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ValleyChat
The official podcast of Shepherd of the Desert Church, Scottsdale, Arizona. Faith, life, and wisdom in the Valley of the Sun.
ValleyChat
Learnings from Basecamp
Embark on a journey with us to the heart of leadership evolution, as we unpack the richness of our experience at Global Leadership Network's Base Camp conference at Life.Church in Edmond, Oklahoma. This conference was a vibrant precursor to the Global Leadership Summit. Share in Pastor John and Pastor Scott's insights from this gathering of like-minded church leaders in Edmond, Oklahoma, and feel the excitement building for the summit slated for August 2024.
Captivated once more by the power of Craig Groeschel's words at the summit, I revisit the pivotal moment when personal spirituality took on a new center — Jesus. This episode is a tapestry of transformation, interwoven with the personal quests of speakers who prove that the Holy Spirit can magnificently amplify our unique talents. As we express our heartfelt thanks for the privilege to partake in such a life-altering event, we invite you to explore the transformative potential lying in wait for you at the Global Leadership Summit, ready to ignite a deeper engagement with the divine mission that unites us all.
Hey Shepherd family, I'm Pastor Scott Siddler, I'm with John Corollis and we've got a Valley Chat podcast that is built around leadership, devotion, culture, personal growth and development. This is going to be a little bit of a hodgepodge episode because John and I just came back from Base Camp, which is part of the global leadership networks onboarding of new congregations and church leaders into the August 8th and 9th 2024 Global Leadership Summit. We were able to spend some time at Craig Groeschel's church Life Church in Oklahoma City actually at the headquarters in Edmond with other church leaders from across many denominations, learning about the global leadership summit that's coming up and really just spending some great collegial time learning from Craig and others about what is making them tick in life and leadership these days. And so John and I, as we were coming back and hanging out at the airport yesterday, we thought you know what let's put together.
Speaker 2:It's been a while since we've done a Valley Chat. Let's get together and let's just allow you to overhear. While we overhear each other, think about the things that we learned that really stick out for us. Maybe it'll give you a little hat tip to get involved in the global leadership summit, because I came back a complete believer. I am going to be participating in that August 8th and 9th, 2024, in case I didn't mention it. But in advance of that we were really blessed for a 24 hour period in some really consequential presentations and discussions. So that's my setup, john. We're going to have a top three list, john. What's your number one take away from this global leadership network base camp conference in Oklahoma?
Speaker 1:The illustration that stuck with me that I'll never forget is when they had the explorer Joel Shower he's one of 48 people in the world to have submitted the highest mountain on all seven continents and then also so good to the south and north pole. Not many people have done that. He was one of the few that has, and he started doing it in his late 40s 46.
Speaker 1:That was his when he submitted Kilimanjaro, and then he went on this amazing journey over the next decade or two to get to the point where he has climbed Everest and climbed.
Speaker 2:His daughter wanted to. He asked his daughter what do you want to do as a graduation present for high school? And she said I want to climb Kilimanjaro. And so they started doing stair step machine at the gym for three hours a day to prepare for it. I mean, it was crazy, the story.
Speaker 1:It's amazing and the lesson that he brought to us. He's talking a lot about the idea of base camp on Everest, which, of course, is kind of you know, that's the famous picture, that's the famous mountain, it's, you know, knowing in fame and also infamy for being, you know, this place that all these explorers and climbers do. But that's not to diminish the accomplishment that it is to actually achieve the summit of that mountain, which the more I learned as we listened to him speak, the more a really impressive that feat becomes. Because when you're at the base camp, that's the place where you're gathering stamina and strategy to put together your effort to get to the top of the mountain, which is not guaranteed, by the way, until it actually happens Right. And one of the elements of that is this sort of staggered, metered, incremental ascent. One day you go up, you know, to 16,000 feet, and then you go to 20,000 feet and then you go for the summit at 23 or whatever the numbers actually are Right.
Speaker 1:And the question was by the host of the summit, david Ashcraft. He said well, why would you not just go for all at once? And the simple answer was great Well, david you don't want to die.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And there's, there's a million ways that you could, you could die on Mount Everest, but one of them is that your body is not ready for the extremes that the altitude does to your body, and so you need to incrementally get yourself ready for that kind of ascent. And that applied, I feel like, to leadership and to church change, because you can't go for everything all at once. Your church body, the body of believers, is not going to be ready for the change in climate that is going to do to your organization, to your culture, to your team, to the people that are in the room with you. And so it's these incremental steps of what does it mean to? To take one step further, to take three steps forward and two steps back, to get to the point where now you're in a sustainable rate of change, a sustainable new cultural environment. So that was huge for me. I think that that illustration is going to be coming back a million times for me over the course of oh my gosh, what was your number one?
Speaker 2:well, it changed. And, by the way, I just have goosebumps right now and, like for the past 48 to 72 hours, I have been a walking goosebumps because that idea of this incremental change. I'm just gonna pivot off of what you just said. So, background Craig Rochelle leads Life Church. Life Church is on 45 campuses it's essentially its own denomination, right so 45 campuses, one of which is its online campus. This past weekend had 95,000 people in physical worship, or I think it was 40 45,000 connecting online.
Speaker 2:What I took away was this and if you're in the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, listen up now because this is directed right toward us. Craig said when we build a church, when we drop the standard typical 38,000 square foot life church in a new town and we play pop-up church with a new pop-up staff, we never build the church's worship space to be able to hold more than three to five hundred people, he said. We he unapologetically says we are not a mega church, even though they worship 95,000 people and that is physical people right across their luck. Oh, is it so? Okay, so, but the larger point is their building footprint only allows for three to five hundred in worship at one time. So even though, let's just say, a campus has four or five thousand people attending worship, they have to attend across 10 services and the reason for that is because they want to create environments where people can actually know people that the pastors who are in each service assigned. Okay, you're the 430 Saturday afternoon pastor and you have 300 people to care for, so you're going to get to know everybody in the room plus the visitors you're going to do the follow-up. That kind of Christianity inspires me and here's the reason why. Here's the application point for us Lutheran Church, missouri Synod, maybe mainline denominations.
Speaker 2:I just heard a statistic that the median worship population in an LCMS congregation is 55. Oh well, 55. So if you are at 55, here's a question how do you get double that number to a hundred? And to see that your trajectory, even though we were like wow, great building, great staff, wouldn't it be cool to be in a 95,000 member church making that level of impact? Craig's DNA of organizational leadership is. 95,000 is a great number and there's a real value to it. But the greater value is does the body of Christ know each other and is there a trained pastor that is overseeing the life of that 300 person worshiping congregation. So I love here at Shepard Our commitment is we've got great rooms. We're going to be doing some renovation this coming year, but that just spoke into where we are at. We don't want to be a mega church with 2000 people in a single room.
Speaker 1:We'll put as many services as we can together so that people get to know people through consistent relational experience weekend after weekend, and I think that the criticism from people like us, or us as a denomination, tends to be oh you know those big churches people like, because you can be anonymous and unknown.
Speaker 1:And behind so much of the conversation that we've got to be a part of over the last couple of days was this heart, for I want to know when the people don't show up, I want to be able to ask them how the family member in the hospital is doing.
Speaker 1:I want to be able to walk with them through life, and it just connected directly to what drives us as a church body as well. A pastor is someone who is shepherding his people, walking with them, leading them to sources of truth and life and renewal, being there to communicate God's word to them in an important, meaningful, cohesive way, an intelligible way, and so it's like we've got this treasure that we're sitting on and there are ways for us that God is going to be using us to make the most of that, even though we like to think, oh, we're this historical, traditional denomination and we've got to deal with decline. And it filled us with hope, which was really, really cool, even though there was one other LCMS guy in the room 200 pastors, right it was. It was very inspiring, hopeful to see that kind of collaboration and it never was like a Competition, mm-hmm, it was very clear. You know we're on the same team, which was, which was pretty incredible.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I would just pick up on that. You know I hate competitive church. There are eight billion people in the world. There are 350 million people in the United States. If any Congregation is dying and they say such words as well, we're dying, but it's not our fault. Well, I, I'm just I'm not saying it's your fault, but I'm like how can we live in a country of 350 million people and Not believe that the Holy Spirit of the risen Lord, jesus Christ, is actually working for one person?
Speaker 2:So we're in a, we're in a town, right, a town Phoenix, four million plus Is it? Is it reasonable to think that if we're losing ground, we're losing membership, that there is no one in four million person population Phoenix that Shepherd of the desert can reach with our unique DNA, worship style, format, pastoral personality? It is unreasonable to think that and I think that's that's what I took away is is we have to have Optimistic hope that the Holy Spirit is still working in this crazy mixed up USA of ours To convert, to bring to faith, to grow into the grace and knowledge our Lord Jesus Christ. So I am. I can't wait for this conference. I mean, you can hear my voice, I am in it to win it. I am going to 67 and a half and a long way past that do in the mission of the gospel. Okay, john.
Speaker 1:Second thing second thing for me is the importance of knowing what's going on in the world of the people you're pastoring, mm-hmm, the people that you're leading. So here in our church we've got people that are involved on global scale, global markets, and another thing, too, is like the local market, real estate, small businesses. We've got a lot of enterprising people in our church, and so to know the things that are stressing them due to events across the world or market trends or Political decisions being made, being aware of those things, so that we can speak a word Into their life that connects with them where they're at, instead of feeling like they're not allowed to bring some of that anxiety or stress into the worship space because no one's listening to them.
Speaker 1:The importance of having that relational connection with your people was huge and it just, I think, emboldened me to be more courageous about. Hey, did that particular event, you know, last week over in another part of the world, have an impact on on your life, on on your work week? You know what's? What's going on with you? Are you doing okay, even though the market, the housing market in Scottsdale seems to be extremely competitive? Or you know Whatever those specific details are, getting to know your people, getting to know their world and then staying informed of what's happening in their world was, was major.
Speaker 2:So my second thing I'm making up as I go along now, because every time John talks I'm thinking something else with that on top. The cherry on top is we are unapologetic, that Jesus is the center of the church. So all the diversity in this world, everything that divides us, jesus supersedes it all. And if again, I appreciate Craig Groeschel, he's 56 years old, I'm 53. I felt like I'm talking to a peer who shares my heart for the rest of his earthly life. Right, he has passed the, you know, working really hard in ministry and maybe doing stuff just to build church or whatever else he's now asking.
Speaker 2:Craig is asking wisdom questions which inspire me and he's making statements that keep things really clear for me. And it's all about Jesus. In other words, if you're a Democrat, I'm your worst enemy and your best friend. If you're a Republican, I'm your worst enemy, I'm your best friend. If you're rich or poor, for either of those groups I am your worst enemy and best friend. Because I cut through all of the friendship with the stuff, the categories of this world, because my top level call is Jesus says I am a friend of God and so I want my friendship with eternal things to always supersede any commitment and value for worldly things and I just appreciated Craig was. I don't know whether he voted for Trump, biden, obama, nikki Haley. I don't know who he voted for because he spoke with such tension of saying I am not going to be defined by anything else in this world. It is Jesus alone or it is nothing at all. And oh, so good. So clarifying.
Speaker 1:He gave a lot of analogies throughout his speaking tying to his recent development of hobby expertise in piloting, and one of the expressions he used was flying in the soup, which is when you can't see through the clouds or inclement weather that are surrounding your plane, and he used that as an analogy for the times and culture we are trying to pass our churches in and lead people through.
Speaker 1:We can't see very far based on our own senses. We can't seem to make a head nor tail of what's going to happen down the road. We're all confused and frustrated by political realities, by economic realities, and so it's a confusing time, and there's a super helpful article that came out in 2020 by one of our own seminary professors, joel Okamoto, called Politics in the Dark, or something along those lines Darkness Long Incoming, and it talks about the same idea of when you can't see what's ahead. How are you going to handle what it means to be someone led by Jesus as Lord, as the primary authority, as the center? You will not be blown off course by political ideals or ideas that threaten to compromise your identity as a Christian, and all of a sudden now you're being confused with someone who's more than a Christian in another area, and so that centrality of Jesus is so key, and it was so cool to hear that from multiple voices.
Speaker 2:We'll get that Joel Okamoto article in the show notes. So if you're following us on Spotify or Apple Podcasts or whatever, you can look in the show notes and we'll make sure that that reference is there, along with, by the way again another shameless plug information for connecting with the Global Leadership Summit, which, if you can't make it to a host site or in person in South Barrington Illinois, you can watch it online at your computer. And I'm just saying, believe me, I am back into the Global Leadership Summit. It is, I have drank the Kool-Aid and I am in, and this is my. I'm going to go. My third now. Wow, so here's my third. And then you can finish yes, oh, yeah, yeah. So, right, right, right, two, three, finish it up. So my third is this. So, at the end of the whole, I'm going to stick with Craig Rochelle, I'm going to do my love affair with Craig right now.
Speaker 2:So Craig, at the end of the conference, gets up and he's going to be the keynote for the Global Leadership Summit and he's been working on his speech since August 23. He showed us the timestamp when it started. He gave us the first five minutes of the speech and it essentially was a repeat of that call make sure Jesus is the center. But then he added this little bonus which I mean, just wrecked me. It was so good, john. I gave my life to Jesus on August 9, 1989. Having been baptized, raised in the church, I was a Christian, but I as an adult made a commitment in 1989 to follow and serve the Lord, jesus Christ, all my life at Okabodji Lutheran Bible Camp. It was great. I told my wife that that August 9th 1989 experience for me as an adult is now paired with what happened these past two days in Oklahoma City. That's how mountaintop of this is.
Speaker 2:And Craig ended with this kind of five-minute teaser for what his main talk at the summit was going to be. He said the world desires for conformity and it will make room for your passion, but it will tamp down your obsession. And he then goes into this kind of rah-rah moment where he says you are uniquely made. You are a unique child of God with unique talents, gifts and abilities by which to do the mission of the gospel. Every single child of God should be obsessed about some positive contribution that they can make to the kingdom. Maybe it's to be a helper, a pastor, a visionary, a teacher, a really good volunteer at church, a missionary somewhere else, a silent missionary in the neighborhood that they occupy. But his larger point is it was essentially an invitation to be obsessed.
Speaker 2:And then he concluded with just an avalanche to quote the summit an avalanche of affirmations from Scripture about who we are and our identity, because Jesus Christ is our Savior, lord, and the Holy Spirit lives in us as a temple. And I will just simply say I am ready to charge hell with the squirt gun. I have complete confidence that the Holy Spirit is going to do amazing things here at Shepard I don't know who's listening or watching this podcast I'm 100% confident that the Holy Spirit of the risen Lord, jesus Christ, that raised Jesus Christ from the dead, is going to and has the capability to do something completely compulsive in you because of your obsession. And so that was so, so motivating for me, and for that reason I have to hear the rest of the 55 minute presentation, because if that's how it starts, daddy, bring me home to the Promised Land, take me across the Georgia. John, what about you?
Speaker 1:That was such a powerful moment, and there are so many nuggets of leadership and organizational wisdom scattered throughout all these speakers and especially Greg's talks as well. An underlying theme that is a major takeaway for me is that God uses us where we're at, and he sets up the various seasons that we're through so that down the road we'll continue to draw from them, even if we're pointed in somewhat different direction than where we had been at that time. And so we're hearing from somebody Stephanie Chung is her name who is directing airline. She was parking coins at an airport and now she's involved in national security conversations around how to develop different governmental democracies across the world. As kind of a part-time thing, this journey as a part-time thing.
Speaker 1:It's a gig job and it's amazing. Or you've got this guy who just got involved with doing mission trips at his church because he had the financial freedom to do so. He got involved in helping a friend help build orphanages in Ghana and that led to his daughter who had been to Africa wanting to climb Kilimanjaro, and then God's brought him to the top of Mount Everest and the top and bottom of the world and now he's helping encourage pastors to bring the truth and joy of God's word in the lives of their people. And never once were we ever told like you're not doing enough or this falls on your shoulders alone. It was this encouraging message of God's using you where you're at and there's gifts in the room already that will allow you to open the doors wider to welcome more and more people into a loving and encouraging and sustainable relationship with Jesus. And that was just incredibly encouraging. I mean, it was like I came out of those two days feeling like we had just been working for a week straight.
Speaker 1:That's just the level of mental engagement, emotionally exhausted, and being there together meant a lot too, because we were able to have conversations around our own ministries, our own personal growth and development, and then also the work that God's doing at Shepherd and how we're going to be sharing that with our team as we continue in the days, weeks, months ahead.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so the Global Leadership Summit. It began years ago under Bill Hybles at Willow Creek and it has gone along and it is in a new season under the leadership of David Ashcraft. David Ashcraft is a pastor out of Lancaster, pennsylvania, used the life church model to a degree to build 21 congregations out in eastern Pennsylvania and then now has come on board as a president with his wife Ruth, to be the president of the Global Leadership Network. We're grateful for the invitation, because his invitation just came kind of spontaneously and I'm like, well, I'd rather send John. And then he said, well, why don't you both come? And we both did, and now we this and that, and so, anyways, I just I feel like I owe it to him and to the Lord, jesus Christ, who gave us this incredible opportunity, to say if you have the opportunity to engage the Global Leadership Summit August 8th and 9th this year 2024, it is going to be, I think, an investment well worth it.
Speaker 2:We're going to try to be a host site here at Shepherd and Scottsdale, so if you're from the Phoenix area, there's going to be other host sites, I guarantee, around Phoenix, scottsdale. But I just encourage you to take part in it, john, thanks again, not only for just being wise and receptive to what the Spirit of God was doing there, but being such a great partner in ministry. It's a blast to have these conversations. We've got so much to digest but, at the same time, knowing that incremental change, sustained over time, yields the fruit that builds the church, and so, as the Spirit blesses, we're going to be after that. Hey, thanks for joining us. Check out the show notes if you need, and we look forward to seeing you again soon.