Hello, and welcome to the shifting culture podcast in which we have conversations about the culture we create, and the impact we can make. I'm your host, Joshua Johnson. Go to shifting culture podcast.com To interact or donate. If you're enjoying this podcast, don't forget to hit the Follow button to get new episodes as soon as they come out. And leave a rating or review and let your friends network know about the show. Previous guests on the show have included Steve Addison, Curtis
Sargent and Pam Arland. You could go back and listen to those episodes and more. But today's guest is Dawn way bright. Dawn is a seasoned church planting movement practitioner and great commission leader. He now serves as global strategy leader for the movement organization reach the rest. We talked about how abiding with Jesus propels and sustains movement, how church planting movements are breaking out in prisons and much more. It's a great conversation. So here's Don, enjoy the
conversation. Welcome, Don, thanks for coming on the podcasts. I'm excited to have you here.
Yeah, glad to be here, man.
Yeah, you know, I'd love to get into your story of how you got turned on to church planting movements disciple making movements and your journey into that area.
As I got baptized in our 30s, my wife and I, and, you know, we didn't have any traditional background in church, that we were always, yes, we read the Bible, we were always doing ministry outside the walls of the church. And that was just natural DNA. And then I was in Fayetteville, Arkansas was working for Tyson Foods, took perspectives course. And that really like ruined me. You know, I remember week two, the story of his glory. And it just changed the whole shift,
kind of paradigm shift. And I ended up joining, going full time ministry in 2001. And I was on a big church and Tossa became the missions pastor, and that church had Avery Willis, who was a influential person with the International Mission Board of Southern Baptists and, and we're out in movements and Sunday, he got me into what was called strategy coordinator training with the idea of developing strategy coordinator churches where churches were to missionary, to engage unreached
people groups. And so I was like, I did that, like, right at the beginning of ministry, full time ministry, went to that some of the great practitioners, David Watson, and some others, really poured into me at that point. And so I had that DNA set of multiplication. Right at the very beginning, that's just the way I thought about ministry. And that's, I mean, I just really couldn't even compromise I couldn't do anything other
than multiplying disciples. And yeah, you know, simple, biblical reproducible.
That's, that's fantastic. So what did it look like for you as you stepped into that strategy coordinator role within large churches to go off to unreached people groups and see multiplication take place on the ground?
Yeah, I mean, we started training up people, and there was a paradigm shift for a lot of people just to the principles of multiplication. Yeah. They soon started embracing it as, particularly as we saw fruit on the field, you know, on the ends of the earth type of mission. So that's where we were engaged in it. And we were seeing some fruit and
breakthroughs. And, you know, just seeing an activity of God on display, which was just so exciting and inspired the church yet then trying to execute it locally was a great challenge. And I'm trying to incorporate it into all the spiritual formation processes of the church. That
was a great challenge. I left that church and came to Sugar Creek Baptist Church in Houston 2005 and continued the same journey, really trying to engage internationally with unreached people groups and real simple church planting movement principles and saw some degrees of fruit and then try to apply it locally. And the same thing just experimenting with things failing forward and such and, and just just kind of journey in
with that. 2011 I came across and partnered with Nathan shank in the International Mission Board in north India. And that's really changed everything we discovered some tools this tool called for fields in this kind of organic framework for the couple of evangelism and discipleship together and some, some best practices and the simple biblical reproducible tools for evangelism and discipleship. And that just changed the game for us man shifted the church, we just started seeing tremendous fruit
there, from the harvest. And then, and so that brought this momentum back to our church. And he's tools just started getting implemented, we started launching out these tools, with systematic training on a monthly basis. Yeah, we launched out, there's no place left movement, we were kind of like a early adopter of the no place left movement. So we launched that
out for Houston. And really going after it with just equipping people empowering a priesthood, a believer, with the simple tools and, and so within a few years, we trained 3000 People at Sugar Creek, it really created, you know, what I call gospel fluency and the life of the, you know, just, they're just the leaders. They're just thinking and breathing and, and dialoguing from a lens of the gospel, and their precedent in the gospel and other circumstances of life.
So when you say gospel fluency for, you know, for the church and everything we do, what does that mean for you, in practical terms?
Well, as a leader of it, you know, we're bringing it about trying to, you know, engage all the circles of influence of our church. So we're trying to see our ministries become fluent in our children's ministry, youth ministry, our simulation practices, but also then try to engage with gospel language and conversations and interaction, our neighbors, our workplaces, different spectrums of our schools and things like that. So how to roll that out in that regard.
So as you're, you're looking for people with gospel gospel fluency, what are some practical ways that we could go and have gospel conversations within our workplaces and our neighbors, in our neighborhoods, as we're outside of the walls of the church? You know, I've I've been, you know, walking with with people, and helping them share, you know, stories of Jesus and Jesus stories from their own life and from the Bible, with other people,
practically. And it's one of those things I think, within the church that has been difficult for people to engage here in the West, when I was in the Middle East, it was the easiest thing in the world to sit down and have a conversation about Jesus with a Muslim. But when I'm here in America, it seems to be difficult to have these conversations for a lot of people, and they're scared to engage in conversations about Jesus. What are some practical tips that you've seen that have
been effective? For good gospel conversations within our neighbors, our neighborhoods and our workplaces?
Yeah, that's, that's great. That's the reality that I hear all the time, I think a few things lessons learned on that would be first, the whole posture before God of of ourselves, just the abiding posture that's been in yielding and being filled with the Spirit and just the nearness to God, and knowing God know intimately that he reflects on you. I mean, when people see you, they see that display of holiness. And so I think that's a unique thing.
Because when you're in the workforce, you're on display, they, they see how you interact with others, they see how you interact in difficult situations and challenging people. And so
you're on display. So that display of holiness gives a degree of credibility there in the workplace as far as his conversations, and then even out of that, when we're surrendered and yielded and filled with the Spirit, this boldness and we're listening to the voice of God, it just leads us to pursue these promptings of just really a joyful lifestyle, or that's contagious, but also a boldness, a boldness in a joy in our dialogue. So that abiding thing
is so, so important. And then you know, we, in First Thessalonians, two eight he says, I shared the gospel, but also my whole life, and said, There's got to be a genuine love for that person to get to know them, to care for them to care about their needs to know about their life, so it doesn't come across transactional. You feel like great story to tell them and you got to get to know them first and let them know you.
And, and then out of that context, so many times people face the crisis, and they're gonna come to you with that crisis. And that's a great opportunity for the gospel out of that gospel centered relationship that you formed.
Hmm, that's good. I, you know, I often, you know, share with people as we're looking and trying to find people with peace people that that the gospel can start to flow through that God has prepared the open up their hearts to receive him, you know, oftentimes that when we're out and about that we're not actually finding persons of peace, but persons of peace are
finding us. Because as we're engaging the world, and we actually start to look like Jesus, we're gonna start to be safe people, for people to engage spiritual conversation with and they're going to come to us with questions, and start to engage Jesus at their level, which I think is a is a beautiful thing. You know, I love what in Luke 10, I like the actual sequence that Jesus lays out in Luke 10, which is to go to, if you find a person peace, to stay there, and then to eat
with them. And I think, you know, the first thing is we do is we eat is we actually have to get to know the person in front of us. What is their what is there need, what is there? What would be good news to that person that we're talking to? And then it's to heal the sick is the next thing that Jesus says. And I think that's how do we help people to have an
encounter with Jesus? And then it's proclaimed that the kingdom of God is near and proclaim that thing, and I think we often go about, and we have in the past, a lot of times, proclaiming loudly, without our our life and our lifestyle, actually
reflecting Jesus. So how did how have you seen any stories of impact when our lifestyle reflects Jesus when we're abiding with him, and we're engaging people sharing good news for the person in front of us, and then proclaiming afterwards, any good stories of impact that you can share?
Well, I mean, we see those stories, like you described around the world, and these dark places, and these persecuted places, they'll come to us, man, he was someone they'll say, Come pray with my, my family. And, you know, so that, that takes place all the time. But here locally, as you said, it's a more challenging environment. Once again, it's it's out of that contagious love that's on display from you, you know, I mean, you have a genuine
care for people. You're, it's not a transactional thing that you're getting to, you're you're getting to know them and to love them. You know, we've seen that in the hood here of Houston, we go routinely out into the streets to buy to into the darkest block of Houston. It's just a really rough neighborhood and a lot of drug dealers, and prostitutes, and we've been doing it for so long, about four or five years. Many times, we're just praying with them,
listening to him. But when we listen to him, that's when no one listens to him. No one ever listens to no one. You know, one of the things I remember a long time ago, as I was doing this on skid row in LA, you see all the ministries all around, you'll see all this Christian ministries, food, shelter, clothing, shelters, so I walked up to this man and just said hi to him, and, and, and asked him what he needed. And he told me, he says, look around, I don't need anything. I need someone to
look me in the eye. And treat me like I have value like I have a human being. And so I don't this block in Houston, those times where we really just listen to them. And we didn't try to get to the gospel. We didn't try to instruct them how to live, you know, we just listened to them and listen to their needs. And it really, it would shape them and they'd show up for an event and clean up the neighborhood and, and stuff like that. And no, we had stuff like that
breakthrough. But it's really that listening to genuine carry. Yeah. And really willing to get messy. I mean, we're seen in the red light districts where we're seeing these movements. And it's really letting them know that we love them and care for them. That you're not judging them. Yeah. And it takes some physical touch. It will take a hug and Let them know that you're
secure, we do. Value you, you have dignity, you're, you were born in the image of Christ, we want to restore that image in your life and help you in that journey.
Yeah. Yeah, it sounds like the difference between doing doing so called projects, and actually just engaging people at their level of where they're at, and seeing them as, you know, beloved children of God that were born in the image of him, that, you know, for me, I like to say, you know, as a family, in the world, we are all just wayward sons and daughters of God, that we're all family, because we're made of
the image of God. But it's how do we actually go about and start to connect one to another, so that we can start to imitate Christ, instead of imitating the world or, you know, anything else that we're trying to imitate? And, you know, we I think we all have the same desires. And inherently, we have a desire, a spiritual desire to connect with God and connect with one on one to another, with
a greater purpose. And, you know, I love that it's not just a project, but it's, you know, we're seeing people and engaging people at their level. And so as we start to do that within city and within a city, what does it look like, you know, I would love to see cities in America be transformed, for Christ to see really true Shalom and peace happen within cities. As you're going about and engaging people one on one, how do we get to that place where cities are transformed, and whole
communities are transformed? For Christ?
Well, that's a great question, man, because by 2050 90%, of the world's going to be living in cities around the globe, urbanization of the world, and we haven't done a good job, these movements that we track around the world are predominantly in rural settings. Right now, some of the top leaders in India, some of the top movement leaders in India, God's given them a vision for
the cities of India. And they're really going after at heart and they're mobilizing their significant networks of multiplying leaders, and moving
the cities. And they're started with like, 100 days of prayer, followed by three days and a harvest and, and I think we're gonna learn a lot from them, these top, you know, highest level practitioners and strategy coordinators and sense that are engaged, that he's going to learn a lot from them just the rhythms of life that are required to engage cities, it's not your normal nine to five man, you got to you got different windows, because it's active 24 hours a day, and, and
you got all these different pockets of peoples and segments and different approaches and such. But I do think in the US, the challenge is a little bit different. You've got to have a spirit led, the spirit formed, spirit fueled collaboration between these apostles that are, are breaking new territory, and
the traditional churches. So there's got to be the spirit of God's got to come together, and bring them both together, and then start equipping start empowering the priesthood of believer releasing them to reach their weakest to reach their relationship maps in our, in our churches, our mega churches, if we can empower all of them working together for a purpose, such as that prayer, prayer, walking our streets, loving on our neighbors flowing through their relationship maps, we have
a chance to see a culture shift in our cities.
Yeah. Yeah, that's good. So as we start to engage our relationship maps, what does it look like for an individual going into that place, and a group of people say we have, you know, a group of five or six that say, we really want, we have this neighborhood, this is where we live, this is where we work and play. And we want to start to engage this this is our relationship map here, our oil costs. What does
that look like? As you know, for your your strategy, you know, if you're looking at for field strategy, or whatever you're going after, what does it look like for that group of people to really impact that neighborhood? Practically, what are some steps that they could take to see that neighborhood transform?
Well, we have done a good job of it here. In our local context, we've experimented quite a bit. One of the things that we've moved to, you know, we've had great challenges with the COVID. People were fearful of lettuce in their houses, even though they stepped up to the Gospel, it was very challenging to get any type of follow up in their homes and such. But that's
starting to lessen. One of the things we quit doing was inviting the church and instead inviting them to discover the love of Jesus and force them into family groups and, and start meeting with them as regularly as we could, because even in the community that we're, we've been targeting this kind of a lower middle class type of single family homes, people struggling to work and get jobs and different hours, different days. And so it was going to try to meet that
demand. So we got to be flexible on our schedule, we just can't say, Hey, we're going on Wednesday nights it, you know, such and such time, our practitioners got to be very flexible with their schedule, be willing to do what it takes to get to disciplemaking versus just getting to that gospel conversation that took place.
So then if we're, we're starting to adapt, and we're getting to a place of disciple making, what are some good things that you've seen, to make disciples, with people? What does it look like to be a common disciple of Jesus together in a neighborhood?
Well, I mean, it's whether it's here, it's inside of our churches, it's in the prisons, or in a harvest fields around the world. One of the best practices is this tea for tea, or just three thirds, the simple biblical model of creating some biblical community around the word of God, Self discovering the Word of God in that group together, and then obeying the Word of God, and then in loving accountability to one another. So I think it's a best practice, I've seen it work
in every context. And, you know, just in a loving community where people love loud and care for one another. You're, you're learning discovering the commands of God of Jesus Christ, and then you're obeying them, you're putting together simple action plans, in my context, how I can live it out. And then you're just kind of lovingly holding one another accountable to that. And yeah, and feeding off of that, and it works in everywhere.
You know, what I, you know, as we're discovering the truth in the Bible, and we're looking to obey it and put it into practice. You know, at the end of the Sermon on the Mountain, Jesus says that if you're gonna build your house on the rock, you're gonna hear the words of mine and put them
into practice. And so we actually have to put them into practice, but what I love what you were talking about their within that discovery process, the three thirds group, discovery, Bible, study, whatever you want to call it, there's this thing as you go, there's the balance between obedience and love and love and obedience. And there it goes back and forth. If we, you know, focus too heavily on obedience and obedience only without love,
we're gonna burn out. And it'll be legalism, if we focus too heavily on love. It's going to be just too Grace filled, that we're gonna fall on the, the other end as well. So what is that balance that you've seen between love and obey, and how does do those work together?
But just think you described it well, the structure of our three thirds helps you to remember to put that into practice. And you just gotta go with the Spirit, it's the spirit led thing, the whole inviting the Holy Spirit, into that in your habitat in with the Spirit of God. And you know, your leaders really need to meet and to know Jesus, and they got to be flowing in that. So some days, there may be, you know, someone there in your group may have some deep concerns, and you
just got to love them. And you may have to, you know, not even go to the word that they might have to put aside whatever you plan and just love on that person. And so it's really just flowing in the spirit and gut, you have leaders that are just, they know Jesus and are deeply in love with Jesus, and it just reflects and how they lead
you know, and Houston or anywhere else in the US, I think, you know, we've seen a lot of good movements around the world but in the US What are because we have people in places that are really spread out, and I think with with mega churches, what's happened is we've we've decided to we could arrive 30 minutes to church. So we could be on there on a Sunday morning with a whole bunch of people and, and doing something. And then we gather into some, you know, some small groups
around something. And we have a little bit of community. But if that small group is has some distance, and they drive 1520 minutes to get to one another, you know, once a week or so, there's not a lot of life on life, it's just, hey, we're gonna meet for a couple hours once a week. Are there some things and some some best practices that you've seen multiplication take place within, within micro churches or small groups that been able to multiply? Are they neighborhood
based? Are they people that that come together? They affinity based, what are ways that you have seen multiplication take place within the US so that we can't make sure that we are, are are setting and laying down good foundations from the beginning?
Yeah, I think in a small case studies that I've seen in the US different settings. One, you've got characteristic of fellowship and loving for one another and, and enjoying one another, getting into the word, maybe obeying the word, you're talking about obedience, but really, I think the key is keep the mission before the group. And together as a community, they're engaging the mission, whether it is loving on the neighbors of their street, looking at the, you
know, what's the darkness? Or what's the giant, that's, that's preventing your neighborhood or your community from experiencing that Shalom? In a sense? Yeah, I mean, as a group, keeping that vision and doing that together, and having that sense of, of
oneness there. So that's been one of the key things is not just the fellowship, and getting around the word, but it's really the mission that has been the fabric of keeping them together, and, and willing to make some sacrifices and get uncomfortable when it's, you know, you got to drive this far such and, and so that there's a genuine desire to be with one another because you're a team that's affecting your culture.
Hmm. That's good. Put the mission forefront and keep it right in the front and front and center to make sure you know, what is our purpose? Where are we going? What is your mission? You mentioned prisons the other just a little while ago? What are some, some exciting things that are happening within prisons have heard that, you know, there's a lot there's movement happening happening in prisons? What's happening?
Well, not in the Texas prisons, we'd launched out this forcefields training. And so back in about 214, there was a group of men that I was training systematically, with over the course of a year and then did some intensives with and they, they got shifted, they got reassigned to some church, or some other prison. So, in 215, these two guys went to the biggest prison in Texas, Cofield
prison, 6000 inmates. And when they got there, they just surveyed the land, there was maybe about four known Bible studies going on. And they just started rolling out this four fields and just started living it out. They did it in the chapel at first. And they were actually kicked out of the chapel by the Christians that didn't buy into their philosophy of ministry to simple biblical reproducing, multiplying stuff. So they took it into the rooms and such I started seeing fruit.
And then they got invited back into the chapel and all the programs there. And they basically developed a no place left or four fields residency, it was like a 12 week intensive, and it ended up having like four different levels to it. And not only how many men they trained, but within two years, they had over 500 baptisms. And they had over 280 groups that in every living area of the prison of
funk function as church. They had the the warden told me that gospel conversations you just hear the Gospel 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and it shifted the culture of that prison. I was there one time when they were baptizing some inmates, and I saw this, they were baptized and about 50 Guys, and and then they were following up with Lord's Supper. And there was this guy Aryan Nation, the knee. He's covered head to toe
with prison tattoos. I mean, just a scary looking guy, just, uh, you know, just the embodiment of racism. And, and here he was he was being baptized by the black brother that led them to Jesus. Wow. And they got up out of that water, they embraced each other. And that was just like, I just had tears. It was like this. That's what reconciliation, the ministry of reconciliation is
all about. Yeah. And so you really saw that, in that prison, it just shifted the culture today, rooms that were once dominated by gangs and drug dealing, became Bible studies. And, you know, you just really saw it. inmates were wanting to get transferred to that prison, because they heard about the culture shift. So yeah, really, really flowed out of there. And then another, another characteristic of that they're all cloistered together. Yep. And they're all on display. You
can smell their stinks. You know, it's, that's what they call, and you gotta be real. I mean, if you say that you're this Christian, you better be the display of holiness, man, you better show the glory of God, by the way you live. And so they really hold high standards. But they love one another deeply. And it really led to a movement that's taking place now. We're seeing a lot of these guys. It's like, by the sovereign wealth, God, we're seeing some of our best leaders get transferred to other
prisons. And we're going in kickstarting these four fields residencies enough for five other prisons, I'll be in one, this Thursday, getting it started.
Wow. And, you know, as you said that, you know, they're closer together than they are, they're within the prison with each other. And, you know, that gives, what they have time. They have proximity, all sorts of things that that enable movement within this, prisons, what happens when they get out?
Yeah, that's a big gap force, we've got to do better with that. There's two guys that I just mentioned, started that movement, they just got moved to another prison that was nearby. It's called College
to transition unit. And our whole goal, and we think God sent them there, to start doing something such that we're training up and equipping these guys to be movement leaders that are transitioning out and then help them get on their feet, because that's the gap, they need a way to get on their feet, and then engage into the mission. So that is a big gap that a lot of us are aware of.
So what is it? What do you think it would take? How can how can believers in Jesus that come together and help in transitioning inmates back into society? How can we help and get people on their feet?
Yeah, I think, some best practices, I mean, a lot of these guys may not have any support systems, or their support systems are not what we want them to be around, ends up getting them back into prison. And so it's going to have to be a residency type of a setting where they've got a season to get on their feet, they learned some skills about, you know, reentry into society. And at same time, they start getting introduced to the new harvest fields on a on the Free World Harvest fields.
Yeah, that's, that's really good. And I, you know, I think that, you know, especially, you know, in these movements, we can't discount anybody, you know, movement leaders can come from anywhere from any backgrounds. You could see, you know, the disciples of Jesus came from a lot of different backgrounds. And they were raised up and they were very unlikely disciples to come and lead the movement that we
see today. So, we don't want to discount anybody, you know, as you're looking and as you're engaging around the world and what you've seen, what are some places or things that are really getting you excited at the moment?
Well, I told you about that city movements that the call lights in India that's it's it's creating tremendous fruit. They had a prayer time last fall, but they started to harvest intensive. This you know, at the beginning of the year, and the numbers are extraordinary, it's and then we're learning from it and doing some down downstream development
of leaders and stuff. So it's, it's it's very fruitful, but really an every hard place, my goodness and every prosecuted environment, we're just seeing the kingdom of God break through exponentially. Whether it's in Nigeria amongst, you know, right now, Nigeria, in northern Nigeria would be the highest concentration of martyrs, Christian martyrs in the world dangerous to do ministry. But you got these men and women that are just, you know, they're filled with the spirits rendered
to Jesus. And they're going there with great effectiveness.
And rolling out these multiplication principles and seeing breakthroughs and signs and wonders and demonstrations of the Spirit's power accompanying the gospel go out, we're seeing it with Afghans, Yemeni leaders, the cranium movements, throughout this whole tension belt of Africa, where you got this Muslim incursion, and these jihadists and this extremism, we're just seeing breakthroughs in this one area of the Horn of Africa and southwest Ethiopia, that's a Muslim dominated environment 10s
of 1000s of baptisms in the past
six months. I mean, the kingdom of God is blowing up exponentially in and even in these really dark places, as we're engaging the cities, we're seeing the emergence of the red light background believers, you know, we talked to Mr. Logically reaching Muslims with MBBS, you know, but seeing God slay the giant of the darkest depravity in our cities, by raising these RBPS, these red light background believers, and seeing them multiplied to kingdom within their own, you know, networks and some,
Yeah, isn't that interesting? I mean, where the gospel flows and who gets to come out, as, you know, people that start to start to lead, you know, it's just, I, I'm just reflecting that, you know, we often discount a lot of people because of their backgrounds. Right. And, you know, Jesus doesn't discount people. And
Jesus sees everyone. And so I just, I just love that their people are not discounted, that they're not disqualified because of what happens and their past, their background where they came from, who they were. Because, you know, once you, you, you get Jesus, you get to be transformed into, you know, you have newness in Christ, which is so beautiful. And it's just amazing. It's just the power of what the gospel is and does, through people's lives. I just think that's so amazing.
Incredible. Yeah. Yeah. If you if there are three, you know, two or 3123 paradigm shifts, for people to move from the status quo of their Christian life into disciple making and multiplication. What are some paradigm shifts that you think that we should, should move into?
Well, first, there's no silver bullet with methodology, whether it's for fields DMM CPM, it's, we follow Jesus. And it's, it's really, this deep intimacy, of knowing Jesus and him knowing you. Really, that surrender, that yielding, that intimate love relationship with the Living
God. And now that that everything starts shifting your prayer, life shifts, just you start listening, hearing the voice of God more and, and, and if you have a desire for his dreams in his heart, I mean, his, his economy is multiplication. That's the only way. And so, as you abide you're, the more you abide and just enjoy that and you begin to walk in obedience to the commands of Christ, simple commands, you can obey. Immediately, you know what you
learned so good. There's practitioners, there's good people all over the country. You know, this 2414 movement, no place, movement. There's great practitioners great trainings all over the country. Enter into that, go check it out, kick the tires and learn from that, and let's discover from Scripture itself. Self discover from Scripture as as you're in that intimate relationship with
living God, just what to do. And you'll see that all these practices are derived from Scripture and then enter into it, and watch what God does. And don't do it alone. Take someone with you.
I love that. It's an intimate intimacy with Christ, discovering the truth found in scripture for yourself and go with others. Yeah, I love that. A couple questions I'd like to ask here at the end number one, if you could go back to your 21 year old self, what advice would you give?
Don't do what I was doing. Oh, man, I wish I was living for Jesus. And I just, you know, the greatest thing I see these young people. And I'm seeing so many young practitioners just on fire for Jesus at that age. Yeah. And it just warms my heart and just stay the course man and just have that intimacy with Jesus really. Don't get so caught up
in the methodologies. And some of these, you know, you get along with some of these great practitioners, you want to learn their tools, but really learn how they walk with Jesus, and continue that walk and you'll discover all these tools and all these methodologies that will produce fruit.
Hmm, that's really good. Anything you've been reading or watching lately, you could recommend?
Well, I just, I just really been digging into the whole abiding, I've been listening to some Francis Chan, just just the way he communicates. And his whole focus, once again, isn't on methodology. It's just on knowing Jesus and loving him deeply. And, and so really all this abiding. Me, I think it all just flows out of that. You know, we got some great. I think we got Clemson giants and methodology, but man we got to have, we're gonna have some giants in this posture of abiding.
Yeah. Yeah, I agree. I think so. I think that's, that's definitely needed. 100% is needed. And, you know, I think as we start to abide, and we become a Jesus culture, you know, that's going to shift things, more than any strategy can ever shift. Yeah, yeah. They
share about our political mountains. They want to know how we love. Yeah. And the world doesn't love that way. And we need a new way of thinking a new way of living a new way of loving.
Yeah, I agree. I agree. Don, thank you. This has been, this has been fascinating. It's been a great conversation. I really appreciate it was good. So thank you so much.
Yeah, thanks. What you're doing appreciate it deeply. Yes,
thanks. All right. Anything if you could leave us with one thing? What would you leave us with?
Oh, the, the power of the gospel. I mean, it's a love story. God is love. So he gave us the gospel, he inhabits the gospel, that seed, that seed when it's planted, it just brings forth life and it has the power of creation as the power of the blood of transforms. A person that transforms marriages and families and it can lead to the entire transformation of a community. And you know, the whole story of the mustard seed that's, that's that gospel, man.
It's so little. But man, it's so powerful, and it contains the love of God. And, man, we just got to we got to sow it abundantly, and live it extremely.
Amen. Well, thank you, Don. It was a privilege.
Yeah, you too, man. Love you.