Overcoming Self-Doubt: Why God Still Wants to Use You

Episode Transcript
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Pastor Asa Slaughter (00:00):
Foreign.

Pastor Brent McQuay (00:10):
Welcome to another episode of Between Sermons.
I'm your host, Brent, and I get
to be the lead pastor here at
Disciples Church. And this podcast is all
about taking that monologue, the sermon from
the stage where we're just kind of
talking at people and turning it really
into a dialogue, kind of a small
group conversation, hopefully getting a little bit
more nuanced into the message, a little

(00:31):
bit more practical. And really, this is
kind of a glimpse into what's probably
happening all over Chicagoland right now or
this week as people in different groups
are discussing sermons. And so that's a
lot of fun. And in order to
do that, though, I need other people
with me, because if I'm just talking
to the camera, that's not very much
fun. So our co host, Tyisha Beasley.
How you feeling?

Ti’heasha Beasley (00:51):
I am doing better than you.

Had a rough week last week.

I had a rough week, but. But
I'm here. God, it's.

Cause you missed me so much. Cause
I was gone last week, and it
just.

You know what? I was throwing up,
so maybe you know how someone annoys
you so bad they make you.

Wow. Wow. I was trying to be,
like, nice, and we have such a
great relationship.

I love this place.

And she went straight to. I make
her vomit. That's.

Wow, you're so annoying. You make me
vomit.

Anyways, if anybody out there is looking
for a hosting gig totally unrelated to
this conversation, right here, please.

I'm taking resumes. I'm just playing. No,
it was a rough week, but, yeah,
I'm glad I'm here. And we did
miss you on the set last week,
but we had Ruben and Pastor Harry
here to help that conversation.

Just forget who he is for a
second there.

See, this is what I'm talking about.
I get no breaks on this show.
But, no, it was. It was a
good conversation. I'm glad to be back
here at work and feeling a little
better. So continue to stretch your hands
and pray for me. So, yeah.

Amen.

Yeah. But today we get to have
a pastoral conversation around serving in a
church with Pastor Asa, who's joining us
today.

Hello.

How you feeling?

Good afternoon.

You good?

Not good night? I'm good. I'm great.

It's not night.

Not yet. Who knows when people are
watching this?

That's true.

It could be any of those.

You're absolutely right.

You want me to do the. And.
And if I don't see you, good
afternoon, good evening, and good night. I'm
sorry. I love the Truman show, but
we're not gonna even go There. That's
the Truman Show. We're not gonna go
there.

We had a lot of coffee today.

Not really. Actually, I only had a
cup. I got the other cup on
my desk downstairs. Cold.

No, it was good. But you taught
an amazing message yesterday. We are, you
know, we are continuing the conversation about
getting the game. And so you taught
on limitations. So that was a great
sermon.

Well, praise God. That. That was a
great sermon. I enjoyed preaching it, but
preparing for it was a struggle. But
it's okay. We got there.

Why was it a struggle?

Because it always is. I just need
to do this more or something to
get better at preparing. But it's always
like pulling teeth. As I said yesterday
in the message, it was just a
struggle I spent on Monday. I'm like,
carlton, Brent's out of town and I'm
not coming to work today because I
need to focus on this sermon. So
I'm just gonna go in the bunker

(03:23):
and work on this sermon.

The bunker?

Yes. And I literally put in. I
Woke up at 5am about 2:30. I
couldn't look at it no more. And
I tapped out. I went and took
a jog and worked out. My wife
got home, I grilled, and then I
said, all right, I'm gonna run this
sermon by you. And I went through
30 minutes of a sermon with my
wife after 10 hours or however many

(03:45):
hours that was. I don't know, five,
five in the morning to 2:30. And
she said, well, the intro was good.
And I was like, whatever. What do
you mean the intro was good? And
then she started telling me about why
it wasn't gonna work. And I pouted
and I stumped my feet.

I think you said, my wife is
smart.

Eventually I got there. Eventually, right? Eventually
I got over myself. And I'm like,
listen, I'm about to watch this basketball
game. I can't even think about this
sermon no more. Today I'm gonna wake
up in the morning and I'm gonna
do it again and we'll figure it
out. And she's like. She's just. She's.
Let's just do this. This is a
good idea. Here's a good idea. Blah,
blah, blah. So she's trying to work,
not just.

Complaining, but giving somebody.

I'm taking a break. I don't want
to hear. So all night I moaned
and complained. And I woke up the
next morning and I don't know what
happened. I sat there and I considered
my wife and what she said. And
then I don't know.

I think she's a wise Woman.

She's a wise woman. And praise God,
the Holy Spirit just helped me write
a message. And I literally sat there
for another 7, 8 hours, from 5
in the morning to I think I
came to work at 12:30 or 1,
went to Sermon planning, and Pastor Carlton
didn't give his normal, wonderfully brilliant remarks.
He just started clapping and said, that

(05:05):
was great. And I said, well, praise
God, because I almost got a divorce
over this message, but I didn't really.

Can you get Kiana pretty and have
her cup sitting on this? We need
our counselor.

But you wanna know what's so funny?
I've been encouraging a lot of guys
lately about how to use their wives
because she's a tool to use. She's
not your enemy. God has given you
her to help you. So literally, I'm
hearing myself in the background talking to
myself. I have given you or God
talking to me. I've given you Tracy,

(05:38):
to help you. So get over yourself.
And I got over myself. And praise
God. Between the Holy Spirit and my
wife, I managed to have a good
message.

I guess I always tell people the
Holy Spirit's voice sounds a lot like
my wife.

Yeah, it just hurts sometimes. Does she
always have to be right?

I mean, yeah, probably.

So why are you here today? Go
ahead. So counseling.

Should we have gotten Tracy to come?
Maybe we got the wrong guest.

We have Tracy, ladies. But no, I
think that's good. I think God was
sovereign because your message was about limitations.
And maybe do you feel like, you
know, being called to speak and teach,
there are some limitations there for you?

Yeah, 100%. I feel like I don't
qualify all those excuses. I identify with
those when it comes to doing this
job. 100%.

So tell us. And do you have
anything before? Because I have questions.

Go for it.

Jump in. Let's. Let's roll.

So how did we get here to
thisrapy today? No, let's go through it.
How do we get to this place?
Pastor Asa, like, tell us how you
kind of got started with Disciples Church.

Well, with Disciples Church. As an employer,
as a member?

No, like coming in, serving, getting connected.
How did you get in the game?

So 2018 is when we committed to
Disciples Church and back to the wife
being right. I didn't want to go
here. I wanted to go somewhere else,
but she wanted to go here. So
I decided to seek God about what
my wife wanted. And he said, go
where your wife want to go. So
we stayed here at Disciples Church, so.
Or Christian Life center at that time.
So right away or within A few

(07:23):
months, we went through growth track. And
growth track, it used to be more
of a. They would run all the
leaders in front of you from different
ministries to tell you about the ministries
in step four. And in step three,
I gotta go back, because before step
four, you will fill out a paper
about what you wanted, what you possibly,
where you possibly wanted to serve. So

(07:44):
I get this paper in front of
me, and for some reason, I can't
get past prison ministry. And I'm like,
I'm not doing that. I've spent my
whole life trying to stay out of
prison. Why would I go into prison
on purpose? And so I filled it
out because I felt like I should.
I felt like that was kind of
the Lord nudging me. I go to
my mom's house, right after me, Tracy,

(08:06):
the kids, we go to my mother's
house, and I'm telling her about that
situation, and she said, asa, you don't
remember? I used to do prison ministry
when y' all was younger. It's like,
no, I don't remember. And why are
you trying to confirm to me that
I'm not tripping right now? She's like,
yeah, I used to do it. I'm
like, okay, well, she's like, you'll be
fine. You can do it. And she
really convinced my wife, though, more than
me. Cause Tracy was like, absolutely not.
You're not about to go into jail.

(08:27):
So anyway, so that fourth step, the
next week, I came back and they
lost the papers. That was my opportunity
to not tell them that I was
interested in prison ministry. So I had
to do it all over again and
recommit to prison ministry. So I did,
and I talked to Brother Aaron, who
is now home to be with the
Lord, and he got me rolling right

(08:48):
away with prison ministry. So that was
my start into at least joining. Joining
the church and also jumping in and
joining the team.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's awesome. So I, I, I wanted
to highlight that, because sometimes people see,
like, speakers or teachers and. And, like,
I'm going to go straight for that.
And it's like, no, it's a journey,
and we all have journeys to get
to where God is calling us to
be. So do you feel like if
you wouldn't have taken that step to
do growth track and join a team,

(09:16):
that you would be where you are
today?

I would say that that was definitely
part of a bunch of steps that
I took that led me where I
am today. Absolutely. I feel like God
give you a step, and your job
is to take the step. You'll figure
out later what the next step is.
I mean, I didn't know the next
steps. I wasn't looking for any next
steps. I knew step one was be
obedient to what I felt like he
was saying do, and that's go to

(09:40):
Disciples Church. And then when it was
time for prison ministry, I was fired
up to get involved. So I felt
like getting involved. But where to get
involved? I surely wasn't anticipating prison ministry.
But the interesting part about it is
right away I got in there and
Aaron, who was the leader of prison
ministry at the time, so we going
to 26th in California to Cook County
Jail. And we was having a service.

(10:01):
It was like 30 men. And we
sing a few acapella songs and. And
then he would preach a message, or
Tyrone or Sam would preach a message.
So he literally had me early on.
First time I watched the second. The
second time it was like, all right.
Aaron was preaching. He was like, I
got this list of scriptures, but we
only got this many minutes, so it's
easier if you just read it for

(10:21):
me. He was like, so I'm gonna
give you my scriptures. When I get
to that part, I'm gonna say, read
first Peter, whatever, and you read it.
So that's kind of how I started
being more active now. So I'm reading
the scriptures for Aaron. Then. I don't
know, within a few months, he's like,
I'm gonna speak on. And I don't
remember what it was. I'm gonna speak
on whatever it is, and you're gonna
speak 10 minutes on that same topic

(10:43):
and follow me. And I'm like, I'm
not here for that, Aaron. That's not
why I'm here. But I just reluctantly
said yes. And then he was like,
you're just gonna do a whole message.
And I'm like, I'm not here for
that, Aaron. So I just did what
he asked me to do. And that's
kinda how that happened. So that was.
All of. That was part of a

(11:05):
bunch of steps that we could be
here all day if I went through
the whole step to get here.

It's a lot of little yeses, a
lot of.

A lot of small yeses. Is what
led me to here at the same
time was when God was. I was
out. I tell the I'm out jogging
story a lot, but I was out
jogging. And I felt like he said,
going to all the world, preach the
gospel to every creature that was happening
at the same time as that other
stuff. But I wasn't connecting the Dots.
I literally wasn't. I'm. I wasn't connecting

(11:32):
the next step from that. I'm like,
how do I do that, Lord? Go
to Bible school. So it was just
like, when I felt like God was
telling me something, I said, how do
I do that? And then I felt
like he'd tell me how, and I
had to say yes. And the interesting
part about Bible school is Tracy would
ask me because she's a planner all
the time. So what are you gonna
do? What are you planning on doing?
Do you want to be a pastor?
Do you want to be like, no,

(11:53):
I don't want to be any of
that. I'm like, I'm just here because
I feel like God told me to
be here. And that's what I did.
And that's kind of been a journey
step by step.

So saying yes.

Yeah.

What about you, Pastor Brent? What was
your first shoe in to Christian Life
center before you became pastor? What was
the first ministry or team?

My first team would have been our
children's ministry at the time. So, of
course, my parents started this church when
I was 4 or 5 years old.
So my journey's a little bit different.
Basically, raised to. You had to do
it, but it was. Yeah, I was
probably, I don't know, 11, 12 years

(12:33):
old, and I had to be here
for multiple services anyways, so I was
like, I might as well, like, do
something.

Oh, wow.

And so me and a couple friends,
we started serving in the children's ministry.
And, yeah, from there, I've served in
just about everything, every department, because you
pretty much know.

Yeah, yeah.

It's kind of funny because I'm actually
watching my middle child do the exact
same thing. Like, he's got his group
of friends, and they're all serving in
the children's ministry together. And it's just
kind of like, look at that. Look
at that full circle moment.

That is awesome. Cause what you said,
I was like, oh, that's happening now.

Yeah, actually, I had to stay after
service yesterday because there was a meeting
for the kids camp that's happening over
the summer. And my son's like, I
gotta be at the meeting. I'm like,
you don't have to be at the
meeting. In all reality, they're gonna have
you play a couple games. You're 13.
Like, it'll be fine. But he's like,
no. Like, I. I need. Jenny said

(13:34):
I had to be at the meeting,
and I'm like, wow. Well, then we'll
hang out.

That's awesome. So I like how you
Said saying yes, Pastor Brent, to the
little, like the little yeses along the
way, you know, elaborate on that some
more. Like was there times in your
life where you said yes and you
were like, I don't feel, feel qualified
or I don't feel like this is
something I should be doing?

Yeah, I don't know that I've ever
felt qualified for something I said yes
to. I think my, my qualification. And
I got to be careful how I
say that because the Bible does give
us like qualifications for, for leadership. And
that's not what I'm talking about. Not
like I've got these giant sin issues
that disqualify me and I'm going to
say yes anyways.
That's not what we're talking about. I

(14:18):
mean that, those limitations that we put
on ourselves. And so there's always been
that kind of discomfort, I guess kind
of a good way to say it.
But yeah, it's so I think a
lot of times people are looking for
that big yes. They're like that big
moment. It's like, I'm going to be
a missionary and it's like very rarely
does God take you from 0 to
100.

(14:38):
Right. Immediately. Like how can you be
obedient to the next thing he's telling
you to do? And so a lot
of times it is this cumulative, these
little yeses over time. And so like
I could go back through my whole
life, teenage years, into young adult, into
adulthood, of all the little yeses that
I would say over time.
And so like saying yes to serving

(15:00):
in ministry as a teenager, saying yes
to going on missions trips, saying yes
to going into a church internship, saying
yes to stepping into full time ministry.
Even some of the ministry roles that
we've, we've walked into, like immediately I
said no to several things. So they
asked me to be, to go to

(15:22):
our campus in South Bend at the
time and my immediate answer was no.
And then we ended up going. They
asked me to be the children's pastor
and I laughed and said no because
at that point I'm like, I'm a
youth pastor, I'm not a children's pastor.
This is not happening. I don't even
know if I like kids. So I

(15:42):
laughed and said no. And then we
ended up saying yes and doing it
anyways. I said no to so many
different things in that because I was
so overwhelmed with. I can't do that.
Like that's beyond my ability. And so
it's almost like my story is an
immediate no and then an eventual yes.

(16:04):
And Jesus Actually tells a parable about
that. Like, which son is actually obedient?
The one that says he's gonna do
it but then never does it, or
the one that says no, but then
goes and does it. And I've always
identified with that because I'm like, man,
that's kind of my story. And I
would love to get to a place
where I just say yes without that
first no. But, yeah, there's been probably

(16:25):
more times in my life when I
started with a no than I started
with a yes.
And God worked through some stuff with
me, thankfully. I think my no seasons
have always been very, very short. Like,
I remember my dad invited me out
to breakfast for him to have that
first ministry conversation with me when I
was about. And I told him no

(16:48):
and tried to go back to sleep.
And literally five minutes later, I was
putting on clothes and we were heading
out to breakfast because, like, my no
lasted all of five minutes.
And same thing with the children's pastor
question. When I laughed and said no,
he kind of walked away like, all
right, I guess I gotta find another
solution to this problem. And by the
time he got downstairs, the Holy Spirit
had already slapped me in the back

(17:08):
of the head. So I just went
back downstairs. I'm like, hey, I'm so
sorry. I shouldn't have laughed. Let me
pray about that. And I think that's,
In a lot of ways, that's always
been the solution to the no problem
is in prayer. So I remember I
was invited to go down to Mexico
to continue my internship there. And I
immediately, again laughed and said, no, I've

(17:32):
already got everything set up in Chicago.
I know what I'm doing. I don't
want to go live in Mexico for
a year. There's just no desire to
do that. But I said, I'll pray
about it. And that was very quickly
turned from a no to a yes,
which resulted in my marriage and my
kids and all kinds of fun things.

Yeah.

But yeah. So the no kind of
starts the conversation for me, and then
prayer fixes the no to a yes.

I think that's relevant and relatable. I
think a lot of people, if they're
honest because of their limitations, feel like
you got the wrong person. Do you?
Do either one of you? I guess
I can start with you, Pastor Asa.
Still feel that you have limitations even
in what you're called to do right
now?

Oh, 100%. What I feel like is
if I don't really stay reliant upon
the Holy Spirit, this thing would be
one big, hot mess. I mean, literally,
I think my job is to try
to be in tune with God as
much as possible possible. So I need
to be praying, I need to be
in the Word, and I need to
be trying to be sensitive to the

(18:37):
Holy Spirit, because I don't have the
answers. Yeah, I got. I got common
sense. I know people say sense ain't
common, but. Or whatever, but I. I
mean, I know how to do the
right things. I could advise people on
the right way to go. I know
how to do those things. But a
lot of times that ain't what people
need to hear. They need to hear
the Holy Spirit, give them what they

(18:58):
need. So unless I'm able to kind
of stay in tune with that, yeah,
I don't know how to love, you
know, how to be friends. But, I
mean, I don't know what else past
that that I have to offer other
than to try to stay in the

(19:19):
Word, seek God, and then feel like
I'm giving you what I feel like
God want me to give you. So
that's kind of. So. I don't know.
That's not a me thing. That's a.
So I'm limited, 100% limited in this
thing. But with the Holy Spirit, he
thinks I'm good enough. So my job
is to don't be scared and just
man up and do what he says.

(19:41):
So that's kind of what that is.

I would go so far as to
say, like, that's healthy. I think it's
really unhealthy when somebody has this, like,
I'm amazing. I don't have any limits.
I've totally got this. I think that's
actually unhealthy. And sadly, I do see
some people step into ministry roles and
different things where that's the arrogance that
they have. And it usually does not

(20:04):
end well either for them or the
people around them. I think it's way
healthier to have that reliance on the
Holy Spirit to say, you know what?
I don't got this. But I'm gonna
say yes anyways. And I'm gonna be
obedient because I know that this is
what God wants from me. And if
God's calling me to it, if God
wants me to do this, then my
limitations aren't going to stop it. And

(20:26):
so I think when we approach these
limits, we need to recognize that some
limits are real, some are imaginary. We
need to learn the difference between the
two. Like, what is an actual limit
on my life and what is not.
And then we need to distinguish between,
okay, what is a limit that I
need to overcome. And what is a
limit that I need the Holy Spirit
to show up in? Because I think

(20:47):
that there are moments when the limit
is very real and it means you
need to do something. Like, you may
say, well, I don't know enough. That's
a very real limit. But there are
real solutions to that limit.

Yeah.

Start reading more books, go to school,
watch some YouTube videos. Like, do something.
Like, you can overcome limited knowledge. Yeah,
Right. And so there. But there's other
limitations where it's like, okay, if I
spent the rest of my life trying
to be not this thing, it's still
going to fail. Like, I need the
Holy Spirit to show up, and in

(21:24):
my weakness, he gets to show his
strength. And so I think it's. Is
the limit that you're looking at, is
it real or is it imaginary? If
it's imaginary, forget about it. If it's
real, is this something you need to
do something about, or is this something
that God needs to do something about?

That's good. I think that's why it's
important with making disciples and being in
a discipleship relationship, because sometimes they can
help pull you into places that. Or
see things in you and encourage you
to pursue serving opportunities that you wouldn't
have never seen in yourself. So I
know both of you guys lead groups.

(21:58):
Is that something you've seen active in
your groups?

Tell me exactly what the question was.

I got lost in that. So I
was talking too fast.

No, it might have been me. I
might have just spaced out.

You space it out on between service.

What's the ask in my group?

Yeah, like in your groups, have you
seen where one person is serving in
a department and then they'll bring a
buddy with them to serve? So, like,
in that capacity, we know discipleship is
a big part of overcoming some of
those limitations.

Yeah. So. Absolutely. So trying to think
of how many guys from my group
in these. When did we start the
Ephesian series? Back at the end of
February. Since February, I know two particularly
that have joined the team of somebody
that's in the group. Actually, one of
them, he's joined. He's helped in the

(22:52):
cafe. He was on the outreach team
for the last three weeks, helping with
the stuff that I had going on.
So that's directly relational.

And.

And then a few of them, you
see a lot of it. Like a
few of them get baptized, and then
here goes some more wanting to get
baptized. So as people step out and
do things with the church for the
church, other people in the group definitely
Start to do those things. So it's
definitely this man that really encourages me

(23:22):
that you stepped up and kind of
did what was happening. I think I'm
gonna step up and do what was
happening. So, yeah, it's a lot of
that that I've seen definitely in my
group. Like we went out. I mentioned
we went out to serve downtown because
that's just part of the study thing
that we're doing in our group. So
we went downtown to help feed some
people. And just coming together as a

(23:44):
team, actually serving, you see people wanting
to now do that in other areas.
So the more you do it together,
the more you want to do other
things together for God. Because that was
like, man, we should do this, or
we should do this like every week.
And I'm like, I got kids and
a family, so we're not going to
do this every week.

We got limitations.

Right. But realistically, it motivates them to
want to do more for God, for
Disciples Church. And. But in that community,
the community aspect of it really makes
them want to get involved together. So
it's kind of. It's really cool to
see.

So that's cool. So you had a
list of limitations you listed out. Do
you remember them?

I should. No, I didn't memorize those.

Let's go through. And I'm gonna pick
up my phone that failed.

I got. I got the church app.

Okay. Yeah. So I was gonna go
to the app.

So Plugger for the Disciples Church.

Yes.

Because you can pull up notes.

Notes.

I'm not good. I'm too old or
too young.

I'm not good enough. I failed too
much. I don't have what it takes.
I'm too old or I'm too young.
I don't know enough. I'm just one
person. I'm too broken slash damaged. I
don't have the right background. What will
people think? And it's too late for
me. 10 most common self imposed limits.

You thought about these things?

I just googled it. I just pulled
it from the Internet. I didn't come
out.

You studied and researched.

Yeah, I just pulled it.

Tried to help you out. You studied
and researched?

No, I said, what's the. No. I
asked the question. And he gave me
back the list.

No, but with this being. And I
wanted to go through that list because
I do feel like there's people who
are watching who feel like these are
some limitations that they have. What, what
are some ways we can encourage people
to overcome some of these limitations? Because
I do like what you said. Pastor
Brent when you said some are imagined
and some are not. And I guess

(25:38):
for me, who's an overthinker, I'm like,
well, which ones are imagined and which
ones are real? You know, so what
are some practical ways? First of all,
we can identify that they are imagined
or real or. And what some ways
we can start moving forward so that
these are not hindrance to us joining
a team.

I think a lot of it is,
yes, the things you can do practically
to make yourself better at things do
that. But you still may feel like
there's a limitation there. And a lot
of times it is that you're kind
of downplaying what you can do. But
the message was focused around when God
asked you to do something, you need

(26:17):
to be ignoring those limitations and doing
what he asked you to do. And
he's going to be the one to
help you to get over those things.
So. So there's practical ways to make
yourself better when you think you're not
good at certain things or you have
limits on yourself. But then there's also,
if God tell you to do it,
then you need to just do it.
I don't think that answers your question.

No, it did. No, that was good.
I like how you said at the
top of your message, this is God's
game.

Yeah. Yeah. Because it is. I mean,
and literally, Harry preached that. And the
scripture that he used, that I used.
I mean, it. Well, the one he
used about, you know, the work of
the ministry. Our job is to build
up the church, to equip the saints
to do the work of the ministry.
It's God's ministry. Like, everybody's here serving
at Disciples Churches. God's ministry. Like, none

(27:04):
of this is Pastor Brent's ministry. This
is God's ministry. Like, we're just doing.
We're trying to follow examples, to go
out and actually spread the word of
God to people. So it's God's ministry.
So that's how that God's game just
kind of popped up. But that's kind
of the. The moral to this whole
story. But I wanted people to see
the value of actually doing it here

(27:24):
at the church. Yes, you'll get training,
but you're truly, like, when I say
the greeter gets credit for the person
that gets saved, that's real. Like, that's
real because that same greeter could turn
that person off before they ever hear
an altar call. So it really is
that important that the first people they
see are walking in the love of
Jesus and ushering them into the church.

(27:44):
The second Person is doing the same,
the third is doing the same, the
ushers are doing the same, the worship
is doing the same. Kids life is
doing the same. All of that is
just as important as Pastor Brent saying,
how many of y' all want to
say yes to Jesus or what? In
whatever way we do that. It's all
of the same importance. It all leads
to somebody getting to Christ.

You want to just walk through the
10?

Yeah, let's do it.

Yeah, we got time.

Real quick. We gonna walk through the
10. But what was cool about it
is what I did research is the
fact that I was pulling out that
people in the Bible said those exact
things. And that wasn't made up. That
was the research that I came up
with. And I had no idea. I
just started looking for it once I
had the list, and I was like,
oh, wow. They said the exact same
thing. So that was kind of cool.

No, that is. That was good. And
that's why I would encourage you to
go back and watch that, because you
did walk through some people in the
Bible and the different limitations they had.
So, yeah, let's. I think that would
be a good way.

All right, so number one is I'm
not good enough. Is that real or
is that imaginary?

Is it real?

I feel like it could be imaginary
because you. Who's the standard of you're
not good enough.

Yeah, I would. I would say that
that one is probably a either or
it. For some people, it is a
very much imaginary. I think in some
situations, it's very true.

Right.

And then we also have to define
good enough morally or good enough, like,
practically.

Right. I'm not good enough to get
on stage and play the piano, which
is true.

Yeah. I have a breakfast, and that's.
And that's a great place to probably
start, actually, with this list is we're
not saying you can do whatever you
want to do. Like, this is about
when God calls you to something. Like,
God is not calling me to go
up on stage and sing.

Me neither.

Like, that's just now, if he did,
it would probably be to illustrate a
point of total surrender. Not out of,
like, Brent all of a sudden magically
has a beautiful voice.

How can you humiliate yourself for me.

That would be like, hey, are you
really willing be undignified for me? Go
sing.

Right.

Like, you do it this Sunday, please,
before. So go.

You know what? If you were the
voice of the Holy Spirit, I totally
would. But that's the voice of Taisha
is.

The voice of the Holy Spirit.

Not all wives Right, right.

I just want to hear you sing
on stage.

No, you don't. Trust me. Nobody does.
So, yeah, so. So this is prefaced
by saying, you know, the. We're talking
about when God calls you to something,
when God tells you to step out
at something. So just to say, man,
I've never taken a piano lesson in
my life, but it'd be really cool
to go up on stage and play
the piano right now. Yeah, no, that's
not. That's not. Yeah, right. Like. And

(30:25):
so there's some. Like, so if this
is a question of your morality, then
that could be very real, and you
need to do something about that. Can
God still use flawed individuals? Absolutely, 100%.
But he also still calls us to
holiness. And so, you know, if you
are celebrating sin and, you know, perpetual

(30:45):
unrepentant kind of sin behavior, then, yeah,
you're not good enough morally to stand
on a stage and encourage other people.
Like, it's. You got to figure some
stuff out in life first. There's got
to be some surrender and repentance and
recovery. It also could be, you know,
first time I preached a sermon, I
was not good enough to preach a

(31:06):
sermon. Right. Like, it was. It was
not good. It was not pretty. Like,
there was some things about the. The
calling that I was not good enough.
And that's where research and study and
practice and, you know, I started reading
books on communication. I started practicing communication.
And so it's something that. Yeah, that
might be a very real limitation on

(31:28):
you. It may also be imaginary because
I've met a lot of people that
are fantastic at things, but they're like,
oh, but I'm just not good enough.
And it's like, I don't know if
that's false humility or if that's just.
Yeah, you view so negatively yourself that
you just. You can't get over it.
And so, yeah, I'm not good enough.
Sorry to start off with one that
can be both. And.

Yeah.

But I think it very much depends
on the person, depends on the situation.
It may be all in your head
or it may be very real.

Yeah.

If it's all in your head, spend
some time in prayer, talk with God,
surrender that. Get around a group of
people that can encourage you, that can
be the ones to say yes or
no about whether you're good enough.

Yeah.

And if it is a real limitation,
then I think, okay, you've identified a
real limitation. What are you gonna do
about it? Right. If you're not good
enough in that area, what can you
do to get better.

Yeah. And. And another way that I
see this is people, when they come
to Christ, not wanting to remind themselves
that they're not good enough for this
free gift of salvation. I've had that
talk several times with new believers here
at the church that just dealing with
condemnation, dealing with their past, not being
able to accept the fact that it's
not a. That it's a free gift.

(32:37):
And in those situations, it's actually true.
You're not good enough to deserve this.
You know what I mean? But you
have to just accept it. You know
what I mean? You have to be
willing to say, yeah, I'm not good
enough. But God says that it's a
free gift that I can have and
take it. You know what I mean?
So that's another way that I've had
to deal with. I'm not good enough.
At least in my role with helping

(32:58):
other people is getting them past that
part. No, you're not good enough, and
I'm not good enough for salvation.

That's kind of the points. Like, literally,
that's the point of the Old. The
Old Testament law is to show you
that you're not good enough.

Yes.

Like, because without the law, without the
Old Testament, we think too much of
ourselves and we think, well, you know,
I'm not that bad. Right. And then
all of a sudden, he pulls up
this law that there's no way we
could possibly reach it or uphold it.
And it's almost like a mirror in
our lives. And we look at this
law, and that's when we realize, oh,
I'm. I'm sinner. Like, I'm sinful. I'm.

(33:33):
I'm not good compared to the standard
that God is setting. That's the whole
Old Testament. And then it constantly is
pointing to, you're not good enough, but
there's coming someone who's going to make
you good enough. There's someone coming that
is going to redeem you even though
you're not good enough. And then the
New Testament is just, hey, you're not
good enough. But he is.

Right?

And so just accept him and this
free gift of salvation that he has
for you.

I think that's Romans. When Paul is
going back and forth between the law
and righteousness, and he points out that
exact thing. The law was given to
show you that you're not good enough.

Yep.

Exact words. But the law was given
to expose.

Yeah.

That you're just not good enough. So,
yeah, that's good.

All right, Number two, I have failed
too much. Imaginary one, Hundred percent all
the time. Always.

Always imaginary. Because you can get over
many, many, many, many, many, many, many,
many, many, many, many failures. You can
always get over them.

Yeah. I think that there's no such
thing as I failed too much for
God to use me.

Yeah, that's true.

Agree.

I mean, there. There may be a
situation where it's like, look, I have
planted 18 churches, and all of them
have exploded with negativity and badness. And
I've been, probably shouldn't start a new
church again. So remember, this is always
in the context of God is telling
you to do something. If God's telling
you to do something, the excuse or

(34:52):
the limit of I failed too much
is never on the table. It's never
part of the conversation.

Imaginary number three.

Number three, I don't have what it
takes. True. Correct. You don't. Okay, that's
the. The point.

That's not imaginary.

That's not imaginary. That's accurate. But that
shouldn't stop you. Like, that's. That's one
of those limits that doesn't stop you.
Leads you to lean on Christ, to
lean on the power of the Holy
Spirit at work. Do you have what
it takes to do any of the
things that God calls you to do
on your own? No. Yeah, like that's
kind of the point. Like, if you

(35:31):
could do it on your own, God
probably wouldn't tell you to do it.

Yeah.

And that one's true. But it's also
something that you can work on practically
depending on what the thing is. Yeah,
but it's still true. So what God
asked you to do.

Number four, I'm too old or I'm
too young.

It's imaginary.

That's imaginary. But it's a lot of
people who feel like they're too old.
Like it's, you know.

Yeah. And if we're talking about too
old to make a difference, let's just
use that one. That's where it's definitely,
definitely like an imaginary thing. Too old
or too young to actually be used
by God. That's. No, that's not true.
But I get physical limitations and things
like that. Too older, too young. I
get that. But to be used by
God, you're never too old. You're never
too young, and you can do what

(36:15):
he asks you to do. So.

Yeah, and. And I'm just gonna stress
it again, like it's always prefaced by.
This is what God is calling you
to do at 8 years old. Should
you be leading a church? No, you're
too young. Okay. Like, it's just. This
is the reality of it. There needs
to be some maturity happening. There needs
to be some growth. At 8 years
old, are you too young to be
used by God?

No.

No.

That's really good, because I. I'm. It's
a couple people, like, faces popped in
my head, and I was just.

Like, okay, well, and think. How old
is your son?

12. 13. How old is 12? 12.

He's almost 13, but he's part of.

That crew that's being used by God
serving in D.C. kids.

Right.

So he's not too young to be
used by God, you know?

Right.

All right, number five. I don't know
enough.

You don't. That's true.

Probably true. Probably true. You probably don't
know enough.

We are always growing in everything God's
called us.

The moment you think you know enough,
watch out.

Right.

I agree with that.

Yeah. So that one's very real, but
it's also very easy to overcome.

Yeah.

Like, I don't know enough. Yes, you
can pray and ask the Holy Spirit
to help yourself. Knowledge and wisdom. But
I would say that this number five,
I don't know enough. That's something that
you need to do something about. Right.
And. And so we pray and we
ask the Holy Spirit to help us,
but we don't just sit there and
go, okay, Holy Spirit, teach me everything
I need to know.

Right? Right.

Come back.

Like, that's not how that works. Yes,
right. Like, that was some. I don't
know enough. Okay, so go buy a
book.

Yeah.

Like, get a. Get a Christian theology
book. Get a. Whatever it is that
you don't know enough about God. Learn.

Yeah.

And, yeah, ask the Holy Spirit to
help you in the learning process. But
if you're waiting for him to just
teach you everything you need to know
without picking up your Bible, without picking
up a book, without going to school,
it's just not going to happen.

I think what's interesting about that, it
was making me think about when you're.
When you're passionate about something, you do
those types of things. Right. But what
I've learned is that when I say
yes to God, even if I ain't
passionate about what he's asking me to
do, usually when I start acting and
being obedient, my passion for that thing
actually lines up with it. Like, I
get more passion to do what God

(38:29):
is asking me to do when I
do it. Yeah. So I think that's
kind of. Kind of cool.

That is good.

I like it. We good on that
one. All right, number six, I'm Just
one person.

You are.

You are one person. I don't know
that you've ever been more than one
person. That is a true statement.

That is true.

I don't see how that limits us
from doing anything, though. So I don't
know. I put that in that weird
category of that's imaginary, that that's a
limit. It's reality. That. Yes. You are,
in fact, one human being. You are
one individual. I don't see how that
could possibly be a limit.

Well, the thought process there, and this
is me assuming the thought process is
that the job at hand takes more
than one person.

Yeah.

So we know it's true that you're
just one person, but I can't do
what you're asking me to do because
this job takes more than just one
person.

Yeah, but you know what?

50 people are just 51 persons.

Just 51 persons. Like, it's just one
person 50 times. No, it's. It's. That's
why I say it's not a limit.
Like, it's when God's telling you do
something, you. You do it.

Right?

Right. And if you're the only one
doing it, then God only needed one
person to do it. And there's so
many times, though, when one person steps
out and starts doing it and other
people join in. Right. Like, sometimes you
just got to be the first person,
not the only person. And so suck
it up.

Yeah.

Come on, Nike. Just do it.

Just do it. I need to. I
want to jump in with just a
small just one person story I'm gonna
get in trouble for later. So when
I saw that.

Those are my favorite stories.

When I saw that one, I was
like, oh, that's a great Tracy story.
So Tracy uses that, right?

You almost got divorced over the ceremony.

So Tracy has used that one before
in the past. And this is not
about to be a bad reflection on
her. It's gonna be a bad reflection
on her husband and the children. So
it's okay.

We'll allow it. We'll allow it.

So basically, more to the story is,
you know, we wasn't helping clean up
enough around the house. We wasn't doing
enough. And Tracy came to the point
where she was like, I'm just one
person. So as soon as I saw
that, I'm like, oh, God, that's the
Tracy excuse. So I'm like, now is
that a limitation she putting on herself,
Lord, or do I need to help
out more?

Which is the truth you put on
your wife.

Sister, I got you. Cause that was
right.

Right. I know the answer. Trust me.
The answer is we need to help
out more.

You tell me. Is that a limitation
she putting on herself?

That's self limiting yourself? Tracy, you see
this? I showed it to her. Like,
see you just one person. Stop it
with that limit.

Oh, wow.

But the truth is, is, yeah, we
need to help out more.

All right. I like number seven. I'm
too broken, slash damaged.

Yeah.

And so the imaginaryness of this one,
number seven is the word too T
o o that I'm too broken. Right.
The reality is you're broken and you're
damaged. The imaginary is that you're too
broken and too damaged. And so what
we need to address is, okay, how
do I find healing in my brokenness
and my damage? How can I get

(41:31):
into therapy, get into counseling, get into
a community where I can take off
the mask, be vulnerable, be real, deal
with some of the brokenness and some
of the damage in my life, find
healing from those things? So, yeah, so
it's one of those. Where that one's
another one of those mixed bags. Like
there's some truth to it, but there's
also something that's untrue about it. And

(41:51):
so to say God can't use me
to do this thing because I'm too
damaged. That's not true.

Yeah, that's good. I agree. Simple.

That's good. Number eight.

I don't have the right background.

That could be true.

Yeah, you might not.

What?

Nothing. I thought she was gonna give
us more.

Come on, Taisha, you've been quiet. So
quiet. Like a church mouse over.

That one. Is true. That could be
true.

I don't have the right background. I
mean, that could be true. Like you
could just feel like you don't have
the education or you can feel like
you're like how you guys was teasing
me, how you guys were teasing me
about how I pronounce things sometimes.

Like what?

The word, the tortillas.

Tortillas.

Mexico. Yes. I just got back from
Mexico.

Mexico. But like, sometimes you could just
feel or even like coming from a
very charismatic, reformed background, sometimes it's like
I.

Still laugh every time you combine those
two.

I know, I know.

Charismatic reform.

I am. That's what. That was my
background.

And then coming you and maybe three
other people on the planet are Charismatic,
reform, David.

And so I said three.

You, David, Neo. That's the three.

So I just. Sometimes I feel like
I was just too much for this
space. Like I was just, oh, she's
about to, you know. So my background,
I felt like didn't match some of
the areas. So I felt like that
was a limit for a while.

Yeah.

A limitation.

And there could absolutely be some truth
to, like, not having the right background
for something, but when God calls you
to something, your background doesn't really matter.
Right. Like, Luke probably didn't have the
right background to be writing the Gospel
of Luke to join into the Jewishness
of, like, he's the only non Jew

(43:53):
to write in the Bible. Right. Like,
his background should have disqualified him, but
it actually qualified him. Like, the fact
that his background didn't match actually makes
the Gospel of Luke amazing. The book
of Acts is amazing. All because we
got a gentile doctor who's analyzing the
details and paying attention to things.

That's good.

So.

Yeah.

So what you think is a limit
may actually be why God is calling
you to do something.

That's good. All right.

All right. Where are we at number
nine?

Yep.

What will people think? Who cares?

That's an imaginary huge, though.

How do you overcome that one? Because
I don't know. Maybe my person. So
I have a weird personality. So, like,
I have to. I have to preface
this for people. I have a very
weird personality where I have really high
social anxiety. So in a sense, that
means I really care what people think.
Like, I don't want them looking at
me and thinking things and saying things
at the same time because of my
personality. I just don't care what people

(44:56):
think. And I don't know how to
reconcile the fact that there. It seems
like there's these two.

Yeah.

Opposite things happening in me. And I
think that maybe I'm bipolar or schizophrenic
or something. Multiple personality disorder. I don't
know. There's something wrong with Brent that
I think we can all agree there
is something wrong.

Is that imaginary or is that real?

I think it's very real. There is
definitely something wrong with my personality, which
is usually the limit that I think
of for myself, is my personality. But,
yeah, so help us, because I don't.
I don't deal with that in the
way that most people do.

I. I don't know how to hope
because I feel like I keep thinking
I'm free from people pleasing, but I
always find myself in that situation. So
I haven't learned the healthy balance of
not. So, Asa, you're the ticket.

No, I'm not the ticket. That's surprising
to me. So I didn't realize that
you was a people pleaser.

Okay.

No, no. This is news to me.

I don't.

It's just because she's never trying to
please you.

Maybe so. I don't know. This is
news to me.

I. Maybe because, you know, in certain
environments, you would never know, and it's
not people pleasing. I just want to
do things well, you know, So I
don't know if that's people. I don't
know. Maybe I need to see.

It depends on the motivation.

Yeah.

So, like, wanting to do things well,
that's normal behavior. The why behind what?
That's where a therapist could try and
dig in.

Right?

And they'll probably be like, well, when
you were six years old and you
spilled the milk and your mom yelled
at you, it created this trauma moment
where now you always have to do
things so well.

I know he took a few classes.

Or he was either in there. I'm
not sure which one, but he broke
that.

I don't want to disappoint people. Like,
I care for people so deeply. And,
like, even with me being, like, a
leader, like, for example, I lead Grace
Collective, like, at one point I was
like, just, yes, yes, I'll do that.
I'll show up. I'll do. And it's
like, girl, why are you. You can't
be everywhere. You know what I mean?
And so it's not that I want
to please them, it's just that I
want to. That's my way of caring

(47:01):
for people. So I don't know. I
don't know. I got to work that
out.

I would say that it definitely can
become an unhealthy thing, and I think
it does come to what's the underlying
motivation behind things? And so that's. That's
something. I don't think a podcast helps
you figure that one out. I think
that's. That's where you got to get.

Asa wants to figure it out. Right?
I never knew that about it.

I'm here for the ride. But it
makes sense when you say it. Yeah,
I can see it now.

Yeah, but.

But yeah, the whole. What will people
think? Yeah, it's funny to me in
the sense of, like, yes, that is
real, but it really doesn't have any
bearing because, like, at the end of
the day, it doesn't matter what people
think. The only thing that matters is
what God thinks. And if God is
telling you to do something, then. Then

(47:48):
why would you say no to God?
Out of fear of people. Like, you
should say no to people out of
fear of God. Yeah, right. Like, don't
mix that one up. And so. But,
yeah, I'm unqualified in this conversation to
offer somebody Advice on how do you
get over this? Worrying about what people
will think?

Stay close to the fire.

And I was. And I was.

I'm broken.

Trying to fix you. I was just
trying to think about it for myself.

Damage. I'm very broken and damaged.

And damage. I was trying to think
about it for myself, like, okay, am
I a people pleaser? And I still
don't know the answer? I don't think
so, but. Because I kind of don't
care.

Yeah, I would. I wouldn't put you
from. Working with you over the last
couple years. Like, I wouldn't put you
in the people pleasing category.

Yeah.

I think you're. You're very comfortable being
able to be like, look, if they
don't like my decision, they don't like
my decision. If they don't like me,
that they don't like me, that's on
them. That's not on me.

There you go. Look at that. Sometimes
outside helps. So I was just trying
to think about it. That's really why
I was looking at you like that.
I was thinking about it for myself.

Yeah.

So I don't. I don't know that
we helped anybody. That's.

We didn't. We helped each other.

What will people think?

We helped each other realize we need
counseling.

What matters is what will God think?

Yeah. I think that might just be
one of those things where you got
to push through that and be more
focused on God and the process and
not on people.

What God is saying, calling you to
do.

All right. And number 10, it's too
late for me. That's imaginary. If it's
something that God is calling you to
do, that means it's not too late.

Right.

If you're breathing, it's not too late.
Now, there are some things in my
life that are probably too late for
me at 40. Right.

What's one thing right?

I don't know.

I need to know. Maybe not.

I don't know. I ain't running an
Iron man again.

But you could. You are not.

That's too late for me.

I'm on my way back at 45.
I never did Iron man, though, but.

But I got one under my belt.
That's more than enough.

That's good. If anybody don't know, that's
a marathon after 100. What?

Bike 119. Bike 119 or 115. And.
Yeah, 2.2. 2, 2.4, 2 point something.

Swim.

Yeah.

1001900 14, 15. I always forget swim,
bike, and then you got to run
a marathon.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's That's. I haven't done it.

My time was 13 hours and 15
minutes. So not a very great time.

But it's a time.

It's a time, man. I did it
in one day. 13 hours.

Yeah. I tried to talk myself into.
I'm too old and fat these days.
I guess I'll never run again.

But body shaming on the show is.

No, I mean, that's. I mean, that.
That was real. I was. I. That.
That. That foolishness tried to creep in
and I'm like, yeah, I know better
than this. I am not get myself
together. So I've been on the process
of trying to get myself together. I'm
not too old and to get myself
back going. So therefore, I'm in the
process of getting myself back going. So

(50:42):
that's the moral.

So it's too late for me. Imaginary.

Yeah.

Not true. If God's calling you to
do it, then.

And even if God ain't calling.

Clear.

It's not too late to do that,
Iron Man. You can do it. It
would just take a lot of.

Time, take a lot of work.

Look at. Look at the community. I
think you should do it now just
to prove yourself.

I'll do it if you do it.

Nope.

That's how I started running marathons with
that same type of comment.

See, the.

The mistake you made is you made
the comment to somebody that said, yes,
I made the comment to somebody. I
knew there was zero chance she.

Was going to commit to that.

I would not have confidence now. If
I said it to David, he'd be
like, let's go. Right. My group was
still trying to get us to go
run the stairs at whatever.

A few of them undid it lately.

Yeah. One of the guys in my
group.

Jorge, they both have went in.

Oh, Ramon went too. I know. Jorge
went. Yeah, he went with Eddie.

Oh, yeah. So, hey, have fun with
that.

My wife went with a women's group.
Yeah, yeah.

Like 115 stairs, open payloads.

She did not enjoy it.

It's work and she hates exercise, so.
I know she did enjoy it. That's.
She does. Oh, she does. She'll tell
you she hates exercise.

All right. This conversation derailed. Where were
we going?

No, no, it was good. We landed
the plane by going through the 10
most common limitations people can have. So
I think that was a good way
to kind of like end the conversation
by giving people hope to know that
limitations. It can fall a lot in
the imaginary space or some could be
true, but it's not really a limitation.

(52:19):
If it's true, it's an opportunity to
grow and become better.

Maybe the one thing that we can
address, though, is there are some biblical
limitations to church governance, church leadership. And
so, like, that's one of those things.
Like, I just want to make sure
in this conversation we don't kind of
gloss over some things because I've seen
too many people that are disqualified from

(52:45):
things biblically that are like, but I'm
limitless. And if God's calling me to
it, and it's like, yeah, if God
was calling you to it, but he's
not, because God's not going to disregard
his own word. Right. And so we
need to be mindful of that. So
what are your thoughts there?

No, that's good. I wanted to bring
that up, but when I bring it
up before the show, y' all looks
at me crazy. But I do think.
Think, like, the other side to this,
to just make the conversation more whole.
Is there are. Is limitation really a
bad word in some spaces? Like, so
biblically, I was thinking, like, is there

(53:22):
spaces where there could be limitations to
things that you desire to do? I
don't know. I guess it makes it
difficult because you were saying, like, God
called you to it. Yes. So I
guess within those perimeter is, like, can
there be limitations?

Yeah, I think so. Like, one of
the cool things with limits, when they're
real, is it's motivation, at least for
me. And I think that that's. That's
probably the. Where I would like more
people to get to a place of
saying, okay, what's limiting me from being
able to do this? And how can
I overcome that limit? So. So there's.

(53:59):
There's real, genuine limits that I need
to overcome through study, through training, through
prayer, through time with God. Like, and
it's when I see, like, hey, I'm.
I'm not good enough in this area,
how can I get better? Right. And
so instead of allowing that kind of
limit of I'm not good enough, therefore

(54:20):
I shouldn't try, like, that's the unhealthy
response. The I'm not good enough, so
I need to get better is the
right response. And so I think that
there's something actually healthy about recognizing the
limits in our lives.

Yeah. So what about when limits are
just in place in different institutions? Like,
you. Like, you say, you can't just
say, oh, I feel like God is
calling me to be a pastor.

Right? Yeah. I mean, so we can
go to scripture. You want to do
that? Because the Bible's awesome. It's my
Favorite. So there's like two main passages
that talk about qualifications for church leadership,
church governance. It's talking about elders or
overseers or deacons, but pastors applies in

(55:08):
that. And really I think we could
probably kind of stretch it into a.
If you're trying to have any kind
of leadership role within church ministry, especially
something on where you have influence over
people, like, we need to adhere to
these things. So you got Titus one
and you got First Timothy three. Where
do you want to go first? Titus

(55:28):
or Timothy?

Titus.

Titus. All right, come on, Bible app.
All right, so Paul's writing to Titus,
one of his leaders, and he says,
this is why I left you in
Crete, so that you might put what
remained into order and appoint elders in
every town as I directed you. Right.
So Paul's setting up this church in

(55:51):
Crete, making sure that they're growing, they're
healthy. He's appointed Titus to go there
and kind of be the, the champion
of the church there. And he says,
so that was verse five, Verse six
says, if anyone is above reproach, right?
So that's our first requirement. You got
to be above reproach. Which we could
probably spend a whole podcast talking about

(56:12):
what that means and what that looks
like, but we won't. But being above
reproach really just means like people can't
even make an accusation about sin in
your life because they would be proven
wrong so quickly, so easily. Like, like
you're not even flirting with these things.

(56:33):
The husband of one wife and his
children are believers and not open to
the charge of debauchery or insubordination. So
one of the requirements for leadership is
you got to know how to lead
your family. If you're not leading your
family, well, you're disqualified for ministry. Now
there's also a nuance to this where,

(56:56):
like, I've seen some people try and
claim that a leader was disqualified from
ministry because his adult child wasn't following
the faith. And it's like, well, that's
silly because that goes against free will
that we see throughout the rest of
Scripture where, right, like that that child
is now responsible for themselves and their
decision is theirs. And you can't force

(57:17):
following Jesus on anybody. So I would,
I would just say like, don't take
that scripture to like an extreme place
because I think that you'd be saying
more than Paul was trying to say
in that passage. For an overseer as
God's steward must be. Be above reproach.
He must not be arrogant or quick
tempered man. That right there probably disqualifies
a lot of people that are already

(57:38):
in ministry that shouldn't be arrogant, quick
tempered, or a drunkard, or violent or
greedy for gain. Man, sometimes I want
to like hand preachers, Bibles, just certain
passages highlighted. Is that. Was that a
little too.

Just keep going.

Was that a little too.

Now I have questions.

I love you, but. Yeah, but hospitable.

That's good.

A lover of good. Self controlled, upright,
holy and disciplined. He must hold firm
to the trustworthy word as taught, so
that he may be able to give
instruction in sound doctrine and also to
rebuke those who contradict it. So like,
you got to know your doctrine, you
got to know your word, not just

(58:23):
teach it, but also to defend it.
You've got to be holy, you got
to be upright, you got to be
self controlled, you got to be disciplined.
Right? Like I read that and I'm
like, oh man, am I disciplined enough?
Am I self controlled enough? Because last
night I definitely had an extra slice
of pizza. And so like, these are,
these are just very real, like requirements.

(58:43):
And so when, when you are saying,
hey, I meet a lot of people,
they're like, hey, I want to be
a pastor. You're a pastor. Tell me,
tell me what I need to do.
Yeah, it's like, okay, we'll start with
this. Start with first Timothy, first Timothy
3, and start with Titus 1. Because
if you can't do those things, then
you're not qualified. You're not. That's not

(59:04):
something in your future. And we've got
too many people in positions of leadership
that don't actually follow this. And it's
scary to me. So that's Titus. So
those are limits.

That's good.

Those are very real limits. First Timothy
3 is a little bit longer saying
is trustworthy. If anyone aspires to the
office of overseer, he desires a noble
task. So it's a good thing, right?
Wanting to become a leader in the
church is good. Therefore, an overseer must
be above reproach. There you go, Paul,
once again throwing that reproach word in

(59:39):
there. The husband of one wife, sober
minded, self control, respectable, hospitable, able to
teach. Not a drunkard, not violent, but
gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of
money. Like, he's basically going through the
same things he went through with Titus.
Now he's going through it with Timothy,
but he gets a little bit more
detailed than some of them. He must
manage his own household well with all

(01:00:01):
dignity. Keeping his children submissive. That's that
whole raising up the children in the
way that they should go. For someone
does not know how to manage his
own household, how will he care for
God's church?

Pastor Asa Slaughter (01:00:11):
Right.

Pastor Brent McQuay (01:00:11):
He goes a little bit into more
of the why there with Timothy. I
think he liked Timothy more than Titus.
He gave Timothy way more than he
gave Titus.

But Titus was just smarter.

Maybe, maybe Titus, he's like, ah, Titus
got this. He must not be a
recent convert, right? And so somebody that's
like, man, I got saved last week,
I want to be a pastor next
week. And slow down. Can't be a
recent convert. Or he may be puffed
up with conceit and fall into the
condemnation of the devil. Moreover, he must
be well thought of by outsiders that

(01:00:42):
he may not fall into disgrace, into
a snare of the devil. Deacons. So
this would be another role within the
church. Deacons likewise must be dignified, not
double tongued, not addicted to much wine,
not greedy for dishonest gain. Right? So
he attacks like drunkenness a couple of
times. He attacks the lover of money

(01:01:05):
and dishonest gain and all that. Like,
if you're in it for the money,
man, it's such a sad story. I
was in Nigeria on missions and I
was praying for a group of people
and one boy came up. He's probably,
I don't know, 17, 18 years old,
late teen or early young adult. And
he's like, hey, I just need you
to pray for me. I want to

(01:01:25):
be a pastor. And I was pretty
young at the time. And I was
like, man, that's awesome. I'm so excited
for you. And then something in me
was just like, ask him why. And
so I was like, okay, man, tell
me, tell me why you really want
to be a pastor. He said, well,
my father said that I would never
amount to anything. And I know that
the pastors here have cars. And so
if I become a pastor, I'll be

(01:01:46):
able to have a car and I
can show my dad that I did
something with my life. I was like,
oh, we're praying a totally different prayer
for you, bro. Like, it was, it
was just, it was. He had the
wrong, the wrong heart, the wrong motive,
the wrong mindset. It was a scary
moment.

Ti’heasha Beasley (01:02:00):
Yeah.

So not greedy for dishonest gain. They
must hold the mystery of the faith
with a clear conscience and let them
also be tested first. Then let them
serve as deacons if they prove themselves
blameless. And that testing first, man, that's
huge. And so that's, that's how we
operate a lot of things here at
Disciples Church is like, we'll test people
like, we'll give them a little something

(01:02:23):
like, hey, hey, Asa, why don't you
run growth track for us? Like, that
was, that was Asa's testing. It was
like, hey, here's. Here's a ministry. We
want you to run it. You know,
we've seen you do other things. We've
seen you in prison ministry. You put
your toe socks on my couch. And
we got real familiar with each other.

I ain't got them on today. I
got some downstairs in the bag.

Right. So there, there was a lot
of. We knew you, we knew your
qualities, we knew your caliber. But there
was also, hey, we need some testing.
We need to see, okay, how do
you do leading people in a smaller
scale before we take you into a
larger scale? So the testing first is
huge to me. Their wives, likewise, must
be dignified. Not slanderers, but sober minded,

(01:03:09):
faithful in all things dignified wives. And
I will. Look, this may be weird,
but, like, I will honestly say we
have not elevated somebody to a position
before because of their spouse.

Oh, wow.

That we, we looked at their spouse
and what happens there, and it was
like, if we put this person in
the role, the spouse is going to
create issues, can create problems. There's going
to be people around that are going
to be negatively impacted because of the
spouse. And so your spouse really can
hold you down.

Wow, that's.

And it's biblical.

Yeah.

Like, it's not just Brent being weird,
it's biblical. Their wives likewise, must be
dignified. Not slanderers, but sober minded, faithful
in all things. Let deacons each be
the husband of one wife, managing their
children and their households well. For those
who serve well as deacons, gain a
good. A good standing for themselves and
also great confidence in the faith that
is in Christ Jesus. So again, how

(01:04:02):
you handle your family is pretty important.

That was really good.

So family finances, morality, self control, alcohol,
like, all those things. So, like, if
you know that you're struggling one of
those areas before you are qualified for
ministry, you got to do something about
that.

That's good.

Do you have to be perfect? No,
because none of us are.

Right.

But you can't be okay with some
of those things in your life.

Yeah, yeah.

So there are very real limitations. There
are given to us in scripture for
what we can and can't do. Now,
somebody that fails those qualifications, can they
still be used by God in some
way? Absolutely. 100%.

That's levels. Yeah.

So what's interesting, and I know we
gonna wrap this thing up, but Pastor
Brent talking about you know, being elevated
to growth track to, you know, as
a testing. Right. Well, earlier, earlier we
talked about some of the little stuff.

Why are you laughing?

Did you know it was a test?

No, I was just.

He was just saying yes. That was
just a little. Yeah, you just say
yes to the little things. So Brent's
always orchestrating things.

You threw me off. Yeah, I didn't
know that. I know that's how you
operate now, but I didn't know none
of that. But earlier we were talking
about the little steps, the step by
step process that gotta put you through.
So Brent only knew me because I
was in his life group.

Group.

Right. That's where I met him. And
I was only in his life group
because after months of being here, I
think we have been here now almost
a year. Tracy never wanted to get
in the life group because she's not
as social as I am. I'm like,
I don't care. Meet new people, go
to somebody's house. All good. But around
Christmas time, I was trying to find

(01:05:43):
something for Tracy for Christmas. I think
this was 2018. Trying to find something
for Tracy for Christmas. And one little
thing that I found was this book.
I saw her listening to this lady,
so I bought her a book from
the lady who she had been listening
to. And it was this motivational get
out there and don't be scared to
do things book. I only. I literally
was just saw the advertiser for the

(01:06:03):
book and someone was like, buy that
for Tracy. So I bought it for
Tracy. Tracy's reading the book. I'm not
thinking nothing about it. February come around.
Tracy's fired up from this book. I
don't know if a message was preached
on getting on a. Joining a group.
I have no idea. He might have.
He might have mentioned it because probably.

February, that's when we launched, so.

And literally we wasn't really talking about
groups. Like, the last time I asked
her about groups would have been the
fall. But I didn't even bring it
back up and because she had already
told me no. So I. I'm smart
enough to know she wasn't. She didn't
want to go in the fall. She
don't want to go now, didn't mention
it. We. We're walking out of church
and she's like, let's go sign up
for a group. And I'm like, what?
And she's like, yeah, I was reading

(01:06:43):
that book and I kind of feel
like I gotta get involved. I can't
keep holding us back from getting in
the group. And so she go off
there. I'm like, okay, well, go find
one. And she goes. And she's looking
through the thing. She's like, well, this
is family night group. Look like it's
for people with families and young kids,
so let's join that one. I'm like,
all right, whatever you want to do.
And that's how we joined the group.
But we joined the group because I
bought the book that I felt like
the Holy Spirit led me to buy

(01:07:03):
the book for the wife, which led
her to join the group, or he
wouldn't have had a clue who I
was. So it wasn't so.

So.

So there's always little steps that God.

So I want to just walk through
this, and then we can close up,
because I know Tyisha's like, I landed
the plane 20 minutes ago. Why are
we still in this podcast? Just. I
want to count the yeses, right? So,
like, so you said yes to Jesus.
You said yes to serving in prison
ministry. You said yes to going to
Bible school, even though you didn't know

(01:07:32):
what that would look like. You said
yes to the Holy Spirit telling you
to buy this random book.

I say yes to even stand at
Disciples Church, but yes.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You
said yes to the stand.

I didn't even want to be here.
I'm like, no, let's go somewhere else.

Yeah. He's like, that white pastor. I
don't know, man.

I grew up in a white church,
so it wasn't even a white church.

He had on a visor yesterday. I
think he's okay.

Wow.

Is that a white thing? Dang.

I've never worn a visor in my
life. Okay, so then fifth. Fifth yes
would be the book. Then you said
yes to going to a group with
your wife in that. In a result
of that group. You said yes to
leading growth track. You said yes to

(01:08:21):
going to a missions trip to the
Philippines with us. In the Philippines, I
asked you to be our campus pastor,
and you said yes.

That so yes.

There's nine little yeses that we just.
From what we can count, there was
nine little yeses.

And. And I had no idea what
that.

Number 10. And then number 10, I
said, hey, I'm gonna be in Mexico.
Will you preach? I said yes the
week I get back.

Yeah, that's awesome how you just walk
through that timeline.

That's a lot of little yeses.

A lot of.

And you could have easily, like, ignored
one of those yeses. Like, you could
have easily been at the bookstore and
been like, I I'm not buying this
book. Like, that's dumb. You could have
very easily walking out of the. The
auditorium. Your wife's like, we should join
a group. You could have very easily
been like, nah, you know, I don't
feel like that. You could have very
easily, like, you want to go to
the group with the pastor? Like, no,
we're not doing that. Like, that's just
weird. Yeah. There's a lot of places

(01:09:10):
where you could have said no, but
you chose to say yes.

Yeah, that's true. That true story.

That was great.

Isn't that fun?

It is fun.

The little ones, but.

It was no clue of any of
it. I was just saying yes. There's
no plan. What made you want to
become a pastor? Did you hear anything
I said before?

This here's where it started. You said
yes to Jesus. And when you say
yes to Jesus, you're saying yes to
whatever he wants you to do. And
when you genuinely say yes to Jesus,
you may end up on a missions
trip. You may end up on a
stage. You may not end up doing
any of those things. You may end
up serving in a children's ministry. But
when you say yes to Jesus, it.
It opens up this door of all

(01:09:54):
these other little yeses that you get
to say.

And I have to continue to say
yes. That's the thing. It ain't done
now. I'm 45. I ain't got to
say yes. I need to continue to
say yes to Jesus for the rest
of my life. Whatever that the kill
is. Right. She ready. She ready to
go. Where'd she gotta go? We don't
get off to five.

No, I'm not ready to go. I
was messing with you.

It's all good. Say yes. People say
yes.

That was good to Jesus.

Yeah. And who knows where that yes
is going to lead. But you don't
have to worry about the IN Yes.
Number one, you weren't thinking about yes.
Number 10, not at all. Just say
yes to the next thing.

And at yes at the yes to
growth track. I was not thinking about
any further yeses. None of that was
in my brain. It just wasn't so
good stuff.

I love it. That was such a
good way to conclude the show to.
To travel down your yes lane because
it was an encouragement to. To others
watching and even to myself, like, you
know, just. It's about obedience. And that's
what you. You taught in your message
yesterday. It's really about being obedient to
God, man. It's so important. And. And

(01:11:01):
we are going to end. But I
have to ask this question because I
was chased down.

We got a question.

We have a question.

We're like, hey, we'll totally keep asking.
Answering questions. And nobody asked any.

Like, I know. And it is so
unrelated to any of this. So the
question is, does our sin cancel out
the work of the cross?

Man, that. I feel like that's more
of a long conversation with the individual.
How would I articulate that?

So here's some backstory before you. So
her family goes to another church. The
pastor of that church said that over
the pulpit, and she was just like,
that is not. You know, so the
little bit of backstory.

Yeah. So does your sin cancel out
the cross? No, because there's. There's nothing
that can cancel out the cross of
what God does. Has done for us.
Does sinning. Right. Like, so there. There's
a verse, and I'm trying to remember
what. Where it is and what it
says, but it basically talks about, like,

(01:12:11):
you can't crucify Christ twice. Right. And
so what that preacher was trying to
illustrate, I'm guessing, and I don't know
the preacher, I don't know the context.
My guess is he was just trying
to convey the seriousness of sin, that
when we repent and we accept forgiveness
and then we keep on sinning, it's.

(01:12:32):
It's. The way I've phrased it before
is it's like spitting on Jesus at
the cross, right? It's. It's like saying,
I know you're up there because of
me, but go ahead and stay up
there a little bit longer kind of
thing. So, like, I. I get his
heart behind the phrase or his intent
behind the phrase from my assumption, but
I would say that that's incorrect theology.
Yeah.

Okay. Well, I hope that answers your
question. I'm so sorry it took us
a while to answer that question, but.

Oh, that came in a while ago.

Well, I could never find it. And
I was like. So I finally saw
her in the hall. I was like,
what is the question? Let me write
it right now on my phone. So
I'm glad we were able to address
that.

Would I. Would I freak out hearing
that from a pastor? Probably not. I'd
probably have a conversation with him, be
like, hey, can you clarify what you
meant by that? You know, I think
sometimes preachers, myself included, like, we're. We're
guilty of. We get passionate about something
and we say something, and, like, what
we believe and how we phrased it
are maybe not even the same, which

(01:13:31):
is hard, man. That's the challenging thing
about preaching right. Is like you're held
accountable for every word that comes out
of your mouth. And there's sometimes we
have a slip of the tongue. There's
times when you have, man, my brain
was here and I said this and
I was like, well, I don't even.
Like we make the joke. Like, oh,
no. Words are coming out of my
mouth. Like it's right.

No.

So.

And the thing is, regarding, regardless of
what he was trying to say, what
we know about sin is that it
leads to death.

Yeah.

Jesus, that you can't cancel that out.
But me, I can do a whole
lot of sinning that's going to lead
to death in some type of way.

Yeah.

That Jesus died and paid for.

Yeah.

So the best thing to do is.

Yeah, there's nothing I can do that
can cancel out the work of the
cross. But there are some things I
can do to reject the gift that
is provided by the work of the
cross.

Yeah. Good job.

We try. We try. Remember that. I'm
sure somebody in the comments will be
like, pastor, you missed this.

And you can ask that question and
we'll get to it next time.

Let's go.

But we are so glad you joined
us on this conversation. Conversation on between
sermons. This was a great conversation, guys.
Thanks for just lending that pastoral perceptive
perception. What am I trying to say?

Perspective.

Perspective. Anyway, I'm tired. Let's go.

That's why she always wants to land
the plane.

I do. I want to land a
plane.

She's like, my brain's got a 45
minute window.

Yes.

You go past the 45, it's done.

So I love you guys. I hope
you guys tune in next week. And
until then, God bless you.

Sa.

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Overcoming Self-Doubt: Why God Still Wants to Use You

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

.css-r6mb8g{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:1;overflow:hidden;}Crime Junkie

24/7 News: The Latest

Stuff You Should Know

All Episodes

Overcoming Self-Doubt: Why God Still Wants to Use You

Crime Junkie