Transcription
Hey everybody, and welcome to the Grow Leader podcast, where we grow leaders that grow churches by helping them reach their full potential. So glad to have you with us today. My name is Matt.
If it's your first time listening to the podcast, make sure you go by and check out growleader.com to see all the things that we're doing, all the ways that we can help you. I'm sitting right beside, uh, my founding pastor, Pastor Chris Hajis. I miss you. I just want to say that.
Yeah, thank you. It's good to be back in Birmingham. I've been on a little bit of a break, and I'm locked and loaded, ready to go, man.
You, well, you, you have, you have a lot in your heart. We've already been talking before we started recording today, and so I don't want to, uh, waste a lot of time, but I mean, tell, tell us what you've been up to for the past couple weeks.
Well, I always take, um, not all of this. So, every time I say this, Pastor, I go, "My God, that's a long break." But it's always in the season between Mother's Day and July 4th. I always say that's one of the toughest seasons to, you know, really be, have high expectations of getting a lot done because people are traveling and so many different things that are happening in the month of May and June. So, anyway, so that's when I take my break. And, uh, but then July is always so exciting because we have Serve Day, and then we have our Motion Conference, and then of course the Grow Conference, and so we kind of get back, uh, in action, and I'm excited about it. I'm, I'm fired up because the breaks, Matt, always revive me. You know, they say, "Change of pace with a change of place will give you a change of perspective." And that happened.
So, I was just, I was away resting a little, riding a lot. I want to talk about that a little bit. Um, uh, spent some time with my grandkids, spent some time with my family. Um, did, did a lot of golf, by the way, played a lot of golf. Went to the US Open this year. Um, and so just, uh, at Oakmont. And so, anyway, just, it's been a great, it's been a great time off, but I'm ready. I'm, I'm, I'm tired of sitting around now, or playing, and even playing golf. I can't believe I'm saying that. I'm ready. I'm ready to work. Let's go.
Well, I was on Instagram and I saw a picture of, uh, the first annual Grand Camp. You guys tell me more about what Grand Camp is.
Yeah. So, um, um, we decided that all of our grandkids that are six years old and older, um, which that's half of them, it's five of the 10 grandkids, that we wanted to pull them away without their parents and have a week with them. And I wanted to make sure they go to a golf clinic. So, I arranged that. We, we swam in lakes, waterfalls. You know, you know me, I stay away from the beach. So, this was all mountain activity. U, we, we played pickleball and tennis and hiked and, uh, ate ice cream and just did s'mores on a fire. Just had the best time together. Made matching t-shirts, uh, about Papa and Honey's Grand Camp. So, anyway, it was, it was awesome because I want to pour my life into my grandkids. And, uh, so as they get to that six-year-old age, which is about the age where they can spend an entire week with someone other than their parents, uh, is is something I'm very, very excited about. And we intend on doing this every year for the rest of our lives.
Well, it looks super fun. I want to hear more about the writing process because we, I just asked you before we even started, hey, is, is this writing muscle, once you get it going, is it a groove you get into? And you said, "Absolutely." It sounds like you wrote a lot on this trip.
Yeah. And I do my best writing out of Birmingham for whatever reason. I don't, I don't, I don't write well at my home office. I have to get away. So, I got away and spent at least six hours, some, some days up to eight hours a day, just writing. Now, my process is, is that I collect tons of of content, right? Stats, quotes, research. I already had my chapter headings. I've had that for a year. So, that, once you have your table of contents, so to speak, and then what you want to write about, I do a collection process. To me, it's similar to going to the store. When you go to the store and buy food, um, for your pantry, you're not cooking all those meals. You're filling the pantry for future meals so you don't have to go to the store. And so for a year, I've been filling my pantry full of things I knew I wanted in the book, but not a single sentence was written. So, I got, uh, away and started writing the sentences.
And I'm very excited about this book because it evolved while I was writing. It started out, Matt, that I was just going to write a principles book. I thought at 62 years old, it was time to start sharing some of my life principles. And I, I don't plan on dying anytime soon, but I'm, I'm in this "leave it" um, mode, right? I want to leave it with you. I want to, in fact, the, the subtitle of the book is "Timeless Principles I've Learned, Lived, and Now Leave Behind."
That's great. So, I, so I had, I had, I had to learn them first. I lived them. So, got to make sure they actually work. And then I, now, but I want to give stuff away. I'm in this, I want to give, I want to give away what I know. And so it feels really cool, by the way, to to feel that way. Um, and so I wrote 30 principles. So, these are short essays. In fact, you can read any chapter. You can read them out of order. You pick the principle you want to read about. They all stand on it. Every chapter kind of stands on its own.
But what happened was in the writing process, I got in this mode where I was thinking about how this would affect this, this principle. How would it impact my grandkids? Because I had the Grand Camp coming up, and my, some of my family was there, um, during our break, and I started writing these letters. So, it's summarizing the entire chapter, principal chapter, in letter form, just eight sentences, you know, 10 sentences, and just in, in the most endearing way I could think of how I would want you to hear this principle to my grandkids. So, I wrote these little letters at the end of every chapter.
"Dear grandkids."
That's awesome. Well, and then I brought it in to D. I said, "Damn it, damn, check this out. I, check, read these three chapters I just read. What do you think?" And I come back about 10 minutes later, and she was over on the couch sobbing. And I, so I thought, "Wow, this is going to work." Because I could even feel it, how endearing this became, how like, I, I don't want you to just learn this. I want to, I want to give this. This is a gift I have for you. This, this life principle that can change your life. And so I decided that I would write every chapter and finish it with a letter. Of course, can't write it just "Dear grandkids" because it needs to go. And so I changed it to "Dear friends." And, um, and I, so, but an endearing, so the chapter in an endearing letter form. So, I'm calling the book "Legacy Letters."
That's awesome. And, uh, and Matt, this is a cool thing too. I don't know if I told you this already or not, but this is the first book I've written too that's not, um, directly faith-driven. So, you can't take the faith out of me, obviously. I'm a pastor, and I talk about being a pastor in the book, but I don't cite scriptures and things like that. I'm not teaching like I did with, you know, "Out of the Cave" or "Daniel Dilemma," you know, where it's very scriptural driven. This was something that John Maxwell encouraged me to do, is actually write a book for the general audience that introduces them to your faith. Right? So, in the first 30 chapters, you, of course, I talk about Jesus and being a pastor, but I'm not quoting scripture and things like that. I'm not teaching the Bible.
But after the 30th chapter, there's a page in the book that says, "Only turn the page if you want to hear more about my faith."
That's great. And then the 31st chapter is the 31st principle is the faith-driven principle. And it's, "You only live twice." That everything that I do, I live through the lens. I do it through the lens of, "I'm going to stand before God one day." And what would your life look like if everything you said, every place you went, every, everything you did was through the lens of, "I'm giving an account for it one day before my God." And then I even introduce Jesus to people who might not know Jesus in that chapter. There's even a salvation prayer in that chapter. And then it ends with the final legacy letter that, "I hope you make the most important decision of your life. And that is to be a follower of Christ." And it says, "Sincerely, Chris." And that's how the book ends.
So, give me, give me, I'm excited about it. I can't wait to get it. I know all of us are already like, "Hey, it didn't come out to April." So, I'm, I'm now, I'm like, "Let's go." So, I turned, turned the manuscript into the publisher, and now it's in their hands, and now I'm waiting for all these, uh, red lines, like I get in, in all of my books. Pray for a few red lines. Uh, so, April is the release date. Uh, I'm sure some of this is going to come up in some of what you're going to talk about at the Grow Leader Conference coming up in a few days.
Yeah, a little bit. Uh, yeah, I have actually a couple other books that are coming out that I'm going to talk about at Grow Leader because I actually have a book that's coming out July 15th, something I want to promote even on this podcast, and, and the, the Grow Conference is, are going to get the first copies of. You ready for this? And that is "Pray First" for young readers. So good. So I've written my first kids book. Uh, this is targeted through the 8 to 12 year old, but it's "Pray First" uh, for kids and, for young readers. And so that book is coming out July 15th. In fact, anybody listening wants to get there for your churches, we have ways you can do bulk orders. So, you can, uh, get them ready for 21 Days of Prayer that's coming up very, very soon. Um, hope, by the way, pastors and leaders that who are listening to me, you have a month to start preparing and planning for 21 Days of Prayer. Best way to pull people out of the summer slump, get them excited about vision for the fall. So, I'm excited about this.
Remind the pastor that's listening, maybe that's new to all of this, how they can be a part of 21 Days of Prayer with us as we walk through that.
Yeah. So, I mean, I always encourage churches that can do it on their own, do it on your own, which, which for us, that means we have prayer every day from at 6:00 a.m. Monday through Friday, 9:00 a.m. on Saturdays. And we have thousands, we'll have thousands and thousands, thousands of people gathering early in the morning for prayer. Most people have said that this is the most impactful thing, uh, that they experienced while at Church of the Highlands. If, if they were to point to one thing that had the most impact on their life at Church of the Highlands, it's 21 Days of Prayer because it takes this daily commitment, and it only, you only have to get three or four days in before this is going, "Wait a minute. I can feel how this is changing my life." So, it's just a great way to pastor your people is to call them to corporate prayer for an extended period of time. Uh, all the resources, of course, are available. We'd h, we're happy to resource people on how to do this, including the book "Pray First." There's a whole section in there on fasting, um, and on, on corporate prayer. Um, but if they, but if you don't feel like this is something that they can pull off, we have hundreds and hundreds of churches who actually stream our prayer services either live or delayed if they're on a different time, uh, zone. And, uh, so we have hundreds of churches that join us and, and, and, and it makes a difference, man. There's nothing better than calling the church to corporate prayer.
Yeah. And if you need more information about any of that, uh, obviously check out the website growleader.com, but you can also email us info@growleader.com. We're glad to help you out with getting connected with the resources, also getting the links, uh, to be able to participate with us, uh, during 21 Days of Prayer. Big summer coming up. You take the wheel. You're going to got to.
Well, I'm, yeah. So, right now, what I'm doing is I'm in writing mode for the Grow Conference. So, I have a couple of messages that are staples. You know, you don't, you don't change them. You improve them, but you don't change them. Like my opening talk on, uh, what I call "Vision to Grow." You've got to understand why growth is important. And I'm doing, I'm doing a message this year, or I'm adding to the opening message on why growth is so important. Some people are naysayers on, on all things growing. They want to, you know, "Oh, don't worry about." No, no. There's, there's more verses. In fact, the very first words out of God's mouth in Genesis chapter 1 is, "Be fruitful and multiply." Everything about God, Ephesians 4, if, if he wants the body to come together so it can grow. It, every one supporting the other, but it produces growth. You cannot get away from the biblical mandate for growing. Of course, healthy things, it grows. So, we do it through health, not out of just some metric or number that we're trying to go after. So, I'm going to build the case for growth, and then build the case for what does a healthy growing church look like? And to me, that's not our vision, it's God's vision. So, that's opening night.
But I always have a couple of messages that are new to the conference, um, and that are current things that are important right now. Uh, one of them is on leadership development. The number one question we keep getting asked is on leadership development. Of course, we dealt with this in the last podcast as well. I'm forming that message on how to, how to, how churches can create a leadership pipeline, a leadership culture in their churches where you're producing leaders left and right. And I know it can be done. We're going to teach that, uh, at Grow this year.
But secondly, I'm doing a message that I want to talk about in, uh, in the remainder of our time here on this podcast. And I'm calling it right now, Matt, for lack of a better way to say it, "Seven Things That Growing Churches Are Doing in 2025." And the reason why I'm saying in 2025, because I think some of these aren't the things that we did even five years ago, and certainly not when we started 25 years ago. So, when we started 25 years ago, churches, Sundays weren't great, music wasn't great. No one even thought about having, you know, coffee in the lobby. Now, every, pretty much everyone has figured out how to be what was, what some called either the seeker church, where where people that are new to faith or new to church aren't feeling ostracized or out of place when they come to a church experience. We've all gotten better at that. All denominations. Um, I jokingly say, "Even the Methodists have coffee now." So, you know what I'm saying? So, we, there's plenty of, there's plenty of that. And some call it attractional churches. You know, churches that are intentional about, um, convincing someone who doesn't even know they want to be convinced to come and check things out. I think some of that's changed. And you'll hear other church leaders saying, "Yeah, that's changed. That the, the curiosity is not there anymore. It's more, it's turned into hunger." People aren't, aren't spiritually curious. They're, they're, they're spiritually hungry. They're looking for something real. And so I do think it's important that we understand the trends and we shift. And I've written out seven. These are just mine. Great. Um, that I want to cover just a few today. And, and, and for all of you that are coming to the conference, you'll hear all of these. For those of you who are not coming to the conference, you need to come to one of our one days, or you need to come to other, uh, Grow events, and we'll cover these in podcasts. I'm sorry that you're going to miss it at the conference. It's going to be spectacular. It has been sold out for 10 years, a long time. But if you are missing it, just to say that again, regionals, one days, uh, other events throughout the year, and check out the website. We'd love to get this to you.
Yeah. So, number one is that there is a shift from, um, from attractional to, I don't have a better word for it, to transformational. Okay. That's not even a great word because there's shifting to, they want God encounters. Let me say it that way. They're looking for, they're not looking for the lights and the cool graphics as much as, "Did you feed my, my spiritual need?" I want to make, be clear though, that we're not talking about sacrificing. Now, we don't, that we don't have to have great produced services and things like that. No, still, you can still be attractional. In fact, please be attractional. Um, but I would just say that the presence of God comes ahead of that. It should, anyway. It, it's, but it's not an either or. It's a both that, that we need to plan, plan services for presence, not just planning service for programming.
Great. And I even wrote a list out. This is, this is such a working list, um, that, that I'm doing a, so do, so if that's true, do more of this and less of this. Okay? And pastors and leaders that work in churches that are listening to this, you might want to write some of these down, and we might put some of these in the show notes. I don't know. And that is, do, do more of this, and that is, assume people are hungry versus assuming people that are, uh, people are skeptical. It's good because you preach differently. I would preach differently if I thought the person I'm talking to is hungry versus not sure, looking at me like, "Yeah, I don't know if that's true." I don't think they're there as much as, "I don't know if this is true." As, "Please feed me. I'm starving over here. I'm dying over here." Does that make sense?
Yeah. Do you think some of that is even in our preaching, the, um, we have this hospitality, and we're trying to win you over instead of just, "Hey, we're going to go into the word and unpack it because I know you want."
Yeah. And I know, I know I've even brought messages thinking, "There are people that don't agree with me right now." I don't, I'm not going to, I'm not going to come from that angle as much in my future preaching, right? In this season. In fact, I think, and I, I really focus a lot on entertainment. Now, entertainment, by the way, for that word, offends some people. Yeah. The word entertainment literally is defined as holding someone's attention. So, obviously, yes, you want to, you want to entertain. But it's, but we need more than entertainment. We need engagement. We need, um, we need, we need to feed their, their spiritual needs again. So, I think it's important right now, pastors, to make space for worship, prayer, spiritual response versus keeping things so tight. You, I see a lot of churches, pastors, you know, always thinking of a cute prop to use. Man, I'm telling you, give them, give them a scripture they don't know. Give them a God they, they've never encountered. Um, I think, I think things need to be designed for discipleship, um, and life change instead of the casual attender.
Um, here's another, "Do more of this and less of this." Um, um, you give them an encounter with God. Um, have room for the unplanned. Uh, rely on anointing versus talent. Um, which, again, I don't want you to not be talented, right? And I don't, I don't want you to not be professional in your craft, but are you, but make sure that you spent time with God and you're carrying the anointing. That would actually be a "do more of" and a "less of" um, kind of a thing in my mind. Uh, you want to cultivate true authenticity. By the way, this generation is not looking for the stage performer. They're looking for, "This guy gets me," or, "I think they're being real right now." You, you want authenticity. That even shouldn't be new, but I'm just throwing it out there. Um, you know, to, to preach and teach the Bible with conviction versus just a principle-based message. Uh, I see a lot of pastors that are, you know, it's just good life principles. I just wrote a book on life principles. I'm, I'm all for that. Right. But people, they want the Bible. Yeah. Teach, teach them the Bible and teach it with conviction. Uh, do it, uh, by being bold. I always say, "Without being weird." Um, versus in the years we were saying, "Man, don't create any any intensity in the message." You know, that, that'll drive people away. I think people are looking for some passion and, and, and intensity right now. Um, here's a big one. Calling people to surrender and make a commitment instead of just sending them, say, you know, sending them on their way, "Hey, we'll see you next Sunday. God bless you." You know, pick up an ice cream on your way out. No, we, why don't we call them to, make sure we're not skipping the response time, the, the surrender time, the commitment time. Um, anyway, those are just a few of the some of the things that I think are really important.
How would you, I'm thinking about the pastor that's listening right now who's thinking, "Hey, how, how would, how would Chris Hajes recommend that I plan for the unplanned?" How, how, what's a practical step that you would give somebody as they think through service flow and their Sunday, how they might do that?
Well, I still think you, we ought to start and end on time. But if you're in the middle of the service and, and you feel the prompting of the Holy Spirit to, even though it's not the next point in your notes there, to like, "Man, I think we ought to stop right here and pray about this." Do it. That's the unplanned. Like, you're, you're teaching on something and you feel this connection with the, with, with the congregation, and like you feel them lean in. I mean, what would happen if you just stopped and said, "You know what? Before we get to this next point, can we just pray right now? Everybody close your eyes. Hey, somebody come play behind me on the keys." And I want to just take this moment because I'm, I'm sensing the presence of God is here. In fact, if you're there listening to me right now, and you need a healing in this area, would you just open your hands before God and let's just pray. I'm telling you, if you did some things like that and followed the prompting of the Holy Spirit without it being goofy or weird or, you know, um, but I just think they would know, "Hey, wait a minute, that wasn't planned." It's going to feel very authentic to them. Um, just so, just follow the, the prompting of the Holy Spirit, and you can get right back on schedule, get right back on, on the place, you know.
So, do you think some of this is a return to, because I think about the, the, what you probably grew up in in the 70s and 80s, that there were elements about how church happened. It's a spirit-led service.
In fact, I must speak on it on Wednesday night at the Grow Conference. We, I, I'm convinced we need to be more spirit-led. That's great. I think we need to invite more of the presence of the Holy Spirit. We need to teach on the person of the Holy Spirit. We need to teach people how they can have a relationship with the Holy Spirit. Um, because he's the one. Amen. So good. Father, Son are in heaven. Holy Spirit's here on earth with us right now, guiding us, directing us. Go read John 14:15-16. You'll see his role in our life in such a tremendously important way. And I, and I think we can, without it being getting, you know, without it getting, I still call it weird. Yeah. I used, I used to call it charismania, you know, where it was just, you know, it was just, you know, in my opinion, in some places it got quite out of control. Um, in, in a little bit. I don't think it was the Holy Spirit. I think it was a lot of show, but we still, we can't let the pendulum swing to safety, you know, so tidy and in order that we've not allowed, uh, the move of the Holy Spirit in our services.
Well, I can't wait to hear you unpack it more, but I love how you said it. Uh, to be bold and anointed without being weird or off-putting.
Exactly. It's great. Exactly. But we've got to, I think, I think the world is hungry for it, and, and, and I know God wants people to encounter, uh, the presence and the person of the Holy Spirit. So, um, yeah.
Do you think that the, the amount of content that people have is driving us more towards this? Like they can go on YouTube and watch any amount of content they want to see all day long, but when they come to church, I don't know.
That's a good point. Um, I don't know. I, I, I do know that just information is not enough. They want transformation. And transformation happens when they encounter God, not just learn about God. And how do you encounter God? You encounter God when we surrender to him. And then he, work starts working in our lives. And that's, we've got to get that dynamic happening where this is a spiritual journey, not just a practical one.
So, so great. So, we go from attractional to transformational. What are some of the things that we can do?
Well, some of these we should be doing. Yeah. Some of these, uh, aren't new, like, like the second one I have on my list of what growing churches are doing in 2025 is they are still intensely devoted to building small group communities, not just Sunday attenders. And I'm just letting you know, pastors and leaders, that if, if you're building a church just on the Sunday experience, you can't grow someone in the large crowd. You can motivate them. Sundays are a catalyst, but real life change takes place in the context of small group relationships. Always has, always will, and I can prove it. And that is, tell me the last 10 sermons you preached, you can't. Or the last 10 sermons you've heard, you definitely can't. Amen. But tell me the last, tell me 10 people who've impacted your life, good or bad, you can. Why? Because our life has been shaped by our relationships, not just by information. I don't discount the Sunday experience because that's the catalyst. It's the, it's the giant spiritual explosion that causes all this desire. But the desire has to be followed up with discipleship. Discipleship happens when iron sharpens iron. That's more personal, relational. Uh, it, it, people need to connect, be known, and grow together. I'm convinced of that. So, um, some churches are still having trouble making small groups work to the point, Matt, where they abandon their commitment to those types of relationships. And whatever it looks like, I think we have one of the best models, but there's plenty of great models. You have to have something where people can, um, not just attend, but belong to and be known.
So, I, I have a, I want to get your advice on something. So, um, I used to get really, really bugged by something. Is the fact that I would lead a small group, and I've got guys in my small group. They're listening right now, by the way, and not all of them come to church every single Sunday. They do not miss small group. And as a pastor, that used to bother me. I almost got offended by it. Man, why are you not all in on this thing? But unpack that because I think it showed me the relational component was the thing that was more valuable to them than even Sundays have changed. There's travel sports, there's, there's, there's competition, other activities. Unfortunately, I want them to be in, in church every Sunday, guys. You hear me right now? But, um, but unpack that a little bit about the value of that relational component.
Well, and let me, let me address the first thing you said. Yes, you, you definitely need to be in church every Sunday. In fact, I challenge you. Yeah. To whatever your current ratio is, let's say it's one or two a month for two months. Go eight times in a row. And you tell me if your life is not, your weeks aren't remarkably better. And by the way, studies are coming out now proving adds years to your life, health that you have a weekly corporate faith experience. That's the Sunday experience. But yeah, the, the, the relationships that happen between brothers, couples, people that can actually where you can be known and where you're able to share, "Here's what I'm going through," and people know when you're telling the truth or not. I don't know anything that can replace it. It's just, that's what discipleship is. That's what growth is. And it happens through the form of accountability. It happens whenever, you know, I'm strong when you're not, and vice versa. Uh, when someone can stand with me in prayer, when you have a phone number you can call, whenever you enter a dicey situation, you need someone right now. I mean, there's nothing that can replace it. Absolutely. A Sunday cannot provide that need. And when you, and you've said for years, there are more people that, uh, are faithful to small groups. Once they get in and they find those relationships, uh, they, they will, they will commit to that and not stop meeting together, which is a win for you as a pastor. You don't see that as a, "Oh man, they missed my message," but they came to your small group. Exactly. You want both, but you love the fact that they're in relationship all together.
Yep. That's great. All right. So, we have from, uh, attractional, transformational, committing to authentic relationships with your people. And what else?
Number three, 100% of the growing churches that I know of right now in 2025 are obsessed with, with health, spiritual health, not just hype. Okay? And what I mean by that is that they're not just counting what I call nickels and noses, which is the offering and the attendance. Those, those, those are important metrics, but they're at the bottom of the list. There are metrics, and I list 12, three under each of the four areas of our vision. So, I have 12 metrics. I had a pastor text me this week, "Send me the 12 things that you're measuring." I'm going to put these together for us in the show notes. But, for instance, if, if we believe in "Know God," "Find Freedom," "Discover Purpose," "Make a Difference." I have three measurables under each of those. For instance, under "Know God," that you've committed your life to Christ and have gotten water baptized. That you're reading your Bible and you enjoy it. And you know how to pray and worship and you enjoy it. Those are measurable metrics that if we're saying, "This is, this is what spiritual health is going to look like." Once I know what those are, those metrics, and I know that produces health, Matt, now I know what to teach on a Sunday. I know it needs to be in our small groups. I need, and you follow what I'm saying? These become my sermon topics because I'm not just preaching to get amens. I'm preaching for health. I'm, I'm obsessed, uh, with health. And so I don't want to dig into it more than that. We'll put some of the information, uh, on the show notes, and of course, I'm going to be teaching about, uh, spiritual health and how to walk people through these 12 measurable, um, metrics of, of discipleship.
So, the, the third, the fourth one is, is prioritizing leadership pipelines over pulpit polish. Right? And what I mean by that is, is that, um, again, I like, put all the emphasis you can on Sundays. I am not saying don't focus on Sundays. Everything starts with Sunday. Work hard on Sundays. Sundays need to be great. But I've seen an overemphasis on that. That's all we're good at. And there's a, there's almost in churches, are become some of the ones I've been working with or have seen are almost anemic when it comes to their leadership pipelines where, and the way I put it in my notes is, "A great sermon draws a crowd, but a great system develops leaders." And if your system is not, not developing leaders, that's not a great system. That's right. And so, growing, growing churches are investing more in building disciples than building stages. They invest in the dream team, like staff. They, they know how to develop and empower, uh, volunteers. They offer clarity coaching. They call for high commitment. They're very mission-critical. And I've got a whole brand new message based on some of the things I'm learning about how churches can have healthy leadership cultures that's producing leaders, um, that I'm sharing this year at the Grow Conference.
One of the things you, you've done a great job in leading us in over the years is helping, you know, we don't call them volunteers here. We call them the dream team. Exactly. The people that are a part of the mission of the church, but that trickles over into their Monday through Friday. Now they're on mission in their job. What, what's one thing that a pastor can do right now to even start thinking that way, to get people to think more than, more than just about Sunday service? "I'm going to impact my city through my church."
Well, if I was going to do that, I have to start with this, this, this goal of developing leaders has to come into the content that you're preaching on the stage. So, we got to talk about how you're fearfully and wonderfully made, how you have a spiritual gift, how you find your spiritual gift. We have to, I mean, start from the very beginning because once you're actually not developing leaders because of your need for people, but you're doing it for their need to discover the thing that's already inside of them that God put inside of them, that's when it all comes alive. But you have to teach the theology of that first, right? Then create the systems that allow those things to be discovered and developed and then deployed. So you have to discover it first. You develop it some, and then you give them a, give them a place to serve. We have that opportunity coming up with Serve Day. We're, we're going to see 20, 30,000 people, you know, in our church out there in some type of serve project. And they, and the church comes alive. I mean, thank God for the projects we actually do, but Matt, if we didn't help a, if we didn't really practically help anyone, that what it does for the people who did the serving, how their spirituality came alive is, is unbelievable.
Well, and you've talked in the past about stacking the dominoes. I mean, the next several weeks for us, Serve Day, uh, Motion Conference, Grow Conference. People take vacation time to come serve in these and love it, and they come alive spiritually, and that's where they're developed. And so, I know we're pushing on the clock. I'll just, can I just mention the, uh, the last three things that I see that growing churches do, and then not, but not teach it. I think we're run out of time. But growing churches always have built a contagious, life-giving culture. Don't ever forget that when you build systems and Sundays that you don't, that you can never forget that none of it works if the culture is bad. Okay? So culture trumps everything. It's just so important. And culture is never created by chance. It's built on purpose, modeled from the top, and then protected at all costs. So, define your culture, develop it, and then just fiercely defend it. Number six, uh, every growing church I know doesn't just teach prayer, they build a culture of it, which why I'm again, I'm begging churches to consider participating in the August and January 21 Days of Prayer. But prayer cannot be a side ministry. It is the engine of the church. Great. And growing churches don't just start with prayer, they stay with prayer. So, and then seventh thing is this one's kind of been new. I haven't taught this, but the growing churches that I'm following right now, the ones that I'm saying, "Wait a minute, these guys are really exploding right now." They don't copy culture. They're shaping the culture. They've taken culture head-on with grace, but with truth as well. And the best churches just simply aren't imitating the world. They're influencing the world with creativity, clarity, conviction. They're setting the tone in their cities. And I'm telling you, people are drawn to that resolute. We know what the truth is. We're not mean, but we're not unclear either. That we're going to follow God's word and do it God's way.
So, can I ask you to explain one thing that I've heard you say a lot? Explain the principle of being known more for what you're for than being known for what you're against.
Well, exactly. That the, the ones, some of the ones that nothing about them makes you want to be around them is when they're only always telling you who they're mad at and what they're against. But we like. So, we're not, we're not against certain groups, but we are for, yeah, the family. Yeah. We are for marriage. We are for students knowing their God-given identity, you know, like, so the more we speak into what we are for, the more clarity we bring to the culture.
So much we could sit here for another hour and unpack all this. Uh, we are going to unpack it at the Grow Leader Conference and also at our one days and our regionals over, uh, the rest of the year. Don't forget if you want information about any of the things we've talked about, including 21 Days of Prayer, uh, the book that's coming out, 21 Days of Prayer, uh, for, for our kids. Yeah. "Pray First" for young readers. It's available right now on Amazon or all the places. Yeah. And, and we'll have copies. Awesome. Uh, soon. And then "Legacy Letters" coming out in April. That's exciting. Yeah. April. It's going to be here before we know it.
Hey everybody, thanks for listening to this month's edition of the Grow Leader Podcast. We'll see you next time. Have an amazing day.