to continually bring to him and process with him. Yeah. One of the biggest gifts that the Lord gave me in, in a tough season was a carry new off article called They're Not Your Friends that talked about how we

identify ourselves when we walk with people spiritually. Like I did their kid's wedding, or I baptized their kids, or I had this spiritual and then they're just gone. Like it wasn't important. And he just reminded pastors, we play a role in people's spiritual journey. But it feels like friendship to us. And it is a relationship yet, but it's not a friendship, which means when they leave, it's not betrayal. It's not personal betrayal. And I just needed to work through that and go, oh, if I, again, if I put everyone in a friend category or as my people or as whatever, then when they go to Noah's church that's threatening to me, and I even lead them in a way where they feel like they're supposed to be loyal to me or to our church and they don't feel safe to go. This is not a fit for me. And that's not healthy for them. That's not healthy for anybody. And so, you know, um, question I've been wrestling with is if I was suddenly gone from my church, does it keep running or does it stumble? Because if it stumbles, yeah, that's a problem. Yeah, that's so good. Yeah, I'm kind of working through some of that as I'm getting closer to leaving glory day. It's, I mean, it's personal, it's emotional. And boy, these people that we walk through their joys and baptisms and weddings and spiritual life, but also their challenges and hurts and funerals to think about, um, I'm leaving this behind. They're, they're my friends, but I love what you said about kingdom builders, right? We're, we're building the kingdom, not just our particular silos,

yeah, kind of thing. Tim, can I ask like, is the competitiveness something you've struggled with in the past? Um, can I? Yeah. And I do wrestle with that. Absolutely. I don't, I'm in my, um, I was hoping you're going to say no. So I could like look forward to the data that stops. It is, it's never easy to have, as you said, a family or others leave. And you think, why, why are you leaving? Is it, uh, what, you know, what did we do wrong? Or what did I do wrong? Or what, uh, um, um, but that's, I mean, I've really come to realize in 37 years of ministry or whatever it's been, um, that it isn't, uh, all about me. Um, it's, it's really about Christ. And if they are then fined or a part of another congregation, another Christian church, um, it's hard because we're people right now, but, uh, but let's try to rejoice in that. And, uh, yeah, yes, I've wrestled with that. No question. So the answer is that I'm sorry. You were supposed to say when you turn 45, it goes away. That's right, 45 is the years, so it was about four and four years. I was like, from my perspective and maybe from years two, as I look back on that many years of, of, uh, ministry, that has gotten a lot easier. The perspective of all of that is, um, thing. And of course I am. I mean, I know that. But personally, you think, boy, I've led this for 18 years, is it going to stumble? Is it going to go? How's it going to go? And I wanted to be healthy. And fundamentally, which of us as a pastor doesn't want our people to understand, hey, you're a

child of God, and that's enough. Yeah, that's the things that we're talking about, our proof that we don't have that figured out. If my identity as a child of God was enough, I wouldn't feel these things. And yet here we are. Yeah, that's so good. Okay, so I want to switch to just kind of make it a pivot here. What's one thing you love about being a pastor? And what's been one thing that's really hard for you to be a pastor? Maybe the hard part is something you dealt with earlier on in your ministry, whatever. But what's one thing that you love about being a pastor? And what's one thing that's like, man, this is really hard. I'll just kick it to anybody who wants to go for it. I love the relationships. We've had 90, I can't put a percentage on it, but 97%, 98% of the people I've been able to do ministry with just been wonderful relationships. And I love preaching. I mean, I do. I love preaching. That's preaching and teaching when I do my Thursday night or Wednesday morning teachings and preaching on whether it's a hour Wednesday or Saturday or Sunday. Love that. Challenges for me have been, and sometimes with very good friends, some disagreements on the direction of the church or disagreements over some, whether they be political issues or whether they be modern day issues that are going on in our community that causes some rift and people wanting me to kind of take stands on different things that I think you know, while I have my personal opinions on issues and politics and all the rest, when people want me to kind of pull in their direction from the pulpit or other places. And it sometimes hurts those relationships. That's been a big challenge. Yeah. I'm honored that you'd share that. I think I don't want to speak for all of us, but even that part of things, I know I feel that often. Hey, when are you going to speak? Why aren't you saying enough? Why aren't you doing that? I think for me, I'll go, the thing I love about being a pastor is getting to see the Holy Spirit so clearly move in someone's life never gets old. Even this morning, there was something where I'm like, I just know the Lord is at work in her. And then moments later, it was fully verified that that exactly thing had happened. It was just like, oh my gosh. So I think that and then getting to like you shared preaching, getting to talk about the greatest joy in my life, which is Jesus is pretty amazing. And so those, there's so many things I love. Things that have been harder for me. I don't feel this as much now, but I, things that have been harder for me as I always wanted to be in the business world. For I'm an entrepreneur. And so oftentimes, I feel like I'm not what a pastor should look like. My father-in-law is a longtime pastor and I was been a hospice chaplain for as many years.

And for me and my brain, he is the prototype. I mean, when I'm on my deathbed, I want someone like him. He's calm. He's steady. Very few highs and lows loves Jesus. And then there's this guy who's restless and can't sit still and all over the place. And so for me, I've really wrestled with my identity as a pastor because I just, I like to build things and I like to go. And yeah, and so that's been, that's been a challenge. The first 15 years, I struggled probably every single day of whether I was supposed to be a pastor or not. Specifically with my giftings, I'm like, a lot of these giftings are celebrated in the business world, but in the church world, it's like, whoa, it just didn't feel like, I just didn't feel like I fit. And then I, thankfully there's people like the Apostle Paul that I'm like, I think we might have been wired similarly. And so he, you know, gets put in prison, beat, stops by the prayer meeting, guys, I'm good. And then goes back out and shares the gospel. I'm like, okay, I think I could probably relate with him a little bit better. So that's been something that I've struggled with. And, and even just, I'll be really candid, I always thought I would be the person writing large checks. I just have a heart for generosity. And I always thought I would be, what do we need? Well, we need 500,000. Okay, well, I'll go harass five of my business friends. And we'll have that by this afternoon, you get back to reaching people for Christ. And so I just always thought, even as I talk, I just get fired up wanting to be that. And it was a, it was a non pastor friend of mine, who's a realtor who just said, Adam, I know that you want that. And he's like, but how much cooler if you could raise up an army of people to do that. That's right. And so it wasn't just you, but it was an army. And so that's something that I've really, that's being really open and candid. But that's something I've really, really struggled with. Yeah. Well, I'm really happy for you that you've figured out how to get past that feeling inadequate being a pastor wanting to put every day or whatever. What's what's best is people, what's hardest is people. I wish I wish that weren't true. What I love most about ministry, though, honestly, is, and this is a

perspective thing, because ministry's got hard parts, ministry's got lots of ups and downs. But when I remember like, every human being is called to do what I do and I get paid for it. And like, I, I get to do something. What I do every day isn't making widgets that has kingdom eternal value. And even on the bad days, I had a really bad day investing in something of eternal value. That that's the the wind for me also just that feeling of knowing you're in the center of God's will, even if you don't want to be there, is is the best, right? The worst is all the human stuff. When I have to be a pastor as a human, you know, not on my best day, but on my worst day, all the things I just mentioned are the worst. But I'm the problem, but right? Like I'm the only, I'm the only constant in the whole, in the whole thing. And you know, and so, you know, on a good day, someone leaves and my heart breaks for them. And on a bad day, someone leaves or says something mean, and I take it as an offense. So good. And it could be the same thing. And I yeah, on the fact of that move. So yeah, yeah, that's good right there. No, I think my answer is exact and people and people. I think I think more specifically, my favorite part of pastoring has been we get the privilege of having a front row seat to the church being the church. And so in those moments where it's like someone loses a loved one, you get to watch people bring in the meals and showing up and being present in their life. Nothing beats that stuff for me. So watching not just pastors do the role of the church for the whole church stepping up and saying, what do you need? How can I show up? What does this look like to be Jesus right now? Yeah, that is by far the most rewarding thing to me is just seeing people fully own the call gods put on all of our lives to be his hands and

feet. A challenging part, I think I have to die to myself all the time. Being misunderstood, specifically motives being misunderstood is a hard one for me when my motives are misunderstood by people I deeply love and care about and was in relationship with. That's tough. And so when people walk away from the church and you never even get a chance to talk and there's they haven't been about your motives or who you are. It's hard. You have to die to yourself. And so how about that? Yeah, I think that was spoken so well. And for people listening, like, I should have stopped us several different times. Like, I hope this gives a window into just this world a little bit of like good, bad and otherwise. But also again, I'm going to get there in a second for people or even considering ministry. Like, I hope this gives a window. So maybe it's several different reasons that a person's listening to this. Thank you guys so much for tuning in today and listening to these pastors chat. We're so grateful for you for being here and yeah, it wouldn't be possible to do without you. Yeah. So thanks for listening in again. Love your pastor. If you have a church, unless it's embrace, I don't this isn't just this isn't for me. If you attend another church, make sure to say thank you to your pastor sometime this month. Thanks to our partners, the Tyler Goth group. Hello. And for 90 minutes to be she, these episodes would not take place without these amazing partners. Thanks so much for listening and be blessed. Have a good one guys. [Music]