June 3, 2025 • 27 mins
In this episode, the guys break down 5 ways church culture gets KILLED from leadership drama to fake smiles in the foyer. 🙃 Whether it’s cliques in the choir, over-scheduled volunteers, or “we’ve always done it this way” syndrome, we’re calling it out (with love, of course). 💒❤️
If your church feels more like a boardroom than a body, this one's for you. Let’s laugh, learn, and maybe revive the vibe a little. 😎
Thank you for listening. Tell us what else we can cover!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
UNKNOWN (00:00):
you
SPEAKER_01 (00:08):
Welcome to the Two Young Pastors podcast.
This episode, we're talkingabout culture killers.
And number three will make youwant to unsubscribe.
But you want to stick with us.
You want to stick with usbecause it is going to challenge
you and me.
And we want to hear from you aswell.
So you want to make sure youlike, share, and subscribe and
(00:28):
comment so that we can hear fromyou.
I'm joined, as always, the otherhalf of the Two Young Pastors is
none other than Jawan.
What's What's
SPEAKER_00 (00:40):
up, bro?
How's your day going?
They indeed are asking questionsas to why they feel funny about
their church.
And I believe that what we'regoing to be talking about today,
(01:02):
it directly answers why you mayfeel funny about your church.
So I'm feeling good, man.
How are you?
SPEAKER_01 (01:08):
I'm good.
I'm good.
I'm good.
And, you know, we were justworking through the why of this
episode is that you're going tobe transitioning soon.
And these are some of the teststhat that we look for as pastors
when we go into a church.
These are just a few of them.
We just got together and said,hey, if you want to do a quick
(01:32):
grading of your church, theseare five things that you can do
right now to grade your church.
So if you want to put it on ascale from one to five and then
allow yourself to grade yourchurch of the, all right, do I
have this?
Do I have that?
Where would your church fallinto it?
And you can give your, yourchurch a grade.
(01:55):
And then we could talk about howto fix those things as well.
So we're just excited to goright into this because this is
what we do as pastors to help tocorrect and to grow our
churches.
We're calling it culture killersbecause churches are cultures,
man.
As much as people don't want toadmit it, there is a social
fabric in our churches.
There is a leadership fabric,man.
(02:18):
And all of those apply intogetting people into our church,
assimilating them and allowingthem to be the best possible
Let's get right into it, man.
(02:55):
on a team and you've been in ameeting for like 20 minutes and
you don't know what the point ofthe conversation
SPEAKER_00 (03:02):
is?
I have.
I have.
I have.
Sometimes it really came in aform of like class projects,
those group projects that youhad in school where we're just
like, what are we doing here?
Like we're just talking.
But I certainly have.
I certainly have.
And I have a feeling that you'veprobably been in a few of those
as well, right?
Yeah.
Man, I have been in
SPEAKER_01 (03:22):
a lot of them through college too, bro, where
it's just like, even inseminary, to be honest.
It's like, what are we doinghere?
And I had that about someclasses too, of like, what is
the point of this class?
There was no clear objectives,no clear discernment about what
we're doing here.
And when we're talking aboutvision, really what it is, is
(03:45):
what is the destination that thechurch is working towards?
So if your church does not havea, at the end of this year, this
is what we are looking to do.
And the thing is like, I'm nottalking about I'm not talking
about building projects.
I'm not talking about anycapital improvement projects.
Those are good, right?
Some tangible things that youcan work towards.
(04:08):
I'm talking about what are somevisions that you as a church
want to do, right?
That directly contribute togrowth in your culture.
So whether it's, hey, at the endof the year, we want to have a
team of 50 competent greeters,right?
Yeah.
that know that one person can'tleave outside of our church
(04:32):
without being said hello to.
Because that is something thatwe'll explore a bit.
But the number one for ourculture killers that we
identified first is lack ofvision, bro.
I'm not sure if you've ever beenin a church where they have
banners up you know, saying,hey, we want to have, this is
(04:55):
the vision of our church.
SPEAKER_00 (04:57):
Right.
There are core values.
Those types of banners.
Yes.
Where it identifies like whatthe mission is and what the
vision is.
I have been in, yes, my churchactually has like, it has the
mission and vision on the wall.
It has it on the wall.
So yes, I've been in there.
Why do you ask?
So
SPEAKER_01 (05:15):
those are good, right?
Like every organization needs amission statement and a vision
statement.
Yeah.
What I found is if your churchis meeting every Saturday or for
those in other denominations onSunday and you don't have a
(05:36):
clear goal that year, you'remissing out on something.
You're missing out on growth.
UNKNOWN (05:43):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (05:44):
And the reason that I say that is because we as
individuals were only boughtinto a certain organization when
we see where it's going andwe're bought into the
destination.
So we do a better job of havinga destination, whether it's,
Hey, this year we're going tohave eight Vespers.
That's our vision this year.
That's our objective this yearthat falls within whatever your
(06:07):
overall
SPEAKER_00 (06:08):
mission of your church is.
You know, bro, I want to, I wantto say that like, Understand
that like your vision as achurch at the end of the day, it
should be a reflection of theculture of the church.
Like whatever you're building towithin your church body, it
somehow some way should speak tothe type of culture that you're
trying to build upon, thatyou're trying to strengthen
(06:29):
within your church.
And so to your point, you know,the question you would ask,
well, why do we want to have 50greeters?
Well, you would probably saythat we want individuals to feel
welcomed.
We want individuals to feellike, hey, this is home.
This is community.
And so, you know, depending onlike the culture that your
leadership team, that yourpastors, that your elders, that
they're trying to build at yourchurch, you know, that will
(06:52):
indeed be able to give insightas to the type of vision that
you should try to adopt, thetype of goals that you should be
trying to work towards withinyour church in a set year or
even within a season or slashquarter within the year.
So, yeah, I I just wanted to add
SPEAKER_01 (07:07):
that, man.
Yeah, yeah.
Man, what's the other
SPEAKER_00 (07:10):
culture killer?
Yeah, man.
Second culture killer that Ithink we got to talk about is
the lack of relevance within thechurch.
I think that at a certain pointin time, for certain groups of
people, church stopped beingrelevant.
It stopped being relevant.
And I think it stopped beingrelevant because the church, to
(07:32):
a certain extent, depending onwhere you're from, it stopped...
speaking to the relevant thingsthat are happening in your life.
At a certain point in time, thecommunity, which was the church,
it was founded to be a safespace for several individuals to
be able to gather together andto also be able to find
(07:53):
individuals who were goingthrough like-minded things,
especially within the Blackcommunity.
The church was a pillar inmaking sure that certain civil
rights movements were taking offand being sustained.
The church really helped outwith that because in in church,
you would hear sermons andmessages about the rights that
(08:13):
we should have, the rights thatwe deserve, and the value that
is in alignment with our lives.
Yet, man, I don't know aboutyou, but I've noticed that
there's been somewhat of a shiftthat's been taking place in a
lot of our churches, where it'snot so much about how can we
make the lives of everyonearound us better.
(08:34):
I don't know about you, but I'veseen so many individual churches
grow because they're now focusedon how can you live your best
life here?
And I think that's differentfrom what it used to be, bro.
It's very different from what itused to be.
Rather than talking about howGod indeed is calling us to be
(08:54):
individuals who fight againstcertain systems, it's now about,
well, God, how is God going tohelp me live in my purpose?
God, how are you going to helpme get my dream job?
How are you going to help mefind bae?
And so rather than us livinglike Yeah.
(09:28):
The Lord is coming back soon.
The Lord is coming back soon,which is great.
But some individuals don't knowhow to balance it with what
we're going through right now.
And the truth is, is one of thethings that keeps people in
church more than not, more thananything, is that the church and
God and the Bible alwaysprovided answers so that we
(09:48):
would understand why we're goingthrough the things that we are
going through.
And so, bro, just to start usoff for number two, I would say
that, man, the church isstruggling with relevance within
our community.
What about you, man?
SPEAKER_01 (10:02):
It is not like just right there, to be honest.
Yeah.
I had a conversation this pastweek with someone that was like,
Hey, why, why do some churcheshave more, more prominent in
political views?
And they talk about oneadministration over the other.
And then I replied back and Isaid, it's because the other
(10:23):
half of the church is silent.
And, and one, And the other sideof the church has to speak as if
it's two voices because theother side is so silent.
And a part of what I loved aboutthe way that I was taught
evangelism is that what we'rereally asking people to do,
(10:44):
right, is to see the world froma different perspective.
So when we're talking about howpeople cope with death, Because
it's a reality we have, right?
We as a church are taking awaythe idea, especially in
Adventism, right?
That when you die, your soulgoes up into heaven, right?
We're taking that keyunderstanding away from people,
(11:06):
right?
And then as an evangelist, whatyou do is you give them another
key of understanding and say,hey, this key was okay, but
here's a better key.
to understand the world aroundyou.
And it's that your loved one isnot actually up in heaven,
watching you in pain, right?
They're waiting for the samething that you are waiting for
(11:26):
right now.
And a part of you that, that,that wants to see them needs to
make sure that just, just likethey're sealed in Christ, that
you eventually are sealed in himas well.
And you stay sealed with him,right?
So it's just like, Hey, if we'retaking away a key of
understanding, whether it's, abehavior, whether it's a
emotion, right?
(11:47):
Whether it's a job, you need, weneed to be relevant enough to
give them something to replacethat hole in their life with.
And man, I heard that fromsomeone who was a investor and
he's like, I went down to churchand he said, I, I was a 14 year
(12:07):
old and I prayed in a pew.
And then he said, I didn't hearanything.
SPEAKER_00 (12:13):
He
SPEAKER_01 (12:14):
said, I didn't hear God.
And then he said, but the churchdown the street, they taught a
prayer that was more, that wasmore thinking through logical
prayer.
And then he said they had anunderstanding that helped them
work through life while me andmy church, I didn't teach that.
(12:37):
And then what really broke myheart, man, is he said, He said,
and then I looked at theHinduism and I looked at the
Buddhism.
And this guy is a billionaire,right?
And I was like, man, we as achurch had someone that God gave
us with the mental capacity toinvest and become a billionaire.
And we lost him because wedidn't give him the keys to
(12:59):
understanding life, to help himlive through life with God, not
just pulling life from him, man.
SPEAKER_00 (13:05):
That's good.
Man, you know, I'm happy thatyou said that.
I'm happy that you said, butman, you know what I'm even more
excited about?
I'm excited about this thirdone.
Now we said before, number threeis going to shock some people
and it might make a couple ofpeople upset.
Okay.
But here's our third one.
Elijah, what's the third churchkiller, the third culture killer
(13:26):
that we want to identify today?
SPEAKER_01 (13:27):
The third culture killer that will probably make
you unsubscribe is yourcompeting priorities.
SPEAKER_00 (13:35):
Unpack them.
SPEAKER_01 (13:36):
You have competing priorities with God.
Now, here's what I mean by that.
Let me just give you a quickbreakdown of what our week looks
like, because most of usprobably go to church on the
weekend, right?
And it's between an hour and ahalf to three hours, right?
That's your short church serviceto probably the longest service.
that you'll probably encounter,right?
(13:57):
So here is the breakdown.
You have about 168 hours in yourweek, right?
That's 24 hours a day, sevendays a week, right?
You have 168 hours a week.
And your standard work week isabout 40 hours, right?
Where you're able to have, yourjob is requiring you 40 hours of
work, right?
That might be flexible dependingon what you do, but this is the
(14:20):
general thing, right?
And most people sleep around,give or take eight hours,
hopefully, If you're within thatfive hours, do a bit better,
right?
So that's totaling about 56hours per week.
And we're talking about thatalso includes 10 to 20 hours of
eating, going to work, right?
(14:41):
And then your personal hygiene.
So we're talking about about 10to 20 hours.
So that leaves us with aboutgive or take 48 hours to 72
hours of free time per week,bro.
So We have 168 hours.
That breaks down after all thethings you have to do to about
(15:01):
two to three days worth of freetime throughout the week.
Then you then prioritize whatyou want to do in those 48 to 72
hours.
And what I have a hard timebelieving is that in those 48 to
72 hours, you can't give up anhour and a half Spending time
(15:23):
with people that believe in thesame thing you do.
SPEAKER_00 (15:27):
Yes.
Listen, man, can I tell you howI just started reading this
book?
One of my friends in ministry,Pastor Eric Bell, he shared this
book with me called Free toFocus, right?
Free to Focus, written byMichael Hyatt, I believe.
What's so interesting about thisis that he was sharing that in
(15:47):
this book, there are so manydifferent things that are
competing for our attentionthroughout the week.
And because of this, it is soeasy for us to actually get
distracted or possiblyoverwhelmed by all the endless
opportunities that we have atour fingertips.
And so, you know, as you weregoing through everything just
(16:09):
now and you concluded with thefact that we have about 24, 24
to 48 hours worth of time on ourhands where we could really do,
let's say, recreational things.
I was thinking that after workor after we pick up our kids,
after we possibly come from thegym, the truth is that several
(16:32):
individuals are not thinkingabout their church anymore.
They're not thinking about, man,how could I connect with my
community?
How can I connect with mypeople?
Many times, individuals aresimply trying to look for a
source, look for a resource thatcan help them recoup from their
day, right?
(16:52):
And so because of that, you findseveral individuals, rather than
actually doing things that buildthem up, they find things that
can help give them dopamine.
And so rather than calling upsister so-and-so or brother
so-and-so or elder so-and-sobecause you want to
(17:13):
intentionally make sure that youare growing in community or
helping towards a project thatyour church is doing, a lot of
times we can find ourselves onsocial media, bro.
We can find ourselves scrollingand scrolling and scrolling.
And if we're not careful, bro,the truth is that some of us can
even have conversations withcertain people who we don't need
to be having conversations with.
(17:35):
And the reason is because whenyou do not have have a list
where you are telling yourself,hey, this is what I'm
prioritizing in my day.
Listen, your activities willfind a way to gain control over
you rather than you havingcontrol over them.
You know?
And so it's imperative that yousomehow find a way to lasso your
(18:00):
priorities down so that your daydoes not get away from you, but
so that you can actually havecontrol and command over your
day, if that makes sense.
SPEAKER_01 (18:10):
Yeah, bro.
So here's the last thing thatI'll say to you.
The reason that competingpriorities, exactly like you
said, is a culture killer.
The reason that it's a culturekiller, the reason that
competing priorities prioritiesis a culture killer is because a
pastor can bring someone intothe church, but members keep
(18:31):
people in the church.
That's right.
That's good.
The reason that it's a culturekiller is because we can bring
people into the church as muchas we want.
Cause we know that our peopleout there that, that are looking
to hear hope and inspiration.
Right.
But if you come in and the pewsare empty or, or, Even worse,
(18:54):
and this is worse, the pew isfilled with the wrong people,
right?
Yeah.
That person that could have beenintegrated into a community,
right, has either come into achurch that's full on the books,
but empty in person.
Mercy.
Or full on the books, right?
(19:16):
Yeah.
They're introduced to the wrongpeople because the right people
were busy at home.
SPEAKER_00 (19:20):
Mercy.
Yeah.
Mercy.
SPEAKER_01 (19:23):
They're
SPEAKER_00 (19:23):
gone.
Mercy.
They're gone.
SPEAKER_01 (19:25):
Man, but that gets us right into number four,
though.
Talk to us.
What's number four, bro?
SPEAKER_00 (19:30):
Bad customer service.
Ooh, okay, okay.
So connected to, connected to,because you said that gets us to
number four.
SPEAKER_01 (19:38):
The same idea of a culture killer, bro, is this,
right?
We can invite as many people tochurch as we want to, but how
many times have we ended arelationship with a product or a
company because they did not getback to us on the customer
(19:58):
service side.
SPEAKER_00 (19:59):
Yeah, you're right.
You're right.
You're right.
It matters so much,
SPEAKER_01 (20:04):
man.
It matters.
It matters.
Bro, have you ever looked upsomething and then their
customer service is so bad thatyou're like, I don't want
anything to do with thatcompany?
SPEAKER_00 (20:13):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I've also been to places and Iwas just like...
Never again.
Never again.
It's kind of sort of like thedifference between Popeye's and
Chick-fil-A.
Chick-fil-A, you feel like aftereverything, my pleasure, my
pleasure, my pleasure.
Would you like extra sauce withthat?
Would you like extra fries withthat?
(20:34):
Would you like me to take yourkids to Walmart with you?
That's Chick-fil-A.
But when you go to Popeye's, youdon't know what you're going to
get from Popeye's.
You don't know if it's going tobe a...
If you say, hey...
I don't have any sauce.
I don't have any sauce in here.
You might get a, so, so, I don'tgot any sauce in here either.
Like, you don't know what you'regoing to get.
(20:55):
Which is why so many people likegoing to Chick-fil-A.
SPEAKER_01 (20:59):
Bro, that's exactly, it's like, hey, are you, do you
want to be a Chick-fil-A churchor a Popeye's church, right?
Yeah.
Has nothing to do with the food.
Yo, I love Popeye's food, bro.
Like, like right next to BerrienSprings.
Yeah.
There was this Popeye's that,that like I would go to.
But, But it depended on who wasthere.
(21:20):
You weren't
SPEAKER_00 (21:21):
allowed to wait 40 minutes, bro.
It's supposed to be fast food.
SPEAKER_01 (21:28):
At one point, I think I just left the drive-thru
because I was like, this iscrazy, right?
Yeah.
But every time I went toCheckpoint, it was consistent.
So when we talk about culturekillers, right, that is bad
customer service, and I tellthis to everyone, bro, is like
you as a member of yourcommunity, local church right
(21:48):
you have the responsibility ofsaying hi to your guests yeah
SPEAKER_00 (21:55):
yeah
SPEAKER_01 (21:56):
like if you want to turn around be someone that just
says hi to your guests becausei've talked to so many young
adults man that are like i neverwant to go back to that church
because i did not have oneperson that said hi to me mercy
SPEAKER_00 (22:12):
The one thing that the church should be doing,
greeting people, especially newpeople who don't look familiar.
Yeah, bro.
It's definitely a problem.
But I think that ultimatelyleads us into our fifth and
final one.
If you don't have a clearvision, if your church is making
(22:33):
you feel like it's not relevant,if you have competing
priorities, which possibly are asign that hey, you might also be
lacking in customer service,then what it seems like it's
ultimately bound in is the factthat you're lacking in purpose.
Break that down.
(22:54):
The truth is that many of ourchurches, their culture is dying
because The culture of yourchurch is dying because of the
fact that there are severalpeople who are there who don't
necessarily know why they arethere.
They're simply going becausetheir parents taught them that
this is what they're supposed todo.
And the furthest that they gotin it is that, hey, it's what
the Bible said, but they haven'tnecessarily made a real personal
(23:16):
connection and found a personalwhy as to why they are still
believers, as to why they arestill church goers.
And because there are so manyindividuals who have a surface
level belief spirituality and asurface level church
involvement, there are manyindividuals who go week in and
week out and they miss out onall of these amazing things.
(23:39):
Because truth be told, no matterwhat, if you do not have a clear
purpose, a clear why, you won'thave a clear vision.
And if you can't have a clearvision, you will never be able
to see how relevant the churchis to your life.
In addition, you will never beable to see how important
because it's so important, youneed to make space and make it a
(23:59):
priority.
And when you make church apriority, ultimately you will be
the church so that you can bethe customer service, so that
you can be that gentle touchthat many individuals are
standing in need of.
And so, you know, when I thinkabout the fact that there are so
many individuals who are likingthis, I think, man, it has to be
because of that lack of purpose.
(24:21):
Those are my thoughts.
What about you, man?
SPEAKER_01 (24:22):
Yeah, man.
Yeah.
Like if you are a know what yourpurpose is, you'll have things
pop up on your board meetingsthat you're just like, why?
We lose so much time talkingabout things that are irrelevant
because we don't have a purposefor our church where we spend
(24:45):
time bogged down in all thesedifferent areas where I found
that if we say, hey, this is ourpurpose, everything else has to
fit into it.
So there is no question of, Hey,does this outing or does this
project?
The number one question is howdoes that fit into what we're
trying to do right now?
So good.
(25:06):
And people can, can figure outby themselves.
I can't really bring this up ina meeting because I'm having a
hard time fitting it into ourpurpose.
So if your church is focused ongrowth, and assimilating and
developing the kingdom of God,there are some projects that
don't really fit into that asyou're building out the kingdom
(25:29):
of God.
If your church is saying, hey,we want to take care of our
members and only our members,right?
I personally don't think thatthat's the purpose of the
church, but if you as acommunity get together and say,
hey, our goal is to take care ofour members, right?
Here's...
What that does is it freeseveryone.
(25:51):
So if you're a leader that'sgoing to that church and your
mindset is growth and yourchurch has a clear priority of
in-reach, right?
As a leader, that frees you togo and find another community
that aligns with what youbelieve the church is supposed
to do.
(26:11):
And man, it's freeing.
once you know what the purposeof that church is, bro.
So those were just five, whatwe're
SPEAKER_00 (26:18):
calling culture killers.
Just five, just five, just five.
And listen, you know, therecould be more.
We know that there are more,but...
You know, we shared our five andnow we want to hear from you.
And so if you are an individualwho is involved with the church
or you possibly left the churchor are looking for a new church
and you could possibly identifywith any of these, tell us what
(26:39):
we're possibly missing.
Tell us what else is a culturekiller, because I believe that
if we indeed are able to rootout and be able to discover what
these culture killers are.
We can share it.
We can learn it so that we canfind ways around it so that we
can overcome it.
And so we'd like to hear fromyou within the chat.
Please let us know.
(27:00):
Let us know what your thoughtsare in these and what you would
like to add.
Or even email us atthe2youngpastors at gmail.com so
that we can hear from you.
We want to continue thisconversation.
But ultimately, we want to saythank you so much for joining us
for this episode.
And listen, we look forward toseeing you at the next one.
And so listen, folks enjoy therest of your day and we are
(27:20):
indeed out we're signing off
you
SPEAKER_01 (00:08):
Welcome to the Two Young Pastors podcast.
This episode, we're talkingabout culture killers.
And number three will make youwant to unsubscribe.
But you want to stick with us.
You want to stick with usbecause it is going to challenge
you and me.
And we want to hear from you aswell.
So you want to make sure youlike, share, and subscribe and
(00:28):
comment so that we can hear fromyou.
I'm joined, as always, the otherhalf of the Two Young Pastors is
none other than Jawan.
What's What's
SPEAKER_00 (00:40):
up, bro?
How's your day going?
They indeed are asking questionsas to why they feel funny about
their church.
And I believe that what we'regoing to be talking about today,
(01:02):
it directly answers why you mayfeel funny about your church.
So I'm feeling good, man.
How are you?
SPEAKER_01 (01:08):
I'm good.
I'm good.
I'm good.
And, you know, we were justworking through the why of this
episode is that you're going tobe transitioning soon.
And these are some of the teststhat that we look for as pastors
when we go into a church.
These are just a few of them.
We just got together and said,hey, if you want to do a quick
(01:32):
grading of your church, theseare five things that you can do
right now to grade your church.
So if you want to put it on ascale from one to five and then
allow yourself to grade yourchurch of the, all right, do I
have this?
Do I have that?
Where would your church fallinto it?
And you can give your, yourchurch a grade.
(01:55):
And then we could talk about howto fix those things as well.
So we're just excited to goright into this because this is
what we do as pastors to help tocorrect and to grow our
churches.
We're calling it culture killersbecause churches are cultures,
man.
As much as people don't want toadmit it, there is a social
fabric in our churches.
There is a leadership fabric,man.
(02:18):
And all of those apply intogetting people into our church,
assimilating them and allowingthem to be the best possible
Let's get right into it, man.
(02:55):
on a team and you've been in ameeting for like 20 minutes and
you don't know what the point ofthe conversation
SPEAKER_00 (03:02):
is?
I have.
I have.
I have.
Sometimes it really came in aform of like class projects,
those group projects that youhad in school where we're just
like, what are we doing here?
Like we're just talking.
But I certainly have.
I certainly have.
And I have a feeling that you'veprobably been in a few of those
as well, right?
Yeah.
Man, I have been in
SPEAKER_01 (03:22):
a lot of them through college too, bro, where
it's just like, even inseminary, to be honest.
It's like, what are we doinghere?
And I had that about someclasses too, of like, what is
the point of this class?
There was no clear objectives,no clear discernment about what
we're doing here.
And when we're talking aboutvision, really what it is, is
(03:45):
what is the destination that thechurch is working towards?
So if your church does not havea, at the end of this year, this
is what we are looking to do.
And the thing is like, I'm nottalking about I'm not talking
about building projects.
I'm not talking about anycapital improvement projects.
Those are good, right?
Some tangible things that youcan work towards.
(04:08):
I'm talking about what are somevisions that you as a church
want to do, right?
That directly contribute togrowth in your culture.
So whether it's, hey, at the endof the year, we want to have a
team of 50 competent greeters,right?
Yeah.
that know that one person can'tleave outside of our church
(04:32):
without being said hello to.
Because that is something thatwe'll explore a bit.
But the number one for ourculture killers that we
identified first is lack ofvision, bro.
I'm not sure if you've ever beenin a church where they have
banners up you know, saying,hey, we want to have, this is
(04:55):
the vision of our church.
SPEAKER_00 (04:57):
Right.
There are core values.
Those types of banners.
Yes.
Where it identifies like whatthe mission is and what the
vision is.
I have been in, yes, my churchactually has like, it has the
mission and vision on the wall.
It has it on the wall.
So yes, I've been in there.
Why do you ask?
So
SPEAKER_01 (05:15):
those are good, right?
Like every organization needs amission statement and a vision
statement.
Yeah.
What I found is if your churchis meeting every Saturday or for
those in other denominations onSunday and you don't have a
(05:36):
clear goal that year, you'remissing out on something.
You're missing out on growth.
UNKNOWN (05:43):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (05:44):
And the reason that I say that is because we as
individuals were only boughtinto a certain organization when
we see where it's going andwe're bought into the
destination.
So we do a better job of havinga destination, whether it's,
Hey, this year we're going tohave eight Vespers.
That's our vision this year.
That's our objective this yearthat falls within whatever your
(06:07):
overall
SPEAKER_00 (06:08):
mission of your church is.
You know, bro, I want to, I wantto say that like, Understand
that like your vision as achurch at the end of the day, it
should be a reflection of theculture of the church.
Like whatever you're building towithin your church body, it
somehow some way should speak tothe type of culture that you're
trying to build upon, thatyou're trying to strengthen
(06:29):
within your church.
And so to your point, you know,the question you would ask,
well, why do we want to have 50greeters?
Well, you would probably saythat we want individuals to feel
welcomed.
We want individuals to feellike, hey, this is home.
This is community.
And so, you know, depending onlike the culture that your
leadership team, that yourpastors, that your elders, that
they're trying to build at yourchurch, you know, that will
(06:52):
indeed be able to give insightas to the type of vision that
you should try to adopt, thetype of goals that you should be
trying to work towards withinyour church in a set year or
even within a season or slashquarter within the year.
So, yeah, I I just wanted to add
SPEAKER_01 (07:07):
that, man.
Yeah, yeah.
Man, what's the other
SPEAKER_00 (07:10):
culture killer?
Yeah, man.
Second culture killer that Ithink we got to talk about is
the lack of relevance within thechurch.
I think that at a certain pointin time, for certain groups of
people, church stopped beingrelevant.
It stopped being relevant.
And I think it stopped beingrelevant because the church, to
(07:32):
a certain extent, depending onwhere you're from, it stopped...
speaking to the relevant thingsthat are happening in your life.
At a certain point in time, thecommunity, which was the church,
it was founded to be a safespace for several individuals to
be able to gather together andto also be able to find
(07:53):
individuals who were goingthrough like-minded things,
especially within the Blackcommunity.
The church was a pillar inmaking sure that certain civil
rights movements were taking offand being sustained.
The church really helped outwith that because in in church,
you would hear sermons andmessages about the rights that
(08:13):
we should have, the rights thatwe deserve, and the value that
is in alignment with our lives.
Yet, man, I don't know aboutyou, but I've noticed that
there's been somewhat of a shiftthat's been taking place in a
lot of our churches, where it'snot so much about how can we
make the lives of everyonearound us better.
(08:34):
I don't know about you, but I'veseen so many individual churches
grow because they're now focusedon how can you live your best
life here?
And I think that's differentfrom what it used to be, bro.
It's very different from what itused to be.
Rather than talking about howGod indeed is calling us to be
(08:54):
individuals who fight againstcertain systems, it's now about,
well, God, how is God going tohelp me live in my purpose?
God, how are you going to helpme get my dream job?
How are you going to help mefind bae?
And so rather than us livinglike Yeah.
(09:28):
The Lord is coming back soon.
The Lord is coming back soon,which is great.
But some individuals don't knowhow to balance it with what
we're going through right now.
And the truth is, is one of thethings that keeps people in
church more than not, more thananything, is that the church and
God and the Bible alwaysprovided answers so that we
(09:48):
would understand why we're goingthrough the things that we are
going through.
And so, bro, just to start usoff for number two, I would say
that, man, the church isstruggling with relevance within
our community.
What about you, man?
SPEAKER_01 (10:02):
It is not like just right there, to be honest.
Yeah.
I had a conversation this pastweek with someone that was like,
Hey, why, why do some churcheshave more, more prominent in
political views?
And they talk about oneadministration over the other.
And then I replied back and Isaid, it's because the other
(10:23):
half of the church is silent.
And, and one, And the other sideof the church has to speak as if
it's two voices because theother side is so silent.
And a part of what I loved aboutthe way that I was taught
evangelism is that what we'rereally asking people to do,
(10:44):
right, is to see the world froma different perspective.
So when we're talking about howpeople cope with death, Because
it's a reality we have, right?
We as a church are taking awaythe idea, especially in
Adventism, right?
That when you die, your soulgoes up into heaven, right?
We're taking that keyunderstanding away from people,
(11:06):
right?
And then as an evangelist, whatyou do is you give them another
key of understanding and say,hey, this key was okay, but
here's a better key.
to understand the world aroundyou.
And it's that your loved one isnot actually up in heaven,
watching you in pain, right?
They're waiting for the samething that you are waiting for
(11:26):
right now.
And a part of you that, that,that wants to see them needs to
make sure that just, just likethey're sealed in Christ, that
you eventually are sealed in himas well.
And you stay sealed with him,right?
So it's just like, Hey, if we'retaking away a key of
understanding, whether it's, abehavior, whether it's a
emotion, right?
(11:47):
Whether it's a job, you need, weneed to be relevant enough to
give them something to replacethat hole in their life with.
And man, I heard that fromsomeone who was a investor and
he's like, I went down to churchand he said, I, I was a 14 year
(12:07):
old and I prayed in a pew.
And then he said, I didn't hearanything.
SPEAKER_00 (12:13):
He
SPEAKER_01 (12:14):
said, I didn't hear God.
And then he said, but the churchdown the street, they taught a
prayer that was more, that wasmore thinking through logical
prayer.
And then he said they had anunderstanding that helped them
work through life while me andmy church, I didn't teach that.
(12:37):
And then what really broke myheart, man, is he said, He said,
and then I looked at theHinduism and I looked at the
Buddhism.
And this guy is a billionaire,right?
And I was like, man, we as achurch had someone that God gave
us with the mental capacity toinvest and become a billionaire.
And we lost him because wedidn't give him the keys to
(12:59):
understanding life, to help himlive through life with God, not
just pulling life from him, man.
SPEAKER_00 (13:05):
That's good.
Man, you know, I'm happy thatyou said that.
I'm happy that you said, butman, you know what I'm even more
excited about?
I'm excited about this thirdone.
Now we said before, number threeis going to shock some people
and it might make a couple ofpeople upset.
Okay.
But here's our third one.
Elijah, what's the third churchkiller, the third culture killer
(13:26):
that we want to identify today?
SPEAKER_01 (13:27):
The third culture killer that will probably make
you unsubscribe is yourcompeting priorities.
SPEAKER_00 (13:35):
Unpack them.
SPEAKER_01 (13:36):
You have competing priorities with God.
Now, here's what I mean by that.
Let me just give you a quickbreakdown of what our week looks
like, because most of usprobably go to church on the
weekend, right?
And it's between an hour and ahalf to three hours, right?
That's your short church serviceto probably the longest service.
that you'll probably encounter,right?
(13:57):
So here is the breakdown.
You have about 168 hours in yourweek, right?
That's 24 hours a day, sevendays a week, right?
You have 168 hours a week.
And your standard work week isabout 40 hours, right?
Where you're able to have, yourjob is requiring you 40 hours of
work, right?
That might be flexible dependingon what you do, but this is the
(14:20):
general thing, right?
And most people sleep around,give or take eight hours,
hopefully, If you're within thatfive hours, do a bit better,
right?
So that's totaling about 56hours per week.
And we're talking about thatalso includes 10 to 20 hours of
eating, going to work, right?
(14:41):
And then your personal hygiene.
So we're talking about about 10to 20 hours.
So that leaves us with aboutgive or take 48 hours to 72
hours of free time per week,bro.
So We have 168 hours.
That breaks down after all thethings you have to do to about
(15:01):
two to three days worth of freetime throughout the week.
Then you then prioritize whatyou want to do in those 48 to 72
hours.
And what I have a hard timebelieving is that in those 48 to
72 hours, you can't give up anhour and a half Spending time
(15:23):
with people that believe in thesame thing you do.
SPEAKER_00 (15:27):
Yes.
Listen, man, can I tell you howI just started reading this
book?
One of my friends in ministry,Pastor Eric Bell, he shared this
book with me called Free toFocus, right?
Free to Focus, written byMichael Hyatt, I believe.
What's so interesting about thisis that he was sharing that in
(15:47):
this book, there are so manydifferent things that are
competing for our attentionthroughout the week.
And because of this, it is soeasy for us to actually get
distracted or possiblyoverwhelmed by all the endless
opportunities that we have atour fingertips.
And so, you know, as you weregoing through everything just
(16:09):
now and you concluded with thefact that we have about 24, 24
to 48 hours worth of time on ourhands where we could really do,
let's say, recreational things.
I was thinking that after workor after we pick up our kids,
after we possibly come from thegym, the truth is that several
(16:32):
individuals are not thinkingabout their church anymore.
They're not thinking about, man,how could I connect with my
community?
How can I connect with mypeople?
Many times, individuals aresimply trying to look for a
source, look for a resource thatcan help them recoup from their
day, right?
(16:52):
And so because of that, you findseveral individuals, rather than
actually doing things that buildthem up, they find things that
can help give them dopamine.
And so rather than calling upsister so-and-so or brother
so-and-so or elder so-and-sobecause you want to
(17:13):
intentionally make sure that youare growing in community or
helping towards a project thatyour church is doing, a lot of
times we can find ourselves onsocial media, bro.
We can find ourselves scrollingand scrolling and scrolling.
And if we're not careful, bro,the truth is that some of us can
even have conversations withcertain people who we don't need
to be having conversations with.
(17:35):
And the reason is because whenyou do not have have a list
where you are telling yourself,hey, this is what I'm
prioritizing in my day.
Listen, your activities willfind a way to gain control over
you rather than you havingcontrol over them.
You know?
And so it's imperative that yousomehow find a way to lasso your
(18:00):
priorities down so that your daydoes not get away from you, but
so that you can actually havecontrol and command over your
day, if that makes sense.
SPEAKER_01 (18:10):
Yeah, bro.
So here's the last thing thatI'll say to you.
The reason that competingpriorities, exactly like you
said, is a culture killer.
The reason that it's a culturekiller, the reason that
competing priorities prioritiesis a culture killer is because a
pastor can bring someone intothe church, but members keep
(18:31):
people in the church.
That's right.
That's good.
The reason that it's a culturekiller is because we can bring
people into the church as muchas we want.
Cause we know that our peopleout there that, that are looking
to hear hope and inspiration.
Right.
But if you come in and the pewsare empty or, or, Even worse,
(18:54):
and this is worse, the pew isfilled with the wrong people,
right?
Yeah.
That person that could have beenintegrated into a community,
right, has either come into achurch that's full on the books,
but empty in person.
Mercy.
Or full on the books, right?
(19:16):
Yeah.
They're introduced to the wrongpeople because the right people
were busy at home.
SPEAKER_00 (19:20):
Mercy.
Yeah.
Mercy.
SPEAKER_01 (19:23):
They're
SPEAKER_00 (19:23):
gone.
Mercy.
They're gone.
SPEAKER_01 (19:25):
Man, but that gets us right into number four,
though.
Talk to us.
What's number four, bro?
SPEAKER_00 (19:30):
Bad customer service.
Ooh, okay, okay.
So connected to, connected to,because you said that gets us to
number four.
SPEAKER_01 (19:38):
The same idea of a culture killer, bro, is this,
right?
We can invite as many people tochurch as we want to, but how
many times have we ended arelationship with a product or a
company because they did not getback to us on the customer
(19:58):
service side.
SPEAKER_00 (19:59):
Yeah, you're right.
You're right.
You're right.
It matters so much,
SPEAKER_01 (20:04):
man.
It matters.
It matters.
Bro, have you ever looked upsomething and then their
customer service is so bad thatyou're like, I don't want
anything to do with thatcompany?
SPEAKER_00 (20:13):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I've also been to places and Iwas just like...
Never again.
Never again.
It's kind of sort of like thedifference between Popeye's and
Chick-fil-A.
Chick-fil-A, you feel like aftereverything, my pleasure, my
pleasure, my pleasure.
Would you like extra sauce withthat?
Would you like extra fries withthat?
(20:34):
Would you like me to take yourkids to Walmart with you?
That's Chick-fil-A.
But when you go to Popeye's, youdon't know what you're going to
get from Popeye's.
You don't know if it's going tobe a...
If you say, hey...
I don't have any sauce.
I don't have any sauce in here.
You might get a, so, so, I don'tgot any sauce in here either.
Like, you don't know what you'regoing to get.
(20:55):
Which is why so many people likegoing to Chick-fil-A.
SPEAKER_01 (20:59):
Bro, that's exactly, it's like, hey, are you, do you
want to be a Chick-fil-A churchor a Popeye's church, right?
Yeah.
Has nothing to do with the food.
Yo, I love Popeye's food, bro.
Like, like right next to BerrienSprings.
Yeah.
There was this Popeye's that,that like I would go to.
But, But it depended on who wasthere.
(21:20):
You weren't
SPEAKER_00 (21:21):
allowed to wait 40 minutes, bro.
It's supposed to be fast food.
SPEAKER_01 (21:28):
At one point, I think I just left the drive-thru
because I was like, this iscrazy, right?
Yeah.
But every time I went toCheckpoint, it was consistent.
So when we talk about culturekillers, right, that is bad
customer service, and I tellthis to everyone, bro, is like
you as a member of yourcommunity, local church right
(21:48):
you have the responsibility ofsaying hi to your guests yeah
SPEAKER_00 (21:55):
yeah
SPEAKER_01 (21:56):
like if you want to turn around be someone that just
says hi to your guests becausei've talked to so many young
adults man that are like i neverwant to go back to that church
because i did not have oneperson that said hi to me mercy
SPEAKER_00 (22:12):
The one thing that the church should be doing,
greeting people, especially newpeople who don't look familiar.
Yeah, bro.
It's definitely a problem.
But I think that ultimatelyleads us into our fifth and
final one.
If you don't have a clearvision, if your church is making
(22:33):
you feel like it's not relevant,if you have competing
priorities, which possibly are asign that hey, you might also be
lacking in customer service,then what it seems like it's
ultimately bound in is the factthat you're lacking in purpose.
Break that down.
(22:54):
The truth is that many of ourchurches, their culture is dying
because The culture of yourchurch is dying because of the
fact that there are severalpeople who are there who don't
necessarily know why they arethere.
They're simply going becausetheir parents taught them that
this is what they're supposed todo.
And the furthest that they gotin it is that, hey, it's what
the Bible said, but they haven'tnecessarily made a real personal
(23:16):
connection and found a personalwhy as to why they are still
believers, as to why they arestill church goers.
And because there are so manyindividuals who have a surface
level belief spirituality and asurface level church
involvement, there are manyindividuals who go week in and
week out and they miss out onall of these amazing things.
(23:39):
Because truth be told, no matterwhat, if you do not have a clear
purpose, a clear why, you won'thave a clear vision.
And if you can't have a clearvision, you will never be able
to see how relevant the churchis to your life.
In addition, you will never beable to see how important
because it's so important, youneed to make space and make it a
(23:59):
priority.
And when you make church apriority, ultimately you will be
the church so that you can bethe customer service, so that
you can be that gentle touchthat many individuals are
standing in need of.
And so, you know, when I thinkabout the fact that there are so
many individuals who are likingthis, I think, man, it has to be
because of that lack of purpose.
(24:21):
Those are my thoughts.
What about you, man?
SPEAKER_01 (24:22):
Yeah, man.
Yeah.
Like if you are a know what yourpurpose is, you'll have things
pop up on your board meetingsthat you're just like, why?
We lose so much time talkingabout things that are irrelevant
because we don't have a purposefor our church where we spend
(24:45):
time bogged down in all thesedifferent areas where I found
that if we say, hey, this is ourpurpose, everything else has to
fit into it.
So there is no question of, Hey,does this outing or does this
project?
The number one question is howdoes that fit into what we're
trying to do right now?
So good.
(25:06):
And people can, can figure outby themselves.
I can't really bring this up ina meeting because I'm having a
hard time fitting it into ourpurpose.
So if your church is focused ongrowth, and assimilating and
developing the kingdom of God,there are some projects that
don't really fit into that asyou're building out the kingdom
(25:29):
of God.
If your church is saying, hey,we want to take care of our
members and only our members,right?
I personally don't think thatthat's the purpose of the
church, but if you as acommunity get together and say,
hey, our goal is to take care ofour members, right?
Here's...
What that does is it freeseveryone.
(25:51):
So if you're a leader that'sgoing to that church and your
mindset is growth and yourchurch has a clear priority of
in-reach, right?
As a leader, that frees you togo and find another community
that aligns with what youbelieve the church is supposed
to do.
(26:11):
And man, it's freeing.
once you know what the purposeof that church is, bro.
So those were just five, whatwe're
SPEAKER_00 (26:18):
calling culture killers.
Just five, just five, just five.
And listen, you know, therecould be more.
We know that there are more,but...
You know, we shared our five andnow we want to hear from you.
And so if you are an individualwho is involved with the church
or you possibly left the churchor are looking for a new church
and you could possibly identifywith any of these, tell us what
(26:39):
we're possibly missing.
Tell us what else is a culturekiller, because I believe that
if we indeed are able to rootout and be able to discover what
these culture killers are.
We can share it.
We can learn it so that we canfind ways around it so that we
can overcome it.
And so we'd like to hear fromyou within the chat.
Please let us know.
(27:00):
Let us know what your thoughtsare in these and what you would
like to add.
Or even email us atthe2youngpastors at gmail.com so
that we can hear from you.
We want to continue thisconversation.
But ultimately, we want to saythank you so much for joining us
for this episode.
And listen, we look forward toseeing you at the next one.
And so listen, folks enjoy therest of your day and we are
(27:20):
indeed out we're signing off
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