The Carey Nieuwhof Leadership Podcast
CNLP 056: 7 Powerful Conversations That Will Help Your Church Grow—An Interview with Jeff Henderson and Carey Nieuwhof
[MUSIC PLAYING] Welcome to the Carey Newhoff Leadership Podcast, a podcast all about leadership, change, and personal growth. The goal? To help you lead like never before in your church or in your business. And now your host, Carey Newhoff. Well, hey, everybody. And welcome to episode 56 of the podcast. My name is Carey Newhoff. I'm so glad we get to spend some time together. And I really hope today helps you lead like never before. Hey, today's going to be a fun day. We are doing something a little bit different today. Jeff Henderson is going to be on the podcast. You may remember him from episode 16. And we are turning the tables. Jeff's actually going to interview me, which is kind of fun. Actually, we have a great time. We're good friends. And Jeff and I are going to talk about seven of the most critical issues facing the church today. Large churches, small churches, urban churches, rural churches, denominational, non-denominational churches. And a lot of the ideas in today's podcast actually come from my brand new book called Lasting Impact, Seven Powerful Conversations that will help your church grow. And it is finally releasing today. That's right, today's the book launch day. We've been waiting for this for a long, long time. And here's what I thought I'd do as a bonus for podcast listeners. I mean, if you want to buy my book, that would be incredible. But here's what I'm going to do instead. I'm going to give you most of the ideas in the book today on the podcast. We're going to talk about why churches aren't growing faster. We're going to talk about why high capacity volunteers are walking away. We're going to look at some of the key reasons that young adults are walking away from the church. We'll look at team health today and a few other issues, including change, all of which I cover in Lasting Impact. So I'm just a free believer in great content and trying to deliver value to you guys week after week after week. 'Cause I know what it's like to be a church leader. I know what it's like to lead when you really don't have a budget, et cetera, et cetera. Now, obviously we can't cover all the ideas that are in the book and there's a lot more if this interests you. But I just thought as a gift to you, we would kind of go through all of the ideas, the key concepts in the book. And hopefully that will be value in and of itself for the hour or so that we spend together today. So that's sort of my gift to you. If you want to get the book, you can actually find it today on Amazon on Orange Books and also on iBooks. So you can get a hard copy via Amazon or some other sources and you can find everything you will need at LastingImpactBook.com. That's just Lasting Impact Book. That's sort of your one stop shop and it'll launch you onto all the platforms where it's sold. And here's what's really cool. We had some pre-order bonuses and lots of you cashing in on those, which was awesome. But for the next week, here's what we're gonna do. If you pick up Lasting Impact, you not only get the book in whatever format you buy it. You could get it for your Kindle, you could get it for whatever device you want, or you can get actual copies for your team. But if you order in this first week, like today, up until next week, you'll get the audio book for free. That's right, I actually narrated the audio book. So it's an author narrated audio book rather than just some actor we hired or whatever, which I don't know what had been better or not. But anyway, I did it, so it's gonna be a lot of fun. And you'll get that for free. So what you need to do when you order your book, whether that's on iBooks or the Orange Bookstore who co-published this with us, or whether that's on Amazon, just keep your receipt and then go to Lasting Impact Book and fill out the bonus claim form, which is on that page, lastingimpactbook.com. And then we'll send it to you. So that's awesome. And for all of you who got the huge pre-order bonuses, they will be coming your way very, very shortly. You'll get an email in your inbox if you're wondering about that and you pre-order the book because there were some extra bonuses. But if you order it in this first week or today on launch day, you will get the audio book for free. Just fill out the bonus claim form at lastingimpactbook.com. So hey, a lot of fun today. And Jeff Henderson actually came to Canada for the first time and we hung out for a day or so. And we had a great conversation up in Muscoca. So let's jump into the ideas in lasting impact. You can also get everything in the show notes. It's just carrynewhop.com/episode56. But again, if you want to claim the free audio book or get your copy or copies for your team, lastingimpactbook.com on this launch day. Here's my conversation with Jeff. - Well, today I'm excited about the not so hostile takeover of your podcast. (laughing) I'm so excited to turn the tables on you. You've interviewed so many great leaders and-- - Including you. - Well, except that one. But you and I are great friends. But I think this is a great opportunity and I appreciate the opportunity to interview you on something that you know a lot about, the church and church growth. And I'm very excited about your book lasting impact and we can dive in. But first of all, before we do just a lot going on and why did you write this particular book? What kind of prompted you to say, "Okay, I've got a lot going on, but I've got to do this for leaders." - Yeah. Well, let me just say, Jeff, it's an honor to have you do this. When we came up with the idea that, hey, somebody would interview me. It was just in media. Well, that would be Jeff Henderson. That's great. - And also, you're doing this in Canada. - That's right. - Which is fun. - First time here. - First time here. - We're sitting here in Muscoca. And anybody who knows Canada has got a lot of Muscoca at the Leadership Studio at Muscoca Woods. So this is a lot of fun. This pronounced that in customs last night. - Oh, what did you say? - I'm trying to get across the border. - They corrected us. So anyway, it was my southern accent. - It was my southern accent. - Southern accent. - Right. Well, at least they let you in, which is good. - That's right. - And no, it's just, it's a lot of fun. And here we are in John McCauley's office recording this. - That's right. Leadership Studio. I've never been here before. It's phenomenal. - Isn't it spectacular? - And we just had a great session with your staff and-- - We did, yeah. We had the whole Connects Church staff up here and they just left. So now it's just us. Just hanging out, which is great. So why did I, why did I write lasting impact? You know, Jeff, you know this. You love speaking into leaders' lives. And about three years ago this month, I started to write a blog more regularly. I'd had it for years, but like, you know, finally like, okay, I'm gonna blog three times a week. And I was just surprised by how many leaders started to read it and started to notice some patterns. And you see patterns in traffic, but you also see patterns in comments. And I realized, you know, very quickly that whether you're leading a very small church, like, you know, and I've done that. You know, a dozen people, six people, 25 people, those are small churches. Or whether you lead a very large church like you do. Or, you know, a good sized church like I do now. We're all kind of struggling with the same issues. That we're struggling with growth and even growing churches know that there's something in the water supply that's changing. And how do you attract and keep really great leaders? And, you know, there were just some trends that were emerging. And I began to see that again and again. And so about a year ago, I thought, well, 'cause everyone said, "When's your next book coming out? When's your next book coming out?" And I kind of feel, I started to answer, I already wrote it and it's in my blog. It's just buried somewhere in these posts. So I pulled about 20 or 30 of the posts that got a lot of traction, found the common themes and then wrote lasting impact and rewrote a lot of it as well. Based on just seven issues, I think we're all struggling with that we need to figure out. So my hope is it's gonna help church leaders navigate the stuff that they should be talking about and are talking about. - And I love it. It's seven powerful conversations that will help your church grow. And so let's dive in. 'Cause, you know, whether you're to your point, whatever leadership situation you find yourself in a church, we all want to grow. We all want to, and it's not just numbers, but numbers are people and people matter. So let's dive into that. And the first conversation you have is why is our church not growing faster? So what do you see happening right now in culture that's making church growth harder than maybe it was a decade or so ago? - Yeah, I think there are big issues. There's a cultural shift happening. And I talk about that in a number of the chapters in the book, but there is, you know, we are moving from the Constantinian era or a Christian culture deeply into a post-Christian culture. And that's happening very quickly in Canada. It's happening in regions of the United States. And it's even happening to a certain extent, Gwynette Church, where you serve, where you just realize it is not automatic anymore for people to show up on, you know, wake up on Sunday morning and go, what church should we go to? Will there be Gwynette today? You know, it's just not the case. Sundays are for football. And so we see a trend of even in growing churches, people who attend church are attending less often. And then I think with smaller churches or stuck denominations or stuck traditions or stuck congregations, there are some systemic issues that are really difficult. You know, sometimes, and I was part of a mainline denomination for a while, the churches I started in two decades ago hadn't grown in a generation, literally. It had been 40 years since they saw any growth. And 40 years since they had a full-time pastor. And that was shocking to me. I mean, before I was born, decades before I was born, was the last time that they actually called anyone full-time and they had no money and they had no vision. So I think we're all struggling with it. And I think often for the small churches, it can be cultural and structural. In other words, there are things going on outside in the culture that are making it difficult. But there are things happening inside your church that are making growth difficult. So even if it was 20 years ago or 30 years ago, you know, hey, the churches I started with weren't growing in the 50s, they weren't growing in the 60s, they weren't growing in the 70s, and they weren't growing in the 80s. So, you know, some listeners would go, well, I remember when our church was 2,000 people back in 1985, you know, there are some churches where that never happened or it happened in 1885, you know? And so I think if you're in that kind of culture, there are elements inside your church culture that make it more difficult for you to grow, like your structure or the role of your board or this whole idea, Jeff, and you must struggle with this. You know, see, I wanna flip this and start interviewing you 'cause I think you're far more interesting than I am. But, you know, the whole pastoral care tension, a lot of pastors face, right? And I led a small church. You know, when you have six people attending your church, it's pretty hard to say I'm too busy to go to the hospital. I think it's not very credible, right? They just don't, they don't listen to that. And so that becomes a real issue around 200 where a lot of pastors like, okay, I'm visiting, I'm doing all the weddings, I'm doing all the funerals and you just can't do it. You can do it at 50, you can do it at 100, you can't do it at 200, but now there's this expectation where your board is saying to you or your elders are saying, well, you need to do it and you need to do it better than before and you're like, am I a robot? Like I'm not a robot. Those are the structural issues you have to break through to the other side to get beyond 200. - And then you're expected to preach a great sermon on Sunday. - Yeah, you better. Do a really good job. I mean, what you've said before, right? Like your father was a pastor and it was about, what was it, 150 sermons a year? - Well, it was three a week. - Yeah. - Yeah. - So you do Sunday night, Sunday morning and Sunday night, Sunday morning had to be different and then you had Wednesday night. So, and that was just the plus with going to the hospital visits, you know, leading a volunteer, all of that. It was like, that's one of the reasons why I said, I don't think I'll ever do that. - And here you are. - And you know, one of the things, you're raising a great point. You and I, you know, we have some church baggage from our past. The good news is there are a lot of people out there that don't have any church baggage. As a result of that, church isn't even on the radar screen. - Right on it. - It's not even church. It's not even an item to even be considered. And that's a problem 'cause there's not even, church isn't even a category for them. - Yeah, you're right. So I mean, all that's happening inside a lot of churches, particularly stuck or declining churches. So that's one cultural issue. And we talk about that in the book. But then the other issue is, okay, even if you solve all that, well, now the culture is changing very, very rapidly. And Sundays are for football. Sundays are for baseball, travel sports. You know, around here, the beach in the summer, ski hills in the winter. And sometimes honestly, you know, it's cold out. You just stay in bed. And collective guilt has disappeared. So, you know, people don't even feel guilty for missing church or as you say, they don't, you know, the way I think about it is, the average Christian or, you know, doesn't feel ever guilty about missing synagogue on Saturday. Well, the average non-Christian just doesn't, you know, when was the last time as a Christian you woke up on a Saturday and went, "Honey, we should be in synagogue today." - That's right. - You don't think about that. - 'Cause it's not a category. - It's not a category. And I think unchurch people, you know, you drive to church on a Sunday morning thinking, "I bet everyone's thinking, should I go to church or not?" No, they're not thinking that. - Right. - And so, you know, what is it gonna take for your church to make an impact in a culture that's changing that quickly? So there's internal change that you have to make to your sort of dysfunctional culture as church leaders. And then there's external change you need to make in terms of how do we respond to this rapidly changing culture. - Right. The other issue, and you point this out, is even Christians are attending church less often. So tell us about that trend. - Yeah, I think, you know, a lot has changed in the last decade or two. There is the disappearance of collective guilt. You also have other factors like travel. I mean, remember when a holiday was an annual thing. And I rented all kinds of people who are not independently wealthy, who are like, "Well, you know, they take four or five mini vacations a year now." It's like, "Well, we went to the lake this weekend, and then we're at the cottage all summer, or the lake house all summer." And then, you know, we're gonna fly to here on the weekend, and you're kind of like, "Wow, people are just gone." Travel sports, shift work is huge. I mean, there was a time, even in this province, where we're sitting today in Ontario, in the '80s, where it was illegal to be open on a Sunday. It was against the law. And I mean, you gassed up on a Saturday, because for the most part, gas stations weren't even open. And I mean, that's just gone. We're in a 24/7 culture. And then, we have other factors like online options. You know, when Steve Jobs introduced the iPod, he said, "Well, you've got a thousand songs in your pocket." Well, now you've got a thousand preachers and a thousand worship leaders in your pocket. So, you know, you can be pastoring in Iowa, but you're up against Andy Stanley on a Sunday. Or maybe you podcast your sermons. Well, if I can listen to the car on the way to work, why would I take an hour to visit you on a Sunday? So I think for all those reasons and more, we outline a lot of them in the book. People are just deciding to stay home more often, and they don't feel bad about it. - Right. And I think there's something, you get into this, is that you can watch online, but you don't get community to the extent that you can in real time. So that's something we can talk about in just a second as well. Let's move on to another question, though, or conversation, team health. To have conversation having the church, 'cause we're all supposed to be healthy. - Yeah. You wrote some great blogs about your own struggle with burnout, and so tell us about that. Tell us about why burnout is an epidemic in ministry, and what teams and leaders can do, 'cause if you've got a team that's imploding and burning out, sometimes growth is the last thing you need, because that fuels it. So tell us about your experience there. - Yeah, well, I did burnout. It was about nine years ago for me, and I think it was after about a decade of leadership, and I'm an A-type-driven person. You're familiar with that personality profile, Jeff, and I just went fast and hard at ministry through my heart at it, you know. Long days, even when you're, you know, this is the amazing thing, when your church is 50 people, you can still put in 50, 60 hours a week, right? Doesn't take you much to figure out things to do, and then we started to grow. And a mutual friend, who I interviewed in, I think, episode two, Perry Noble, said that workaholism is the most rewarded addiction in the world, it just is, and he's right. And I mean, when our church was really at its peak and things had never gone better, Perry and I had a parallel experience, we burnt out. It had, we'd never had more people. People were literally flying into our church from coast to coast in Canada to study what was going on, and I burnt out, and Perry had the same thing. His church was spectacularly successful. Now, in his case, in my case, you know, there was no moral failure, thank goodness. We didn't quit our jobs, cheat on our wives, or buy a sports car, although, you know, the sports car would have been fun. - Right. - Yeah, yeah, that would have been a lot of fun. But, you know, we didn't do anything dumb, which sometimes happens, but it's a very, very dark place. And I think there's always a tension between the things that grow your church, or you get rewarded for in leadership, and the things that corrode your soul. And I burnt out in the summer of 2006, I was sort of down and out for a couple of months. I, you know, took three weeks off, but went back to work, but could barely drag my knuckles across the desk. It was, it was, it was miserable. And it took me a while, took me about five years to get back to healthy. And since then, I monitor it. Like, I feel like I've always got, you know, lines or drips hooked up to me somehow as a leader, figuratively, because I watch my sleep very carefully. I watch my exercise a lot better. You've been a great accountability partner in that. I watch what I eat more. And I try to get to that place of emotional health. You know, I read Daniel Goldman's emotional intelligence. I read Pete Scazero's books on the emotionally healthy church. And my goodness, when I did that test 12 years ago, he's got this little test at the back of the emotionally healthy church. And like, how healthy are you? And he sort of rates you are, you know, an infant, a toddler, you know, an elementary age kid, an adolescent, an adult. Are you mature? I was like a toddler. And my wife would have told me, yeah, you're a toddler. Like, you know, you have temper tantrums. And, and, you know, when elite, but those things work for you at work sometimes. They don't work in the kingdom of God and they certainly don't work in your soul. So I've had to learn a whole new model of leadership over this last 10 years. And I've learned to try to stay healthy emotionally, spiritually, relationally and physically, which I think are the four big categories. And we've even made it like a value in our church. I think we, we've, for years, when we started Connects' Church, we had a very clear mission, a very clear vision and a clear strategy, in part, thanks to our friend, Andy Stanley's book, Deep and Wide, which is basically our strategy playbook. But we, we hadn't defined our cultural values. And so when we did that as a staff a couple years ago, one of the values we picked was just pursue health. And the question we ask, and we ask a question under every value is simply this. Am I living in a way today that will help me thrive tomorrow? And that's a very challenging question for me, you know, financially. Am I setting up my finances in a way today that will help me thrive tomorrow? Is my body in the physical shape that'll help me thrive tomorrow? As I get older, emotionally, am I in the place where I can thrive tomorrow? Relationally, are my, my relationships rich? Or, 'cause here's what happened to me, Jeff. You know, friendships hard in ministry, as you know, and a lot of ministry is very giving. You just give, give, give, give, give. And sometimes you've done a day and you've given it a meeting, you've counseled a couple and you visited someone, you know, if you're in a smaller church, and you're just drained. And you don't have any offsetting relationships that actually fill you up. You know, one of the questions I ask myself is, when was the last time you and your wife, you know, me and Tony went out for dinner with a couple that made us laugh 'til we cry? And if there's a drought in that season or you can't think of a friend or a relationship that actually does that for you, well, it's like your bank account. You're just, you're overdrawn all the time. And eventually you go bankrupt. So, you know, you've gotta have those replenishing relationships. And I think that's why I gravitate toward leaders who don't live in my community. You know, our friendship has been very life giving to me. And I have some in the community that are very life giving to me. And elders at this point who are very, you know, we've always had good elders, but like very life giving and staff that are very life giving. And that means that when you have to go to the trenches and you have to give where you have a week where it was like, "Wow, I just gave, gave, gave, gave, gave." It's okay 'cause there's another week coming. And so I've just, I've gotta stay current. I've gotta stay in balance. And I think that's a major issue. And whenever I talk about this, whenever I write about this, inevitably I hear from leaders who are like, "I'm right on the edge." And I thought it was like a 40 or 50-something issue. I gave a talk on burnout last spring and cynicism and burnout. And I had like leaders in their 20s come up and go, "Okay, you said this wasn't for people my age. "I'm only been in ministry a year. "I think I'm burning out." And so, you know, "Hey, and if that's you, "man, I just wanna encourage you. "Tell a friend and get some help. "See a doctor, see a good Christian counselor "and try to get some help." - I'm reading Brene Brown's book, "The Gift of Imperfection." I think she said something that's very, well, crucial for all of us, but especially for those of us in ministry. She said, "For many people, they derive their self-worth "by giving help, but never receiving it." And in ministry, you don't need any help because you're a pastor and you have it all together. And so, I think that fuels that. And then obviously, growth and the desire for growth can have a negative impact on your emotional health and burnout. - Oh yeah. And I think it's a constant motive check. The verse in my devotion this morning was Philippians two, "Let nothing be motivated "by selfish ambition." There's the near message version. I just butchered that verse, but anyway, I'm not saying the message butchers versus, but you know what I mean? That wasn't quite a direct quote. But yeah, I mean, you're right because growth can be very, very good, but if it's not well motivated, if it's truly not for the glory of God, if it's more about what you want from people, I want you to be a statistic for me. Man, that can get unhealthy and dark very, very quickly. So I think burnout is endemic. And it's also Jeff, very confusing because what we do is who we are, is who we hang out with. And so, if I'm working in law, which was my previous background, you know, I'm a lawyer, but I'm not, you know, law is not my identity. I'm a Christ follower, I'm a family man. Well, you're never not a Christian, right? And yet what you do is for Jesus, so if you put some balance or some different passions into your life, are you being unfaithful or disloyal to Jesus, it's just so confusing. And I think getting those categories clear and even having the conversation, you know, around your leadership table, like, am I healthy? Are we healthy? Do we have a culture where health happens? Three years after joining our church, are people as a rule, 'cause there's always outliers, there's always exceptions. But as a rule, are people in a better place, emotionally, spiritually, you know, relationally, even physically? Is this a place of growth and health? Because I think that's what the kingdom of God brings about, not prosperity, but just a place of wholeness and health and you're growing. You know, the ancients called it sanctification. - Yeah, it's good point. Team health and leader health is critically important in terms of church growth. Another area you talk about are volunteers and they're critical, obviously, to churches and really any non-profit organization. High capacity leaders, they're shy away from engaging from the church's mission. You suggest every team should talk through that. So why do high capacity leaders, volunteers, the high capacity leaders, it could be volunteers, stay away from a church's mission? - Yeah, man, I love that question 'cause it haunts me. And, you know, the struggle for every, for every church leader is I need more volunteers, I need more volunteers. And then you get some good volunteers and they disappear. I think there are a few and I outline quite a few in one of the chapters, but, you know, a big one just to start is disorganization. I mean, if you're a high capacity person and you show up on a Sunday and let's say you're a small group leader for middle school kids, you get to that place where everything's disorganized. You know, the curriculum isn't set out for you. The room's a mess. Oh, you were serving at what service? Sorry, we had you down for the other service. I mean, how long are you gonna hang in there? And a lot of the times churches are not particularly well run organizations and I think that is a repellent to high capacity leaders. I think another reason Jeff is we set the bar too low. It just feels like a low challenge environment. Have you ever heard or done this? 'Cause I've done this. It's like, you would never say it this way, but it kind of comes across as, well, I know you probably don't want to serve at our church and, you know, we know you're busy, but if you could help us out once every eight Sundays, just for an hour, that would be awesome and we'd be so grateful. Well, high capacity people are not attracted to those calls. And when you set the bar high, and it should be high, I think, in the church, like is there any more noble calling than the kingdom of God? Is there any more noble call, a higher bar than to live to Christ? I don't think there is and I don't think there's a more important mission on earth. So we don't have to have impossibly high standards, but I think there should be a high level of challenge. And you know this, Jeff. I mean, high capacity people are attracted to high levels of challenge, they just are. And when you give people that opportunity, I think high capacity leaders go, oh, you want me to serve every week and build into middle schoolers? Like that's a pretty high commitment. Yeah, but let me tell you why, because they need another voice that's with them in this critical stage in their development and they need to hear a non-parent say the same thing a loving parent would say. And you'll discover if you serve, Jeff, that yeah, these boys kind of need you, but you're going to realize, wow, I'm really growing, that this is really drawing me in and we actually need our best leaders on this. We need people who are really ready to commit to the next generation. Are you in? Well, when a high capacity person hears that, they're more likely to say yes than, hey, we're disorganized. And then another reason is no end to terms of service. I heard this, I think it was maybe Frank Bieler who told me this or somebody told me this a few years ago and I'm like, you're right, it's the hotel California. You can check out any time you like it most churches, but you can never leave. So how long do you want to serve like forever? Like when do you plan on living till Jesus comes back? Yeah, Jeff, you know, so you have 30, 40 years. You think you're always signing up for life in church. Well, why? 'Cause we all know as church leaders, you're probably not going to serve for life. You're going to serve for life, but you don't have to serve in this group and this capacity and this role for life. So why not just put terms of service on and say, hey, we need you for six months or we need you for a year? And that scares leaders because leaders are thinking, well, you know, I'm not six months. Like then I'm going to have to recruit again. Well, if you have a really contagious environment and you love on your volunteers and you're organized and you got a high level of challenge, when you say, hey, Jeff, your six months are up, they're like, oh, really already? Would you consider renewing? Oh, yeah, I'm in. Like, sign me up for another year of this. I'm good for that. And then eventually you'll probably be done leading groups, but it's like, well, why don't I coach or why don't I work in production or why don't I work somewhere else? And so, you know, I think when you give volunteers an out, they lean in and it's really important to give them an out. So those are some of the reasons I think. I mean, what have you seen at your church? I will flip the tables for a moment. What's a great and contagious volunteer environment for you? I'll have what you just said. I think with high capacity leaders, though, one of the things, they're being recruited by other companies to work for them. Yes. And I think that there's something about them that they would like to see an individual ask rather than a blanket ask of, hey, come join us, which is good, but identifying somebody and saying, hey, I need you to do, here's our vision. I believe you can play a role, will you help me? And then just have that awkward moment of silence. And sometimes they'll say no, but I think you honor them by saying, by carving out time, having a cup of coffee with them and saying, I need you in this role. Can you help me? And I think just having that individual request just means the world to them. And more often than not, you get a yes. And that's not just true with recruiting volunteers, it's also true with fundraising. Cast the vision, that's why I'm here, will you help me? And then you be quiet and let them respond. So that personal request. - See, that's good. This is why I like interviewing people. - Yeah, that's so good, Jeff. - That's the link I'm saying after that. Let's talk about young adults, all right? Those young people, we're both 50 now, so we can call them young people, right? - Those young people. - Young adults leaving the church. Ciar Powell and the Barnard group, obviously, have done some research on this. So tell us what you found out about the trend and how talking about it in your book can help church leaders. - Yeah, well, when I found Ciar Powell's research that has surfaced in the Sticky Faith series, I was just surprised. It's half of all students who were active in the 12th grade are walking away from church five to 10 years later. Like, wow, this is not just, see Barn has done a lot of research in a number of areas, but he's discovering that the vast majority of millennials would have a post-Christian worldview. So that's people under 30 who really don't think the Bible is the inerrant word of God. I think Jesus was probably a historic figure, but maybe not the savior. Like, don't identify with historic Christianity in a major way, that's 48% of millennials. So even the boomers and the builder generation who don't go to church, most of them would identify with sort of a Christian worldview. Yeah, I don't go to church, but I think Jesus probably is son of God. I don't know what that means, but I would believe that. And 48% of millennials don't. So what we're discovering is in this under 30 generation, the number of kids who were raised in the church and not raised in the church who are walking away from the church is just soaring. And you have to be careful, because I think I can look into my church. I mean, you were with our staff today. You could see how many did I introduce you? Hey, this person started in our kids ministry. And now they're 22 and they're joining our staff or they're part of our leadership development program. We all have success stories. You can go to Gwynette church and probably fill a good size room with 25 year olds. And you can go, success, we've done it. Those are probably the exceptions to the rule. And when you get out into the community and you get out into the community colleges and you look at who's working for the up and coming companies, you'll discover the majority of those don't go to church and are not interested or have a lot of de-church kids. And probably the most shocking finding in the research that I saw and the one that really challenges me is that kids walk away not because of having doubts. Everybody has doubts. So it's not just, you know, hey, my professor talked about evolution, not creation, now I'm not a Christian anymore. It's not doubts. Cara's research discovered that it was unexpressed doubts. So I've got these doubts. I just don't know who to talk to about them. And I don't feel like our church is the place where I can say, well, I'm not sure I believe in creation. What about evolution? Or why would a loving God send people to hell? I just don't get that. Or, you know, maybe the pastor preaches on it, but like there's no discussion and I don't feel safe enough to tell you that I'm not sure I buy that. And then if I don't buy that, does that mean I'm out? I'm not a Christian. Does that mean I'm an atheist? Does that mean, like what does that mean? Does that mean I'm Buddhist? And what they found is churches that had environments where that conversation could happen, retained far more kids than churches who didn't. And so it's not doubt, it's unexpressed doubt. That finding blew me away and, you know, the challenge is, you know, is my home a place where people can express doubts is, is our church a place where people can express doubts and still feel like they're part of the family, still feel like they're loved and still, you know, within, if you're, you know, questioning, is Jesus the way, the truth and the life, well, that's a different level than going, I'm not sure about what hell is or, you know, but can you still be part of the family? And the answer is absolutely. I mean, Jesus in her circle, Thomas doubted. Peter was like, no way. And even in the early church, you know, when Peter was in prison and he got released spectacularly, the church was praying and earnestly and the prayer got interrupted and the guy at the door was like, Peter's here. It's like, oh, it's his ghost. Yeah, he died. We know, we know what happened to him, right? It's not, it's not really him. And, you know, everybody doubts. And so I think we've developed this artificial barrier in the church that everybody's got to have faith. Now it's deeper than that. There are other reasons that millennials don't like church hypocrisy, inauthenticity from leaders. We think that talking about our weaknesses is going to drive people away. It actually draws them here. That when you say, hey, you know what, I burned out or hey, my marriage hasn't always been great. And we had to really fight for our marriage through different seasons. People go, oh, you're human, you're real, you're authentic. And that's a real connection point with the next generation. So there are solutions. The good news is to all of these problems, there are solutions and there's no silver bullet, but like if you have these conversations, you can realize, okay, we're going to create a culture where people kind of want to engage and as a result, we'll attend. We can create a culture where we're healthy. We can create a culture where you can express doubt and not get penalized for it. So I think the clues are in when you identify the problems, you then say, okay, we're going to shift culture and make this a different kind of church. - And the point you're making too is that it's not seven powerful tactics. It's conversations together. Let's begin to talk about these things in the church, among our team, among elder board, volunteers, whatever. The conversations will lead us to answers. - Absolutely, yeah, because I couldn't imagine writing a book where it's like do these three things and you'll see 70% growth. I mean, I don't know, 'cause I don't know what the problem is in your church. But what I do know in talking to hundreds and hundreds of church leaders every year, probably more than that, is we're not, even though our churches seem different, there are these universal things that keep popping up. And if you can just talk about them, it's kind of like your marriage. If there are money problems in your marriage or something, sometimes having the conversation and saying, okay, we need to go and meet with an investment planner or we need to do this. You kind of, okay, we took the elephant out of the room, we had an honest conversation, and now it's not solved overnight, but we know within two or three years this is gonna get better and we can make progress in that area. And I think the same thing is true in church. And so, the big question is, well, how do you have the conversation? So that's the big idea behind the book. Well, let's all talk about it. Here's how. - Well, one of the things you talk about as well is the cultural change that's happening at a faster rate than really any time. You could look at all sorts of examples of that, but you argue that church leaders often miss cultural trends that we should be catching and responding to. So what are we missing as it relates to culture as church leaders? - Yeah, I love that question because I think culture is changing far more quickly than we realize. Like, you know, everybody who's listening, you're probably listening on your phone, and the reality is if you're driving in the car, if you're running, if you're cutting the grass, and think about what you can do on your phone today that you just couldn't do a decade ago or 20 years ago. I mean, even if you had a cellular telephone, it didn't do a fraction of what it does today. I read my Bible on my phone. I'm connected all the time via LTE or via wifi. And, you know, the whole internet is now in your hand. And churches have websites, and sometimes they're not very mobile friendly, which is a mistake. Churches have, you know, Facebook pages and so on, but are they really connecting with people? Probably not. And even in your social media, you know, you look at how rapidly things have changed. And just saying, hey, our church starts at nine o'clock. Probably is not cutting edge social media anymore. And we don't know what to do with it. And we think, well, the internet, yeah, we'll figure that out at some point. Well, the internet is not going away anytime soon. I heard a futurist on another podcast say, you know, right now, think of the internet. It's the size of a golf ball. 20 years from now, it'll be the size of the sun. So how are we responding to that? What does that mean in terms of relationships? Like, is an online relationship a real relationship? Can you actually connect with unchurched people via Facebook? And if so, how? And then you think about consumption patterns, this gets back to declining attendance. Look at, look at what's happened with cable television, network television and Netflix. So, you know, on the one hand, Netflix has been around for a few years, but I mean, we raised our kids in an era where they remember going to Blockbuster to get a video. I mean, that's been years since we've actually done that. You just sit on a couch and you press a button and boom, there it is, Netflix or iTunes and you've downloaded the movie for the day. It used to take, you know, you used to have to walk out of the room while it downloads. Now, 20 seconds later, oh, it's done in HD, ready to go. Boom, that's a major change. Well, you know, our whole model of church when you talk about the culture has been based on two things happening. It's been based on, you know, you have to gather in the square footage, this box to listen to a message and to listen to music. So, that's sort of the mainstay of Protestant worship for centuries. Well, now all of a sudden, you can get the message on your phone, you can get the message on your laptop, you can get the message anywhere you want. And if you have a $20 iTunes card, you can get your favorite worship leader anywhere, anytime. So, that has totally changed the game. And I think it's gonna change, you know, what, you have to ask philosophical questions like, well, what is church? What are some of the unique things when we gather that we do outside of the message and the music that will draw people back in? Or why do we gather, period? You've got to start asking questions like that. And then I think, you know, you look at what Netflix has done, Jeff, for content consumption, it's huge. I mean, binge watching probably started with DVDs in the 80s or 90s, but I mean, you had to get out of your chair and actually pop a new DVD in. Now, people watch entire series in a, you know, whole season in a day. And episodes are released in batches, right? So you get all of season three of House of Cards at once. Boom, there it is, downloaded. And how is that gonna change content consumption patterns for churches? We'll often hear from people now who said, hey, we found the pursued series on your website. I watched all five messages on Friday. When are you doing this again? Well, that's a very interesting question that wouldn't have even arisen. And then what does that mean? Like, can you use your series? One of the things we wanna do next year is we wanna cut our series up into more bite-sized pieces, two-minute highlights, 10-minute chunks, and get them out onto the internet, because you and I work for hours, days, weeks, months on a series, and then we finish our 40 minutes on a Sunday, and it sits on a website or a podcast, and we never speak of it again. Well, what if you could repurpose some of that and send it out into your community via social media? What if somebody who's going through a difficult marriage finds your last series on marriage and finds help and hope in it? And what if you can connect with them? See these cultural trends that are happening, and we don't often equate the two. So we sort of have one category for church, and then we sit down and we watch Netflix at night, and we never think, well, is this one of the reasons people are attending church less often, and how do we connect these two worlds, these two divides that we live in? And again, if you're not struggling with that as a church leader, I understand, but I promise you, everybody under 30 is already there. - You know, the interesting, if the business world, we would say, okay, how do we monetize this? How do we not fight against this? How do we monetize this? So in the church world, we wouldn't necessarily say that, but I think a future question for the church is, if this is the trend that it's going, to some extent, how do we create giving patterns so that we can still remain open for business? And so that really leads to digital giving and this whole other platform that if you're not really leading toward digital giving, and having people give without showing up on a Sunday, then there could be financial trouble down the road for your church. - I agree, we talk about that in one of the chapters, and I don't write about it specifically in this detail, but my goodness, our church has been down that journey, on that journey, rather, for the last three or four years, and we've moved from 30% of our giving being online, to almost 70% of our giving being online, to the point now, where if we're closed at the end of the year on the final Sunday, we will often beat budget. Like imagine that, we took up the offering and nobody was in the building, and again, that's not, don't let your cynical heart play out, but reaching people is worth the investment, and even if the church doesn't need my money, I need to give, as a Christian, and so to say, well, the only way you can give is using a check or cash on a Sunday morning and putting it in a wooden bowl, how much money are you carrying in your wallet right now? - Right. - Very little. So if you're gonna tithe and, you know, as soon as you start tithing on 40, $50,000 a year, that's more than the 20 bucks you got in your pocket, like you gotta open up digital channels. Another great example of a cultural trend that we're missing that we do talk about in the book. - A couple of other questions, then we will let you go. So you hear all this as church leaders and we realize we need to change. So where is this fear that you see this and go, okay, we gotta make change, we gotta make change. So you've written another great book about creating some change. So why are leaders scared to make change like this? - I just think change is scary, period. You know, people change when the pain associated with the status quo becomes greater than the pain associated with change. And we're pretty good at just saying, well, I know all those things are happening in the world, but this is the church. Shouldn't the church be different? Well, not always. I mean, sometimes the church should be different. It really should be different. We should be the most loving people. We should elevate community. We should never be out-communited by the secular world. We might be out Disney by them, but we'll never be out-communited by them. So, I mean, there are things that are distinctives about the church, but if you wanna put your head in the sand, you are on the path to irrelevance. So I think a lot of the time we just come up with justifications and excuses, Jeff, about why our church is different, why our region is different, why we can't change, and we just make excuses. And I always think you can make excuses or you can make progress, but you can't make both. We also have the capacity for self-deception, I think, around church boards. You know, well, the lights are on, and we got the bills paid, and sometimes we'll mask it in faithfulness language. Well, we're not gonna be relevant. We're just gonna be faithful. Well, don't you just wanna be effective? Isn't God calling you to be ineffective? If there were another thousand people that you could reach with the love and forgiveness of Jesus Christ, would you do it? And if the price was an honest conversation about change, why would you not be willing to have that conversation? Jeff, I think another reason that we're afraid to change, and this doesn't impact the stuck church, but the successful church. When you're growing double digits and you've got a lot of young families coming to your church, you quickly become a conservative culture in terms of change because you're afraid of blowing it. Whoa, we've got success. Okay, if we change, if we experiment on the side here, I don't wanna wreck this thing. I don't even understand it, but like, I don't wanna ruin it. And I always think the greatest enemy of your future success is your current success. So if you're a successful church, it's not so much like, you know, well, we're just afraid to talk about change. It's like, no, you're afraid to talk about change because if you were to change, you're afraid of breaking something. But the reality is every success curve has a lifecycle. And you may be at the peak of your effectiveness. So if you're not having the conversation now about what needs to change, then you're gonna have it at some point. And it's much better to do preventative change conversations. Like, are we really crushing it with 20-year-olds? Are we really effective with teenagers? Because they're your 30-year-olds of tomorrow. And if you're like, well, you know, we're a whole bunch of 40 and 50-year-olds now, great. But you'll be a whole bunch of 60 and 70-year-olds a decade from now. So successful churches are afraid of talking about change. Stock churches are afraid of talking about change because I think people are afraid of talking about change. And so, you know, in the book, I talk a lot about, well, here's how to have an honest conversation. Like be deadly honest, look in the mirror and just admit the truth. If the truth is, we are stuck. We're not reaching anybody and we're not gonna change. Just say it out loud. Just say it out loud. Just admit it because if you're gonna sit around this table and say, well, why aren't people coming? Or, you know, how are we gonna reach people? Or you'll delude yourself into thinking that you've changed when you haven't. And so it's really painful for me to have that conversation. But you have to have it, you know? We're in a high growth year at Connexus Church, our fastest growing year in a while. We're excited, we've never been bigger, never been better. And guess what we're talking about around our leadership table? What we're gonna change because reaching the next thousand is gonna be more challenging than reaching the first thousand. And if all we do is what we've currently been doing to get us here, it is not gonna get us there. And so I just think change is a universal thing. And, you know, hopefully leaders will change. - And that's one of the things, one of the many things I love about the book. The book is a way to introduce change to those that might be uncomfortable through conversations. So how could a team, it could be a team of elders, it could be a team of volunteers, it could be a team of staff. What would you say is the best way to leverage the book in order to have these conversations? So it's not as threatening. You start talking about change. Whoa, what's this gonna look like? But hey, let's have these conversations. So how would you best leverage the book in team conversations like that? - Well, you know, that was what I was thinking about when I wrote it because there's seven distinct subjects. And I say this in the introduction, like, you know, read the whole book if you want. But if you try to introduce seven points of change at once, you're just gonna fry everyone's brain and people are gonna throw their hands up. So what I would suggest is try to pick one or two issues. And maybe, you know, it's, well, why are people not attending more often? Like just try to get some insight into that and just tackle one issue at a time. So one chapter at a time. And you'll get a sense when you just even scan the book. Okay, this is what we need to be talking about. Focus on that. And then having let a lot of these, I mean, all of these conversations, our conversations we've had at Kinexis Church, where I serve, I finish every chapter with some discussion questions. So you don't have to be the guy that asks the awkward question. They're already written for you, right? And so you're not like, well, what's Jeff's agenda behind like asking me that? No, they're already written. And then there's a really simple action plan for every chapter. It's just really simple strategic planning, basic strategic planning 101. You can make it a lot better. But if you read the chapter together and sort of set that good tone for it, that neutral tone, like let's just be honest with each other. And let's just talk about it. Like what do you think, Jeff? What do you think, George? What do you think, you know, Alice, what do you think? Ask those questions and then kind of work through the study questions and then say, okay, well, what is our single biggest issue here? That's sort of the common theme at the end of every chapter. What could we do about it in the next six months? And then let's list three to five other issues. And then what could we accomplish around those areas in the next three to five years? And if you get the audiobook, actually, if you're listening around the release of the podcast for another week or so, if you order now, you'll get the audiobook for free. I actually take you through a lot of bonus content. That's where I added stuff that isn't in the book, is through those questions, some of our own experience and everything. And like I encourage you exactly how to have that conversation. So you'll get that free if you sign up this week, but you have to fill out the bonus form at lastingimpactbook.com to get the free audiobook once you order the book. But does that make sense? Like to have that conversation, you have those conversations around Gwynette Church. What have you found to be really helpful in having them without the place exploding or melting down? - It's helpful to have a third party. And you are the third party in this book. - I guess that's true, I hadn't thought about that. - You know, you could even say, "Well, I don't agree with the carry on this point." You know, so even though I don't know why anybody-- - From me under the bus. - No, you could totally disagree with you. - I'm just saying, "Hey, you might be right." I don't know if carry is right on this, so let's talk about this. So it's the permission to disagree that creates great conversations. So that's why I think this book is so helpful to create those conversations so that you can move down. And the issue is facing, you know, one leader's church is a different issue that's facing other leader's churches, but the conversations can lead as kind of and go in the same direction. Hey, this has been awesome. Final question, what's the hope? What's your hope for this book? Why did you take the time to put it together? - I just really hope it will facilitate the kind of conversations that will actually help churches thrive in the future. Like, I think we all kind of know, when you look around, even the big churches, the small churches, you know, the non-denominational, the denominational churches, urban, rural, it's all the same, we know we're in a crack in history. And if in some way these seven conversations help local churches advance, I'll be thrilled. And that's why I wrote it. - Well, and how can leaders find it? - Oh, just go to lastingimpactbook.com. It's on Amazon, it's also on iBooks, if you're an Apple fan. It's also on the orange store. If you just go to orangebooks.org, you'll find it there. And the best place to find all that is just lastingimpactbook.com. And that's where you can find the bonus form if you order this week to get the free audio book as well. So you gotta fill that bonus form out, but it's available online at all those sources. And it's in Kindle, and it's also in hardcopy, which makes studying as a group a lot easier. And if you want bulk discounts, make sure you check out the orange link on lastingimpactbook.com because there are great reductions for great quantities. - That's great. Well, Kerry didn't ask me to say this, but since this is the hostile takeover of the podcast, if you love this podcast, which I know you do, I would encourage you to help Kerry through your social media platforms, just promote the book. I think that would be a thank you back to all the hard work that Kerry has done on the Leadership Podcast. He works so hard and gives us his content for free, and that would be great. So he didn't ask me to say this, and he may even edit this out, but I really feel like that would be a value at, in a way for us to say thanks. And hey, on behalf of all of your podcast listeners, which is growing daily, by the way, thanks for doing this, and thanks for all the hard work that you're doing. - Well, you make it fun. I mean, some of this is selfish. Like, I just love having these kinds of conversations. Usually when I'm the interviewer, not the interviewee, and it's a lot of fun for me, but as I've said all along, the greatest joy is just hearing from listeners and leaders to hear about, you know, your struggles and what you're going through. And if there's some tiny little way I can help, I'm so, so thankful for that. - That's great. Any update on future episodes of the podcast, then we'll let you go. - Yeah, you know, who have we got coming up? I've been in book mode so much. We've got a few people coming up that are going to be actually next week. You're going to hear from a guy. You may actually know Aaron Harris, and it's-- - Well, I know Aaron Harris very well. Aaron helped with Lauren SB design Gwynette Church from the interior branding, so he's awesome. - We are going to talk all about Aaron talks very openly and very honestly about just his same sex attraction and growing up in the church as a Christian. It is our longest episode to date. Beth Marshall, actually if you're a small church pastor, you'll love this or a large church pastor, but Beth Marshall is coming up in the podcast and she has done pastoral care at New Spring Church. So if you think pastoral care is complicated at your church, try it at a church of 30,000 and how do you do it? And she tries to crack the code on that. Yeah, and then we got a bunch of other stuff coming up. So it's going to be awesome. - Well, I'll hand you back the reins now of the podcast, but let me, thanks for letting me do this. - Jeff, thanks so much. Looking forward to hanging out later today again. - It's great. - Well, listen, here's my deepest hope. I really, really hope that these ideas will help you lead like never before. And if you want to get the book, couple of thoughts, just go to lastingimpactbook.com and you can order it off any source. However, if you want to get some bulk discounts, let's say you want 20 people to read it or 30 people to read it, you can get them the free audio book as well. And the best place to order that is right off of Orange Book. So again, if you go to lastingimpactbook.com and click on the Orange Books tab, you will see that there are some significant volume discounts. If you buy more than 10 copies, if you want to buy 20 or 30, the price just keeps dropping the more you buy. And again, if you fill out wherever you buy it, whether it's a single copy or multiple copies, just go to lastingimpactbook.com and make sure you fill out the bonus claim form. And then you will get for this first week anyway, the free audio book. And then that disappears. So I just want to say thank you to all of you. You've made writing this book and launching this book. So awesome. So many of you have dropped notes and just been encouragement and said, "Hey, when is this coming out?" And it's like, "Well, today." So thanks for celebrating that with me. And even if you don't buy the book, I really hope that the ideas we shared today are going to help you lead better. And those are in fact the ideas that we unpack in the book. And of course, there's much, much more that we just couldn't get to today in the podcast. So thanks everyone for being awesome. And thank you so much as well for all of you who continue to subscribe to share the news about this podcast and to leave ratings and reviews on iTunes. I really, really appreciate it. Thank you, that helps get the word out. And Jeff did ask me, who else is on the podcast? And I kind of blanked, I froze. I'm like, "Ah, I can't remember." But let me tell you, we do have Aaron Harris next week for episode 57 and then Beth Marshall. And then here's a few other guests we've got coming up. And again, if you subscribe, they come to your inbox for free. Many of you might know the name Lewis Howes. He has a brand new book releasing this month called School of Greatness. I listened to a School of Greatness podcast. This guy is like king of the internet. One of the top 10 podcasters on planet Earth. He has, get this, 800,000 downloads a month. Lewis Howes is my guest coming up in three weeks. Then we're gonna hear from Sue Miller. Many of you have said, hey, we wanna hear from women leaders. We wanna hear it. Sue has been such a great friend. She's gonna talk all about how to lead volunteers better. Josh Gagnon is coming back from next level church. And again, he was in Canada visiting me and we sat down and had a powerful conversation about insecurity and leadership. And then Jerry Gillis, who is from the chapel in Buffalo, New York. I was gonna talk all about attractional and missional church and how his large attractional church became missional. We got a whole lot of other stuff coming up too. So just wanna say thank you for all of your continued encouragement. And thanks for celebrating this book launch day with me. You can get everything at lastingimpactbook.com. And just thank you for your encouragement. We are back next week as usual with a brand new episode. And Aaron Harris is gonna talk all about what it's like to grow up gay in the church. And try to figure out your sexual orientation and your faith and involvement in the local church. A powerful, long story that we're gonna hear together next week. Thanks so much. I really do hope that this and everything we do around here helps you lead like never before. See you next week. (upbeat music) - You've been listening to the Kerri Newhoff Leadership Podcast. Join us next time for more insights on leadership, change and personal growth to help you lead like never before. (upbeat music) [MUSIC PLAYING] [BLANK_AUDIO]