Transcription
Regular viewers of this channel will likely have noticed that I have not produced a lot of video content recently. This has doubtless led to wild speculation. Am I sick? Am I backslidden? Am I dead? Do I just hate my audience? Well, I'm pleased to report that as far as I am aware, I am not dead. Uh, in fact, actually, none of the above.
However, I do have a bit of a life update to give you because my life has changed and it's making a short-term impact on my ability to run this channel as I would like. So, what's happened? Well, in March of this year, our senior pastor at our church, at which I am the associate pastor, his name is Craig Cooney, for whom I have the utmost respect and thankfulness, he informed me that he has felt that God, um, has called him to move on from that role.
Now, that's not to do with any problem or issue or anything like that. Actually, very much the opposite. The church couldn't be going any better. Over the last, you know, couple of years, we have doubled in size. We're seeing more salvations than ever before. Even some really miraculous answers to prayer and a profound sense of God's presence in worship, unity, etc., etc., etc. And in the natural, I don't think anyone would imagine that he would have considered moving on. But, he is someone who's always been open to how the Spirit is leading and guiding him, and he and his family just believe that now is the right time to do that. And so, he and our church trustees asked if I would be willing to step into the senior pastor role when he departs at the end of June.
Now, my initial reaction to all of this was actually tinged with, or marked actually with, more than tinged with, sadness because Craig has had a huge influence in my life. I've said to our church that of all the figures that have impacted me since leaving Bible college, so throughout my entire ministry journey essentially, Craig has probably been the most influential. Um, back in late 2020, I was essentially out of ministry after leaving a role as a campus pastor in a UK functional megachurch essentially, um, over disagreements with some of the theological and cultural direction of travel. And that was actually one of the hardest points of my life, pro- I, I would argue the hardest. And it was Craig's invitation to me. I knew him a little bit and he invited me to come and speak at Hope. And then after that, just kept inviting me back. We made it our home church. He eventually brought me on the staff. And I think that that probably stopped me moving out of ministry entirely. Not necessarily because I would have wanted to have gone out of ministry, but just because you simply have to pay the bills at some point. And as we made this our church and then came on staff there, we realized that we absolutely loved this church. I do love our church. I know you think your church is great and all that, but our church is better as far as I'm concerned. I don't know if there's an objective measurement for church greatness, but if there was, we would be top of that list.
And so, when I took up that role on staff, I and the trustees actually originally had suggested and planned for it to be a single year. Um, but by the end of that year, I had actually been thinking when I came on the staff that we might consider planting, planting with the church that we're now in, etc., etc. By the end of that year, I didn't want to do that. Um, any desire to plant had gone entirely because we just loved this church and these people. They are absolutely awesome. They are godly and faithful and prayerful and biblical and counter-cultural and passionate, and they are just our people. We, we really, really, really do love them. And the ministry that we've been able to do then here over what's now been 3 and a half years has been, I would say, the most fruitful and enjoyable of my life. I've seen more salvations, more miracles, more growth in people, more growth of a church than ever before. And I can assure you that I take absolutely no credit for that whatsoever. Um, it's not like I'm doing something amazing. It's normal ministry. We're praying and preaching and singing, doing all the key things that you're supposed to do as a church. But the blessing and favor of God is just on it, and in that sense, it just couldn't be more exciting.
So when Craig asked if I would take on that role, whilst genuinely saddened by him leaving, I also couldn't be more honored or excited to take up the role of senior pastor. I've always felt and said that pastoral ministry is my primary calling and that this online thing, this YouTube channel, um, this is a tool to support in-person church ministry rather than the other way around. I don't want to be a pastor so I can have an online platform. Actually, I have an online platform in part because it's a discipleship and evangelism tool to bless our church. That is really the aim and goal of it. And yes, obviously, as a church, we then want to influence churches around us. Which church doesn't want to do that?
Now, that being said, I'm not the senior pastor just yet. That will be at the end of June. So why have I not made a lot of videos in that time? Well, the truth is that the workload has naturally pretty massively increased actually on the church side of things. I've been part-time in that church role since commencing it, which is by design. It allows me to do this and other things, and it reflected the needs of the church up until that point in time. Um, and though I haven't sort of technically bumped my hours up, the fact is I'm already basically working close to full-time, if not, yeah, full-time for the church already at this point because people just naturally start coming to you. They start to ask you things because they know that you're stepping into that role, and so anything with future planning, you have to be involved with. You know, we have appointments to make, we've got programs and ideas, we've got stuff coming up over the summer that all of which, you know, needs organized at this point. It needs organized now. And just with the natural discipleship journeys as well that people are on, people that want to discuss things over a longer period, maybe not just a one-and-done, but they've got something they want to talk about a bit more and it's going to require a bit more ministry to them or a bit more counseling, that sort of thing, they're coming to me. And, uh, is that, by the way, actually, is a massive privilege and I'm delighted to do it. It's the privilege of the role. But it also means that sitting here and editing memes and GIFs on Adobe Premiere Pro is not something I can do quite as readily as you can imagine.
Furthermore, in the middle of all of this, we are pursuing a building purchase. We've massively outgrown our space. We've knocked down multiple walls in our church, but it just keeps filling up with more people, which is wonderful, but it is a problem and our building is no longer really fit for purpose. So we do need a new one. And there is one somewhere on the market. We're right now in a bidding process for that, probably closing relatively soon, actually, maybe even after the time you see this. And we are doing everything we can to get it. And I'm naturally becoming the person who's doing a lot of the work in that because I'll be leading us into that. We will not be in that building prior to to me stepping into that role. We would need to renovate it, etc. And just the natural timelines of all these things, they drag on for months and months. Uh, also, I am, uh, relatively obsessive, uh, when it comes to church buildings. I just can't help myself. I really like them. And I've always been interested in church buildings. And so, I have been messing around with this. I would have been doing so either way. And now I'm sort of pretending to be an architect and moving walls around and picking out fonts for signage and things like that because I care about it. I think it's important.
And all that is to say, look, you viewers of this channel, YouTube, uh, people, uh, people of the internet, uh, you're wonderful. Um, but there are a million decent Christian voices on the internet. Also, like a bazillion bad ones, which is a real problem, actually. But let's not talk about that right now. There are a bunch of good Christian voices out there, all of whom you can listen to, who do great work. My church, though, is only going to have one senior pastor. It's only going to have one person who can do this role and do what I need to do at the minute. And though you are wonderful, please take no offense at the following, or like, do take offense if you want to. I'll, you know, the fact of the matter is I don't care as much about this channel as I do about our church. I think you're awesome, but I also will not be doing your weddings or your funerals or your baby dedications or your hospital visits or preaching to you every Sunday, unless, of course, you're one of the YouTubers who comes to our church. YouTubers, YouTube viewers, that is.
That being said, I do want to keep this channel going because I think when it comes to sound Christian content that's not compromised on the cultural issues of the day, particularly in the UK, nah, there's not really a lot out there. Pretty much everyone sucks. Um, and I'm somehow one of the bigger, maybe biggest voices in the UK from that perspective, up there anyway, somehow, which is mental to me, but it just shows that there's not that much out there. Which is, you know, a blessing and depressing at the same time. So, I'm not giving up on this channel at all. In fact, I'm hoping long-term that this channel can be part of our church's ministry and can be what I want it to be, which is a discipleship and evangelism tool that blesses the people of our church and impacts at the national level, which I believe is something our church is called to do. Our nation needs churches that embody a bold, counter-cultural, biblical spirit, and we want to do something in that direction.
However, in the short term, that means, you know, next few weeks, I'm not going to be making that many videos. I really just cannot do it. It's not possible. Um, I will make them when I can, but only when I can. And that period will probably last for the next couple of months. I'm envisaging by mid-August I will be back at it in a more regular fashion. We're also trying to move house, by the way, down to the church area. So, there's a, there's a lot going on. That means that the next few weeks is going to be, you know, pretty hard when it comes to making lots of regular videos.
My plan is this. I want to pivot the channel a little bit because the biggest time suck, there's two. Scripting detailed videos and getting every niche little bit of information into them. That's a challenge. The other one is then obviously editing them in a fancy fashion. Um, editing in particular is something I do myself and it is not a quick process. One option that I am excited to bring to you guys is having a second person on the channel. A second host, someone you may actually know if you're in the UK context. Won't say all of that yet because we need to have one last wee chat to discuss that, but we're going to do it. I'm pretty sure. And, um, really excited, which will mean that these videos will be more of a back and forth between he and I. They'll be a bit less scripted. There will be less editing needed. And a lot of that kind of editing can even be done automatically using sort of AI software and so on. And that's one option. Uh, the other one is that if that doesn't work, I can just jump on here and riff on the state of the UK. And we can just, you know, get terribly depressed together whilst believing for better, right? We could do that as well. So, we'll see where God is. There will be a degree of change. That's okay as far as I'm concerned.
So, what do you need to do as a YouTube viewer? Well, not a lot. Um, pray for me, pray for our church, pray for this building purchase and for this channel. Have some patience, if you would, as I navigate the next few months. We will be back in a more regular fashion. It will be good, okay? It's not done. But there's going to be a little bit of just figuring out the kinks and taking one season at a time and honoring God with the moment in which I'm in. So, hopefully that makes sense. Uh, love the opportunity to do this and speak with you guys. People say they love their viewers. I mean, I do, but I also don't know you. That seems weird. But I really am appreciative of this audience. And so, look, thank you for continuing and watching. We will do plenty of stuff in the months and years ahead. And let's try and do something really great. But let's also acknowledge that God at this moment is just asking me to do something else. So, thank you very much. God bless.