July 22, 2025 • 50 mins
Whether you're a traditionalist, a missional reformer, or somewhere in between, this episode will challenge your assumptions and stir your heart for unity, clarity, and bold gospel witness.
Rod Zwonitzer—a second-career pastor with a background in corporate marketing—joins Lead Time to drop some hard truth: the LCMS is great at feeding the sheep but terrible at fishing for the lost. In this rich, candid conversation, Rod explores the tension between doctrinal purity and outreach, confessional liturgy and contemporary music, and why the term “church growth” sends some Lutherans into panic mode.
From defending contemporary worship (with his Stratocaster in hand) to later questioning whether pop culture fits in the sanctuary, Rod shares his journey through marketing, ministry, and the Book of Proverbs—all while urging the church to stop fighting and start fishing.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
This is Lead Time.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Welcome to Lead Time, tim Allman here.
It's a beautiful day to bealive.
Jack Calberg is also in thehouse.
Pray, the joy of Jesus is yoursas you're buckled up, ready to
learn something new.
Today the Holy Spirit is atwork.
He's within us and he's leadingus to look and become, look and
sound more and more like Jesus,for the glory of his name, for
the advancement of his kingdom.
Jack, how are you doing, man?
Speaker 3 (00:28):
I'm doing fantastic.
It's a beautiful day.
It's kind of crazy becausewe're smack dab in the middle of
May, but we have this reallybeautiful weather right now.
Usually we're in very hottemperatures already.
Yeah Well, we will be.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
We will be soon.
It's coming Tomorrow.
Yeah well, we will be in, liketomorrow, I think tomorrow's
like in the hundreds alreadywe're getting there.
But wherever you are, pray thatyou're setting the temperature
which is joy and love and careand warmth toward those that are
around you.
Today I get the privilege ofintroducing you to our guest.
His name is Rod Swanitzer.
He's a second career pastorwith a marketing degree,
(01:05):
especially in advertising.
Ron has worked in corporateworld for nearly 14 years in
product management atWestinghouse Storage Technology
and then United Technologies,haas Tech.
He's a graduate of St LouisSeminary, my alma mater,
concordia.
They're in St Louis.
He graduated in 1984.
He served congregations inBritish Columbia, dearborn,
michigan, and did a brieftransition work with the radio
(01:27):
station you may have heard of itKFUO in St Louis.
God has written two booksTesting the Claims of Church
Growth and Wise Words for EachDay, a devotional on the book of
Proverbs.
That's going to be fun.
We're going to talk about boththose.
He's always been into outreach,even as a lay person.
Before going into the ministryhelped plan and launch three
(01:47):
mission agencies.
I bet you heard of a number ofthese as well.
Pablo Latino and I should beable to say this better Ephatha,
ephatha gee whiz.
Ephatha Lutheran Mission Societyand he's currently launching an
outreach partnership calledThrough the Bible in Two Hours,
which seeks to attract theunchurched and de-churched into
(02:08):
our LCMS congregations.
Praise be to God, Rod.
What a joy to be with you today, brother.
How are you doing?
Speaker 4 (02:14):
We're doing great Good to be with you guys in the
Phoenix area there.
I almost went to universitythere.
It was my dream and I didn'tquite pull it off, but I've
always loved the Phoenix area,Scottsdale, all of that.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Yeah, asu.
Did you think of going to ASU?
I tried to get in.
Speaker 4 (02:29):
I was a tennis player and I wasn't that good to get a
full ride.
So they, they cut me back and Idecided to to go to another
place Arizona State and Arizonawere in our conference at that
time and so I decided, well,I'll go in my home state, little
Wyoming and then recoup.
(02:49):
But I realized real quick I wasnot competitive at the
collegiate level.
So I decided, okay, you betterget another career guy.
I loved Arizona and my golf pro, the John Jacobs Company, is
out there and I heard you likegolf too.
Oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Oh yeah, yeah, it's cool.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
We call it paradise.
Here I played TPC Scott's field.
Speaker 4 (03:15):
Shot one of my best rounds of my life there, so I
love Arizona.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
There you go.
No, it is a great place to live.
And where do you live now?
St Louis Rod.
Speaker 4 (03:23):
No, we're just outside the Detroit metro area,
a little place called Fenton.
Okay, beautiful my wife.
I'm married to a Michigander.
I'd still be retired in Floridaplaying golf, believe me.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Well, hey, rod, you reached out to me via email
Thank you for doing so andyou've heard us talk about kind
of the two sides of the samecoin mission and confession, as
it relates to our Lutheranconfession.
So start there.
You propose a both-and approachto mission and confession.
We agree and would love to hearhow you articulate that, rod.
Speaker 4 (03:57):
Well, I would summarize it like this guys,
it's one of my big frustrationswith our beloved Synod that we
seem to get into two tribes, thepurity of doctrine tribe and
the outreach tribe, and thetwain shall never meet and I've
(04:17):
tried to bridge both of thosetribes and I was unsuccessful.
Very frustrating to me.
And in the book Testing theClaims of Church Growth, I
proposed, you know, put down theverbiage and the talk and let's
sit down and, as you know,believers in Christ, let's
(04:41):
settle our differences theLutheran way, a formula of
Concord.
And I'll never forget when Iwas at the Sim there was a guy
running around called JA OPreuss and he was an expert on
Chemnitz, as you know, andChemnitz was the big guy in the
formula of Concord.
(05:01):
And so I remember he had alittle lecture one day and they
had cassette tapes of it back.
Boy, that's ancient dinosaur,isn't it?
Cassette tapes and I still haveit of his talk about how to
resolve disagreements in theLutheran church.
And I proposed that and I trieda little bit.
(05:23):
That can't seem to get anytraction at all among us.
I'm just frustrated.
I like both sides, I really do.
I love doctrine, I love thepurity of it.
But I'm also just 100% reachout with the gospel to everyone
I can, in every possible way Ican.
(05:45):
So that's my frustration.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
What did?
And Jack, you're muted.
I had to mute Jack because wehave a huge drum line going on
outside of us right now.
No, we have it's chapel day, aswe're recording in real time
here.
So what was JAO Preuss?
I mean a strong mentor for me.
Do you remember, rod?
Some of his attempts?
How was he trying to articulatebringing confession and mission
(06:09):
together?
Do you remember that, rod?
Speaker 4 (06:10):
Yeah, I mean he said that the way Chemnitz and the
boys did it was to the pointsthat you disagreed on.
You could only talk about themin terms of scripture and what
was already in the Book ofConcord before the formula.
And so you know, articulate thesides, all you could bring to
(06:35):
bear on either side, and thenyou had to pick one.
We confess this and we rejectthat formula of conquered style.
And we actually tried this,guys, in 1996 here in Michigan
and I was really disappointed.
(06:56):
We had four church growth guystalking to four confessional
guys and we talked for threeyears and we both kind of wrote
formula of concrete statementsand discussed them and at the
end we had, I thought you know,agreed to give it on our work to
(07:20):
the Senate and let Senate kindof take it from there to the
Senate and let Senate kind oftake it from there.
And it fell flat.
Guys were opposed to doing itand so to this date it's never
seen the light of day.
I thought it was a greatdiscussion.
I remember we started listingdoctrinal things that we thought
we disagreed on and we stoppedat 20.
(07:41):
And so we waited the place thatwe'd like to start and it was
not my number one, but the onewe settled on.
You guys will like this worshipliturgy and adiaphora, and so
we talked about it for threeyears and a fascinating
(08:01):
discussion, and it just stillfrustrates me that we couldn't
get any traction anywhere amongus to try to keep going with
this.
And so I appreciate you guysand what you're doing.
I've listened to quite a fewand I thought, well, I'll just
come on and share what theLord's been doing in my life and
(08:25):
maybe this will start a sparksomewhere in the Senate and
we'll lay down our hostilitiesand get together as brothers in
Christ and try to resolve ourdifferences, because I like both
sides.
I'm a weirdo.
Speaker 3 (08:40):
Can you help explain to some folks the term church
growth?
How should people understandthat term church growth?
Because I think, yeah, unpackthat for that.
Because to me, on the surface,the term church growth shouldn't
bother anybody.
Everybody in the planet who's aChristian wants to see the
church grow.
It's the Great Commission.
(09:00):
And yet there's some certainbaggage that's tied to this term
church growth that's got somefolks in Lutheranism kind of.
It gets them up in arms whenyou bring it up right, and I
think that's we're trying tounderstand.
This dichotomy has formedaround this topic and I think
there's misconceptions aboutwhat it is and what it isn't,
(09:22):
and maybe what it looks like youknow, and how it can and cannot
be applied in a Lutherancontext.
Maybe can you unpack that forpeople.
Speaker 4 (09:28):
Jack, I think that's such a great question and you
know it's kind of.
I think you know we look backin history of all kinds of
things, and especially thechurch, and we put titles on
things that sometimes just don'tquite define.
You know the issues really welland I think you're pointing out
one of them who wouldn't be forchurch growing right.
(09:50):
But I think the differencesthat at least I'm aware of are
that we are very suspect of eachother and how that growth would
occur, of each other and howthat growth would occur.
And I think that's where I knowI was asked to write the book
(10:11):
because they felt like I had hada marketing career that was
interesting and I maybe couldrelate, and so it kind of took
off from there.
In fact I fought, I have toadmit I fought kind of hard at
the beginning, said I'm thewrong guy to have write this
book because I'm not a wordsmithlike some people are, and it
(10:32):
kind of terrified me and theysaid, no, no, you're perfect.
You're perfect because you havebackground that not many other
pastors do.
And I would summarize it thisway other pastors do and I would
summarize it this way my lastfew days at a congregation that
I was at in Dallas, texas, allthe people were telling me this
(10:54):
we're so excited for you, rod,to become a pastor.
It's about time that we hadmore pastors like you that have
had an executive experience.
And I said I'm not sure beingan executive in the corporate
world is going to do anythingfor me as a pastor.
And as I went through seminarythat's what I found out there
(11:16):
were very little to me thattransferred from my corporate
life to being a pastor, becauseI went into it, you know,
open-minded.
I had no background at allbeing a pastor.
I loved to teach a singlesBible study group that I was in.
That really blessed my life.
But I didn't know how to be,what a pastor would do, and the
(11:40):
only thing that I thought wastransferable was you're a timid
little guy, being a five footeight with a long German name,
and so I was always kind of shyand my dad didn't have a lot of
money most of my growing up life.
So I always felt a littleself-conscious and the corporate
(12:04):
world really did a number on me.
To survive, I had to become onetough hombre, and it was a
rough world, especially in thebig corporate life that I was in
, and so I became a pretty meanlittle marketing guy and I was
shocked to death that I went asfar as I did at the corporate
(12:26):
world and you know, I played forI played for real, I, I, I tell
everybody that, listen, you payme excellent money to give you
the best marketing advice I canand that's what I'm going to
give you.
And so, you know, I, I learned,I learned a lot.
I dealt with very, you know,talented men and women in the
(12:51):
corporate world, amazed them,and I could keep up, and so I
think that's the thing I reallylearned.
I'm not really much afraidanymore to talk with anyone.
I remember when I had tocommune my first synodical
president at the community railand I thought, well, hey, just
another Christian.
I mean, I'm a pastor, he's apastor, no intimidation.
(13:14):
So I think that's what I got.
But I did not see anytransferability of my marketing
life because to me I knew thatmarketing was a dominant theory
in the corporate world, whereyou know the transition from an
(13:35):
engineer designing something youknow.
We always had examples like youdesign a watch and the
engineers design all this thingwith the gears and the levers
and all the other things thatcan consume a watch, and then
the sales department tries to goout and pedal that and the
marketing changed that allaround.
(13:55):
To go out first and figure outwhat does the consumer want,
with keeping time, and that,would you know, in turn drive
the rest of your corporateactivity, and that's what I did
as a product marketing manager.
I had to go out and figure outwhat the consumer wanted.
(14:15):
We would always talk about it.
The consumer was king.
You had to do what the consumerwanted.
We would always talk about it.
The consumer was king.
He had to do what the consumerwanted.
Even in my last career withUnited Technologies Mossack
which is a fantastic corporation, unbelievable to work for that
(14:37):
they really held to that.
So the product marketing guy hehad ultimate uh say, um, like
in my product lines, um, I hadtotal control over what the
design was going to be, what theprice was going to be, what the
distribution channels weregoing to be, what the
promotional plan would look like.
The promotional plan would looklike.
(15:04):
And I looked at the consumer,for if I couldn't please the
consumer, I couldn't get moremarket share.
You know, profit.
All the rest of that followedthat.
So to me, marketing shouldn'tapply to the church.
So you know, like I havefriends that have scathed
reviews about me saying, hey,what kind of marketing guy is
(15:25):
this?
He says he doesn't likemarketing in the church.
And yet he, we've seen him andhe does promotional ads.
And and my response is theydon't know marketing with that,
with that approach, because youknow, promotion is just a part
of marketing.
So can we promote the churchAbsolutely, but I'm not sure
(15:45):
that we can allow the consumerto be the king.
That's my point and that's thepoint I tried to get across in
the book.
So, jack, I guess thelong-winded talk there.
It's unfortunate that I thinksome people in the church growth
business, and just to put thatlabel on that, they become very
(16:09):
consumer-oriented, verymarketing-oriented.
George Barnard wrote a book onit which I used initially before
writing my text to say I don'tthink the church should be a
marketing entity.
I strongly believe that.
So that's kind of where I comefrom.
(16:32):
But should the church dowhatever they can with keeping
Jesus as the king and the Lordof the church?
Absolutely, one hundred percent?
So that's to me the disconnecton the wide range, on both, and
I'm not saying everybody is inthose polarized sides.
(16:54):
Sometimes it's variations ofthat, degrees of that.
Speaker 3 (17:01):
Does that help?
Yeah, yeah, it helps a lot.
And sorry, you're gonna hearsome drums pounding outside my
door right now as I'm talking,so uh, we'll just, we'll just
get, we'll just go with it rightnow, but um I have three.
Speaker 4 (17:10):
I have three brothers , and all of them were fantastic
drummers.
So drums are good.
Speaker 3 (17:15):
I love the drums I've been drummer my whole life, uh
but they're right outside mydoor right now.
But so this is fascinating.
We're just coming off of aseason right now in our ministry
context Christ Greenfield wherewe decided as a strategic goal
that we were going to reallyreally get good at our reach
strategy, and I think that'ssomething like churches do need
(17:37):
to have a reach strategy and adiscipleship strategy, like
we're trying to bring morepeople.
We agree, it's word andsacrament.
It needs to be getting the truegospel into people's ears, and
we also believe that there'sthings that the local church can
do to invite more people in tohear, so that there's more
(17:57):
people hearing the gospel Right.
That's a thing the church cando.
To invite more people in tohear so that there's more people
hearing the gospel right.
That that's a thing the churchcan do, and so promotion is
something that we do.
We have a very intentionalstrategy to bring a lot more
people to our website, and we'veseen a very clear pattern that
a certain number of peoplevisiting our website means a
certain number of new peoplevisiting us on church on a
(18:18):
Sunday, and so we've builtstrategies around that.
Now we're not saying untruethings in our effort to promote,
but we are honoring the factthat sometimes the felt needs of
people in the community mightbe a little bit different than
what you think they are.
And being sensitive to thosefelt needs is a much better way
to start building relationshipwith people so that you can have
(18:39):
permission to share the gospelwith them.
What are your thoughts on that?
Do you think I'm off track hereas I'm thinking this through?
Speaker 4 (18:46):
As I was listening to you, jack, I would say that
that matches up very well withwhat we're doing and through the
Bible in two hours, that whenyou're reaching out to an
unchurched segment of oursociety or a de-churched you
know the people that have fallenaway from church life you
(19:06):
cannot talk to them like they'rechurched and you cannot talk to
them start using theologicallanguage.
They don't know these words,you know so, absolutely.
So you have to do something toattract them and get them
interested, absolutely.
I think that we have to becareful there.
And I would also say thatsometimes things that the church
(19:32):
has tried and maybe beensuccessful at attracting those
kind of people in don't workanymore.
Or in certain areas they don'twork, and I've been a part of
that very.
I mean like, uh, you know, whatsurprises me is is how much the
, the missouri senate, uh, wasmaybe successful in previous
times at attracting uh,unchurched people, for instance,
(19:56):
to have to have a parochialschool, and I've been in
situations where I had wonderfulschools but the Lord just did
not bring any return oninvestment.
And so the church, you know,that's where the marketing guy
comes out in me.
I say, well, hey, it doesn'tlook like the Lord is blessing
(20:18):
that.
Let's try something else, let'sfind something else that will
attract them.
And so when I was listening toyou, jack, I was going amen,
amen to all that.
Speaker 3 (20:27):
And my mind goes to, because I've been in a lot of,
I've consulted with a lot ofchurches in that situation where
there might be a healthierschool than there is a church,
and my first reaction is howwell are we building
relationships with people inthat school?
Um, are we just assuming thatbecause that school is connected
to the church, they're going tocome to your church, or are we
actively going into that schoolsetting and building
(20:50):
relationships with thosefamilies?
Speaker 4 (20:52):
yeah, or or you know you're, you're at, you're in.
I've seen two different,completely uh, you're in.
I've seen two different,completely different areas in
the country, where one thepeople absolutely were thrilled
to put their kids in ourpreschool.
We had 250 kids in a preschoolCan you believe that?
(21:13):
And the entire physicalstructure was it looked like a
preschool, it didn't look like achurch and we could not
interest the people in thechurch side at all.
We could not get them to evenconsider switching over.
Another one that I was in inMichigan we had a large school
and we attracted a lot of peoplefrom well.
(21:38):
For instance, we had a hugeRoman Catholic church right
across the street from us andthey did not have a preschool or
a kindergarten.
So they would send all theirkids to us preschool and
kindergarten and at first gradethey're gone to their school.
And then we had a lot of otherkids in the neighborhood that
would come in and give us theirkids because they were church
(22:01):
but they didn't have a churchschool and the minute they
graduated we lost them.
So we felt like that we weren'tdoing really evangelism in the
one and the other one.
It didn't seem like the Lordwas blessing it at all and that
congregation.
By the way, they were in theOrlando area.
(22:25):
When we retired down there andafter living there for three
years, my wife decided shereally didn't like Florida.
She missed her Michigan and Itried to convince her to stay
down there and let me go off,but she said no, I want to go
back to Michigan.
So when we went back, but theyshifted their outreach away from
(22:50):
the school model and it wentablaze.
They went from worshiping like20 a Sunday when we were there
to right now they are booming.
They're up around 200 and noschool.
So but they're doingoutstanding outreach in their
area.
So you know, to me it's the oldmarketing mix.
You have to shift, you have toadjust.
(23:12):
What maybe didn't work inprevious decades it might work
now something new but you haveto attract and interest people
before you can get them in thedoor, that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Hey, this is good, Rod.
We talk about brand as wellwhat people say about you when
you're not in the room and thebrand of our church now we're
talking.
Christ Greenfield is sointimately connected to our
school that to separate churchand school feels insincere.
We are a church that has aschool and our new principle has
(23:47):
kind of doubled down on thisand we're seeing quite a bit of
growth.
So I think it's just being trueto who you are, where God has
placed you, what the environmentis like.
We're in a very openenvironment towards school
choice, and so for us to nothave a school, lutherans do
school education really reallywell.
We've also seen a lot offamilies that don't have a
(24:08):
church come to our churchbecause of language really
really matters, right, becausewe say welcome to Christ
Greenfield Church and School.
We're honored that you are here, and I just did a prayer walk a
couple days ago with a couplebrand new moms who have had kids
in our school and now have juststarted to come to our church,
(24:28):
and the prayer for all of ourstaff and teachers and families
that are impacted and theworship that takes place on our
campus.
Both these women are far fromunderstanding who Luther is.
They were outside of any kindof Lutheran understanding.
But now they've come in tounderstand who Luther not just
who Jesus is, and then what itmeans to be a Lutheran, things
(24:51):
like that and they've grown torespect it.
And so I think for us, justbeing true to who God has made
you to be as a, not trying to beand, jack, you and I have been
talking about this don't try tobe something you're not, and I
think that's faithful.
It takes all kinds of churchesto reach all kinds of people in
all kinds of contexts and don'ttry and be someone you're not.
(25:14):
Live and evaluate consistently.
Evaluate what's what's goingwell for us right now, cause
there's always things that wecan do to to improve Um and and
to to round back and get alittle higher level.
The whole church growth piece, Ithink we've equated cause words
shape worlds right.
I mean words really, reallymatter.
And we've equated church growthwith and this is in our LCMS
(25:39):
context a decrease in liturgicalawareness, in watering down the
gospel, making Sunday into amessage that's self-help, a
message that's self-help, thatkind of pings at where you can
(26:03):
grow individually and kind of,like I said, waters down the
truth of law and gospel.
I think that's why words reallyreally matter.
Church growth went in thatdirection, and so now I think
this is again a little higherlevel.
If anything looks like one ofthose communities and we'll just
throw out like a Willow Creekor Saddleback, right, I mean
(26:26):
they were early on in the churchgrowth movement and they had
the new contemporary worship,all that kind of stuff.
So for those congregations likeours that have a drum speaking
of drums, drums in worship,singing a new song Lots of drums
, evidently.
Lots of drums.
It was really discombobulated.
To be quite honest, last 20minutes You've done great, rod.
(26:47):
Appreciate you.
For those of us that have gonedown just even alternative forms
of worship instrumentation,then you're immediately kind of
put in that camp of you're achurch growth missional person
and nothing could be furtherfrom the truth.
Is that kind of your book?
I've not read the book.
Is that what you're kind oftrying to get at Rod?
(27:07):
Say more there as we land thechurch growth conversation.
Speaker 4 (27:10):
Gosh, this is such a good conversation.
You know, I remember the finaldays at the seminary there, tim,
where I remember the twopastors that were doing the
placement.
It was the good cop, bad coproutine, where the first guy
(27:33):
would ask you like, hey, rod,where would you really like to
go?
So I was saying I'd like to godo campus ministry in Hawaii,
and he was like, oh great, you'dbe perfect for that.
And then the real guy would say, hey, what's wrong with going
to Iowa, rod?
You know what's wrong withgoing to Kansas?
And I go.
(27:53):
A lot of things you know, youknow, and uh, uh, so, um, you
know it, it it's um.
And then, and then he looked mein the eyeball and he said, rod
, I want you to tell me honestly, are you going to allow
contemporary worship into your,you know, ministry?
And I tried to get as straightfaced as I could and lied
(28:16):
through my teeth Say no, I'mnever going to allow it to come
in.
But you know, I'm an old guy andI was going to high school
right in the middle of theBritish invasion, okay, and so
rock and roll was big, and mybrother who was a fantastic
drummer, I remember I grew up inCheyenne, wyoming, where
(28:38):
biggest rodeo in the world,cheyenne Frontier Days.
And so one year my brother thedrummer on the Kingsman, louie
Louie fame.
He got sick, so my brotherplayed with the Kingsman.
He also played with Sam and theSham and the Pharaohs.
He was a great drummer and so Iwas envious of him.
You know the rock and roll guydoing well, all the girls liked
him, so I of him.
You know the rock and roll guydoing well, all the girls liked
(29:00):
him.
So I'm thinking, you know, Ithink I ought to get this rock
and roll stuff.
So I got into it.
Oh, we're bad, we were one ofthe worst rock and roll bands
you'd ever heard.
I look back now and say, oh,what were you doing, ron?
But anyway, at the time Ibelieved that I could do rock
(29:27):
and roll in a Lutheran way, aconfessional Lutheran way, and
my first call in these littlechurches in British Columbia,
canada, I would vest up and Iwould have my Fender
Stratocaster on and the peopleyou know some of them were
digging it right and I'mthinking this is okay.
I'm thinking this is okay andthen over time I think the Lord
(29:47):
kind of did a number on me to behonest, and you know, I think
what he kind of showed me is,you know, that Christianity
throughout its history hasreally been kind of otherworldly
transcendent.
You know, even consistently,throughout it, if you look at it
(30:11):
, especially in the OldTestament, god's people, israel,
they stood out like a sorethumb.
God's people, israel, theystood out like a sore thumb.
Everything that God had to do,the way they worshiped, the way
they lived, they were differentfrom all the other peoples
around them.
And so I kind of got tothinking about that.
And it really hit me when I wentto Dearborn, because it was a
(30:34):
big, thriving congregation andwe had three worship services on
Sunday and they had juststarted contemporary worship on
Saturday night.
So one on Saturday night, twoon Sunday, and we pastors we
would show up with the sermonand that was basically all we
did.
You know, the praise band didthe rest.
(30:54):
And I remember going home everynight and saying something just
wasn't right, just didn't feelgood, what was it?
And I heard a presentationabout this that totally changed,
started to change my attitude,and it kind of went like this
(31:17):
that I you know what kind ofpraise song would you sing on
the Titanic when you were goingdown.
You know, with something I'mfascinating.
I'm reading this new book sinceI'm kind of getting involved in
(31:41):
social media which talks about afamous book by Neil Postman I
don't know if you've heard ofthis called Amusing Ourselves to
Death and it's kind of like andthis dates me guys Growing up.
I couldn't believe it.
When I was in college, color TVwas so far out there
(32:04):
technology-wise it wasunbelievable.
Look how far we've come sincethen.
I mean just amazing technology.
And that technology doesn't fitreal well with the gospel.
So, and there's a new wonderfulbook by this, called, you know,
(32:25):
scrolling Ourselves to Death,which talks about this.
And you know what I'm saying.
Is it kind of turned me toconsider this?
(32:46):
What I'm saying, is it kind ofturned me to consider this that
you know the gospel is it didn'tequate real well with the type
of music that was being donethere.
And when we finally sat downwith the musicians and talked to
them about making the musicmore in line with the theology
that we were preaching in thesacrament, they said to us well,
you know, we mean to tell youthat your preaching and your
(33:06):
teaching we don't like it.
It does not match up with ourmusic, you're right.
And so they left, and it wasn'tmine or the leader's wishes
that they would leave, I justwanted them to do, you know,
music with drums and guitars andeverything that kept more with
(33:29):
the theology that I believe inand confess I wanted to preach
and teach, and we had a hardtime finding enough songs and
music that would do that.
We did find some, absolutely wedid so, you know, we even found
that we could do a lot ofservice and meet the entire
(33:51):
church church year with, withmusic, but they didn't want it,
they didn't want that, and andit became obvious to both of us
that it didn't equate.
Speaker 2 (34:03):
So that that's kind of where I was coming from yeah,
well, hey, I mean back in the90s I was growing up.
I don't think.
I don't think I've ever saidthis publicly.
I don't think I would have donecontemporary worship in the 90s
or early 2000s.
Speaker 4 (34:19):
And that's when I was talking, I know.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
I know, I know and with the music that was coming
out and I think often in thedebate today around this, many
people think we're still singingthose songs, the eye-centered
songs, the overly romantic.
You could sing to your you know, your girlfriend or boyfriend
or spouse or something like that, just like you sing to God and
(34:41):
you know remarkably repetitiveand theologically very shallow
decision theology oriented likethere's.
I couldn't have, I couldn'thave led as a pastor and I'm not
throwing any boomer pastorsunder the bus you were doing the
best you had with theinformation you had at the time.
But we could and have done alot better now and shout out to
the Songwriters Initiative theJesus-centered songs that are
(35:05):
coming out right now for thosethat have more modern
instrumentation in their worship.
These are wonderful, wonderfulnew hymns for the church that
can be sung on an organ, on apiano or with a guitar.
Speaker 3 (35:20):
It's very, very rich, jack, any comment there
Theologically really rich, veryrich, very appropriate, designed
up front to be meeting theLutheran liturgy.
So there's songs that aredesigned that work well for
communion and songs that workwell for I mean it.
Just it just fits the lutheranliturgy really well, but it's
contemporary and it's actuallyreally really excellent.
Speaker 4 (35:42):
Uh, contemporary music, um, that even just stands
on its own as really great Iwish I would have had you guys
around when I was I wasconfronting.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
This would have been much easier it's taking time to
catch up with that and it'sbeautiful to be able to have
that Now when I think aboutmeeting people where they're at.
A lot of people come from maybea non-denom setting where you
know their tradition is it's aworship band and somebody who
(36:12):
preaches band and somebody whopreaches.
So how do you take that andcreate hospitality around that
and actually make that Lutheranright?
And that's basically what itallows us to do.
It allows us to reach peoplewhere their mind.
You know Lutheranism is great atreaching Catholics right
Because they're used to pews andthey're used to organ and
they're used to robes and sowhen they come from Catholicism
(36:35):
to Lutheranism, it feels verycomfortable to them.
But it can struggle sometimesreaching people from the
non-denom setting, even thoughthe theology is just as much for
them as it is for anybody right.
So how can we createhospitality and still keep the
liturgy, still keep the truththat's being preached, and still
have the truth in the lyricsand the songs and the mood that
(36:55):
we're trying to create throughthe liturgical flow and still
create hospitality for peoplelike that?
And it works, it actually doeswork very much.
Speaker 4 (37:03):
I think that's where we've kind of fallen down, that
you know we maybe don't havehaven't thought it through and
tried to unify on how we couldallow more contemporary music to
be in the church and acceptable.
Speaker 2 (37:24):
Hey, we only got 10 more minutes, Rod, I got to talk
to you about Proverbs.
I got to talk to you aboutProverbs.
You did a book on Proverbs,Daily Walking through the
Proverbs the role of wisdom inthe church.
So what is the role of?
Because what we're talkingabout right now is a lot of
wisdom Do what is right for thecare and discipleship of the
(37:48):
found and for hospitality towardthe lost, those that are coming
to meet Jesus.
So what is the role of wisdom,as found in the Proverbs, for
our daily walk as disciples ofJesus?
Rod, let's hang there as weclose.
Speaker 4 (38:01):
Well, I would put it this way, that I doubt.
I don't know when you graduatedfrom the SEM, tim, but there
was a professor there thatscared the bejeebers out of me.
His name was Horace Hummel.
No, he just was gone when I gotthere, but I've heard stories of
Horace and I was terrified ofhim because, you know, the
(38:24):
Hebrew did not come easy to me,but I loved it and still do, and
all my friends that took himearly on said, oh no, he just
goes so deep into stuff that itterrified me, and so I was able
to dodge him in the enrollmentprocess all the way until my
(38:45):
fourth year and I decided I'mnot leaving here until I try
this.
So the only class he wasteaching was wisdom literature
and it was on the proverbs and Iabsolutely ate it up.
Um and uh.
I did well in it, I'm I'm happyto say, and he became one of my
favorite professors ever.
And what?
(39:06):
What he showed me was um, notwhatever, all the proverbs for
uh and Dr Hummel, he saw thegospel and he saw Jesus all over
in proverbs all over.
So that's what I did, and whathappened was I'd start doing a
(39:32):
little daily devotions for someof my members and I gave it to
him on Proverbs and I said, oh,this is really good.
You know you ought to write abook.
And so I started to write abook and I have a famous friend
who's an author and he publishesat a kind of a
non-denominational publisher.
And he said to me hey, I thinkthese guys would publish it for
(39:54):
you.
And I thought well, terrific.
I tried CPH and CPH said nothanks, so I'd work with them.
Their head editor said we'regoing to do your book.
I said this is amazing.
I stopped working on it becauseI learned the hard way with my
first work.
The editors get all the way.
They change everything thatyou've written down.
(40:16):
Your grammar is bad, blah, blah, blah.
So I stopped and after aconsiderable amount of time, the
publisher said this to me wedon't think the Christian market
that we're in is ready to findJesus as much as you do in
Proverbs.
And I'm like are you kiddingJesus and the gospel are do in
(40:38):
Proverbs.
And I'm like are you kidding?
Jesus and the gospel areeverywhere in Proverbs.
The Nicene Creed was contestedover Proverbs 8.
And that's what I learned fromDr Hummel Arius the heretic.
He gave up Proverbs 8 as theplace where they dueled.
(40:58):
And so I said, well, this iscraziness.
And they said, well, yeah, wethink you might be right, but we
don't think Christianity isready to see Jesus there.
And I'm like wow, us Lutherans,we find Jesus all over the
Bible.
You know, the gospel iseverywhere.
So I went and did it myself andI would say that Proverbs is
(41:20):
just an amazing book because ittalks about, you know, a wise
son who follows his dad's wishesand he goes on the proper way
the path.
And he knows the adulteress isout there, you know, by the size
(41:45):
of the road, you know sayinghey, come on over here.
And she's seductive, and notjust sexually but theologically
as well.
So that's kind of whatattracted me.
And Dr Hummel taught me alsothat most people see Proverbs
(42:05):
and the wisdom literature in theBible as moralistic good versus
evil.
But we see it as believers andunbelievers.
So good and evil is believingand unbelieving.
And you know a wise person anda fool who wrote our church's
(42:34):
commentary on Proverbs.
He translates the word fool, Ithink, in an amazing, accurate
way.
He calls it gullible.
The problem with unbelievers isthey're very gullible to be
lied to.
They can be deceived veryeasily.
You know, theological adulteryhappens and it's very easy to do
(42:54):
with gullible people.
You can fake them out.
So, that's kind of why I'minterested in Proverbs and what
my devotional tries to do.
Speaker 2 (43:01):
How's that?
Yeah, it's so good.
Well, I'm thinking of some ofthe early Proverbs.
Wisdom calls out yeah, that'sit.
Jesus is the wise one.
Right?
Jesus equals wisdom.
So say more about finding Jesusin even that word wisdom.
(43:21):
Can you say that?
Speaker 4 (43:25):
I had a painting done for my cover and it's wisdom as
a female, because in the Hebrewlanguage, uh, wisdom is a
feminine word, so jesus isfeminine, in, in, in wisdom, and
and it's it's all about, uh,two women competing for, for
(43:48):
people's attention and love, anduh, that's it.
And so, um, you know the, thesharp comparisons that it makes
are, you know, life changing andan eternal, you know destinies.
So it's serious stuff and Ijust love it.
(44:09):
You know, one of my favoritesis that everybody in the world
thinks they know the right waybut that way leads straight down
to hell, and so, you know,that's what we face and we've
got, you know, we're out theretrying to change that, to say,
hey, don't be gullible, don't bedeceived by the adulteress.
(44:29):
She's out there competing inthe gates of the city with us as
Christians, with Lady Wisdom.
We're shouting out the truth,and there's all these competing
voice, adultery voices around us, and people are gullible to get
faked out.
So that's kind of what I try toshare with people and get them
(44:52):
to see it, what I try to sharewith people and get them to see
it, and you find Proverbsmatching up with so much the
rest of Scripture, which is whatI try to do in my little
devotional effort too.
Speaker 2 (45:06):
So good Rod, so good Jack.
Any comment on Proverbs Prettyinsightful.
Speaker 3 (45:13):
Sounds like a delightful read.
I'll have to check it outsometime.
I have to confess I've notspent a ton of time in the
Proverbs and I really need tocheck it out more.
Spent a lot of time in thePsalms, but Proverbs seems to
get over with.
There's 31 of them.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
You can do a Proverb a day.
I know a lot of parents and wehad a season with our kids in
younger years.
There's a Proverb for every dayof the month, pretty much
there's a proverb for every dayof the month, pretty much you
know.
And so first day you can gothrough Proverbs one.
Go ahead, rod any any kind ofwords of wisdom for how people
start to engage and internalizethe Proverbs.
Speaker 4 (45:42):
That's why I think it makes such a great devotional
and mine's unique in that that,you know, because on a lot of
months that have 31 days, I cantake a snippet out of each one
of every one of the 31 ProverbsTim.
Speaker 2 (45:57):
So you're right on.
Yeah, hey, this has been good.
Speaker 4 (45:59):
Yeah, go ahead, go ahead, finish up it's a unused
book and uh, you know I, I, ifyou guys, you know I could, I
could.
Uh, maybe something would be inyour mailbox.
You could start getting intoproverbs and tell me what you
think I love it, hey.
Speaker 2 (46:12):
Last question um, this is lead time.
We're praying for localchurches, we're praying for
collaboration, we're praying forunity and mission in our shared
confession in the LCMS.
If you look 25 years down theroad, what's your vision for how
we're walking together asbrothers and sisters in our
(46:35):
denomination there?
Rod?
Speaker 4 (46:36):
Well, you know, let me just put it this way I think
that we do a fantastic job offeeding the sheep, feeding the
flock.
Our doctrine and our teachingis unmatched.
That's why I'm a Lutheran, okay, and I grew up a Lutheran, but
I fell away, played around withcharismania for a while, found
(46:57):
out that to be kind of bankrupt.
So I'm thankful the Lordbrought me back to the Lutheran
church and I just think we havethe mother load of doctrine and
teaching.
But we are not real good on thefishing for humans side.
And that's what I'm trying todo.
And so, through the Bible in twoyears is my humble little
effort to help congregations gofishing and let Jesus catch some
(47:23):
and sort the catch in the nets,throw some out, pull some into
safety.
That's what I'm trying to do.
And I would say hey, and I tellcongregations this all the time
if you've got a day school andthat's pulling in enough fish
for you to survive, that'swonderful.
Whatever you do to attractthese fish is important.
(47:47):
And then give them the gospelright and keep them in the
gospel.
And that's my look is that theSenate has not did a really good
job on the fishing for men part.
We're really good on feed thesheep, and we've got to get
better on fishing for men, andso I'm trying to do what I can
(48:09):
in my little way.
If there's people out there incongregations that are
interested in going fishing in adifferent way, get a hold of me
.
We'd love to talk to youbecause I like to fish.
Speaker 2 (48:20):
How can people get a hold of you?
What's that?
How can people get a hold ofyou and go fishing with you?
Rod Biblein2.org.
Okay, Bible in I-N.
Speaker 4 (48:29):
2.
In T-W-Oorg.
Speaker 2 (48:32):
Okay Beautiful.
We're trying to make OkayBeautiful those that are
(48:57):
listening.
Sorry that.
It was a little stranger forJack and I trying to stay
engaged.
So we have 500-some kids in ourschool from preschool through
eighth grade and we just starteda brand-new drumline for School
Spirit and man, these kids weregetting after it.
I had not heard the drumlineand it was actually quite
impressive, jack, but I wasreally really anxious for it to
be over.
Speaker 4 (49:14):
I wish I could have heard some I can were in the
courtyard.
I can't hear anything.
Speaker 2 (49:17):
I can't hear anything it was good, it was really good
and, uh, yeah, so sorry if weweren't able to interact with
you as well as we normally wouldthere, rod, but I know our
listeners were blessed.
Uh, this is lead time.
Please like, subscribe, comment.
Wherever it is you take inthese conversations, these jesus
confessing conversations?
Jesus is Lord and we must todouble down on what you're
(49:41):
saying, rod.
We must get better by theSpirit's power.
This takes humility at goingafter fishing.
You think you're fishing forfish?
No, no, no, come and follow meand let's go fish for people.
The days are far too short todo anything.
Otherwise, it's a good day.
Go make it a great day.
Good job, jack.
Way to go, rod.
Speaker 1 (49:58):
God bless friends, you've been listening to Lead
Time, a podcast of the UniteLeadership Collective.
The ULC's mission is tocollaborate with the local
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Subscribe to our channel, thengo to theuniteleadershiporg to
(50:18):
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Thanks for listening and staytuned for next week's episode.
This is Lead Time.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Welcome to Lead Time, tim Allman here.
It's a beautiful day to bealive.
Jack Calberg is also in thehouse.
Pray, the joy of Jesus is yoursas you're buckled up, ready to
learn something new.
Today the Holy Spirit is atwork.
He's within us and he's leadingus to look and become, look and
sound more and more like Jesus,for the glory of his name, for
the advancement of his kingdom.
Jack, how are you doing, man?
Speaker 3 (00:28):
I'm doing fantastic.
It's a beautiful day.
It's kind of crazy becausewe're smack dab in the middle of
May, but we have this reallybeautiful weather right now.
Usually we're in very hottemperatures already.
Yeah Well, we will be.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
We will be soon.
It's coming Tomorrow.
Yeah well, we will be in, liketomorrow, I think tomorrow's
like in the hundreds alreadywe're getting there.
But wherever you are, pray thatyou're setting the temperature
which is joy and love and careand warmth toward those that are
around you.
Today I get the privilege ofintroducing you to our guest.
His name is Rod Swanitzer.
He's a second career pastorwith a marketing degree,
(01:05):
especially in advertising.
Ron has worked in corporateworld for nearly 14 years in
product management atWestinghouse Storage Technology
and then United Technologies,haas Tech.
He's a graduate of St LouisSeminary, my alma mater,
concordia.
They're in St Louis.
He graduated in 1984.
He served congregations inBritish Columbia, dearborn,
michigan, and did a brieftransition work with the radio
(01:27):
station you may have heard of itKFUO in St Louis.
God has written two booksTesting the Claims of Church
Growth and Wise Words for EachDay, a devotional on the book of
Proverbs.
That's going to be fun.
We're going to talk about boththose.
He's always been into outreach,even as a lay person.
Before going into the ministryhelped plan and launch three
(01:47):
mission agencies.
I bet you heard of a number ofthese as well.
Pablo Latino and I should beable to say this better Ephatha,
ephatha gee whiz.
Ephatha Lutheran Mission Societyand he's currently launching an
outreach partnership calledThrough the Bible in Two Hours,
which seeks to attract theunchurched and de-churched into
(02:08):
our LCMS congregations.
Praise be to God, Rod.
What a joy to be with you today, brother.
How are you doing?
Speaker 4 (02:14):
We're doing great Good to be with you guys in the
Phoenix area there.
I almost went to universitythere.
It was my dream and I didn'tquite pull it off, but I've
always loved the Phoenix area,Scottsdale, all of that.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Yeah, asu.
Did you think of going to ASU?
I tried to get in.
Speaker 4 (02:29):
I was a tennis player and I wasn't that good to get a
full ride.
So they, they cut me back and Idecided to to go to another
place Arizona State and Arizonawere in our conference at that
time and so I decided, well,I'll go in my home state, little
Wyoming and then recoup.
(02:49):
But I realized real quick I wasnot competitive at the
collegiate level.
So I decided, okay, you betterget another career guy.
I loved Arizona and my golf pro, the John Jacobs Company, is
out there and I heard you likegolf too.
Oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Oh yeah, yeah, it's cool.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
We call it paradise.
Here I played TPC Scott's field.
Speaker 4 (03:15):
Shot one of my best rounds of my life there, so I
love Arizona.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
There you go.
No, it is a great place to live.
And where do you live now?
St Louis Rod.
Speaker 4 (03:23):
No, we're just outside the Detroit metro area,
a little place called Fenton.
Okay, beautiful my wife.
I'm married to a Michigander.
I'd still be retired in Floridaplaying golf, believe me.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Well, hey, rod, you reached out to me via email
Thank you for doing so andyou've heard us talk about kind
of the two sides of the samecoin mission and confession, as
it relates to our Lutheranconfession.
So start there.
You propose a both-and approachto mission and confession.
We agree and would love to hearhow you articulate that, rod.
Speaker 4 (03:57):
Well, I would summarize it like this guys,
it's one of my big frustrationswith our beloved Synod that we
seem to get into two tribes, thepurity of doctrine tribe and
the outreach tribe, and thetwain shall never meet and I've
(04:17):
tried to bridge both of thosetribes and I was unsuccessful.
Very frustrating to me.
And in the book Testing theClaims of Church Growth, I
proposed, you know, put down theverbiage and the talk and let's
sit down and, as you know,believers in Christ, let's
(04:41):
settle our differences theLutheran way, a formula of
Concord.
And I'll never forget when Iwas at the Sim there was a guy
running around called JA OPreuss and he was an expert on
Chemnitz, as you know, andChemnitz was the big guy in the
formula of Concord.
(05:01):
And so I remember he had alittle lecture one day and they
had cassette tapes of it back.
Boy, that's ancient dinosaur,isn't it?
Cassette tapes and I still haveit of his talk about how to
resolve disagreements in theLutheran church.
And I proposed that and I trieda little bit.
(05:23):
That can't seem to get anytraction at all among us.
I'm just frustrated.
I like both sides, I really do.
I love doctrine, I love thepurity of it.
But I'm also just 100% reachout with the gospel to everyone
I can, in every possible way Ican.
(05:45):
So that's my frustration.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
What did?
And Jack, you're muted.
I had to mute Jack because wehave a huge drum line going on
outside of us right now.
No, we have it's chapel day, aswe're recording in real time
here.
So what was JAO Preuss?
I mean a strong mentor for me.
Do you remember, rod?
Some of his attempts?
How was he trying to articulatebringing confession and mission
(06:09):
together?
Do you remember that, rod?
Speaker 4 (06:10):
Yeah, I mean he said that the way Chemnitz and the
boys did it was to the pointsthat you disagreed on.
You could only talk about themin terms of scripture and what
was already in the Book ofConcord before the formula.
And so you know, articulate thesides, all you could bring to
(06:35):
bear on either side, and thenyou had to pick one.
We confess this and we rejectthat formula of conquered style.
And we actually tried this,guys, in 1996 here in Michigan
and I was really disappointed.
(06:56):
We had four church growth guystalking to four confessional
guys and we talked for threeyears and we both kind of wrote
formula of concrete statementsand discussed them and at the
end we had, I thought you know,agreed to give it on our work to
(07:20):
the Senate and let Senate kindof take it from there to the
Senate and let Senate kind oftake it from there.
And it fell flat.
Guys were opposed to doing itand so to this date it's never
seen the light of day.
I thought it was a greatdiscussion.
I remember we started listingdoctrinal things that we thought
we disagreed on and we stoppedat 20.
(07:41):
And so we waited the place thatwe'd like to start and it was
not my number one, but the onewe settled on.
You guys will like this worshipliturgy and adiaphora, and so
we talked about it for threeyears and a fascinating
(08:01):
discussion, and it just stillfrustrates me that we couldn't
get any traction anywhere amongus to try to keep going with
this.
And so I appreciate you guysand what you're doing.
I've listened to quite a fewand I thought, well, I'll just
come on and share what theLord's been doing in my life and
(08:25):
maybe this will start a sparksomewhere in the Senate and
we'll lay down our hostilitiesand get together as brothers in
Christ and try to resolve ourdifferences, because I like both
sides.
I'm a weirdo.
Speaker 3 (08:40):
Can you help explain to some folks the term church
growth?
How should people understandthat term church growth?
Because I think, yeah, unpackthat for that.
Because to me, on the surface,the term church growth shouldn't
bother anybody.
Everybody in the planet who's aChristian wants to see the
church grow.
It's the Great Commission.
(09:00):
And yet there's some certainbaggage that's tied to this term
church growth that's got somefolks in Lutheranism kind of.
It gets them up in arms whenyou bring it up right, and I
think that's we're trying tounderstand.
This dichotomy has formedaround this topic and I think
there's misconceptions aboutwhat it is and what it isn't,
(09:22):
and maybe what it looks like youknow, and how it can and cannot
be applied in a Lutherancontext.
Maybe can you unpack that forpeople.
Speaker 4 (09:28):
Jack, I think that's such a great question and you
know it's kind of.
I think you know we look backin history of all kinds of
things, and especially thechurch, and we put titles on
things that sometimes just don'tquite define.
You know the issues really welland I think you're pointing out
one of them who wouldn't be forchurch growing right.
(09:50):
But I think the differencesthat at least I'm aware of are
that we are very suspect of eachother and how that growth would
occur, of each other and howthat growth would occur.
And I think that's where I knowI was asked to write the book
(10:11):
because they felt like I had hada marketing career that was
interesting and I maybe couldrelate, and so it kind of took
off from there.
In fact I fought, I have toadmit I fought kind of hard at
the beginning, said I'm thewrong guy to have write this
book because I'm not a wordsmithlike some people are, and it
(10:32):
kind of terrified me and theysaid, no, no, you're perfect.
You're perfect because you havebackground that not many other
pastors do.
And I would summarize it thisway other pastors do and I would
summarize it this way my lastfew days at a congregation that
I was at in Dallas, texas, allthe people were telling me this
(10:54):
we're so excited for you, rod,to become a pastor.
It's about time that we hadmore pastors like you that have
had an executive experience.
And I said I'm not sure beingan executive in the corporate
world is going to do anythingfor me as a pastor.
And as I went through seminarythat's what I found out there
(11:16):
were very little to me thattransferred from my corporate
life to being a pastor, becauseI went into it, you know,
open-minded.
I had no background at allbeing a pastor.
I loved to teach a singlesBible study group that I was in.
That really blessed my life.
But I didn't know how to be,what a pastor would do, and the
(11:40):
only thing that I thought wastransferable was you're a timid
little guy, being a five footeight with a long German name,
and so I was always kind of shyand my dad didn't have a lot of
money most of my growing up life.
So I always felt a littleself-conscious and the corporate
(12:04):
world really did a number on me.
To survive, I had to become onetough hombre, and it was a
rough world, especially in thebig corporate life that I was in
, and so I became a pretty meanlittle marketing guy and I was
shocked to death that I went asfar as I did at the corporate
(12:26):
world and you know, I played forI played for real, I, I, I tell
everybody that, listen, you payme excellent money to give you
the best marketing advice I canand that's what I'm going to
give you.
And so, you know, I, I learned,I learned a lot.
I dealt with very, you know,talented men and women in the
(12:51):
corporate world, amazed them,and I could keep up, and so I
think that's the thing I reallylearned.
I'm not really much afraidanymore to talk with anyone.
I remember when I had tocommune my first synodical
president at the community railand I thought, well, hey, just
another Christian.
I mean, I'm a pastor, he's apastor, no intimidation.
(13:14):
So I think that's what I got.
But I did not see anytransferability of my marketing
life because to me I knew thatmarketing was a dominant theory
in the corporate world, whereyou know the transition from an
(13:35):
engineer designing something youknow.
We always had examples like youdesign a watch and the
engineers design all this thingwith the gears and the levers
and all the other things thatcan consume a watch, and then
the sales department tries to goout and pedal that and the
marketing changed that allaround.
(13:55):
To go out first and figure outwhat does the consumer want,
with keeping time, and that,would you know, in turn drive
the rest of your corporateactivity, and that's what I did
as a product marketing manager.
I had to go out and figure outwhat the consumer wanted.
(14:15):
We would always talk about it.
The consumer was king.
You had to do what the consumerwanted.
We would always talk about it.
The consumer was king.
He had to do what the consumerwanted.
Even in my last career withUnited Technologies Mossack
which is a fantastic corporation, unbelievable to work for that
(14:37):
they really held to that.
So the product marketing guy hehad ultimate uh say, um, like
in my product lines, um, I hadtotal control over what the
design was going to be, what theprice was going to be, what the
distribution channels weregoing to be, what the
promotional plan would look like.
The promotional plan would looklike.
(15:04):
And I looked at the consumer,for if I couldn't please the
consumer, I couldn't get moremarket share.
You know, profit.
All the rest of that followedthat.
So to me, marketing shouldn'tapply to the church.
So you know, like I havefriends that have scathed
reviews about me saying, hey,what kind of marketing guy is
(15:25):
this?
He says he doesn't likemarketing in the church.
And yet he, we've seen him andhe does promotional ads.
And and my response is theydon't know marketing with that,
with that approach, because youknow, promotion is just a part
of marketing.
So can we promote the churchAbsolutely, but I'm not sure
(15:45):
that we can allow the consumerto be the king.
That's my point and that's thepoint I tried to get across in
the book.
So, jack, I guess thelong-winded talk there.
It's unfortunate that I thinksome people in the church growth
business, and just to put thatlabel on that, they become very
(16:09):
consumer-oriented, verymarketing-oriented.
George Barnard wrote a book onit which I used initially before
writing my text to say I don'tthink the church should be a
marketing entity.
I strongly believe that.
So that's kind of where I comefrom.
(16:32):
But should the church dowhatever they can with keeping
Jesus as the king and the Lordof the church?
Absolutely, one hundred percent?
So that's to me the disconnecton the wide range, on both, and
I'm not saying everybody is inthose polarized sides.
(16:54):
Sometimes it's variations ofthat, degrees of that.
Speaker 3 (17:01):
Does that help?
Yeah, yeah, it helps a lot.
And sorry, you're gonna hearsome drums pounding outside my
door right now as I'm talking,so uh, we'll just, we'll just
get, we'll just go with it rightnow, but um I have three.
Speaker 4 (17:10):
I have three brothers , and all of them were fantastic
drummers.
So drums are good.
Speaker 3 (17:15):
I love the drums I've been drummer my whole life, uh
but they're right outside mydoor right now.
But so this is fascinating.
We're just coming off of aseason right now in our ministry
context Christ Greenfield wherewe decided as a strategic goal
that we were going to reallyreally get good at our reach
strategy, and I think that'ssomething like churches do need
(17:37):
to have a reach strategy and adiscipleship strategy, like
we're trying to bring morepeople.
We agree, it's word andsacrament.
It needs to be getting the truegospel into people's ears, and
we also believe that there'sthings that the local church can
do to invite more people in tohear, so that there's more
(17:57):
people hearing the gospel Right.
That's a thing the church cando.
To invite more people in tohear so that there's more people
hearing the gospel right.
That that's a thing the churchcan do, and so promotion is
something that we do.
We have a very intentionalstrategy to bring a lot more
people to our website, and we'veseen a very clear pattern that
a certain number of peoplevisiting our website means a
certain number of new peoplevisiting us on church on a
(18:18):
Sunday, and so we've builtstrategies around that.
Now we're not saying untruethings in our effort to promote,
but we are honoring the factthat sometimes the felt needs of
people in the community mightbe a little bit different than
what you think they are.
And being sensitive to thosefelt needs is a much better way
to start building relationshipwith people so that you can have
(18:39):
permission to share the gospelwith them.
What are your thoughts on that?
Do you think I'm off track hereas I'm thinking this through?
Speaker 4 (18:46):
As I was listening to you, jack, I would say that
that matches up very well withwhat we're doing and through the
Bible in two hours, that whenyou're reaching out to an
unchurched segment of oursociety or a de-churched you
know the people that have fallenaway from church life you
(19:06):
cannot talk to them like they'rechurched and you cannot talk to
them start using theologicallanguage.
They don't know these words,you know so, absolutely.
So you have to do something toattract them and get them
interested, absolutely.
I think that we have to becareful there.
And I would also say thatsometimes things that the church
(19:32):
has tried and maybe beensuccessful at attracting those
kind of people in don't workanymore.
Or in certain areas they don'twork, and I've been a part of
that very.
I mean like, uh, you know, whatsurprises me is is how much the
, the missouri senate, uh, wasmaybe successful in previous
times at attracting uh,unchurched people, for instance,
(19:56):
to have to have a parochialschool, and I've been in
situations where I had wonderfulschools but the Lord just did
not bring any return oninvestment.
And so the church, you know,that's where the marketing guy
comes out in me.
I say, well, hey, it doesn'tlook like the Lord is blessing
(20:18):
that.
Let's try something else, let'sfind something else that will
attract them.
And so when I was listening toyou, jack, I was going amen,
amen to all that.
Speaker 3 (20:27):
And my mind goes to, because I've been in a lot of,
I've consulted with a lot ofchurches in that situation where
there might be a healthierschool than there is a church,
and my first reaction is howwell are we building
relationships with people inthat school?
Um, are we just assuming thatbecause that school is connected
to the church, they're going tocome to your church, or are we
actively going into that schoolsetting and building
(20:50):
relationships with thosefamilies?
Speaker 4 (20:52):
yeah, or or you know you're, you're at, you're in.
I've seen two different,completely uh, you're in.
I've seen two different,completely different areas in
the country, where one thepeople absolutely were thrilled
to put their kids in ourpreschool.
We had 250 kids in a preschoolCan you believe that?
(21:13):
And the entire physicalstructure was it looked like a
preschool, it didn't look like achurch and we could not
interest the people in thechurch side at all.
We could not get them to evenconsider switching over.
Another one that I was in inMichigan we had a large school
and we attracted a lot of peoplefrom well.
(21:38):
For instance, we had a hugeRoman Catholic church right
across the street from us andthey did not have a preschool or
a kindergarten.
So they would send all theirkids to us preschool and
kindergarten and at first gradethey're gone to their school.
And then we had a lot of otherkids in the neighborhood that
would come in and give us theirkids because they were church
(22:01):
but they didn't have a churchschool and the minute they
graduated we lost them.
So we felt like that we weren'tdoing really evangelism in the
one and the other one.
It didn't seem like the Lordwas blessing it at all and that
congregation.
By the way, they were in theOrlando area.
(22:25):
When we retired down there andafter living there for three
years, my wife decided shereally didn't like Florida.
She missed her Michigan and Itried to convince her to stay
down there and let me go off,but she said no, I want to go
back to Michigan.
So when we went back, but theyshifted their outreach away from
(22:50):
the school model and it wentablaze.
They went from worshiping like20 a Sunday when we were there
to right now they are booming.
They're up around 200 and noschool.
So but they're doingoutstanding outreach in their
area.
So you know, to me it's the oldmarketing mix.
You have to shift, you have toadjust.
(23:12):
What maybe didn't work inprevious decades it might work
now something new but you haveto attract and interest people
before you can get them in thedoor, that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Hey, this is good, Rod.
We talk about brand as wellwhat people say about you when
you're not in the room and thebrand of our church now we're
talking.
Christ Greenfield is sointimately connected to our
school that to separate churchand school feels insincere.
We are a church that has aschool and our new principle has
(23:47):
kind of doubled down on thisand we're seeing quite a bit of
growth.
So I think it's just being trueto who you are, where God has
placed you, what the environmentis like.
We're in a very openenvironment towards school
choice, and so for us to nothave a school, lutherans do
school education really reallywell.
We've also seen a lot offamilies that don't have a
(24:08):
church come to our churchbecause of language really
really matters, right, becausewe say welcome to Christ
Greenfield Church and School.
We're honored that you are here, and I just did a prayer walk a
couple days ago with a couplebrand new moms who have had kids
in our school and now have juststarted to come to our church,
(24:28):
and the prayer for all of ourstaff and teachers and families
that are impacted and theworship that takes place on our
campus.
Both these women are far fromunderstanding who Luther is.
They were outside of any kindof Lutheran understanding.
But now they've come in tounderstand who Luther not just
who Jesus is, and then what itmeans to be a Lutheran, things
(24:51):
like that and they've grown torespect it.
And so I think for us, justbeing true to who God has made
you to be as a, not trying to beand, jack, you and I have been
talking about this don't try tobe something you're not, and I
think that's faithful.
It takes all kinds of churchesto reach all kinds of people in
all kinds of contexts and don'ttry and be someone you're not.
(25:14):
Live and evaluate consistently.
Evaluate what's what's goingwell for us right now, cause
there's always things that wecan do to to improve Um and and
to to round back and get alittle higher level.
The whole church growth piece, Ithink we've equated cause words
shape worlds right.
I mean words really, reallymatter.
And we've equated church growthwith and this is in our LCMS
(25:39):
context a decrease in liturgicalawareness, in watering down the
gospel, making Sunday into amessage that's self-help, a
message that's self-help, thatkind of pings at where you can
(26:03):
grow individually and kind of,like I said, waters down the
truth of law and gospel.
I think that's why words reallyreally matter.
Church growth went in thatdirection, and so now I think
this is again a little higherlevel.
If anything looks like one ofthose communities and we'll just
throw out like a Willow Creekor Saddleback, right, I mean
(26:26):
they were early on in the churchgrowth movement and they had
the new contemporary worship,all that kind of stuff.
So for those congregations likeours that have a drum speaking
of drums, drums in worship,singing a new song Lots of drums
, evidently.
Lots of drums.
It was really discombobulated.
To be quite honest, last 20minutes You've done great, rod.
(26:47):
Appreciate you.
For those of us that have gonedown just even alternative forms
of worship instrumentation,then you're immediately kind of
put in that camp of you're achurch growth missional person
and nothing could be furtherfrom the truth.
Is that kind of your book?
I've not read the book.
Is that what you're kind oftrying to get at Rod?
(27:07):
Say more there as we land thechurch growth conversation.
Speaker 4 (27:10):
Gosh, this is such a good conversation.
You know, I remember the finaldays at the seminary there, tim,
where I remember the twopastors that were doing the
placement.
It was the good cop, bad coproutine, where the first guy
(27:33):
would ask you like, hey, rod,where would you really like to
go?
So I was saying I'd like to godo campus ministry in Hawaii,
and he was like, oh great, you'dbe perfect for that.
And then the real guy would say, hey, what's wrong with going
to Iowa, rod?
You know what's wrong withgoing to Kansas?
And I go.
(27:53):
A lot of things you know, youknow, and uh, uh, so, um, you
know it, it it's um.
And then, and then he looked mein the eyeball and he said, rod
, I want you to tell me honestly, are you going to allow
contemporary worship into your,you know, ministry?
And I tried to get as straightfaced as I could and lied
(28:16):
through my teeth Say no, I'mnever going to allow it to come
in.
But you know, I'm an old guy andI was going to high school
right in the middle of theBritish invasion, okay, and so
rock and roll was big, and mybrother who was a fantastic
drummer, I remember I grew up inCheyenne, wyoming, where
(28:38):
biggest rodeo in the world,cheyenne Frontier Days.
And so one year my brother thedrummer on the Kingsman, louie
Louie fame.
He got sick, so my brotherplayed with the Kingsman.
He also played with Sam and theSham and the Pharaohs.
He was a great drummer and so Iwas envious of him.
You know the rock and roll guydoing well, all the girls liked
him, so I of him.
You know the rock and roll guydoing well, all the girls liked
(29:00):
him.
So I'm thinking, you know, Ithink I ought to get this rock
and roll stuff.
So I got into it.
Oh, we're bad, we were one ofthe worst rock and roll bands
you'd ever heard.
I look back now and say, oh,what were you doing, ron?
But anyway, at the time Ibelieved that I could do rock
(29:27):
and roll in a Lutheran way, aconfessional Lutheran way, and
my first call in these littlechurches in British Columbia,
canada, I would vest up and Iwould have my Fender
Stratocaster on and the peopleyou know some of them were
digging it right and I'mthinking this is okay.
I'm thinking this is okay andthen over time I think the Lord
(29:47):
kind of did a number on me to behonest, and you know, I think
what he kind of showed me is,you know, that Christianity
throughout its history hasreally been kind of otherworldly
transcendent.
You know, even consistently,throughout it, if you look at it
(30:11):
, especially in the OldTestament, god's people, israel,
they stood out like a sorethumb.
God's people, israel, theystood out like a sore thumb.
Everything that God had to do,the way they worshiped, the way
they lived, they were differentfrom all the other peoples
around them.
And so I kind of got tothinking about that.
And it really hit me when I wentto Dearborn, because it was a
(30:34):
big, thriving congregation andwe had three worship services on
Sunday and they had juststarted contemporary worship on
Saturday night.
So one on Saturday night, twoon Sunday, and we pastors we
would show up with the sermonand that was basically all we
did.
You know, the praise band didthe rest.
(30:54):
And I remember going home everynight and saying something just
wasn't right, just didn't feelgood, what was it?
And I heard a presentationabout this that totally changed,
started to change my attitude,and it kind of went like this
(31:17):
that I you know what kind ofpraise song would you sing on
the Titanic when you were goingdown.
You know, with something I'mfascinating.
I'm reading this new book sinceI'm kind of getting involved in
(31:41):
social media which talks about afamous book by Neil Postman I
don't know if you've heard ofthis called Amusing Ourselves to
Death and it's kind of like andthis dates me guys Growing up.
I couldn't believe it.
When I was in college, color TVwas so far out there
(32:04):
technology-wise it wasunbelievable.
Look how far we've come sincethen.
I mean just amazing technology.
And that technology doesn't fitreal well with the gospel.
So, and there's a new wonderfulbook by this, called, you know,
(32:25):
scrolling Ourselves to Death,which talks about this.
And you know what I'm saying.
Is it kind of turned me toconsider this?
(32:46):
What I'm saying, is it kind ofturned me to consider this that
you know the gospel is it didn'tequate real well with the type
of music that was being donethere.
And when we finally sat downwith the musicians and talked to
them about making the musicmore in line with the theology
that we were preaching in thesacrament, they said to us well,
you know, we mean to tell youthat your preaching and your
(33:06):
teaching we don't like it.
It does not match up with ourmusic, you're right.
And so they left, and it wasn'tmine or the leader's wishes
that they would leave, I justwanted them to do, you know,
music with drums and guitars andeverything that kept more with
(33:29):
the theology that I believe inand confess I wanted to preach
and teach, and we had a hardtime finding enough songs and
music that would do that.
We did find some, absolutely wedid so, you know, we even found
that we could do a lot ofservice and meet the entire
(33:51):
church church year with, withmusic, but they didn't want it,
they didn't want that, and andit became obvious to both of us
that it didn't equate.
Speaker 2 (34:03):
So that that's kind of where I was coming from yeah,
well, hey, I mean back in the90s I was growing up.
I don't think.
I don't think I've ever saidthis publicly.
I don't think I would have donecontemporary worship in the 90s
or early 2000s.
Speaker 4 (34:19):
And that's when I was talking, I know.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
I know, I know and with the music that was coming
out and I think often in thedebate today around this, many
people think we're still singingthose songs, the eye-centered
songs, the overly romantic.
You could sing to your you know, your girlfriend or boyfriend
or spouse or something like that, just like you sing to God and
(34:41):
you know remarkably repetitiveand theologically very shallow
decision theology oriented likethere's.
I couldn't have, I couldn'thave led as a pastor and I'm not
throwing any boomer pastorsunder the bus you were doing the
best you had with theinformation you had at the time.
But we could and have done alot better now and shout out to
the Songwriters Initiative theJesus-centered songs that are
(35:05):
coming out right now for thosethat have more modern
instrumentation in their worship.
These are wonderful, wonderfulnew hymns for the church that
can be sung on an organ, on apiano or with a guitar.
Speaker 3 (35:20):
It's very, very rich, jack, any comment there
Theologically really rich, veryrich, very appropriate, designed
up front to be meeting theLutheran liturgy.
So there's songs that aredesigned that work well for
communion and songs that workwell for I mean it.
Just it just fits the lutheranliturgy really well, but it's
contemporary and it's actuallyreally really excellent.
Speaker 4 (35:42):
Uh, contemporary music, um, that even just stands
on its own as really great Iwish I would have had you guys
around when I was I wasconfronting.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
This would have been much easier it's taking time to
catch up with that and it'sbeautiful to be able to have
that Now when I think aboutmeeting people where they're at.
A lot of people come from maybea non-denom setting where you
know their tradition is it's aworship band and somebody who
(36:12):
preaches band and somebody whopreaches.
So how do you take that andcreate hospitality around that
and actually make that Lutheranright?
And that's basically what itallows us to do.
It allows us to reach peoplewhere their mind.
You know Lutheranism is great atreaching Catholics right
Because they're used to pews andthey're used to organ and
they're used to robes and sowhen they come from Catholicism
(36:35):
to Lutheranism, it feels verycomfortable to them.
But it can struggle sometimesreaching people from the
non-denom setting, even thoughthe theology is just as much for
them as it is for anybody right.
So how can we createhospitality and still keep the
liturgy, still keep the truththat's being preached, and still
have the truth in the lyricsand the songs and the mood that
(36:55):
we're trying to create throughthe liturgical flow and still
create hospitality for peoplelike that?
And it works, it actually doeswork very much.
Speaker 4 (37:03):
I think that's where we've kind of fallen down, that
you know we maybe don't havehaven't thought it through and
tried to unify on how we couldallow more contemporary music to
be in the church and acceptable.
Speaker 2 (37:24):
Hey, we only got 10 more minutes, Rod, I got to talk
to you about Proverbs.
I got to talk to you aboutProverbs.
You did a book on Proverbs,Daily Walking through the
Proverbs the role of wisdom inthe church.
So what is the role of?
Because what we're talkingabout right now is a lot of
wisdom Do what is right for thecare and discipleship of the
(37:48):
found and for hospitality towardthe lost, those that are coming
to meet Jesus.
So what is the role of wisdom,as found in the Proverbs, for
our daily walk as disciples ofJesus?
Rod, let's hang there as weclose.
Speaker 4 (38:01):
Well, I would put it this way, that I doubt.
I don't know when you graduatedfrom the SEM, tim, but there
was a professor there thatscared the bejeebers out of me.
His name was Horace Hummel.
No, he just was gone when I gotthere, but I've heard stories of
Horace and I was terrified ofhim because, you know, the
(38:24):
Hebrew did not come easy to me,but I loved it and still do, and
all my friends that took himearly on said, oh no, he just
goes so deep into stuff that itterrified me, and so I was able
to dodge him in the enrollmentprocess all the way until my
(38:45):
fourth year and I decided I'mnot leaving here until I try
this.
So the only class he wasteaching was wisdom literature
and it was on the proverbs and Iabsolutely ate it up.
Um and uh.
I did well in it, I'm I'm happyto say, and he became one of my
favorite professors ever.
And what?
(39:06):
What he showed me was um, notwhatever, all the proverbs for
uh and Dr Hummel, he saw thegospel and he saw Jesus all over
in proverbs all over.
So that's what I did, and whathappened was I'd start doing a
(39:32):
little daily devotions for someof my members and I gave it to
him on Proverbs and I said, oh,this is really good.
You know you ought to write abook.
And so I started to write abook and I have a famous friend
who's an author and he publishesat a kind of a
non-denominational publisher.
And he said to me hey, I thinkthese guys would publish it for
(39:54):
you.
And I thought well, terrific.
I tried CPH and CPH said nothanks, so I'd work with them.
Their head editor said we'regoing to do your book.
I said this is amazing.
I stopped working on it becauseI learned the hard way with my
first work.
The editors get all the way.
They change everything thatyou've written down.
(40:16):
Your grammar is bad, blah, blah, blah.
So I stopped and after aconsiderable amount of time, the
publisher said this to me wedon't think the Christian market
that we're in is ready to findJesus as much as you do in
Proverbs.
And I'm like are you kiddingJesus and the gospel are do in
(40:38):
Proverbs.
And I'm like are you kidding?
Jesus and the gospel areeverywhere in Proverbs.
The Nicene Creed was contestedover Proverbs 8.
And that's what I learned fromDr Hummel Arius the heretic.
He gave up Proverbs 8 as theplace where they dueled.
(40:58):
And so I said, well, this iscraziness.
And they said, well, yeah, wethink you might be right, but we
don't think Christianity isready to see Jesus there.
And I'm like wow, us Lutherans,we find Jesus all over the
Bible.
You know, the gospel iseverywhere.
So I went and did it myself andI would say that Proverbs is
(41:20):
just an amazing book because ittalks about, you know, a wise
son who follows his dad's wishesand he goes on the proper way
the path.
And he knows the adulteress isout there, you know, by the size
(41:45):
of the road, you know sayinghey, come on over here.
And she's seductive, and notjust sexually but theologically
as well.
So that's kind of whatattracted me.
And Dr Hummel taught me alsothat most people see Proverbs
(42:05):
and the wisdom literature in theBible as moralistic good versus
evil.
But we see it as believers andunbelievers.
So good and evil is believingand unbelieving.
And you know a wise person anda fool who wrote our church's
(42:34):
commentary on Proverbs.
He translates the word fool, Ithink, in an amazing, accurate
way.
He calls it gullible.
The problem with unbelievers isthey're very gullible to be
lied to.
They can be deceived veryeasily.
You know, theological adulteryhappens and it's very easy to do
(42:54):
with gullible people.
You can fake them out.
So, that's kind of why I'minterested in Proverbs and what
my devotional tries to do.
Speaker 2 (43:01):
How's that?
Yeah, it's so good.
Well, I'm thinking of some ofthe early Proverbs.
Wisdom calls out yeah, that'sit.
Jesus is the wise one.
Right?
Jesus equals wisdom.
So say more about finding Jesusin even that word wisdom.
(43:21):
Can you say that?
Speaker 4 (43:25):
I had a painting done for my cover and it's wisdom as
a female, because in the Hebrewlanguage, uh, wisdom is a
feminine word, so jesus isfeminine, in, in, in wisdom, and
and it's it's all about, uh,two women competing for, for
(43:48):
people's attention and love, anduh, that's it.
And so, um, you know the, thesharp comparisons that it makes
are, you know, life changing andan eternal, you know destinies.
So it's serious stuff and Ijust love it.
(44:09):
You know, one of my favoritesis that everybody in the world
thinks they know the right waybut that way leads straight down
to hell, and so, you know,that's what we face and we've
got, you know, we're out theretrying to change that, to say,
hey, don't be gullible, don't bedeceived by the adulteress.
(44:29):
She's out there competing inthe gates of the city with us as
Christians, with Lady Wisdom.
We're shouting out the truth,and there's all these competing
voice, adultery voices around us, and people are gullible to get
faked out.
So that's kind of what I try toshare with people and get them
(44:52):
to see it, what I try to sharewith people and get them to see
it, and you find Proverbsmatching up with so much the
rest of Scripture, which is whatI try to do in my little
devotional effort too.
Speaker 2 (45:06):
So good Rod, so good Jack.
Any comment on Proverbs Prettyinsightful.
Speaker 3 (45:13):
Sounds like a delightful read.
I'll have to check it outsometime.
I have to confess I've notspent a ton of time in the
Proverbs and I really need tocheck it out more.
Spent a lot of time in thePsalms, but Proverbs seems to
get over with.
There's 31 of them.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
You can do a Proverb a day.
I know a lot of parents and wehad a season with our kids in
younger years.
There's a Proverb for every dayof the month, pretty much
there's a proverb for every dayof the month, pretty much you
know.
And so first day you can gothrough Proverbs one.
Go ahead, rod any any kind ofwords of wisdom for how people
start to engage and internalizethe Proverbs.
Speaker 4 (45:42):
That's why I think it makes such a great devotional
and mine's unique in that that,you know, because on a lot of
months that have 31 days, I cantake a snippet out of each one
of every one of the 31 ProverbsTim.
Speaker 2 (45:57):
So you're right on.
Yeah, hey, this has been good.
Speaker 4 (45:59):
Yeah, go ahead, go ahead, finish up it's a unused
book and uh, you know I, I, ifyou guys, you know I could, I
could.
Uh, maybe something would be inyour mailbox.
You could start getting intoproverbs and tell me what you
think I love it, hey.
Speaker 2 (46:12):
Last question um, this is lead time.
We're praying for localchurches, we're praying for
collaboration, we're praying forunity and mission in our shared
confession in the LCMS.
If you look 25 years down theroad, what's your vision for how
we're walking together asbrothers and sisters in our
(46:35):
denomination there?
Rod?
Speaker 4 (46:36):
Well, you know, let me just put it this way I think
that we do a fantastic job offeeding the sheep, feeding the
flock.
Our doctrine and our teachingis unmatched.
That's why I'm a Lutheran, okay, and I grew up a Lutheran, but
I fell away, played around withcharismania for a while, found
(46:57):
out that to be kind of bankrupt.
So I'm thankful the Lordbrought me back to the Lutheran
church and I just think we havethe mother load of doctrine and
teaching.
But we are not real good on thefishing for humans side.
And that's what I'm trying todo.
And so, through the Bible in twoyears is my humble little
effort to help congregations gofishing and let Jesus catch some
(47:23):
and sort the catch in the nets,throw some out, pull some into
safety.
That's what I'm trying to do.
And I would say hey, and I tellcongregations this all the time
if you've got a day school andthat's pulling in enough fish
for you to survive, that'swonderful.
Whatever you do to attractthese fish is important.
(47:47):
And then give them the gospelright and keep them in the
gospel.
And that's my look is that theSenate has not did a really good
job on the fishing for men part.
We're really good on feed thesheep, and we've got to get
better on fishing for men, andso I'm trying to do what I can
(48:09):
in my little way.
If there's people out there incongregations that are
interested in going fishing in adifferent way, get a hold of me
.
We'd love to talk to youbecause I like to fish.
Speaker 2 (48:20):
How can people get a hold of you?
What's that?
How can people get a hold ofyou and go fishing with you?
Rod Biblein2.org.
Okay, Bible in I-N.
Speaker 4 (48:29):
2.
In T-W-Oorg.
Speaker 2 (48:32):
Okay Beautiful.
We're trying to make OkayBeautiful those that are
(48:57):
listening.
Sorry that.
It was a little stranger forJack and I trying to stay
engaged.
So we have 500-some kids in ourschool from preschool through
eighth grade and we just starteda brand-new drumline for School
Spirit and man, these kids weregetting after it.
I had not heard the drumlineand it was actually quite
impressive, jack, but I wasreally really anxious for it to
be over.
Speaker 4 (49:14):
I wish I could have heard some I can were in the
courtyard.
I can't hear anything.
Speaker 2 (49:17):
I can't hear anything it was good, it was really good
and, uh, yeah, so sorry if weweren't able to interact with
you as well as we normally wouldthere, rod, but I know our
listeners were blessed.
Uh, this is lead time.
Please like, subscribe, comment.
Wherever it is you take inthese conversations, these jesus
confessing conversations?
Jesus is Lord and we must todouble down on what you're
(49:41):
saying, rod.
We must get better by theSpirit's power.
This takes humility at goingafter fishing.
You think you're fishing forfish?
No, no, no, come and follow meand let's go fish for people.
The days are far too short todo anything.
Otherwise, it's a good day.
Go make it a great day.
Good job, jack.
Way to go, rod.
Speaker 1 (49:58):
God bless friends, you've been listening to Lead
Time, a podcast of the UniteLeadership Collective.
The ULC's mission is tocollaborate with the local
church to discover, develop anddeploy leaders through biblical
Lutheran doctrine and innovativemethods innovative methods To
partner with us in this gospelmessage.
Subscribe to our channel, thengo to theuniteleadershiporg to
(50:18):
create your free login forexclusive material and resources
and then to explore ways inwhich you can sponsor an episode
.
Thanks for listening and staytuned for next week's episode.
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