September 23, 2025 • 56 mins
When we hear the word "church," most of us picture a building with pews facing a stage. But what if that image bears little resemblance to what Jesus and the apostles actually established?
Matt Anderson takes us on a journey back to the earliest Christian communities, revealing how the church was designed to function as a family rather than an institution. Drawing from over 20 years of ministry experience and deep study of the Book of Acts, Matt shows how the first believers gathered around meals in homes, creating intimate communities where discipleship, worship, and mission naturally flowed from their relationships.
The conversation challenges our modern assumptions about church structure and practice. We explore how the Lord's Supper was originally a full feast shared around a table, not just symbolic elements passed in tiny cups. We discover how early church gatherings were multi-generational, with older believers intentionally mentoring younger ones rather than segregating by age. And we examine how resources were shared generously to advance the gospel rather than maintaining expensive buildings and professional staff.
Perhaps most compelling is the reminder that Jesus said the world would recognize his followers not by their buildings, programs, or even their preaching, but by their love for one another. This profound truth suggests that our greatest evangelistic strategy isn't inviting people to services but inviting them into authentic, Christ-centered relationships.
This isn't about abandoning our current church experiences but about thoughtfully examining whether some of our traditions have drifted from biblical patterns. Matt's insights will inspire you to reimagine what church could be when built on the foundation of family relationships rather than institutional structures.
Subscribe now and discover what it might look like to recover the vibrant, intimate church community that turned the ancient world upside down. And stay tuned for Matt's upcoming podcast "Guarding the Good Deposit," exploring apostolic traditions from Christianity's first three centuries.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Kevin (00:01):
All right friends, welcome back to the Uncommon
Freedom Show.
Today I am joined by a veteranfriend of mine yes, I do
occasionally keep some friendsfor more than one or two years
Matt Anderson, who for over 20years Matt has served in
leadership in education,business, nonprofits and in the
local church as a pastor,worship leader and church
(00:24):
planter.
He now works primarily with theMetro Equipping Coalition, mec
in greater New York City,supporting church planters,
training leaders andestablishing churches as
families patterned after theBook of Acts, which we're going
to talk about today.
I'm really excited.
Matt currently partners withBuild International's Global
Apostolic Team and collaborateswith the Chalmers Center, ccda
(00:46):
and City Advance to advancecitywide unity, economic
empowerment and church-basedleadership worldwide.
Matt is a certified facilitatorfor the Six Types of Working
Genius Model, which Bek and Iare huge fans of.
Matt.
That was cool to read andhere's a really fun fact Matt
once served as the front man fora little-known rock band called
(01:07):
the Middleman.
It's one of the most fun thingshe's ever done in his life and
yours truly was part of thatband and that was an absolute
blast back in the 2004-2005 timeframe Matt, right?
Matt (01:22):
Yeah, something like that.
That was excellent.
Kevin (01:24):
Yeah, it was great.
And he also loves basketball,riding his Harley and spending
time with his family.
His favorite scripture verse isGalatians 6, 9, and let us not
grow weary while doing good, forin due season we shall reap if
we do not lose heart.
Matt, it's great to see you,brother.
Matt (01:41):
Yes, so good to be here on this.
Thank you for the opportunityto just share a little bit about
what God is teaching me.
Kevin (01:47):
Yeah, absolutely.
And you know, as I started thisseries, I've been blessed to
have some just incrediblefriends and incredible Christian
brothers in my life for so long.
And when I look back in my life, you know the season where
Becca and I met you and yourwife Jess, uh, was early 2002
when we showed up in Okinawa andthen after a couple months,
(02:10):
found Calvary Calvary Chapel,okinawa, and I think you and
Jess were leading worship thatlike our first Sunday in that.
Well, actually, yeah, that thatold building, weren't you?
Yeah, yeah.
Matt (02:21):
We were.
I wasn't the, I wasn't theleader of that time.
I think I was still pretty, uh,you know, wet behind the ears
with some of that stuff, but itwas, uh, yeah, we were involved
from the get go um, you know, insome pretty cool ways.
It was a lot of fun.
Kevin (02:36):
Yeah, so real quick, let's uh, let's talk about your
family, so I mentioned your wife.
Matt (02:47):
Jess, you guys got married fairly young as well, right?
Yeah, we've been married now.
We got married in 2002, justbefore we moved to Japan.
So we're on year 23 now, Iguess.
So, yeah, and we have threekids.
They are just about to turn 15,17, and 19.
So they're moving from highschool into college.
(03:08):
We've got three teenagers inthe house, which has been
awesome.
Kevin (03:11):
Yeah, no, it's actually a very fun season.
As long as you can survive thehormones and the mood swings and
things like that, whetherthey're boys or girls, because
they both deal with that stuffit's actually.
It's a very, it's a super funseason in life because you're
transitioning from you knowhaving to do so much and parent
and correct to it's you knowthere's a friendship element.
(03:33):
I think it's you got to becareful to not become your
child's best friend when they'rea teenager, but there's a
relating on a totally differentlevel, so that's awesome.
Matt (03:40):
Yeah, it's been cool too.
Awesome, yeah, it's been cooltoo.
I'll just add to that sayinglike one of the fun things is
seeing each of our kids startingto find their lane and getting
their own interests and finding,like you know, just uh, just
the the kinds of things thatreally uh, feed them and
energize them and just walkingthem each through that and it's
(04:00):
so different.
You know this, we've got threekids and it's like you got to
learn to parent three times fromscratch, basically.
Kevin (04:08):
So it's crazy, yeah, cause you, you get your first
and then you kind of figure out,okay, this worked, that didn't.
And then you're like we'regoing to do the same thing with
number two.
And then you know uh, you knowI'm thinking of who does number
two work for, right From AustinPowers, because it's almost the
same thing, it's like wait aminute like why aren't you
responding the same way?
(04:28):
It doesn't make any sense, soit is a fun season, yeah exactly
.
So, in addition to parenting andraising kids, fill us in what
else have you been up to for thelast 20 years, because it's
been almost that long since weleft, actually it's been about
that long since we left Okinawa.
Matt (04:46):
Yeah, yeah, it's been, uh, it's been a little bit of a
whirlwind and you know, uh, justkind of the long story short.
You know our time in Japan.
Uh, you know about three of wewere there for five years.
I think you guys were threeyears there.
Um, and it really was aformative time for us and we got
very, very heavily involved inministry life at our church
there.
I was, like you mentioned,leading worship there and really
(05:11):
felt called to come back to NewJersey where I grew up.
We moved back here in 2007 andour heart was to plant a church
here in North Jersey and it'sbeen a roller coaster ride.
I spent some time working inthe family business planting a
church, initially in the suburbs, and then God eventually moved
us into the heart of the innercity of Patterson, new Jersey.
Kevin (05:35):
That's where we visited you, right.
Matt (05:38):
That's right.
Yep, that's right.
Yep, you saw the Great Fallsand all that kind of fun stuff.
Yeah, yeah, that was awesome.
And eventually I ended upleading a nonprofit a pretty
significant nonprofit in thecity of Patterson.
I was involved there for about10 years about seven as the
executive director, leading anetwork of about 80 churches and
(06:02):
organizations that we servedall of those churches and
organizations and really, alongthe way, just learning a lot.
God has been just teaching us aton of stuff, and about 18
months ago I stepped down frommy nonprofit role and now I'm
not necessarily just doing onething but doing a lot of
(06:24):
different things.
I'm still working with somenonprofits, doing some of my own
work, supporting my wife insome of her work.
It's been an interesting seasonof transition for us along the
way.
Kevin (06:40):
Awesome, awesome.
Yeah, it's been fun staying intouch, probably talking about
once a year, yeah, and I've seenyou, I think, twice or so since
, since we left Okinawa.
But you know it's good friends,you stay connected and you know
you can connect once a year andyou still know that you've got
each other's back and when youjust pick up where you left off.
Matt (07:01):
Yeah, it really is.
Kevin (07:03):
It really is.
It's awesome.
So what are some of the thingsthat you've been learning along
the way?
I mean, obviously you startedin Christian education in
Okinawa Christian School and thestudents there were they mostly
the children of militaryfamilies or who was the typical
(07:24):
student at OC, at OkinawaChristian school?
Matt (07:27):
Yeah, it was a mix.
So it was an American styleChristian school, all English
instruction and everything wasan international school.
But actually a lot of the kidswere kids that were half
American, half Okinawan.
So generally they would have anAmerican dad that was
oftentimes a military, usmilitary dad, and a Japanese or
(07:51):
Okinawan mom.
So it was a lot of mixed kids,but there was also some, you
know, full Japanese kids, fullAmerican kids.
Parents that you know chose tosend their kids, you know, if
they were stationed there in themilitary.
So it was, it was a mix ofwhich.
That that's part of.
What I loved is just, you know,getting to know all the
different cultures and just yeah, that's.
(08:13):
It was all beautiful stuffthere.
Kevin (08:14):
So, just kind of going with the uncommon man theme,
talk about some of the thingsthat you observed.
If you can reach back this farin your memory, yeah, you know
two very different cultures,okinawan and American, very
different.
What were some of the thingsthat you observed, especially of
the Okinawan kids, the kids whohad two Okinawan parents
(08:36):
compared to the ones that maybehad just one Okinawan and one
American, versus the ones thathad two American, just one.
Matt (08:44):
Okinawan and one American versus the ones that had two
American?
Oh yeah, that's an interestingquestion.
Well, you know, I'm sure youremember this from your time
there as well, but very, verymuch baked into Okinawan and
Japanese culture is it's a highrespect culture, right and some
of that was also baked into themilitary culture, which you know
(09:07):
, having been in the Marinesthere.
So that was actually somethingthat was interesting for me,
coming from the Northeast of theUnited States, and I had
students and like everybodycalled my wife and I ma'am and
sir and there was just that kindof different level of respect
(09:31):
that was kind of in the cultureand the politeness and even just
when you go into a restaurantor a store and the way the
service was in the Japaneseculture is a very service
oriented community and that'sactually one of the things that
we kind of missed, miss comingback to the States, where you go
into a store or restaurant andit's like hey, can we actually
(09:53):
find somebody to help us here?
Kevin (09:55):
Absolutely.
Yeah, One of the profoundmemories that Beck and I have,
uh, was where we don't.
I don't remember the last timeI went to McDonald's, but there
was a McDonald's restaurantright around the corner from our
house and it we'd heard likeyou got to go to McDonald's and
normally that's not what anyoneever says and sure enough, we
(10:18):
checked it out and the, the, theemployees, were perfectly, you
know, wearing a perfectlypressed uniform.
I mean, they just looked, theylooked like you imagined they
did.
Back, when, you know, Ray Krocstarted the company and the food
presentation was just like itis in the photos and it was just
, it was kind of a microcosm ofjust how disciplined they are,
(10:42):
how much respect they have andit's definitely something that
is missing from American culture.
One of the other things thatBecca was kind of surprised
about, cause she taught on the,the base schools, and the
assumption that we both made wasoh, you're dealing with, you're
dealing with military familiesthat typically, you know, have
(11:06):
know, have respect, sir ma'am,that type of stuff, and and she
was shocked at the lack ofrespect, uh, just like how
undisciplined that a lot of thekids were.
It was just an interesting Idon't know.
I guess we had a, an assumption, uh, that would be super
respectful and a lot lessdiscipline problems.
And I guess people are peopleand you know, I guess the bottom
(11:28):
line is, if parents don't teachtheir kids good manners and the
same things that they'reapplying at work, they're not
going to, naturally, do it.
Matt (11:36):
So, yeah, I and actually I got to experience that because
for two years we were at theChristian school and then for
three years I've I also taughton base um at the Christian
school and then for three yearsI also taught on base at the
Department of Defense schools,so at a middle school there.
So that was yeah, I candefinitely identify with that it
was a little bit of cultureshock going back and forth
between those different worlds.
(11:57):
So yeah.
Kevin (11:59):
So one of the things, one of the reasons I was really
excited to have you on thispodcast is I will call it kind
of an uncommon church concept.
And before we get too deep intoit, I just want to I'll throw a
disclaimer out.
There is that you know we'renot, we're not trying to bash
any church.
We're not trying to bash theway that America traditionally
(12:19):
does church.
I think there's reasons thatit's evolved into what it is.
But at the same time, you'vebeen doing learning a lot and
just kind of reflecting.
At the same time, I've beenkind of just reflecting on does
the way that we do things makesense?
And once again, beck and I, weattend a church locally.
We love it, we're grateful forit, the pastors are amazing, we
(12:42):
love the ministry that they'redoing.
But I think it's always good tokind of evaluate and say is
what we're doing the way thingswere meant to be and is it the
best way to do things?
And maybe are we holding ontosome traditions that no longer
serve us and so we're going togo down that road?
(13:02):
And I just want to throw thatdisclaimer out there.
We're not trying to bash anychurch or anything like that.
But if you currently attendchurch, really just kind of want
to encourage you to number one,go back to scripture.
And number two, just keep anopen mind, say hmm, is there
something?
that maybe I'm missing, or justkeep an open mind is ultimately
(13:23):
what we're going to talk about.
So you have been been spendingcan I?
Matt (13:27):
can I add to that real quick, just to say one of the
things I because, when you, whenyou try to challenge people's
thinking on you know biblicalideas and church traditions and
all of that kind of stuffsometimes people interpret it as
like we're bashing and I'm withyou, like I're not.
I don't wanna come across thatway.
Also, though, the cool thingabout it, kevin, is God has a
(13:52):
way, even in our imperfectefforts at church, of redeeming
those things and working despitethem.
Even if it's not 100% alignedwith his plan or his design, he
still redeems it and he stillworks.
So that's I always come back tothat Like God's at work, no
matter what denomination you'rein, no matter if you're
(14:14):
following the scriptures andyou're just, you love the Lord,
right the first commandment thathe somehow has a way of
redeeming our broken efforts.
Kevin (14:23):
So that's Amen.
I love that.
I've actually learned a lotfrom some people that I've later
learned are really horriblepeople and it's like, hey, you
know what God can use goodpeople and he can use bad people
and he can use things eitherway.
Redemption that's the businesshe's in, so Absolutely yes.
(14:43):
So bottom line is you've beenlearning and thinking about the
role of the church, andespecially modern Western church
systems, what we're, in America, certainly accustomed to.
What are some of the keyelements that might need to be
modeled more closely after thepatterns of Acts and the New
Testament?
Matt (15:03):
Yeah, that's a really good question.
The big answer to it is, or thehigh level answer, would be
that we really like the questionyou stated.
We really have to lean into thepatterns of the New Testament
as our guide, and specificallyActs and the epistles.
I actually, you know theintention of the authors there
(15:28):
was that these were patternsthat we are all called to follow
and along the way and this is,you know, one of the key things
that was very, very helpful forme in thinking about the role of
the church, because I believethat the church is God's
intended, it's his plan, right,it's ultimately and I ran a
(15:51):
nonprofit for 10 years and Isaid all the time, the Western
501c3 nonprofit is not God'splan for bringing redemption to
the world, it's the church, andin 500 years, if the Lord should
tarry that, the church willstill be around, but nonprofits
may not even exist anymore.
(16:12):
But the plan is for his church.
But what we've done a lot oftimes in our world is we have
disintegrated the church where,when you read the patterns of
the New Testament, it's anintegrated plan.
So what do I mean by that?
I mean we take something likemissions and we say, well,
(16:34):
that's something that theprofessionals do out in the
mission field and they're alifelong ministry and that's
their job and their role.
And then we take something likeevangelism and we outsource
that to some specially giftedspeakers, maybe somebody that's
more extroverted, or somethinglike training leaders, and we
(16:54):
outsource that to a seminary.
When you look at the patterns ofthe New Testament, all of those
things were integrated togetherinto the life of the church
family and it was something thatwas truly church-based.
It was all happening within thecontext of churches as families
(17:15):
.
So that's kind of a higherlevel answer to the question
there.
But it's this idea that we havefragmented everything from the
daily life of the church andwhen all of those things were
part of their daily life becausethey were operating as family.
That's really what the churchyou know was intended to be.
Kevin (17:38):
So why don't you paint a picture for me, and especially
for those who might not have agood understanding of acts and
the epistles?
Uh yeah, what did church looklike 2000 years ago?
Um?
Matt (17:56):
Yeah, that's a really good question.
Well, I think one of the keyelements is, like I mentioned,
the church was a family, and Ibelieve that's a big part of
God's design and intention forthe church is that we're
intended the base social unit orthe operating unit for the
church is a family, and so in afamily you have fathers and
(18:21):
mothers and aunts and uncles andcousins and brothers and
sisters and all of those kindsof things, and in a lot of ways,
the church has becomeinstitutionalized, where it's
operating on a corporatestructure instead of a family
structure, of a family structure.
(18:44):
So, if a church is intended tobe a family and there's a lot of
texts that Paul talks about youknow these household texts
they're called that Paul writesabout really trying to shore up
this idea of the church being afamily, of families right Coming
together, of families rightComing together.
(19:04):
Well, you think about it.
Then, how do families meet?
What do families do?
And so part of what you knowwe've been practicing in my
church family and we're part ofa whole network of churches that
meet this way is we meet inhomes and we meet around a meal,
around a table, and then wehave more dialogue, discussion
rather than what you might calltraditional preaching along the
(19:26):
way, because that's part of whatfamilies do and part of the
idea around it as well is I wasjust speaking to some folks
about this this past coupleweeks 59 times in the New
Testament there's commands onhow we one another and a big
part of our walking out of ourChristian life is one anothering
(19:51):
, and I had somebody comment tome.
They said, yeah, but oursystems today aren't really set
up for one anothering.
It's set up for a passiveexperience and we don't
necessarily have a system thatis designed and intended for
(20:11):
folks to one another.
Well, so what happens aroundthe dinner table?
And we actually celebrate theLord's supper around a dinner
table and I think this is a lotof what to answer your question.
2,000 years ago churches weredoing.
They were sharing a mealtogether as a family and they
had leaders that were leadingthem through how to be mature
(20:35):
followers of Jesus, like that'sultimately the goal in a family
is to, like we talk about withour teenagers.
We want them to grow and matureand to be functioning adults,
and it's the same is true inchurch families.
We want people to actually growup in their faith.
That's part of the goal.
Kevin (20:53):
Yeah.
So let's just talk about theLord's supper, which most people
probably know as communion.
So what Jesus did with hisdisciples, that he gave us the
instruction to duplicate, is toparticipate in the Lord's Supper
.
And if you take communion atpretty much any church, and
certainly in America I, you know, I haven't been to a whole lot
(21:15):
outside the ones I've been to inother countries are fairly
Americanized, either, you know,in okinawa or, um, yeah, and I'm
trying to think, gosh, if I'vebeen to any churches anywhere
else, I don't know that I have,but I imagine they're heavily
influenced by america anyways.
But you know, if you look atwhat we do for communion, like
wait a minute, this is thelord's supper, like is this all
(21:36):
he's given us?
So like, yeah, dig into that alittle bit more, like what was
really intended.
And the other thing is, if youthink of Thanksgiving feast,
right, the amount of communion,like literally, when we're
talking communion, we mean, youknow, connecting, right, we're
talking about conversation.
The communion that happens whenwe take communion in a Western
(21:57):
church is totally different.
So talk about.
What is that experience?
What did Jesus intend for thatexperience to really be like?
Matt (22:06):
Yeah, yeah, that's a really good question and, like
you mentioned, when heinstituted that with his
disciples, we can get some cluesfrom there.
Another really key place tolook at that is in 1 Corinthians
actually.
So 1 Corinthians, chapter 11,verses 17, all the way through
(22:30):
chapter 14, is really Pauloutlining what the gathering of
believers ought to look like,and that's that.
That's that uh, uh.
As I'm sure you're familiarwith it.
That at the beginning, or at1117, he starts saying I've
received from the Lord what I'mdelivering to you, that on the,
(22:51):
on the uh, uh, at the lastsupper, the Lord took the bread
and he broke it and he said thisis my body Right.
But Paul is actually writingthat because he says to the
Corinthian church you'regathering for the Lord's supper,
not for the good, but it'sactually worse because you've
got it all mixed up.
And so he's actually correctingthem and saying how you gather
(23:13):
really matters.
And what he says is when youcome together for the meal and
the word there is actually theword for feast.
It was actually a feast.
It wasn't a wafer and a shotglass, it was actually them
coming around together for afeast as a family.
And then he goes on to talkabout well, what does that all
(23:35):
look like?
And chapter 12, he talks aboutspiritual gifts and how we use
spiritual gifts.
Chapter 13, he says the mostimportant thing is that we have
love for one another.
Right, it's that famous lovechapter that's not just intended
to be read at weddings.
He's actually saying this isthe most excellent way when we
(23:57):
come together to gather.
And he goes on and addresses abunch of other things in those
chapters.
But that's really what a lot ofthat was is coming together
around a meal.
And then, really, chapter 14,he talks about okay, now, when
you also have this discussiontime, this teaching time of
(24:18):
really leaders, kind offacilitating not just a sermon
that's one direction, butmulti-directional conversation.
The beauty of it is peopleactually can process what
they're learning and you canhave conversation about how to
apply it to our lives, which isa really, really important
(24:39):
element, right Of like, not justnot just throwing ideas at
people and hoping it sticks, buthelping people think through
what does this mean for me andmy family and our lives today
and how we live out our callingas Christians?
Kevin (24:55):
That's great.
Do you see any differences inhow the church interacted from
an age standpoint?
And let me be very clear I'mgrateful for children's pastors
and youth pastors and I knowthat a lot of kids.
They have incredibleexperiences at youth camps and
(25:17):
youth group and things like that.
One of the regrets that my wifeand I have with some of our kids
is we weren't as intentionalabout making sure they had a
good community that a youthgroup can provide although I
don't think it always does, butmany times does.
And I want to say first of allthank you to youth pastors
(25:38):
because I think it's one of themost challenging and thankless
and underrated jobs, at least inthe Western American church.
So I'm certainly not bashing it, but the flip side is we're
very segregated.
You know kids go off to theirthing, the teenagers go off to
their thing, and when you lookat even how life was done in the
old one room schoolhouse, likethere's a lot of advantages to
(26:01):
that and I imagine that churchin 2000 years ago that Paul was
talking about looked verydifferent than it does today.
So, like, how do you envisionthat and how do you see that
possibly being more advantageousfor us properly training up our
kids?
Matt (26:19):
Yeah, that's a really good question.
So one of the uncommon thingsabout the church to use that key
on that term, uncommon that wasreally distinctive about them
though in the early church, wasthat it was multi-generational.
Generational um, the roles andof men and women were very uh
(26:45):
counter-cultural at that time umthe uh diversity in the church,
with different ethnicitiescoming together.
That's why paul talks about,you know, there's neither jew,
nor greek jew, nor greek slave,nor free like it was people from
all different economic levelsall coming and gathering
together, which is really reallyunique.
But along with that, it wasmultigenerational, right, and it
(27:08):
was the idea, and I agree withyou.
Like, we're not bashing youthgroups or anything like that.
My kids have been involved inyouth events and things.
My daughter has been veryinvolved in a local youth group
by us.
But there's a multi-generationalelement of the church and this
is why Paul says to Titus inTitus, chapter two, and he gives
(27:33):
instructions.
He says older women ought tobehave this way, but they ought
to be investing in younger women, and he talks about older men
and younger men and slaves andmasters or we might think of
that as employees and employerstoday, right, those kinds of
(27:53):
things.
But how we all relate to eachother in this drastically
diverse and unique context isactually a big part of our
witness to the world as well.
Right, how we love each other.
That's why Jesus said they'llknow you're Christians by your
love for one another.
And but part of our systemtoday is we have fragmented a
(28:15):
lot of those things where it'slike, oh well, the kids just
hang out over here with the kidsand we have a a senior adults
group and they just do theirthing and we're missing out on
that.
One anotheringmulti-generationally.
That is really, reallyimportant.
Kevin (28:32):
So yeah, it's so good, it's so good.
And then like from a buildingstandpoint.
You know, when a typical personsays church, what they mean is
I go to this particular buildingat such and such location.
What did the buildings looklike?
What did the church physicallylook like from a building
(28:53):
standpoint 2,000 years ago?
Matt (28:55):
And what?
Kevin (28:55):
lessons can we take from that?
Matt (28:57):
Yeah, yeah, there's a really good book I would
actually recommend along theselines as well.
It's available on Amazon.
It's by a guy named RobertBanks and it's called Going a
(29:18):
narrative from the view of aRoman non-believer attending a
first century church gathering.
But essentially they weremostly in homes and you know.
So some people have said well,are you part of a house church
movement?
Which there are a lot of housechurch movements happening.
It wasn't strictly in homes,because sometimes they might
(29:41):
have met in a storefront ifsomebody had a business or those
kinds of things, but theytended to be smaller groups,
more intimate, and they gatheredaround a meal and a
conversation.
That was a big part of how thefirst church gathered in that
way, of how the first churchgathered in that way.
(30:04):
But yeah, again, it was thatmulti-ethnic, multi-generational
type of gathering where they'reall coming together and I'm
forgetting if I'm even answeringyour question at all.
I was talking about kind of likeyeah, what the physical
building looked like as as faras the building, yeah, and you
talked about homes andbusinesses, so yeah, Go ahead.
(30:26):
No, I was just going to say,yeah, that's, you know.
Now we think of a churchbuilding as an auditorium, right
, you know, it's with pews androws, with everybody facing
towards a stage and rows witheverybody facing towards a stage
(30:46):
.
The unique thing back then itwas more around a table,
everybody facing each other andbeing able to interact together,
which is, I think, a keyelement of it all and the
interesting thing about this andI haven't actually done the
math on this, but when youactually look at the amount of
church dollars that are wrappedup in budgets around buildings
(31:08):
and salaries instead, andthey're not actually invested in
the progress of the gospel asmuch, it's more an internal
expense it's pretty striking,especially in America, right?
And so there's I know of somechurches that you know say well,
we give 10% of our budget tomissions or outreach or
(31:32):
something like that.
I also know of other churchesthat have no buildings.
They have dozens, actuallydozens, of churches meeting in
homes or other places like that,and they give 90% of their
budget towards outreach andmissions and the progress of the
gospel.
So there's, that's a uniquething.
(31:54):
When you talk about the buildingand what the building was like,
I'll just say this last thingtoo.
Peter talks about thisspecifically when he talks about
how Jesus is.
Each one of us is living stonesthat make up his church, and
it's the idea that we are thetemple that comes.
(32:15):
We're building up that holytemple and Christ is the
cornerstone of that temple, ofthe cornerstone of that building
and and so.
So it's this.
It's kind of getting beyondjust the four walls of things
and thinking like no, actuallywe are that temple, we are his
image bearers.
His spirit resides in us andthere's something holy about
(32:38):
that.
When we come together, it's.
It's not that the buildingitself or the four walls are
sacred or holy According to theNew Testament, that Holy Spirit
presence resides when we arethere, when his people come
together.
Kevin (32:58):
That's great.
Um, one of the things that I'veobserved and I was listening to
another podcast yesterday andthey mentioned this but in the
new Testament when, uh and I'mgoing to show my ignorance in
scripture, I think it'stypically Paul writing letters
to the churches, right, and hesays to the church in you know,
gilbert, you know, so he namesto the church in a specific city
(33:20):
, and so the when I read that,I'm thinking okay, there's just
a single church there, andobviously I don't know if it's
because it was such a newmovement that there just weren't
that many people, so physicallythey could all fit into a home
or a business.
Did they grow to?
(33:41):
You know, so did.
Did large buildings become anecessity because the church
grew, or was the intent that, um, as you grew, you just broke
off and started, you know, like,all right, we're.
You know, this group is goingto meet in Kevin's home, this
group is going to meet in Matt'shome.
What do you think the intentwas?
And how did we go from meetingat homes and people's actual
(34:02):
buildings, which is a much moreefficient way of doing things
from a financial standpoint?
Because one of the things I'mfully aware of is that I would
imagine that of the money getsyou know, donated to a church,
probably I would.
I guess at least 50% just goesto operational stuff paying the
bills, rent or you know propertytaxes, you know salaries, and
(34:27):
so go ahead and answer that.
And then I have anotherquestion kind of along the line
of salaries for pastors.
Matt (34:31):
So yeah, yeah.
So.
So an example would be you know, Paul writes a letter to the
church in Ephesus.
Right, and I've been there,I've been to Ephesus.
Kevin (34:41):
It's unbelievable.
Yeah, I have too.
Matt (34:43):
Yes, yeah, fantastic, I loved it.
Yeah, but yeah, so it wasn'tnecessarily just one church in
one location.
So part of what Paul was doingwas he was planting communities
and as those communities grow up, they go and they plant more
communities.
So almost think of like astrawberry patch, right, where
(35:05):
you have all these little podsthat all have their roots, but
they're all connected.
And it's this idea thatultimately, what Paul was doing
was he was planting networks ofchurches that were all connected
together.
So when he said, you know thisletter to the church in Ephesus,
there were multiple locations,churches, it actually says that
(35:26):
the whole region was inundatedwith the news of the gospel.
Right, so it was.
There were churches all overthe place that met separately
but they were all connectedtogether through apostolic
leaders like Paul or Timothy orothers that you know.
So they circulated theseletters around to all the
different churches in the region.
(35:46):
But primarily, the churcheswere identified by you know what
city they were a part of.
You know Paul and Barnabas weresent out of.
You know the church in Antioch,you know to on on all of their,
their missionary journeys.
So, uh, those the short answerto your question is no, I don't
believe it was just one churchin one city.
(36:07):
It was a network of churches ora family of families that was
growing throughout an entirecity or even a region.
Kevin (36:15):
So but because the church was considered the body of
believers, you took all thosemicro churches and called them
the church right, yes,absolutely yeah.
So my other question has to goalong with the concept of, like
you know, full-time ministry.
Getting paid Are there, and I'mtrying to remember who it was.
(36:37):
Once again I'm going to show myignorance of scripture, at
least some of the details.
I know there were collectionstaken up to allow people to be,
I think, in full-time ministry.
Was Paul one of those?
But I also know, wasn't he alsoa tent maker?
But are there early churchexamples of people who they
(36:57):
stopped their career whatever itwas to do ministry full-time?
Matt (37:03):
Yeah, yeah, that's a really good question and I think
so it's a nuanced answer or acomplex answer, because I think
we see both of those thingshappening at times.
Right, we see times where Paulwrites and says he's very, very
thankful to the church atPhilippi for the gifts that they
(37:24):
gave to help support him in hiswork, right, right, that's what
I'm.
But at the same time, at thesame time, he writes to, uh, the
church in Thessalonica, andsays when I was among you, I
worked, uh, and and that's theexample that you ought to follow
and he's talking about his tentmaking and how he went to
provide for himself.
So I think there's a little bitof both, of some of those
(37:47):
things, and that's actually someof the transition I'm trying to
figure out personally, to behonest with you, because there's
been a handful of years where Iwas on a salary, right, and
there were people that helped tosupport some of our work when I
was church planting, obviouslyat the nonprofit, when we had
(38:10):
supporters supporting thenonprofit and I was paid a
salary.
Now I'm in a place where I'mdoing a little bit more tent
making type work, but there maybe people that come and support
in unique ways along the way,which is wonderful.
But you know, what we're tryingto build into our lives is a lot
of flexibility.
Where we can, you know we canprovide for the family but also
(38:35):
have the flexibility and thefreedom to step out when God
calls us to minister somewhere,to be involved somewhere as well
.
So I think you can see both inthe New Testament.
Let me just mention one otherthing too.
When it comes to funding andbudgets and all of those
(38:57):
conversations today, there's areally unique thing that you
also see in the New Testament,which is when there was famine
in the church in Jerusalem.
There's churches, a collectionthat is made amongst a whole
network of churches that isgoing to support what God is
(39:20):
doing in Jerusalem, because theysee themselves as the body of
Christ.
And we also see this in thebook of Acts, where it says
people did things like soldproperty Barnabas sold his
property right and they thatpeople were selling their goods
and bringing them to theapostles, not because the
apostles were so important or sothat they could have a salary,
(39:42):
but so that the apostles couldhelp to distribute these amongst
, you know, for folks in need.
So there's a lot of reallyunique things happening in the
New Testaments when it comes tofunding and provisions and all
of that kind of stuff that is.
There's a lot to think aboutthere.
I think that's that's veryinteresting.
Kevin (40:02):
Yeah, especially when you think about the millions I
would guess it's probably morelike billions in America that
are spent on like huge staffs,like like I understand you know
the pastor, he's full-time andhe, you know he's preaching and
he's, you know, teaching andmentoring and things like that.
It's good.
(40:22):
But you know the the advantageof a home church or someone owns
a business that says, hey, I'mgoing to open it up to the
church and on Sundays we'regoing to meet, you're using,
you're leveraging somethingthat's already there and so you
don't have to pay a full-timecustodian.
And you know this and that andand this and that and this and
that there's so many full-timepositions that have to be paid.
And then just the massiveamount that gets spent on real
(40:47):
estate and rent or mortgages andthings like that.
You're like wait a minute.
If we really thought of theworldwide church as the body of
Christ, as our brothers andsisters, I think there's
probably enough money in Americato make sure that no brother
sister worldwide goes hungry.
Matt (41:06):
Yeah.
Kevin (41:06):
But we're spending it on mortgages and salaries, and and
once again, I know this is goingto sound critical, but I'm just
like, I'm thinking about this,like, and I'm just like okay,
god, what do you intend?
What's, what did you reallywant for us?
Because it's so easy to driftover time?
Yeah, what's, what did youreally want for us, because it's
(41:27):
so easy to drift over time?
Um and uh.
So I know to a lot of peoplemaybe they're not interested.
I'm kind of geeking out overthis because I'm just like yeah
because I guess one of my corevalues is also efficiency, and
so when I'm like man, is there abetter way to do it?
So one of I'll I'll, I'll takeyour pick on this.
One of my other observations ofcertainly church today is that
I don't think, like most peoplewho claim to be a Christian in
(41:49):
America, really feel equipped,nor have they ever truly
witnessed to somebody, sharedthe gospel.
The American way of witnessingis hey, come to church, and I'm
going to say it's the pastor'sjob to share the gospel with
people.
Matt (42:09):
Is that what was intended 2000 years ago?
Right, yeah, that's, that's areally good question.
So I'll, I'll, uh, uh.
It's funny that you bring thisup because the last two Sundays
I preached a couple of sermonsthat ultimately led to this
exact conversation.
Amazing, led to this exactconversation, amazing, yeah, so
two Sundays ago, the sermon thatI preached the gist of it was
(42:34):
and this was at a local churchkind of near us that I preached
there about four times in thelast couple of months, just kind
of filling in with pulpitsupply and stuff like that but
the first message was about thisidea of a kind of redefining
worship, and it's the idea that,um, that God's image.
(42:57):
So we think of temples as aplace of worship.
Right, in the old Testament,things like that an ancient
believer would have thought ofthe creation account actually as
God's temple, instituting histemple, which is really unique.
And when he instituted thattemple, he actually put his
image in that temple in theGarden of Eden, and that image
(43:21):
was inscribed on humanity.
Right, we're bearers of hisimage, right?
So one of the primary ways thatwe can honor his image is how
we care for one another, right,if his image is inscribed on
humanity, how we care forhumanity matters.
It's actually an act of worship.
(43:41):
It's why Jesus could saywhatever you do to the least of
these, you do unto me.
It's because his image isinscribed on all of humanity.
But also, as believers think ofa temple, is where, in the Old
Testament, the presence of Godresided right In the Holy of
Holies, and so there's apresence now.
(44:05):
Stephen said in Acts the God,the creator of the universe,
doesn't reside in temples madeby human hands, but he resides
in us, right, and the same thingwith, like I mentioned, with
Peter earlier.
So it's this idea that honoringone another, all of the 59
commands to one another, arepart of our act of worship.
(44:26):
And I'm getting to what yourquestion was ultimately, which
is also okay.
So how we do that is actuallyour biggest witness to the world
.
And this was the second sermonthat I preached, which was, you
know, around this idea fromJesus's statement of a new
command I give to you, and thecommand is to love one another
(44:48):
as I have loved you.
This is how the world that youwill know that you're my
disciples, by how you love oneanother.
So how we gather as a communityis actually the proclamation to
the world how we want another,how we live life together and
how we build this unique, holySpirit filled community is one
(45:12):
of our biggest witnesses to theworld.
It's not as much about yes, weneed to be able to share the
good news, but it's notsomething just for a
professional pastor to be ableto do, just to leave it up to
them, or a high-profileevangelist.
It's something that reallyshould be done on a family or a
(45:33):
household or a neighborhood or acommunity.
Scale based on how we actuallylive our lives together is such
a powerful proclamation of thegoodness of God in our lives.
Kevin (45:47):
Yeah, that's so good.
And if you think about evenbeing intimidated to invite
people to church, if you'redoing church, like Thanksgiving
dinner we probably have allinvited someone to Thanksgiving
dinner at one point in our life.
Right, it's easy to do, butbecause it's like, why wouldn't
you want to go?
We're going to share a meal.
We all love each other.
(46:07):
You know, yeah, are there goingto be some arguments?
Yeah, it's family, right, Imean, there's going to be the
awkward people.
Right, it's family, but still,you love it and you look forward
to it and you know it.
Like, I think it's actually lessintimidating than walking into
a large building.
And you, granted, there's,there's some anonymity that
comes with walking into a largebuilding where you can slip in,
(46:28):
slip out, not even have to talkto anybody.
Uh, but I think there's theability to be a lot more
effective.
Now, here's the reality, right?
Um, there's also, if you'retalking about inviting people
into your home, there's a littlemore sacrifice involved, right,
because you don't necessarilyget to pick, handpick.
You know who's my church andthere might be some people that
(46:51):
you know they don't have your.
And I'm speaking as a type Awho, as a former Okinawan living
person, I want shoes off in thehouse because they're the
nastiest, dirtiest things in theworld and a lot of Americans
don't understand that yet.
Like there's some inconvenienceand stretching that has to
happen.
But that's kind of part of thesacrifice, right?
Matt (47:13):
That's part of the sacrifice, that's part of
learning and growing and lovingone another.
That's that's why you knowfirst Corinthians 13, love bears
all things endures all thingsLike.
That's part of learning.
To grow up together as a familyis, like you said, some of the
inconveniences or theawkwardness of things.
(47:34):
I do think, too, one of thereasons people get hesitant
about an idea of like house,church and things like that is
there's actually a differentlevel of accountability that
exists as well.
It's very hard to slip throughthe cracks like you can in a
large mega church type contextwhere, like you said, you can
(47:55):
slip in and out, um, and youmight not.
You might never meet the pastorof your church, right, right,
um.
But in, in a more intimateenvironment, there's some real
advantages because there'saccountability.
Kevin (48:07):
Yeah, yeah, no, that's great.
So well, we have definitely Imean probably COVID revealed a
lot of the shortfalls of theAmerican church to me the way
(48:30):
that so many churches respondedor failed to respond to it.
And so I've just kind of beenruminating and once again, I
love our church.
I've seen so many great thingscome from it.
But once again it's like is theway we do things, is it the
best?
And as someone who's alwaysstriving after improvement, like
, oh, how can we be better, howcan we disciple better?
And in the theme of creatinguncommon men over and over, you
(48:55):
know America, we'reindividualistic to a fault and
I'm speaking as in the ultimatemaverick type personality, like
I am an American, like to thecore and in many ways to a fault
.
But, you know, we, we send ourkids to school to get educated,
you know, at the Sunday schoolto get discipled, and it's like,
(49:16):
wait a minute, we're supposedto do that, right yeah.
Matt (49:19):
Yeah, no, absolutely.
And I, you know, just in alongthat theme of uncommon men, like
I think it's actually somethingthat we really need to think
about as men, as fathers, ashusbands, you know, taking
responsibility for the growthand maturing and the
(49:40):
discipleship of our families.
Discipleship of our families.
There's a reason why Paul madesuch a big deal about it in some
of those household texts in theNew Testament because it's
supposed to be the foundationfor how Christ's plan comes to
be right.
(50:01):
It's built on strong families.
That's why, when he talks aboutelders and the qualifications
for elders, they have to be ableto manage their household well,
right, that's it's so, soimportant.
The mission of God is directlyconnected to how we, as men,
lead our families and our wivesand our children and and and our
(50:23):
, our, our communities around us.
It's it's so, so important.
I mean we, we have to bewilling to to make those ask
those uncommon questions andmake those uncommon choices in
order to to make that happen.
Kevin (50:36):
Yeah, awesome, matt.
Well, hey, we will.
We may have to do another one,or at least we'll continue the
conversation, because I'm lovingit, um, but talk about.
Matt (50:43):
I could go on forever, but I understand you've got a time
limit too.
Kevin (50:46):
You've got a podcast coming out.
Why don't you just tell usabout that real quick?
Matt (50:52):
Yeah, no, I appreciate you bringing that up it's so yeah,
we're actually looking at, we'regoing to be starting to record.
You know we're here in the endof August now and starting to
record in September.
Hopefully I have some episodesout there later in September.
But the name of our podcast isgoing to be Guarding the Good
(51:14):
Deposit and so it's this idea.
In 2 Timothy 1, paul actuallycharged his protege, timothy, to
guard the good deposit.
That's what he charged him todo and it refers to the
(51:34):
teachings and the traditionspassed down from Christ through
the apostles.
So we're really going to bejust spending a lot of time
intentionally talking about that.
What's that apostolic traditionthat was passed down from Paul
to Timothy?
And then we really see it forthe first 300 years of
Christianity before it kind ofgets institutionalized.
So we're going to spend a lotof time talking about that.
Initially, our first six orseven episodes are going to be
(51:57):
just on the book of Acts andreally trying to discern the
book of Acts and hopefullyhaving a good time having some
conversation.
I'm doing it with a ministryfriend here in New Jersey.
His name is Scott and I'mexcited to see it come together.
So Guarding the Good Deposit isthe name of it, excellent.
Kevin (52:14):
And then you've got a sub stack.
Tell us where to find that.
Matt (52:18):
Yeah, my sub stack is oh man, I get mixed up on what, the
maybe, I don't know.
If you have it in front of you,I've got it.
Kevin (52:24):
So it's substackcom, uh slash at matthew anderson, uh
two t's and it's an e?
R s e?
N instead of the s?
O?
Matt (52:36):
n for that and anderson with an e, yeah, anderson with
an.
I forget, I forget, you know,the facebook link and the the
instagram link.
I forget, but yeah, so so it's.
You can look up MatthewAnderson there on Substack.
And again, that's some of it isjust me, literally, I'm just
starting this as well, but justsome reflections, some thoughts,
(52:58):
some ideas, especially on howwe can better live out our
calling as followers of Jesus.
So I'm excited to-.
Kevin (53:09):
And you're on pretty much all the major social platforms.
I've got your links.
I will put those in the shownotes.
So, if people want to learnmore, if they want to geek out
on this kind of stuff the waythat I'm enjoying the
conversation they can and learnother great things from you.
But, matt, great to see youagain.
Learn other great things fromyou.
But, matt, great to see youagain.
As always, I appreciate you.
You're definitely one of thoseyou know uncommon men.
(53:31):
That has had a profound impacton my life.
I'm better for it.
We've had some incredible timesback in Okinawa just enjoying
life doing.
I mean we we did.
We went to kind of a moreWestern church but we we still
did church the old way.
I mean we spent holidaystogether.
That was what was one of thegreat things about Okinawa is we
spent holidays and we, just we.
(53:52):
We we live life together.
Matt (53:53):
It was incredible yeah Well, that was a unique thing
about that situation too isthere were so many of us that we
were away from our biologicalfamilies.
Right, you were.
You were stationed there inOkinawa.
Your family was back in theStates.
So what do you do whenThanksgiving comes around?
Oh well, we all get together asa church family, and it's a
beautiful thing when you get achance to do that, and there's
(54:16):
lifelong relationships that werebuilt in the midst of that.
So good to connect in this wayyears later?
Absolutely, it's awesome.
Kevin (54:23):
Well, brother, thanks for your time For those of you
listening.
I hope you enjoyed this littlemore unique version of the
podcast.
But thanks for making itthrough and if you have any
questions, you know, reach outto me, reach out to Matt.
You know, and, once again, youknow, if you're pursuing your
faith, feel free go to your.
You know it's going to beeasier to find a traditional
local building type of church.
(54:44):
You know it's going to beeasier to find a traditional
local building type of church.
But dig into the Bible andfigure out okay, what does God
really want and which is?
You know, ultimately, the goalis to build uncommon families,
uncommon, you know, christians.
Uncommon men you know that aregoing to raise uncommon kids.
So, matt, have a great day,brother.
Matt (55:01):
Love it All right, see ya Appreciate it.
Man, have a good one.
All right friends, welcome back to the Uncommon
Freedom Show.
Today I am joined by a veteranfriend of mine yes, I do
occasionally keep some friendsfor more than one or two years
Matt Anderson, who for over 20years Matt has served in
leadership in education,business, nonprofits and in the
local church as a pastor,worship leader and church
(00:24):
planter.
He now works primarily with theMetro Equipping Coalition, mec
in greater New York City,supporting church planters,
training leaders andestablishing churches as
families patterned after theBook of Acts, which we're going
to talk about today.
I'm really excited.
Matt currently partners withBuild International's Global
Apostolic Team and collaborateswith the Chalmers Center, ccda
(00:46):
and City Advance to advancecitywide unity, economic
empowerment and church-basedleadership worldwide.
Matt is a certified facilitatorfor the Six Types of Working
Genius Model, which Bek and Iare huge fans of.
Matt.
That was cool to read andhere's a really fun fact Matt
once served as the front man fora little-known rock band called
(01:07):
the Middleman.
It's one of the most fun thingshe's ever done in his life and
yours truly was part of thatband and that was an absolute
blast back in the 2004-2005 timeframe Matt, right?
Matt (01:22):
Yeah, something like that.
That was excellent.
Kevin (01:24):
Yeah, it was great.
And he also loves basketball,riding his Harley and spending
time with his family.
His favorite scripture verse isGalatians 6, 9, and let us not
grow weary while doing good, forin due season we shall reap if
we do not lose heart.
Matt, it's great to see you,brother.
Matt (01:41):
Yes, so good to be here on this.
Thank you for the opportunityto just share a little bit about
what God is teaching me.
Kevin (01:47):
Yeah, absolutely.
And you know, as I started thisseries, I've been blessed to
have some just incrediblefriends and incredible Christian
brothers in my life for so long.
And when I look back in my life, you know the season where
Becca and I met you and yourwife Jess, uh, was early 2002
when we showed up in Okinawa andthen after a couple months,
(02:10):
found Calvary Calvary Chapel,okinawa, and I think you and
Jess were leading worship thatlike our first Sunday in that.
Well, actually, yeah, that thatold building, weren't you?
Yeah, yeah.
Matt (02:21):
We were.
I wasn't the, I wasn't theleader of that time.
I think I was still pretty, uh,you know, wet behind the ears
with some of that stuff, but itwas, uh, yeah, we were involved
from the get go um, you know, insome pretty cool ways.
It was a lot of fun.
Kevin (02:36):
Yeah, so real quick, let's uh, let's talk about your
family, so I mentioned your wife.
Matt (02:47):
Jess, you guys got married fairly young as well, right?
Yeah, we've been married now.
We got married in 2002, justbefore we moved to Japan.
So we're on year 23 now, Iguess.
So, yeah, and we have threekids.
They are just about to turn 15,17, and 19.
So they're moving from highschool into college.
(03:08):
We've got three teenagers inthe house, which has been
awesome.
Kevin (03:11):
Yeah, no, it's actually a very fun season.
As long as you can survive thehormones and the mood swings and
things like that, whetherthey're boys or girls, because
they both deal with that stuffit's actually.
It's a very, it's a super funseason in life because you're
transitioning from you knowhaving to do so much and parent
and correct to it's you knowthere's a friendship element.
(03:33):
I think it's you got to becareful to not become your
child's best friend when they'rea teenager, but there's a
relating on a totally differentlevel, so that's awesome.
Matt (03:40):
Yeah, it's been cool too.
Awesome, yeah, it's been cooltoo.
I'll just add to that sayinglike one of the fun things is
seeing each of our kids startingto find their lane and getting
their own interests and finding,like you know, just uh, just
the the kinds of things thatreally uh, feed them and
energize them and just walkingthem each through that and it's
(04:00):
so different.
You know this, we've got threekids and it's like you got to
learn to parent three times fromscratch, basically.
Kevin (04:08):
So it's crazy, yeah, cause you, you get your first
and then you kind of figure out,okay, this worked, that didn't.
And then you're like we'regoing to do the same thing with
number two.
And then you know uh, you knowI'm thinking of who does number
two work for, right From AustinPowers, because it's almost the
same thing, it's like wait aminute like why aren't you
responding the same way?
(04:28):
It doesn't make any sense, soit is a fun season, yeah exactly
.
So, in addition to parenting andraising kids, fill us in what
else have you been up to for thelast 20 years, because it's
been almost that long since weleft, actually it's been about
that long since we left Okinawa.
Matt (04:46):
Yeah, yeah, it's been, uh, it's been a little bit of a
whirlwind and you know, uh, justkind of the long story short.
You know our time in Japan.
Uh, you know about three of wewere there for five years.
I think you guys were threeyears there.
Um, and it really was aformative time for us and we got
very, very heavily involved inministry life at our church
there.
I was, like you mentioned,leading worship there and really
(05:11):
felt called to come back to NewJersey where I grew up.
We moved back here in 2007 andour heart was to plant a church
here in North Jersey and it'sbeen a roller coaster ride.
I spent some time working inthe family business planting a
church, initially in the suburbs, and then God eventually moved
us into the heart of the innercity of Patterson, new Jersey.
Kevin (05:35):
That's where we visited you, right.
Matt (05:38):
That's right.
Yep, that's right.
Yep, you saw the Great Fallsand all that kind of fun stuff.
Yeah, yeah, that was awesome.
And eventually I ended upleading a nonprofit a pretty
significant nonprofit in thecity of Patterson.
I was involved there for about10 years about seven as the
executive director, leading anetwork of about 80 churches and
(06:02):
organizations that we servedall of those churches and
organizations and really, alongthe way, just learning a lot.
God has been just teaching us aton of stuff, and about 18
months ago I stepped down frommy nonprofit role and now I'm
not necessarily just doing onething but doing a lot of
(06:24):
different things.
I'm still working with somenonprofits, doing some of my own
work, supporting my wife insome of her work.
It's been an interesting seasonof transition for us along the
way.
Kevin (06:40):
Awesome, awesome.
Yeah, it's been fun staying intouch, probably talking about
once a year, yeah, and I've seenyou, I think, twice or so since
, since we left Okinawa.
But you know it's good friends,you stay connected and you know
you can connect once a year andyou still know that you've got
each other's back and when youjust pick up where you left off.
Matt (07:01):
Yeah, it really is.
Kevin (07:03):
It really is.
It's awesome.
So what are some of the thingsthat you've been learning along
the way?
I mean, obviously you startedin Christian education in
Okinawa Christian School and thestudents there were they mostly
the children of militaryfamilies or who was the typical
(07:24):
student at OC, at OkinawaChristian school?
Matt (07:27):
Yeah, it was a mix.
So it was an American styleChristian school, all English
instruction and everything wasan international school.
But actually a lot of the kidswere kids that were half
American, half Okinawan.
So generally they would have anAmerican dad that was
oftentimes a military, usmilitary dad, and a Japanese or
(07:51):
Okinawan mom.
So it was a lot of mixed kids,but there was also some, you
know, full Japanese kids, fullAmerican kids.
Parents that you know chose tosend their kids, you know, if
they were stationed there in themilitary.
So it was, it was a mix ofwhich.
That that's part of.
What I loved is just, you know,getting to know all the
different cultures and just yeah, that's.
(08:13):
It was all beautiful stuffthere.
Kevin (08:14):
So, just kind of going with the uncommon man theme,
talk about some of the thingsthat you observed.
If you can reach back this farin your memory, yeah, you know
two very different cultures,okinawan and American, very
different.
What were some of the thingsthat you observed, especially of
the Okinawan kids, the kids whohad two Okinawan parents
(08:36):
compared to the ones that maybehad just one Okinawan and one
American, versus the ones thathad two American, just one.
Matt (08:44):
Okinawan and one American versus the ones that had two
American?
Oh yeah, that's an interestingquestion.
Well, you know, I'm sure youremember this from your time
there as well, but very, verymuch baked into Okinawan and
Japanese culture is it's a highrespect culture, right and some
of that was also baked into themilitary culture, which you know
(09:07):
, having been in the Marinesthere.
So that was actually somethingthat was interesting for me,
coming from the Northeast of theUnited States, and I had
students and like everybodycalled my wife and I ma'am and
sir and there was just that kindof different level of respect
(09:31):
that was kind of in the cultureand the politeness and even just
when you go into a restaurantor a store and the way the
service was in the Japaneseculture is a very service
oriented community and that'sactually one of the things that
we kind of missed, miss comingback to the States, where you go
into a store or restaurant andit's like hey, can we actually
(09:53):
find somebody to help us here?
Kevin (09:55):
Absolutely.
Yeah, One of the profoundmemories that Beck and I have,
uh, was where we don't.
I don't remember the last timeI went to McDonald's, but there
was a McDonald's restaurantright around the corner from our
house and it we'd heard likeyou got to go to McDonald's and
normally that's not what anyoneever says and sure enough, we
(10:18):
checked it out and the, the, theemployees, were perfectly, you
know, wearing a perfectlypressed uniform.
I mean, they just looked, theylooked like you imagined they
did.
Back, when, you know, Ray Krocstarted the company and the food
presentation was just like itis in the photos and it was just
, it was kind of a microcosm ofjust how disciplined they are,
(10:42):
how much respect they have andit's definitely something that
is missing from American culture.
One of the other things thatBecca was kind of surprised
about, cause she taught on the,the base schools, and the
assumption that we both made wasoh, you're dealing with, you're
dealing with military familiesthat typically, you know, have
(11:06):
know, have respect, sir ma'am,that type of stuff, and and she
was shocked at the lack ofrespect, uh, just like how
undisciplined that a lot of thekids were.
It was just an interesting Idon't know.
I guess we had a, an assumption, uh, that would be super
respectful and a lot lessdiscipline problems.
And I guess people are peopleand you know, I guess the bottom
(11:28):
line is, if parents don't teachtheir kids good manners and the
same things that they'reapplying at work, they're not
going to, naturally, do it.
Matt (11:36):
So, yeah, I and actually I got to experience that because
for two years we were at theChristian school and then for
three years I've I also taughton base um at the Christian
school and then for three yearsI also taught on base at the
Department of Defense schools,so at a middle school there.
So that was yeah, I candefinitely identify with that it
was a little bit of cultureshock going back and forth
between those different worlds.
(11:57):
So yeah.
Kevin (11:59):
So one of the things, one of the reasons I was really
excited to have you on thispodcast is I will call it kind
of an uncommon church concept.
And before we get too deep intoit, I just want to I'll throw a
disclaimer out.
There is that you know we'renot, we're not trying to bash
any church.
We're not trying to bash theway that America traditionally
(12:19):
does church.
I think there's reasons thatit's evolved into what it is.
But at the same time, you'vebeen doing learning a lot and
just kind of reflecting.
At the same time, I've beenkind of just reflecting on does
the way that we do things makesense?
And once again, beck and I, weattend a church locally.
We love it, we're grateful forit, the pastors are amazing, we
(12:42):
love the ministry that they'redoing.
But I think it's always good tokind of evaluate and say is
what we're doing the way thingswere meant to be and is it the
best way to do things?
And maybe are we holding ontosome traditions that no longer
serve us and so we're going togo down that road?
(13:02):
And I just want to throw thatdisclaimer out there.
We're not trying to bash anychurch or anything like that.
But if you currently attendchurch, really just kind of want
to encourage you to number one,go back to scripture.
And number two, just keep anopen mind, say hmm, is there
something?
that maybe I'm missing, or justkeep an open mind is ultimately
(13:23):
what we're going to talk about.
So you have been been spendingcan I?
Matt (13:27):
can I add to that real quick, just to say one of the
things I because, when you, whenyou try to challenge people's
thinking on you know biblicalideas and church traditions and
all of that kind of stuffsometimes people interpret it as
like we're bashing and I'm withyou, like I're not.
I don't wanna come across thatway.
Also, though, the cool thingabout it, kevin, is God has a
(13:52):
way, even in our imperfectefforts at church, of redeeming
those things and working despitethem.
Even if it's not 100% alignedwith his plan or his design, he
still redeems it and he stillworks.
So that's I always come back tothat Like God's at work, no
matter what denomination you'rein, no matter if you're
(14:14):
following the scriptures andyou're just, you love the Lord,
right the first commandment thathe somehow has a way of
redeeming our broken efforts.
Kevin (14:23):
So that's Amen.
I love that.
I've actually learned a lotfrom some people that I've later
learned are really horriblepeople and it's like, hey, you
know what God can use goodpeople and he can use bad people
and he can use things eitherway.
Redemption that's the businesshe's in, so Absolutely yes.
(14:43):
So bottom line is you've beenlearning and thinking about the
role of the church, andespecially modern Western church
systems, what we're, in America, certainly accustomed to.
What are some of the keyelements that might need to be
modeled more closely after thepatterns of Acts and the New
Testament?
Matt (15:03):
Yeah, that's a really good question.
The big answer to it is, or thehigh level answer, would be
that we really like the questionyou stated.
We really have to lean into thepatterns of the New Testament
as our guide, and specificallyActs and the epistles.
I actually, you know theintention of the authors there
(15:28):
was that these were patternsthat we are all called to follow
and along the way and this is,you know, one of the key things
that was very, very helpful forme in thinking about the role of
the church, because I believethat the church is God's
intended, it's his plan, right,it's ultimately and I ran a
(15:51):
nonprofit for 10 years and Isaid all the time, the Western
501c3 nonprofit is not God'splan for bringing redemption to
the world, it's the church, andin 500 years, if the Lord should
tarry that, the church willstill be around, but nonprofits
may not even exist anymore.
(16:12):
But the plan is for his church.
But what we've done a lot oftimes in our world is we have
disintegrated the church where,when you read the patterns of
the New Testament, it's anintegrated plan.
So what do I mean by that?
I mean we take something likemissions and we say, well,
(16:34):
that's something that theprofessionals do out in the
mission field and they're alifelong ministry and that's
their job and their role.
And then we take something likeevangelism and we outsource
that to some specially giftedspeakers, maybe somebody that's
more extroverted, or somethinglike training leaders, and we
(16:54):
outsource that to a seminary.
When you look at the patterns ofthe New Testament, all of those
things were integrated togetherinto the life of the church
family and it was something thatwas truly church-based.
It was all happening within thecontext of churches as families
(17:15):
.
So that's kind of a higherlevel answer to the question
there.
But it's this idea that we havefragmented everything from the
daily life of the church andwhen all of those things were
part of their daily life becausethey were operating as family.
That's really what the churchyou know was intended to be.
Kevin (17:38):
So why don't you paint a picture for me, and especially
for those who might not have agood understanding of acts and
the epistles?
Uh yeah, what did church looklike 2000 years ago?
Um?
Matt (17:56):
Yeah, that's a really good question.
Well, I think one of the keyelements is, like I mentioned,
the church was a family, and Ibelieve that's a big part of
God's design and intention forthe church is that we're
intended the base social unit orthe operating unit for the
church is a family, and so in afamily you have fathers and
(18:21):
mothers and aunts and uncles andcousins and brothers and
sisters and all of those kindsof things, and in a lot of ways,
the church has becomeinstitutionalized, where it's
operating on a corporatestructure instead of a family
structure, of a family structure.
(18:44):
So, if a church is intended tobe a family and there's a lot of
texts that Paul talks about youknow these household texts
they're called that Paul writesabout really trying to shore up
this idea of the church being afamily, of families right Coming
together, of families rightComing together.
(19:04):
Well, you think about it.
Then, how do families meet?
What do families do?
And so part of what you knowwe've been practicing in my
church family and we're part ofa whole network of churches that
meet this way is we meet inhomes and we meet around a meal,
around a table, and then wehave more dialogue, discussion
rather than what you might calltraditional preaching along the
(19:26):
way, because that's part of whatfamilies do and part of the
idea around it as well is I wasjust speaking to some folks
about this this past coupleweeks 59 times in the New
Testament there's commands onhow we one another and a big
part of our walking out of ourChristian life is one anothering
(19:51):
, and I had somebody comment tome.
They said, yeah, but oursystems today aren't really set
up for one anothering.
It's set up for a passiveexperience and we don't
necessarily have a system thatis designed and intended for
(20:11):
folks to one another.
Well, so what happens aroundthe dinner table?
And we actually celebrate theLord's supper around a dinner
table and I think this is a lotof what to answer your question.
2,000 years ago churches weredoing.
They were sharing a mealtogether as a family and they
had leaders that were leadingthem through how to be mature
(20:35):
followers of Jesus, like that'sultimately the goal in a family
is to, like we talk about withour teenagers.
We want them to grow and matureand to be functioning adults,
and it's the same is true inchurch families.
We want people to actually growup in their faith.
That's part of the goal.
Kevin (20:53):
Yeah.
So let's just talk about theLord's supper, which most people
probably know as communion.
So what Jesus did with hisdisciples, that he gave us the
instruction to duplicate, is toparticipate in the Lord's Supper
.
And if you take communion atpretty much any church, and
certainly in America I, you know, I haven't been to a whole lot
(21:15):
outside the ones I've been to inother countries are fairly
Americanized, either, you know,in okinawa or, um, yeah, and I'm
trying to think, gosh, if I'vebeen to any churches anywhere
else, I don't know that I have,but I imagine they're heavily
influenced by america anyways.
But you know, if you look atwhat we do for communion, like
wait a minute, this is thelord's supper, like is this all
(21:36):
he's given us?
So like, yeah, dig into that alittle bit more, like what was
really intended.
And the other thing is, if youthink of Thanksgiving feast,
right, the amount of communion,like literally, when we're
talking communion, we mean, youknow, connecting, right, we're
talking about conversation.
The communion that happens whenwe take communion in a Western
(21:57):
church is totally different.
So talk about.
What is that experience?
What did Jesus intend for thatexperience to really be like?
Matt (22:06):
Yeah, yeah, that's a really good question and, like
you mentioned, when heinstituted that with his
disciples, we can get some cluesfrom there.
Another really key place tolook at that is in 1 Corinthians
actually.
So 1 Corinthians, chapter 11,verses 17, all the way through
(22:30):
chapter 14, is really Pauloutlining what the gathering of
believers ought to look like,and that's that.
That's that uh, uh.
As I'm sure you're familiarwith it.
That at the beginning, or at1117, he starts saying I've
received from the Lord what I'mdelivering to you, that on the,
(22:51):
on the uh, uh, at the lastsupper, the Lord took the bread
and he broke it and he said thisis my body Right.
But Paul is actually writingthat because he says to the
Corinthian church you'regathering for the Lord's supper,
not for the good, but it'sactually worse because you've
got it all mixed up.
And so he's actually correctingthem and saying how you gather
(23:13):
really matters.
And what he says is when youcome together for the meal and
the word there is actually theword for feast.
It was actually a feast.
It wasn't a wafer and a shotglass, it was actually them
coming around together for afeast as a family.
And then he goes on to talkabout well, what does that all
(23:35):
look like?
And chapter 12, he talks aboutspiritual gifts and how we use
spiritual gifts.
Chapter 13, he says the mostimportant thing is that we have
love for one another.
Right, it's that famous lovechapter that's not just intended
to be read at weddings.
He's actually saying this isthe most excellent way when we
(23:57):
come together to gather.
And he goes on and addresses abunch of other things in those
chapters.
But that's really what a lot ofthat was is coming together
around a meal.
And then, really, chapter 14,he talks about okay, now, when
you also have this discussiontime, this teaching time of
(24:18):
really leaders, kind offacilitating not just a sermon
that's one direction, butmulti-directional conversation.
The beauty of it is peopleactually can process what
they're learning and you canhave conversation about how to
apply it to our lives, which isa really, really important
(24:39):
element, right Of like, not justnot just throwing ideas at
people and hoping it sticks, buthelping people think through
what does this mean for me andmy family and our lives today
and how we live out our callingas Christians?
Kevin (24:55):
That's great.
Do you see any differences inhow the church interacted from
an age standpoint?
And let me be very clear I'mgrateful for children's pastors
and youth pastors and I knowthat a lot of kids.
They have incredibleexperiences at youth camps and
(25:17):
youth group and things like that.
One of the regrets that my wifeand I have with some of our kids
is we weren't as intentionalabout making sure they had a
good community that a youthgroup can provide although I
don't think it always does, butmany times does.
And I want to say first of allthank you to youth pastors
(25:38):
because I think it's one of themost challenging and thankless
and underrated jobs, at least inthe Western American church.
So I'm certainly not bashing it, but the flip side is we're
very segregated.
You know kids go off to theirthing, the teenagers go off to
their thing, and when you lookat even how life was done in the
old one room schoolhouse, likethere's a lot of advantages to
(26:01):
that and I imagine that churchin 2000 years ago that Paul was
talking about looked verydifferent than it does today.
So, like, how do you envisionthat and how do you see that
possibly being more advantageousfor us properly training up our
kids?
Matt (26:19):
Yeah, that's a really good question.
So one of the uncommon thingsabout the church to use that key
on that term, uncommon that wasreally distinctive about them
though in the early church, wasthat it was multi-generational.
Generational um, the roles andof men and women were very uh
(26:45):
counter-cultural at that time umthe uh diversity in the church,
with different ethnicitiescoming together.
That's why paul talks about,you know, there's neither jew,
nor greek jew, nor greek slave,nor free like it was people from
all different economic levelsall coming and gathering
together, which is really reallyunique.
But along with that, it wasmultigenerational, right, and it
(27:08):
was the idea, and I agree withyou.
Like, we're not bashing youthgroups or anything like that.
My kids have been involved inyouth events and things.
My daughter has been veryinvolved in a local youth group
by us.
But there's a multi-generationalelement of the church and this
is why Paul says to Titus inTitus, chapter two, and he gives
(27:33):
instructions.
He says older women ought tobehave this way, but they ought
to be investing in younger women, and he talks about older men
and younger men and slaves andmasters or we might think of
that as employees and employerstoday, right, those kinds of
(27:53):
things.
But how we all relate to eachother in this drastically
diverse and unique context isactually a big part of our
witness to the world as well.
Right, how we love each other.
That's why Jesus said they'llknow you're Christians by your
love for one another.
And but part of our systemtoday is we have fragmented a
(28:15):
lot of those things where it'slike, oh well, the kids just
hang out over here with the kidsand we have a a senior adults
group and they just do theirthing and we're missing out on
that.
One anotheringmulti-generationally.
That is really, reallyimportant.
Kevin (28:32):
So yeah, it's so good, it's so good.
And then like from a buildingstandpoint.
You know, when a typical personsays church, what they mean is
I go to this particular buildingat such and such location.
What did the buildings looklike?
What did the church physicallylook like from a building
(28:53):
standpoint 2,000 years ago?
Matt (28:55):
And what?
Kevin (28:55):
lessons can we take from that?
Matt (28:57):
Yeah, yeah, there's a really good book I would
actually recommend along theselines as well.
It's available on Amazon.
It's by a guy named RobertBanks and it's called Going a
(29:18):
narrative from the view of aRoman non-believer attending a
first century church gathering.
But essentially they weremostly in homes and you know.
So some people have said well,are you part of a house church
movement?
Which there are a lot of housechurch movements happening.
It wasn't strictly in homes,because sometimes they might
(29:41):
have met in a storefront ifsomebody had a business or those
kinds of things, but theytended to be smaller groups,
more intimate, and they gatheredaround a meal and a
conversation.
That was a big part of how thefirst church gathered in that
way, of how the first churchgathered in that way.
(30:04):
But yeah, again, it was thatmulti-ethnic, multi-generational
type of gathering where they'reall coming together and I'm
forgetting if I'm even answeringyour question at all.
I was talking about kind of likeyeah, what the physical
building looked like as as faras the building, yeah, and you
talked about homes andbusinesses, so yeah, Go ahead.
(30:26):
No, I was just going to say,yeah, that's, you know.
Now we think of a churchbuilding as an auditorium, right
, you know, it's with pews androws, with everybody facing
towards a stage and rows witheverybody facing towards a stage
(30:46):
.
The unique thing back then itwas more around a table,
everybody facing each other andbeing able to interact together,
which is, I think, a keyelement of it all and the
interesting thing about this andI haven't actually done the
math on this, but when youactually look at the amount of
church dollars that are wrappedup in budgets around buildings
(31:08):
and salaries instead, andthey're not actually invested in
the progress of the gospel asmuch, it's more an internal
expense it's pretty striking,especially in America, right?
And so there's I know of somechurches that you know say well,
we give 10% of our budget tomissions or outreach or
(31:32):
something like that.
I also know of other churchesthat have no buildings.
They have dozens, actuallydozens, of churches meeting in
homes or other places like that,and they give 90% of their
budget towards outreach andmissions and the progress of the
gospel.
So there's, that's a uniquething.
(31:54):
When you talk about the buildingand what the building was like,
I'll just say this last thingtoo.
Peter talks about thisspecifically when he talks about
how Jesus is.
Each one of us is living stonesthat make up his church, and
it's the idea that we are thetemple that comes.
(32:15):
We're building up that holytemple and Christ is the
cornerstone of that temple, ofthe cornerstone of that building
and and so.
So it's this.
It's kind of getting beyondjust the four walls of things
and thinking like no, actuallywe are that temple, we are his
image bearers.
His spirit resides in us andthere's something holy about
(32:38):
that.
When we come together, it's.
It's not that the buildingitself or the four walls are
sacred or holy According to theNew Testament, that Holy Spirit
presence resides when we arethere, when his people come
together.
Kevin (32:58):
That's great.
Um, one of the things that I'veobserved and I was listening to
another podcast yesterday andthey mentioned this but in the
new Testament when, uh and I'mgoing to show my ignorance in
scripture, I think it'stypically Paul writing letters
to the churches, right, and hesays to the church in you know,
gilbert, you know, so he namesto the church in a specific city
(33:20):
, and so the when I read that,I'm thinking okay, there's just
a single church there, andobviously I don't know if it's
because it was such a newmovement that there just weren't
that many people, so physicallythey could all fit into a home
or a business.
Did they grow to?
(33:41):
You know, so did.
Did large buildings become anecessity because the church
grew, or was the intent that, um, as you grew, you just broke
off and started, you know, like,all right, we're.
You know, this group is goingto meet in Kevin's home, this
group is going to meet in Matt'shome.
What do you think the intentwas?
And how did we go from meetingat homes and people's actual
(34:02):
buildings, which is a much moreefficient way of doing things
from a financial standpoint?
Because one of the things I'mfully aware of is that I would
imagine that of the money getsyou know, donated to a church,
probably I would.
I guess at least 50% just goesto operational stuff paying the
bills, rent or you know propertytaxes, you know salaries, and
(34:27):
so go ahead and answer that.
And then I have anotherquestion kind of along the line
of salaries for pastors.
Matt (34:31):
So yeah, yeah.
So.
So an example would be you know, Paul writes a letter to the
church in Ephesus.
Right, and I've been there,I've been to Ephesus.
Kevin (34:41):
It's unbelievable.
Yeah, I have too.
Matt (34:43):
Yes, yeah, fantastic, I loved it.
Yeah, but yeah, so it wasn'tnecessarily just one church in
one location.
So part of what Paul was doingwas he was planting communities
and as those communities grow up, they go and they plant more
communities.
So almost think of like astrawberry patch, right, where
(35:05):
you have all these little podsthat all have their roots, but
they're all connected.
And it's this idea thatultimately, what Paul was doing
was he was planting networks ofchurches that were all connected
together.
So when he said, you know thisletter to the church in Ephesus,
there were multiple locations,churches, it actually says that
(35:26):
the whole region was inundatedwith the news of the gospel.
Right, so it was.
There were churches all overthe place that met separately
but they were all connectedtogether through apostolic
leaders like Paul or Timothy orothers that you know.
So they circulated theseletters around to all the
different churches in the region.
(35:46):
But primarily, the churcheswere identified by you know what
city they were a part of.
You know Paul and Barnabas weresent out of.
You know the church in Antioch,you know to on on all of their,
their missionary journeys.
So, uh, those the short answerto your question is no, I don't
believe it was just one churchin one city.
(36:07):
It was a network of churches ora family of families that was
growing throughout an entirecity or even a region.
Kevin (36:15):
So but because the church was considered the body of
believers, you took all thosemicro churches and called them
the church right, yes,absolutely yeah.
So my other question has to goalong with the concept of, like
you know, full-time ministry.
Getting paid Are there, and I'mtrying to remember who it was.
(36:37):
Once again I'm going to show myignorance of scripture, at
least some of the details.
I know there were collectionstaken up to allow people to be,
I think, in full-time ministry.
Was Paul one of those?
But I also know, wasn't he alsoa tent maker?
But are there early churchexamples of people who they
(36:57):
stopped their career whatever itwas to do ministry full-time?
Matt (37:03):
Yeah, yeah, that's a really good question and I think
so it's a nuanced answer or acomplex answer, because I think
we see both of those thingshappening at times.
Right, we see times where Paulwrites and says he's very, very
thankful to the church atPhilippi for the gifts that they
(37:24):
gave to help support him in hiswork, right, right, that's what
I'm.
But at the same time, at thesame time, he writes to, uh, the
church in Thessalonica, andsays when I was among you, I
worked, uh, and and that's theexample that you ought to follow
and he's talking about his tentmaking and how he went to
provide for himself.
So I think there's a little bitof both, of some of those
(37:47):
things, and that's actually someof the transition I'm trying to
figure out personally, to behonest with you, because there's
been a handful of years where Iwas on a salary, right, and
there were people that helped tosupport some of our work when I
was church planting, obviouslyat the nonprofit, when we had
(38:10):
supporters supporting thenonprofit and I was paid a
salary.
Now I'm in a place where I'mdoing a little bit more tent
making type work, but there maybe people that come and support
in unique ways along the way,which is wonderful.
But you know, what we're tryingto build into our lives is a lot
of flexibility.
Where we can, you know we canprovide for the family but also
(38:35):
have the flexibility and thefreedom to step out when God
calls us to minister somewhere,to be involved somewhere as well
.
So I think you can see both inthe New Testament.
Let me just mention one otherthing too.
When it comes to funding andbudgets and all of those
(38:57):
conversations today, there's areally unique thing that you
also see in the New Testament,which is when there was famine
in the church in Jerusalem.
There's churches, a collectionthat is made amongst a whole
network of churches that isgoing to support what God is
(39:20):
doing in Jerusalem, because theysee themselves as the body of
Christ.
And we also see this in thebook of Acts, where it says
people did things like soldproperty Barnabas sold his
property right and they thatpeople were selling their goods
and bringing them to theapostles, not because the
apostles were so important or sothat they could have a salary,
(39:42):
but so that the apostles couldhelp to distribute these amongst
, you know, for folks in need.
So there's a lot of reallyunique things happening in the
New Testaments when it comes tofunding and provisions and all
of that kind of stuff that is.
There's a lot to think aboutthere.
I think that's that's veryinteresting.
Kevin (40:02):
Yeah, especially when you think about the millions I
would guess it's probably morelike billions in America that
are spent on like huge staffs,like like I understand you know
the pastor, he's full-time andhe, you know he's preaching and
he's, you know, teaching andmentoring and things like that.
It's good.
(40:22):
But you know the the advantageof a home church or someone owns
a business that says, hey, I'mgoing to open it up to the
church and on Sundays we'regoing to meet, you're using,
you're leveraging somethingthat's already there and so you
don't have to pay a full-timecustodian.
And you know this and that andand this and that and this and
that there's so many full-timepositions that have to be paid.
And then just the massiveamount that gets spent on real
(40:47):
estate and rent or mortgages andthings like that.
You're like wait a minute.
If we really thought of theworldwide church as the body of
Christ, as our brothers andsisters, I think there's
probably enough money in Americato make sure that no brother
sister worldwide goes hungry.
Matt (41:06):
Yeah.
Kevin (41:06):
But we're spending it on mortgages and salaries, and and
once again, I know this is goingto sound critical, but I'm just
like, I'm thinking about this,like, and I'm just like okay,
god, what do you intend?
What's, what did you reallywant for us?
Because it's so easy to driftover time?
Yeah, what's, what did youreally want for us, because it's
(41:27):
so easy to drift over time?
Um and uh.
So I know to a lot of peoplemaybe they're not interested.
I'm kind of geeking out overthis because I'm just like yeah
because I guess one of my corevalues is also efficiency, and
so when I'm like man, is there abetter way to do it?
So one of I'll I'll, I'll takeyour pick on this.
One of my other observations ofcertainly church today is that
I don't think, like most peoplewho claim to be a Christian in
(41:49):
America, really feel equipped,nor have they ever truly
witnessed to somebody, sharedthe gospel.
The American way of witnessingis hey, come to church, and I'm
going to say it's the pastor'sjob to share the gospel with
people.
Matt (42:09):
Is that what was intended 2000 years ago?
Right, yeah, that's, that's areally good question.
So I'll, I'll, uh, uh.
It's funny that you bring thisup because the last two Sundays
I preached a couple of sermonsthat ultimately led to this
exact conversation.
Amazing, led to this exactconversation, amazing, yeah, so
two Sundays ago, the sermon thatI preached the gist of it was
(42:34):
and this was at a local churchkind of near us that I preached
there about four times in thelast couple of months, just kind
of filling in with pulpitsupply and stuff like that but
the first message was about thisidea of a kind of redefining
worship, and it's the idea that,um, that God's image.
(42:57):
So we think of temples as aplace of worship.
Right, in the old Testament,things like that an ancient
believer would have thought ofthe creation account actually as
God's temple, instituting histemple, which is really unique.
And when he instituted thattemple, he actually put his
image in that temple in theGarden of Eden, and that image
(43:21):
was inscribed on humanity.
Right, we're bearers of hisimage, right?
So one of the primary ways thatwe can honor his image is how
we care for one another, right,if his image is inscribed on
humanity, how we care forhumanity matters.
It's actually an act of worship.
(43:41):
It's why Jesus could saywhatever you do to the least of
these, you do unto me.
It's because his image isinscribed on all of humanity.
But also, as believers think ofa temple, is where, in the Old
Testament, the presence of Godresided right In the Holy of
Holies, and so there's apresence now.
(44:05):
Stephen said in Acts the God,the creator of the universe,
doesn't reside in temples madeby human hands, but he resides
in us, right, and the same thingwith, like I mentioned, with
Peter earlier.
So it's this idea that honoringone another, all of the 59
commands to one another, arepart of our act of worship.
(44:26):
And I'm getting to what yourquestion was ultimately, which
is also okay.
So how we do that is actuallyour biggest witness to the world
.
And this was the second sermonthat I preached, which was, you
know, around this idea fromJesus's statement of a new
command I give to you, and thecommand is to love one another
(44:48):
as I have loved you.
This is how the world that youwill know that you're my
disciples, by how you love oneanother.
So how we gather as a communityis actually the proclamation to
the world how we want another,how we live life together and
how we build this unique, holySpirit filled community is one
(45:12):
of our biggest witnesses to theworld.
It's not as much about yes, weneed to be able to share the
good news, but it's notsomething just for a
professional pastor to be ableto do, just to leave it up to
them, or a high-profileevangelist.
It's something that reallyshould be done on a family or a
(45:33):
household or a neighborhood or acommunity.
Scale based on how we actuallylive our lives together is such
a powerful proclamation of thegoodness of God in our lives.
Kevin (45:47):
Yeah, that's so good.
And if you think about evenbeing intimidated to invite
people to church, if you'redoing church, like Thanksgiving
dinner we probably have allinvited someone to Thanksgiving
dinner at one point in our life.
Right, it's easy to do, butbecause it's like, why wouldn't
you want to go?
We're going to share a meal.
We all love each other.
(46:07):
You know, yeah, are there goingto be some arguments?
Yeah, it's family, right, Imean, there's going to be the
awkward people.
Right, it's family, but still,you love it and you look forward
to it and you know it.
Like, I think it's actually lessintimidating than walking into
a large building.
And you, granted, there's,there's some anonymity that
comes with walking into a largebuilding where you can slip in,
(46:28):
slip out, not even have to talkto anybody.
Uh, but I think there's theability to be a lot more
effective.
Now, here's the reality, right?
Um, there's also, if you'retalking about inviting people
into your home, there's a littlemore sacrifice involved, right,
because you don't necessarilyget to pick, handpick.
You know who's my church andthere might be some people that
(46:51):
you know they don't have your.
And I'm speaking as a type Awho, as a former Okinawan living
person, I want shoes off in thehouse because they're the
nastiest, dirtiest things in theworld and a lot of Americans
don't understand that yet.
Like there's some inconvenienceand stretching that has to
happen.
But that's kind of part of thesacrifice, right?
Matt (47:13):
That's part of the sacrifice, that's part of
learning and growing and lovingone another.
That's that's why you knowfirst Corinthians 13, love bears
all things endures all thingsLike.
That's part of learning.
To grow up together as a familyis, like you said, some of the
inconveniences or theawkwardness of things.
(47:34):
I do think, too, one of thereasons people get hesitant
about an idea of like house,church and things like that is
there's actually a differentlevel of accountability that
exists as well.
It's very hard to slip throughthe cracks like you can in a
large mega church type contextwhere, like you said, you can
(47:55):
slip in and out, um, and youmight not.
You might never meet the pastorof your church, right, right,
um.
But in, in a more intimateenvironment, there's some real
advantages because there'saccountability.
Kevin (48:07):
Yeah, yeah, no, that's great.
So well, we have definitely Imean probably COVID revealed a
lot of the shortfalls of theAmerican church to me the way
(48:30):
that so many churches respondedor failed to respond to it.
And so I've just kind of beenruminating and once again, I
love our church.
I've seen so many great thingscome from it.
But once again it's like is theway we do things, is it the
best?
And as someone who's alwaysstriving after improvement, like
, oh, how can we be better, howcan we disciple better?
And in the theme of creatinguncommon men over and over, you
(48:55):
know America, we'reindividualistic to a fault and
I'm speaking as in the ultimatemaverick type personality, like
I am an American, like to thecore and in many ways to a fault
.
But, you know, we, we send ourkids to school to get educated,
you know, at the Sunday schoolto get discipled, and it's like,
(49:16):
wait a minute, we're supposedto do that, right yeah.
Matt (49:19):
Yeah, no, absolutely.
And I, you know, just in alongthat theme of uncommon men, like
I think it's actually somethingthat we really need to think
about as men, as fathers, ashusbands, you know, taking
responsibility for the growthand maturing and the
(49:40):
discipleship of our families.
Discipleship of our families.
There's a reason why Paul madesuch a big deal about it in some
of those household texts in theNew Testament because it's
supposed to be the foundationfor how Christ's plan comes to
be right.
(50:01):
It's built on strong families.
That's why, when he talks aboutelders and the qualifications
for elders, they have to be ableto manage their household well,
right, that's it's so, soimportant.
The mission of God is directlyconnected to how we, as men,
lead our families and our wivesand our children and and and our
(50:23):
, our, our communities around us.
It's it's so, so important.
I mean we, we have to bewilling to to make those ask
those uncommon questions andmake those uncommon choices in
order to to make that happen.
Kevin (50:36):
Yeah, awesome, matt.
Well, hey, we will.
We may have to do another one,or at least we'll continue the
conversation, because I'm lovingit, um, but talk about.
Matt (50:43):
I could go on forever, but I understand you've got a time
limit too.
Kevin (50:46):
You've got a podcast coming out.
Why don't you just tell usabout that real quick?
Matt (50:52):
Yeah, no, I appreciate you bringing that up it's so yeah,
we're actually looking at, we'regoing to be starting to record.
You know we're here in the endof August now and starting to
record in September.
Hopefully I have some episodesout there later in September.
But the name of our podcast isgoing to be Guarding the Good
(51:14):
Deposit and so it's this idea.
In 2 Timothy 1, paul actuallycharged his protege, timothy, to
guard the good deposit.
That's what he charged him todo and it refers to the
(51:34):
teachings and the traditionspassed down from Christ through
the apostles.
So we're really going to bejust spending a lot of time
intentionally talking about that.
What's that apostolic traditionthat was passed down from Paul
to Timothy?
And then we really see it forthe first 300 years of
Christianity before it kind ofgets institutionalized.
So we're going to spend a lotof time talking about that.
Initially, our first six orseven episodes are going to be
(51:57):
just on the book of Acts andreally trying to discern the
book of Acts and hopefullyhaving a good time having some
conversation.
I'm doing it with a ministryfriend here in New Jersey.
His name is Scott and I'mexcited to see it come together.
So Guarding the Good Deposit isthe name of it, excellent.
Kevin (52:14):
And then you've got a sub stack.
Tell us where to find that.
Matt (52:18):
Yeah, my sub stack is oh man, I get mixed up on what, the
maybe, I don't know.
If you have it in front of you,I've got it.
Kevin (52:24):
So it's substackcom, uh slash at matthew anderson, uh
two t's and it's an e?
R s e?
N instead of the s?
O?
Matt (52:36):
n for that and anderson with an e, yeah, anderson with
an.
I forget, I forget, you know,the facebook link and the the
instagram link.
I forget, but yeah, so so it's.
You can look up MatthewAnderson there on Substack.
And again, that's some of it isjust me, literally, I'm just
starting this as well, but justsome reflections, some thoughts,
(52:58):
some ideas, especially on howwe can better live out our
calling as followers of Jesus.
So I'm excited to-.
Kevin (53:09):
And you're on pretty much all the major social platforms.
I've got your links.
I will put those in the shownotes.
So, if people want to learnmore, if they want to geek out
on this kind of stuff the waythat I'm enjoying the
conversation they can and learnother great things from you.
But, matt, great to see youagain.
Learn other great things fromyou.
But, matt, great to see youagain.
As always, I appreciate you.
You're definitely one of thoseyou know uncommon men.
(53:31):
That has had a profound impacton my life.
I'm better for it.
We've had some incredible timesback in Okinawa just enjoying
life doing.
I mean we we did.
We went to kind of a moreWestern church but we we still
did church the old way.
I mean we spent holidaystogether.
That was what was one of thegreat things about Okinawa is we
spent holidays and we, just we.
(53:52):
We we live life together.
Matt (53:53):
It was incredible yeah Well, that was a unique thing
about that situation too isthere were so many of us that we
were away from our biologicalfamilies.
Right, you were.
You were stationed there inOkinawa.
Your family was back in theStates.
So what do you do whenThanksgiving comes around?
Oh well, we all get together asa church family, and it's a
beautiful thing when you get achance to do that, and there's
(54:16):
lifelong relationships that werebuilt in the midst of that.
So good to connect in this wayyears later?
Absolutely, it's awesome.
Kevin (54:23):
Well, brother, thanks for your time For those of you
listening.
I hope you enjoyed this littlemore unique version of the
podcast.
But thanks for making itthrough and if you have any
questions, you know, reach outto me, reach out to Matt.
You know, and, once again, youknow, if you're pursuing your
faith, feel free go to your.
You know it's going to beeasier to find a traditional
local building type of church.
(54:44):
You know it's going to beeasier to find a traditional
local building type of church.
But dig into the Bible andfigure out okay, what does God
really want and which is?
You know, ultimately, the goalis to build uncommon families,
uncommon, you know, christians.
Uncommon men you know that aregoing to raise uncommon kids.
So, matt, have a great day,brother.
Matt (55:01):
Love it All right, see ya Appreciate it.
Man, have a good one.
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