Wherever there are shadows, there are people ready to kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight. This is Bleeding Daylight with your host, Rodney Olsen. Welcome to this episode of Bleeding Daylight. Hundreds more episodes are available at bleedingdaylight.net. That's also where you'll find links for Bleeding Daylight on social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok.
Waiting is a difficult part of life, but sometimes we can use those in-between times to seek greater purpose and direction. Today's guest felt a calling to leave behind what he had known for decades and step into the unknown. Together we'll hear about his time of discernment and discover how we can all benefit from what he's doing in the waiting. Today's guest is someone I've been genuinely looking forward to meeting.
Timothy Stobbe spent over two decades as a pastor before stepping into what he describes as the most peace-filled and uncertain season of his life. He's a poet, a deep thinker, a self-described quirky soul and someone who has walked through the kind of big messy life transitions that most of us quietly wonder about but rarely talk about out loud. Timothy, welcome to Bleeding Daylight. Thank you so much for having me on. This is a privilege.
You pastored at the same church for 24 years, so you're not someone who's prone to constantly changing direction, yet you recently moved from the security of what you knew to a very new beginning. Was the change something sudden or was it something you'd been considering for some time? More of the second. There had definitely been a sense of something else was lurking. Sounds like an ominous word, but maybe it's a good word to describe.
For a few years, a sense that there was something else that the Lord was inviting me into, but I really didn't have any clarity about that. I didn't have any strong sense of what precisely that might mean or timing or any of that sort of thing. So I just kind of let it glow in the back a bit. And then as we approached Christmas of 2024, a very, very strong sense of, no, the time is now.
And still without any real strong understanding of what the next thing would be, but the time is now to begin passing off the pastoring work at Waypoint Church, which is where I served for those 24 years. So that really began to put in motion some conversations with Tina, my wife, and certainly conversations with a couple of friends that I considered to be mentors as well. So that accelerated it at that point, but it was definitely kind of the slow burn for quite a while.
And then it accelerated when we got to about that point and moved much quicker. I want to explore what that change was in a moment, but firstly, let's go back a while. Tell me about your first encounters with faith. Were you brought up in a Christian home? Was that something that came to you later? What was the experience for you? Yeah, that's a great question. I was blessed to be raised in a believing home. We were in church every Sunday. I'm the grandson of a pastor.
I met him when I was one and then he passed away, so I didn't know him, but the stories are told and that's certainly a part of my heritage. When I was six, I remember processing as a six-year-old would ideas that were kind of scary to me. I started thinking about the idea of hell and of heaven. There was something in me that clicked and I realized, oh, mom and dad believe. And I know that what they believe is true and what they believe is right, but I haven't owned it yet.
I knew it wasn't mine. And I remember it was a rainy Wednesday evening in April and I was with my dad. We were going to a midweek club thing that they had at the church. I just started to open up to my dad about it. I'm just like, what do I do, dad? Kind of that conversation. And my dad, in his wisdom and in his affection for me, just pulled the truck over and he said, you know what? We can pray about that. So, my dad led me to the Lord. When I was six, I'm 50 now, almost 51.
Memories from way back then can be cloudy a little bit, but that one is so crystal clear in my mind. Just that moment when the Lord came and not only saved me, but really helped me to let go of that ominous fear. That was a beautiful moment for me. And then raised in the church from that point going forward. I know that some people would say, as a six-year-old, you wouldn't have had the understanding to be able to make that commitment.
But I would ask the question, is there ever a stage at which we fully understand we're constantly growing? So, I imagine that your faith from that initial decision point at the age of six, your faith and your understanding of who God is continued to grow. Where did it take you from there? My faith did grow as I matured and developed. I mean, that's absolutely true. That's certainly part of my story. I had a very positive youth group experience in my church. It was a bigger church.
There was a lot of things going on, a lot of things happening in and around all of that. A critical moment for me came when I was 16 and serving in Mexico, which is a pretty common thing for churches to do. I grew up in Canada, by the way. I live in the United States, but I grew up in Canada. The trip itself was pretty incredible. We had a van breakdown on the way. We had all kinds of crazy things going on, but we got there and we got to do the thing that we came to do.
What I remember is sitting by a campfire at the end of the day with just a bunch of different people. I really couldn't tell you what everybody shared there at the campfire or what songs we sang or any of that kind of thing, but it's a little bit like those old school screensavers. If we go back when computers had that marquee that you could type in some words and it would go across the screen.
Then if you wanted to be funny, you would put a funny message on your buddy's computer and all of that. It looked and felt like that where all of the rest of the thoughts that were cluttering my mind just fell off. Just like a singular thing coming through the Lord saying, I want you to serve me for the rest of your life. That was it. It was silence, that line and silence. I talked to some of our leaders and I said, what do I do with that? They were great.
They just said, well, that sounds like it's from the Lord. You should listen to that. That began not only a choice to pursue in terms of what I would do for a living, but also in terms of faith. Oh, this is supposed to be a life that's devoted to serving God in one way or another. It wasn't more specific than that. It wasn't go serve on the mission field or be a pastor. It wasn't that. It was just serve me. I've done my best to listen to that ever since.
How did you then discern your way into pastoral ministry? If it wasn't as specific as that, but you're going to be serving me for the rest of your life, how did you walk towards that pastoral ministry? Yeah, it's probably a longer journey there, specifically towards pastoring. I got to do different things along the way, music and drama, puppetry, those kinds of things. So performing arts to share the gospel. So I got exposed to communicating from up front. There was that aspect of it.
But then as I grew, and I would say into my early twenties, I had a few opportunities to preach and to share. I had quite a few people come back and say, we see a pastor's heart in you. It was certainly listening to other people and going, this seems to be a fit. And my own journey with the Lord and going, well, is this really it? Is this what I'm supposed to be doing? Eventually I had a mentor that said, if you're feeling called this way, why don't you go ahead and throw that net out?
See what happens. Just ask the Lord to speak through that process. And that's what I did. That's what ultimately got me into pastoring itself. It's been a great journey. I would describe it like a great marriage. That's maybe too strong of a word, but it's been a good partnership with the church. They let me cut my teeth on them, so to speak. And that was a remarkable thing. Someone mentioned to you, you seem like you have a pastor's heart.
Now that's very different from, hey, you seem like you handle the pulpit well, you handle the scriptures well. And I guess in this day and age, we need to define a difference between those who have a pastor's heart to serve their congregation and those who are just great at getting up front. And having both is obviously a bonus. But was that something that you had to explore right at the start of what does this mean?
It's not just getting up once a week and preaching a sermon, but it's actually a lot of the behind the scenes thing of getting to know people, of walking through their darkest moments. Yeah, absolutely. And those two things can certainly be complementary. That's absolutely right. I think it's fair to say that, especially earlier in my role as a pastor, my speaking ability was sufficient and maybe even good, but I don't think anybody would have said, oh, you've got to hear this guy preach.
I was never that guy. I think people knew from the way that I handled the scriptures and also talked to them that I actually did care. And I do. That's one of the things that as I'm stepping into this new journey that I do miss is those very personal interactions, those times to come alongside in those moments. We used to joke at staff meetings or whatever, oh yeah, we're pastors, we work one day a week and chill in the hammock, the rest, and just making fun a little bit.
But there are a lot of times when I'm so glad that our office was open because somebody was going through something that was difficult and being able to sit in that space with them and just listen, to hold that moment as sacred and to sometimes cry with people. Other times offer advice that you were like, Lord, I hope that our relationship is super strong right now because I can see where this other one is going.
And so all of those things were and are really important, and there's not really a way to replace that. There are a lot of great teachers on YouTube, on different programming. If somebody wants to get good preaching or good teaching, there's a glut of it out there. But to have somebody who's personally invested, that's the pastor role. And that did take time for me to sort out. And it took time for our family to work that stuff out.
What does it mean that dad's not here on these nights of the week because I'm meeting with somebody else? All of that was a growing and learning experience for not just for me, but for my wife and children as well. Let's jump into this fairly recent change for you. You've gone out of pastoring. What have you moved toward? For the time being, I've moved into hosting a podcast called Meet Me in the Word. It's the daily devotional with the weekly rhythm. That's our little tagline.
Honestly, that's the only thing that for me was clear as I moved out of pastoring. I've been asking for a while, God, what's the next thing? What are you calling me into? And being okay with it, being okay with the fact that there hasn't been that very clear like, oh, I want you to go do this specific thing. And that's how you're going to make your income or whatever. For now, maybe it's almost just been for me. I don't mean to sound arrogant there.
I mean that it's been a good discipline for me. It's been a process that Monday through Friday, I'm getting up, I'm having my own quiet time. And then when that's done, I'm moving into that phase of kind of unpacking it and just wanting to share my own journey with others. What's been really cool about it is I've had a lot of joy along the way. I have this incredibly supportive wife who's a registered nurse. We have enough income, at least for a season.
If we're talking a couple of years down the road, she's going to have some words for me if I'm not doing something that makes some money. But for now, I have space and I'm grateful for that to explore this whole side of things, to take a look at what there might be for me. So my desire really is to be somebody who comes alongside and just helps people along the way. And that motivates me quite a bit.
I've noticed that for a lot of people, developing that daily time, that regular time with the Lord, there are moments where it's great. And then all of a sudden you get stuck in Leviticus and shoot, that's some hard reading. So what do we do with that? I've spent a long time in Scriptures and I care for people. And so maybe being that companion voice would be helpful for folks. We'll see what God does with it or doesn't do with it. I'm okay either way, but there has been joy.
There has been clarity for me, just a delight doing that on a regular basis. We have heard the stories of people saying that they go along to church each weekend and get topped up and then go into the week. And yet we know that real spiritual change, real spiritual growth doesn't happen unless we're daily in the Word or at least several times during the week. And we don't want to get legalistic about it because we know that that's the fastest way for a regular reading habit to collapse.
But as much as possible, we need to be in the Word throughout the week, not just trying to top up on a weekend. Is that part of your motivation? Is that something that you saw in the church over those 24 years? Yeah, absolutely. And not just saw it in the church, saw it in my own home. As a dad and even for myself, there would be moments when, because it was a part of my job to be in the Word, I was just naturally that way. But I'm like, I need to make sure that I'm doing this for me.
And then also just seeing so many people just working at it, recognizing that there are a lot of people that maybe reading isn't their first love. And so having the audio version is there. And I know that there are great things like YouVersion has, like audio versions of the Bible and that kind of thing is great. And then you're looking at different things.
And if you didn't grow up in the church, if you don't have a sense of cultural background or those sorts of things, some of the stuff, it is confusing. And what do I do with it? And how do I not get bogged down in some of what's taking place? So I do have a certain sympathy, I guess, or for those who are like, I want to be connected with God. I don't know how to do that well. So the kind of the heartbeat of that is, let's not be mean to ourselves. Let's be kind to ourselves.
Let's do this together. That's acceptable. That's okay for us to work through the scriptures together and be lifted up in that sense. The podcast isn't just about reading the scriptures out loud and people listening in, but you're helping to, in a simple way, guide people through the scriptures so that they have a reference point.
And I imagine it's to help people come to a place of understanding, aha, this is what a devotional time or a quiet time as it's often called, is really about bringing the meaning out of the scriptures. So it's not preaching a sermon every day, but actually what do the scriptures have for us today? Tell me a little bit about that journey. Yeah. So each day we begin, and I usually kind of open up with just kind of a thought that I feel is connected to that particular passage.
We make sure to pray because, I mean, if we're not connected with Jesus, what are we doing? But then we go ahead and we get into the scripture itself. I do my best to make some observations of the text itself that I think are helpful. I restrain myself from getting too nerdy about it. Not everybody wants that. Just like, okay, this is what's here and this is, to the best of our understanding, this is what the text meant to the first readers and what the author may have had in his mind.
And to kind of work through that on its own merit. And then to transition, to give ourselves a moment to just stop, to pause, to listen to God. God, what are you saying? And then to move into some more personal reflections and kind of to take the scriptures with us. The word is alive, right? It's this living thing in the sense that it is spirit-filled. And while the truth is there, there's also this dynamic of, well, what do I do with it?
If I've read this text and I've gone through it, how does it change my day? How does it change how I think? So that really is kind of where we try to land each day's quiet time or each day's devotion. Pete You touched on there what the original readers or original hearers of those scriptures would have understood because they were in a moment in time in that particular culture. And so some of the things that we just skip past can actually have a lot deeper meaning when we look back.
So we're bridging that difference between just reading it for what's on the page and understanding what was happening for those people in the past. For some, that would say, well, I'm confused now because do I have to have a theological degree to understand what's happening in the scriptures? So how do you make it simpler for people without cutting away a lot of the context that's in there? How do we draw people on that journey? Mark Yeah, that's a great question.
Other than saying, I do my best. I think I said, I try not to make it too nerdy because I do think that there are times when the scriptures really do kind of just say what they say. And I don't think that we need to make it more complicated than it needs to be. But there are moments that you alluded to. We're going through Matthew and through Romans in terms of New Testament stuff right now. And in both cases, they reference Old Testament scriptures.
It's just good sometimes to be like, okay, well, what was Paul thinking about when he listed off all of these different Old Testament passages or at least alluded to them? Or what was Matthew or even Jesus thinking when these responses come out in that text? When we go back, we're like, oh, well, he pulled from over here. So he must have been thinking about that. And the good Jewish people of the day would have probably also been thinking about those kinds of things.
So just wherever that kind of thing comes out, I just try to highlight that. I don't talk a lot about Greek words, but I will refer to them from time to time and just say, hey, this is talking about faith. And so let's dive into that a little bit to make sure that we're not just running all over the place. And it just helps to have those guardrails. That is part of the joy of doing it, pulling that out whenever it can enrich the process. That's what I'm thinking about.
That's what I'm looking for. I'm not even really that kind of a person that likes to jump down the rabbit hole all that much. Some people are more wired that way. And I don't mean that in a demeaning way at all. There's benefit to that. But for me, it's like, okay, well, how does this help the listener? How does this help that? So I think I bring that out in the episodes, and I think people can appreciate that.
Maybe in the word is still fairly fresh, but have you had people so far that have had a bit of an aha moment? I can now understand more of the scripture. This is helping me to grow. Yeah, for sure. One of the ways I found out about that is I actually made a mistake. I had uploaded the incorrect audio. I clicked the wrong file. And then that morning, I got three, four texts from people saying, hey, Tim, you got to fix this. I quickly did, and I rectified the situation.
But then just a lot of people saying, yeah, just that this connected for me. I'm really appreciating what you're doing. It's helping the word to come alive. So that does feel nice to get that sort of feedback. Now, coming out of a job as a pastor, which most of us would understand is more than a normal working week, that all hours seem to be occupied to this place where you have greater freedom. You're very much a creative person.
Has that allowed your creative side to flourish in other areas as well? The creative side has been there for the last few years, writing poetry in particular, and some music-related things. I grew up playing violin, so that is a love for me. The poetry part kind of started almost as like therapy. I have all of these thoughts and these feelings. What do I do with them? And especially the ones that don't necessarily come out logically.
So using that creative side, using language to help paint that picture was just a benefit to me. And then I began to share some of that. Since my last Sunday at church, yeah, there definitely has been opportunities for that to flourish a little bit, but it's changed. And I think it will change again. What I mean is, leading up to that point, there was this sense of, I'm processing the letting go. Processing, I know that the end is coming. Everybody knows that the end is coming of this season.
And so that evokes a certain kind of an emotion or a feeling. And then now it's shifted into, okay, Lord, what's next? And what I found as of late is the poetry is still personal, but it's less me-focused and it's turning more towards prayer. It's turning more towards that aspect of things because that's what I'm doing more of right now is seeking God and saying, Lord, what is it that you have for me here in this next season? As I go through that, then the poetry turns into that kind of a thing.
I have a really brief one that I wrote yesterday. Would it be okay if I shared it with you? Absolutely. So this is called While I Wait. While I wait, I keep my mind sharp, my hands busy, and my heart full. There's not enough time to let days just pass by and make me dull. Until clarity becomes crystal, I will continue in full-hearted patience. Until I've crossed this bridge of suspension, I will step with purpose and balance.
Since I don't know when waiting ends, each hour becomes its own treasure. Since I don't know my next assignment, each opportunity becomes its own prayer. So it's just where I'm at. It's wonderful when we can reflect on that waiting period. So many of us are in waiting periods of various kinds. You're in that waiting period of, okay, what is the next chapter going to look like work-wise? What do you have me to put my hand to, Lord?
But for other people, it's maybe there's illness in the family or for themselves or something concerning going on, and there is that waiting. What has God taught you in this time about that waiting? Obviously, that poem reflects some of that, but what has that waiting period taught you so far? Yeah, I'm moving slow and learning lots. To flesh that out a little bit more, there is that desire to get to the other side of the street, so to say, to make it through the transition.
But I've also come to this place of trying to appreciate as much as I can about this particular time of my life, that it's unique. I consider myself to be just so blessed to have time to sort things out, to have people in my life to sort them out with, to have all of that. When it comes to processing this with the Lord, it's leading me into patience. It's leading me into that sense of there's a hopefulness about it. The tension is, I feel like I should be making money. Isn't that my job?
I'm supposed to, on some level, bring in income for my household. So I do think about that, and I want to step into that, but I keep getting this thing from the Lord that says, don't rush ahead of me. Don't get anxious about this. Just relax, not to become passive in any way, but to just simply wait on the Lord at this point, without knowing what the conclusion will be, believing that there is something good and fulfilling and something that is in line with God's design for my life.
All of that is true. Ephesians 2.10, we're God's workmanship or his handiwork, and we're created to do these good works that he's prepared for us in advance, to walk in them. I know that I just paraphrased that quite a bit, but there's that reality for me that I'm like, okay, that's what I want to do. That's what I want to do. This waiting is compelling me to really stay in that space and not to rush. You've had the opportunity to choose a waiting period.
Other people are forced into waiting of various kinds, and it's something beyond their control. But either way, what you've mentioned there is that closeness to God in finding out what he is bringing to the table, but also you've reflected on the fact that you have good people around you that are helping you through that waiting. If someone is listening now and they're in a waiting period of some kind, and they don't have those people around them, what would you say to them? Yeah, it's hard.
You don't want to just rush out and find somebody to confide in if you don't have that trust. You can't fabricate trust. But I would say if you're connected with a church, then talk to a pastor that's there. I know sometimes in churches, especially when they're bigger, that can feel intimidating. But I can tell you as a pastor, as somebody who's done this for a long time, I loved it when people would come in, even if we didn't have a ton of relationship from beforehand.
If they're like, hey, I'm navigating this, would you pray with me? And sometimes it's as simple as that. And then the other thing I would say is, I'll bet that there is somebody in your life that is on your side. A spouse, a parent, a child, a sibling, somebody in your life that's on your side. And you don't have to ask them to be an expert. You don't have to ask them to be more than they are.
But simply letting them know that you're in this season of discovery, that you want to do the right thing, that you want to follow the Lord well, I'll bet you they would be honored to join you in prayer. And even if there's just some aspect of checking in periodically, maybe it's once a week, maybe it's something less than that, they don't need to be a guru, right? They can just be who they are and you get to be who you are.
But when we bring all of that to the Lord together, I think it's a beautiful thing. Another great place to start is obviously ensuring that we are having that time alone with God. And if that's difficult for anyone or you're finding it difficult to find a way to do that, meet me in the word is an excellent resource. And there is a link in the show notes at bleedingdaylight.net so that people can find that easily.
It really is something that is going to help people greatly to be able to just hear a little of the word, to hear a bit of understanding around that. And I suppose for the rest of us, we're just eager to see where this journey will lead you. We're wanting to see where God takes you next because it seems to be an incredible journey. And hopefully we can check in with you further down the line when God makes that fully clear for you.
But Tim, I just want to say thank you so much for your time today on Bleeding Daylight. Yeah, thank you, Rodney. Thank you for inviting me into your world here a little bit. It's just been a privilege and a delight, really. I've had a great time visiting with you and your listeners. Thank you for listening to Bleeding Daylight. Please help us to shine more light into the darkness by sharing this episode with others. For further details and more episodes, please visit bleedingdaylight.net.