Hey there. Welcome to the Collide Podcast. This is Willow Weston, the founder and director of Collide and I'm so glad you hopped on. If you're new around here, make sure you check out our website at wecollide.net or hop on Instagram at We Collide or Facebook at We Collide Women t make sure to check out all the things we have for you ladies.
We have online courses and we have Bible study books and conferences coming up and classes and free resources to help you grow and experience Jesus's healing and his purpose for your life. So check all that out. I'm so glad you hopped on today. I just gotta hang out with Pastor Alex Seeley from the Belonging Company, which is a church out of Tennessee. And I absolutely loved this interview. It was inspiring.
She shared her story of God's calling on her life and her husband's life and what God is doing through them is absolutely incredible. So take a listen, Alex. It's so fun to hang out with you today. You're coming in all the way from Tennessee, is that correct? That is right. I love that you are there. And we're up here in the Pacific Northwest, and we have heard so much about what the Lord is doing through you and the church that you're a part of, and we want to hear all about that.
I just want to start by understanding how you moved all the way from Melbourne, Australia, and found yourself in Tennessee. Yeah, it's a wild. It's a wild journey and a wild story. So I'll try and make it short. And it's a fun fact that Yesterday actually marked 12 years since we kind of landed on US soil. So about 13, 14 years ago, I would say we were at church and just feeling a stirring, like there was a new season arising.
And my husband had said, you know, I don't know why, but this last time that I went to America, it just felt like home. And I was like, well, that might be your feelings, but it's not my feelings. I like where I live and not planning to move anytime soon. And. But it was crazy because this guest speaker had come to our church and was talking on Abraham. And of course, it's always about, you know, go to the land that I'll tell you to go in.
But I do remember the Holy Spirit just prompting on my heart and saying, would you go to nothing? You know, with nothing to nothing but my presence? And I. And I actually said, no. I said, that's a really hard thing to do. Like, yeah, if I got a job offer or if there was a church that wanted to hire us, yeah, I would do that, but I'm not just going to pick up and go somewhere. And for the next two years, he just kept working on our heart. And it wasn't a rash decision.
It was a very prayerful decision. And a decision where we'd been with our pastors Since I was 11 years of age, you know, and now I'm in my late 30s. And we had pioneered a movement with them and, you know, done a lot, built a church with them. And so I never really saw myself leaving, but it just was so crazy how things were almost closing in on us in a way that it's hard to articulate, but it just didn't feel like it was right anymore.
And I think God does that in your heart when he's preparing you to transition into a new season. What you once were so connected to now feels a little disconnected. And so we prayed into that and we talked to our pastors about it, and we said, we don't know why. We're just feeling this stirring to go to America. We don't have any rhyme or reason. But God said. And they said, well, get yourself the green card lottery, because that will be God's way of saying yes.
And we're like, well, that's like, the odds are pretty not much in our favor. But we did, we obeyed that, that course of action, and we applied for the green Card diversity lottery because they give 50,000 permanent resident cards to the world every year, but Australia only ever wins about 700 of those. So it was a long shot, but we did it. And then that was a process. We kind of applied in October, following May rolled round.
We checked out our status online and it said we didn't win the Green cup lottery. So it was really bizarre because by then God had really confirmed, no, you're meant to go, your season's up, it's time to transition. And so I just left it with the Lord and said, well, God, this is your problem. If we are really meant to go, make it, make a way. And my husband was actually touring in the. In the.
In Europe at the time, and he said, you're not going to believe this, but I got a letter from the US State Department saying they have messed up the drawer and they're going to start again and they're redrawing it in July. So this was May. Between May and July, I had so many confirmations. People didn't know this.
My pastors were the only one that knew that we were thinking about this people would prophesy if I would go travel, they would say, I don't know why, but I just see you guys in America, you know, they would say all these prayers and things that related to America. Well, July rolled round and we got accepted for the green card lottery. And so we said to our pastors, well, that was what you asked us to do. And they said, well, that's obviously the Lord, so, you know, get ready to go.
And that was in July. And we didn't leave to the following April because you have to go through the process of application. So April 2012, we took our four year old and our eight year old and six suitcases and a shipping container full of Henry's music gear and studio and we just moved to Nashville and literally did not know a single human when we landed. And we were like, oh my goodness, what have we done, Lord?
But honestly now, you know, obviously we'll talk about it in a minute, but 12 years later, on the other side of it, I just thank God that he knew exactly what he was doing. And now we have, you know, this incredible church that we never ever imagined that was not the reason why we came to America. And yet we have this beautiful church and community that we get to steward. And it's just been the craziest ride, but the most rewarding and fruitful one.
What an just crazy ask that God kind of challenged you, like, would you go to nothing with nothing? And I love too that you have this relationship with God where you were like, that's your problem, God, like, if you want us to end up in the United States of America, you're going to have to make a way. I love that you, you feel like you can just say, well, that's on you, Lord. And he made a way.
It's really interesting to me because as you tell this story, I think people could listen to it and say, wow, that's really cool. But invite us in a little bit to what you left because it sounds like you were part of the same church since you were 11 years old. I mean, you left your home country. I'm imagining you left family, friends, roots. Like, what did you leave to show up in Nashville knowing no one? Yeah, we left everything.
And when I mean everything, I don't even think people really understand how much everything was. We were probably what you would call at the pinnacle of, of our vocation and our ministry. You know, we, we had helped our pastors establish a movement, worship movement across Australia and the world called Planet Shakers. And my husband was the Worship director of that from conception. I was helped.
I helped pastor and helped in the executive role of birthing the church that grew to 10,000 in a short amount of time. You know, we were leaders in our own right. We had a church community. We had our entire family. Sides of our family were there. We had paychecks, we had. We had a home. We had everything that you would realize, you know, I'm getting to my 40s. And we were established. You know, we were an established family.
So when God really asked us to sell everything, but not even just sell everything, lay down your position like, you may never preach again. You may never pastor again. You may. For my husband, you may never lead worship again. You may never have a band that you get to steward and build on. But what about if I was going to ask you to do something completely different? Are you more tethered? And is your identity in what you do, or is it in your relationship with me and being obedient to me?
And that was huge. And I'm not going to say it was easy. It wasn't. It took me two years on the other side of moving here to go through the grief of losing family, having no friends, having to rebuild from scratch, even having a credit score in America. We didn't even know what that is. We felt like teenagers out of college. We'd own homes and we'd owned our cars.
And here we are now starting a whole new culture and system because God said, and I don't recommend it for everybody, and I don't think it's for the faint of heart, but when you do have that relationship with the Lord and you do know how to hear his voice, it presses on you. And it's worse for you to stay in disobedience than follow in obedience. And so we left everything, and we really did come to nothing.
And I thought red carpet was going to be rolled out when we got to Nashville and God was going to show us the way and the church was going to invite us in, but they didn't. And it was very lonely. But that was actually the greatest season of me getting to know God as my father and how to hear his voice and his voice alone. Because sometimes I think when we're in a church community, we've got a lot of voices speaking in our lives, and we've got.
But when he strips you of everything, it's so concentrated. And I didn't even realize how much I needed those two years of just being tucked away in the wilderness, if you like, before we could launch into the new season that he had for us. I love that you are being honest about the grief and the loneliness, because I think there are people listening even right now, who maybe, like you, followed God's call, and they're in that space right now.
You get this great gift to be able to look back over the course of the 10 years to that season of grief and loneliness, and you're in a completely different place than that. And you can maybe see now why God has brought you where he's brought you. But there are people listening who are like, hey, wait, like, the Lord told me to go do something, and I'm doing it, and it sucks and it's hard and it's disappointing, and I don't understand why I'm here.
Yeah. And so I love that you're being honest about that. Yeah. You have to. I don't think God. I think God shows you glimpses, and so he gives you these visions in part. And so you obey that one step. But then I feel like you have to get your grounding in that step. And I think now, looking back, I watched God teach me more about who I am and what I truly believed without all the supports around me.
Because now it was like, okay, for years, you have been with a group and they've taught you all the things, and you've relied basically on their prayers, on their laboring over the word, over. You know, you get a bit of a. You become a bit of a consumer Christian. You know, I had lead pastors that knew how to hear from God and led meetings where I always encountered him. But then God's like, okay, you've learned now. What have you learned now? What are you going to put into practice?
Because if I really am who I say I am, you're going to have to navigate hard spaces. And I think about so many people that fall out in this. In between season of the now and not yet. And I actually believe God does his finest work in the wrestle of are you still going to trust God even when you feel alone? Are you still going to trust God even when you think something looks like it's failed?
Because I think my identity had been so wrapped up in the system, success of everything that we'd done that now I almost looked humiliated. Like, oh, my gosh, Alex and Henry have moved to America, and they're not even going to. Like, they're going to church, but they're not planted in a church. Oh, my gosh. Alex and Henry left a huge worship movement. Henry's doing nothing with his music oh, like.
And. And actually, that was very good for me because it was stripping me of the identity of everything I was connected to. And I had to realize, am I okay and am I enough with just being in relationship with Jesus? Because I think so much of our Christian walk is we are doing for God everything.
But what I learned in that season of nothingness for a minute was, who am I without the title, without the position, without the paycheck, without the church name, without my husband's name, like, who is Alex Seeley? And I realized I'm a daughter, and a daughter first. Before I am a minister, before I am a pastor, before I'm a preacher, speaker, author, I'm a daughter. And sometimes I think God puts us in those little, like, in between spaces to really wrestle.
Are you going to throw a tantrum and bow out, or are you going to stay faithful and watch God do more in you than what you're achieving on the outside? Does that make sense? Absolutely. And. And that won't even be the last time you might have to go through that. I think life hands you these seasons where God's almost asking you, you're stripped, and he's asking you, what do you believe about me? And who do you believe you're called to be when you've lost everything? Right.
And so it's good for us, but it's not something we'd sign up for. Right. So you get to Nashville and things are not working out the way that you thought they would. When you think back to that season, is there, like, a day where you can remember where you just. You just felt like you were in the pit and you were like, what are you doing, Lord? I mean, do you have, like, a moment that you can recall? Yeah. I'm not sure if I've written it. I think I may have written it in my.
My book Taylor Made. But it was July 4, 2012. I know it. Exactly. And in fact, my past, my previous church that I just left in April were touring America, and they happened to be worshiping in Nashville, Tennessee, on July 4, which I thought was odd because I'm like, no one goes to church on July 4th. But anyway, this particular church was having worship night, and our band from Australia was playing at it. So of course we were like, oh, my gosh, we're going to go see our friends and.
And we're going to, you know, a little bit of home. We miss them. It's been two months. I don't know what I'm doing here. It feels so. I feel out of myself. And so we. We go with such expectation, and we get there and. And we're received with a really bizarre reception like it. I was expecting everybody to be so excited to see us, but there was almost like this disconnect.
Anyway, they end up doing their thing, and then at the end of the night, one of the ladies just pats me on the back and says, well, good luck with whatever it is you guys are doing here. And it was so condescending, and it was such a jab of, basically, you guys are foolish, right? Like, what the heck have you done? And I remember driving home, bursting out into tears and feeling so humiliated. Like, we were in this rental that was honestly junk because it was the only thing that we could get.
And my kids were sleeping on air mattresses at the time, and I just was like, what? I didn't have a job. I wasn't doing anything. And here is my previous season, almost looking at us like, they weren't. I don't think they had the intention to be like this, but they were kind of looking down like, well, I don't know why you left it. It just felt. I just felt so broken. I remember going home and just crying out to God and saying, God, I. I don't know why you've done this, but I feel foolish.
I feel like I've missed the call of God. I feel stupid. Here, you give it. Because they kept saying, well, what are you guys doing? What are you guys doing? And we're like, actually, we don't know. We don't know. And it was then when God actually spoke to my heart, and he said, if you're willing to look foolish before man, I can trust you with my glory because you won't care what people think anymore.
And I remember just having to literally lay down every bit of my pride, every bit of my past, every bit of the expectation of the future, and just go, you know what, God? If all I did was obey you, then I'm okay. But I'm telling you, that was guttural. That was like the worst day. And it was only two months into the journey. Wow. I. I'm literally writing down what you just said. If I can trust you to look foolish with man, I can trust you with my glory.
I think there's a lot of people who needed to hear that. That's so good. Well, catch us up between your worst day, feeling condescending, condescended. People are doubting you, your kids are on air mattresses, and you're crying out to the Lord too. What has he done since then? Well, it was amazing because it was from that day that I got up and began to pursue God for a word. I was like, all right, God, if you've got us here, there's a reason you've got to hear.
But I'm not going to get writing on the wall. I'm not going to have some person come and tell me and give me the list. I'm going to have to find it in you. And I was reading scripture and I came to this part in second kings 2:19 and it just said, elisha, Elisha, the location here is good, but the waters are sick and the land is unfruitful. And he said, bring me a bowl of salt.
And as he put the salt in the water, the waters were healed and the land became fruitful and has been fruitful till this day. Well, something just pierced my heart and I felt the Lord say, look around you. And this is 12 years ago. Nashville had this kind of irkiness about it. Like it was kind of had lost a little bit of its hunger. It got familiar. It was music industry and it was, you know, even church got a little bit professional and people were hungry for an encounter with God.
And I felt God say, you're going to be part of the breakthrough of bringing my spirit afresh in Nashville, Tennessee. It's dry, it's barren, it's polluted spiritually. And you're just going to come and bring a well of fresh living water. So get to work. And I was like, but what does that mean? You know? And he said, just start loving people. Loving people in the grocery store, love people at the school drop off line, love people that you meet that come over your house for dinner.
And so fast forward that was, you know, July, August, right through to November. And my husband gets this idea to start a little basement worship Bible study because we kept finding so many people who were starving for the same thing. And we open up our home and lo and behold, like, it's like the floodgates of heaven pour out and everyone's encountering Jesus. And then people just started flooding our house. So within a year we had over 120 people in our basement.
And we didn't even think it was a church at the time. And so, long story short, we got two major prophetic words that this was the church. We didn't want it to be a church because we knew what it would cost us, you know, But I was like, I think this is why God's called us here. And so February 2014. We made it official. And honestly, I think the greatest days, like even Sunday, let's just fast forward right to Sunday seeing over 20 people give their lives to Jesus from all walks of life.
Like a girl who was, you know, she looked like she'd had a hard life from a really well known person who's very influential in, you know, in a city that you would know that it's influential for. So you've got the known and the unknown. You've got the great and you've got the meek that like to watch my altars full of people getting right with Jesus. I just couldn't stop crying. And I'm like, that hasn't stopped since that day on November 13, 2012, till April 7, 2024.
We've just seen week after week God's glory come and change people's lives. And so to see the other side of your obedience, when you just take one step and just say, okay, I'll open my house for Bible study. All right, next step, make this a church. Well, I don't know what that means, which is take the first step. Hire a little venue, gather the team. Just start with the basics. You've run, you know, you've been involved in church life. You know what to do. Grab a team. Just take the next step.
Just take the next step. And, you know, now we have the three locations and we have worship that impacts the world. And we have 56 staff. And it blows my mind that just from one small step, now we get to see God move across the earth. And I've written two books and I travel the world speaking about the goodness of God. And I never would have believed. You couldn't have told me that before we left. I wouldn't have believed you. And just, that's, that's the other side of obedience.
But, you know, it takes, it takes 12 years. Like, sometimes it doesn't happen overnight. And I think we pray for. You know, I remember a pastor saying, you want the oak tree? And then God hands you the acorn. And most people either look at the acorn and throw it away because it's just a seed, or, or the wise people bury it in the ground and let the seed take due course. And then one day that thing becomes an oak tree, but the one that threw it away will never have fruit that remains.
And. And I think we were handed an acorn. We were handed five people in our basement. And God's like, what are you going to do with that? And we just stewarded that seed. And now we're Looking at this beautiful tree that's blooming and flourishing and it's just the best. That's so very cool. And I think back to your original calling, you might have felt like he was calling you to nothing, but he sure made something out of nothing, hasn't he?
Which is just like our God, the God who turns water to wine. And I mean crazy that you know, when God asks you to do something, it might feel like he's coming, calling you to leave your land and go to a place. Whether the dream is to build stronger community, write a book, start a nonprofit, tell your story, adopt a child, or take a step toward healing past wounds, Collide's newest Bible study, Go Ahead will encourage you not to let risk aversion or fear get in the way of an invitation from God.
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Go Ahead is available now on our website at wecollide.net I mean, crazy that you know, when God asks you to do something, it might feel like he's calling you to leave your land and go to a place that you do not know and you feel like it's going to nothing. But there's always something if he's in it, there's always something waiting for you there, which is so cool. I love it so much. How did you name the church belonging code? Tell us about the naming process. I love this question.
Not very many people ask me this. Well, when I was, I was kind of going through in that two years of being here and just really going, God, this is like crazy. What are you doing? I remember watching the church at large and even going over how I had ministered back in Australia and how the church sometimes can become a little bit of a what's the word? I don't want to dishonor any church. But you know, it becomes a machine.
It becomes this event mechanism where it's event after event and it's this after that and people become commodities and we're just going at a fast pace where we forget the why behind everything and we discard people if they're not of use anymore.
And I just was watching a lot of church hurt happen within the church and just a lot of bad behavior with people And I started to think about the fact that so many people feel like they can't come to church because they have to get themselves ready and right. And then you'll be accepted, and then you'll be able to have a place of belonging. But I started to look at the Scriptures and I looked at the way Jesus chose his disciples. And yet here he is, the son of the living God, a rabbi on earth.
And in those rabbis would choose the most highly skilled student of the Torah, and they would then interview them and they would then become their successors. So they're picking the cream of the crop of the young men who know the Torah who are also going to then become a rabbi. And, you know, they have to have every word nailed. They have to have their knowledge intact. They've got to be supreme and stand out and have this supreme gifting.
And Jesus comes and he literally picks up fishermen, tax collectors, like zealots, you know, political crazies. And he's like, young men, come follow me. And these guys are unschooled ordinary men who belonged in Jesus's core before they even believed. Like, Peter didn't believe that he was the son of God until he had a revelation while being with him. And I just had this revelation.
I was actually telling one of my friends who lives in California, I was telling her about this revelation, and she goes, oh, my gosh, that's the name of your church. And I said, what do you mean? And she goes, it's the belonging. It's because you've made a place where people can belong to Jesus before they even believe. Because once you're around Jesus's presence, you change. And it doesn't mean you just stay as you are and you just live in your sin.
It means that Jesus says, come, follow me, and we'll work it out on the journey. And that is exactly what has happened. And then the company part is because Henry was looking for a dot com that we couldn't find, that he could only find a dot co. And he goes, oh, that's interesting. Dot co, the belonging company looks up the original word of company and it's actually a French word from, like the 1500s. And it's the root word is companion.
And it means soldiers who fight together and who break bread together. And I thought, oh, my gosh, is that not just the picture of Jesus with his disciples, that he taught them how to fight the fight of faith, but they would sit down and they would break bread together? And so that's how the name was born. The Belonging company And I love it. Every time I share it, I fall more in love with it.
I love it because I think there's this backward mentality that people think, okay, you can belong to this church once you believe what we believe. You live like we live. You look like we look. You talk like we talk, and we're kind of getting it all wrong. And so we wonder why the pews are empty.
We wonder why there's this mass exodus leaving the church, and our voice has lost its power with people who don't identify as Christians because we're saying, hey, you can be a part of this if you are like us. And you're saying, no, like, come and sit at Jesus's feet and get to know him and see how awesome and beautiful he is. And you won't see help, but want to know more about Him. So I love it. You're. You're. Yeah, we're flipping the narrative. Yeah. Because I think it's how Jesus was.
It's why he got ridiculed for sitting with the tax collectors, sitting with the sinners, sitting with the prostitutes. But isn't it amazing that all the sinners loved being around Jesus, but they couldn't stay the same anymore? They all had encounters with Jesus that changed them. And that's the point. We don't have a message that says, come as you are in your sin and stay in it. But it's not my job to change you. It's the Holy Spirit's job to convict you.
It's the Holy Spirit's job to take that minute with you. That can take years, sometimes it can take months, it can take days. But that's your journey between you and the Lord. My job is to provide. Provide a place so that you feel safe to come in, that you feel loved, that you feel seen. And then all I do is point you to Jesus because he's the one that changes you. Oh, man. You preach it, lady. I love it so much.
Let's talk for a minute about your calling and your port, your partner supporting your calling and you his. You kind of are doing this together, it sounds like. Tell us how that works. Yeah, well, I met Henry at church. We were in youth group together, like young adult ministry. And I was already on staff. I just completed Bible college and I was already on staff. As a pastor, I would look after all the female new believers and disciple them. So I was in ministry before I even got married.
And Henry was a musician, and he came on staff to do all the worship leading and creative stuff. And so we've always worked alongside each other and so. But we never really worked together. So we, we worked, you know, I used to sing a little bit while he would lead, but we never really worked in the same lanes of our jobs. But we were in the same church. I was pastoring and, and he was leading. But then when we came to America, it was just that it's what made sense.
I can teach and preach and he can lead worship. And so in the basement in our house, he would do the worship and then I would preach the word and then we would minister together at the end. And no one had ever seen anything like this, like this couple that are working together and ministering together. And it was just actually unbelievable. So I was like, no, this is just who we are. Like we're not trying to be anything. And he's not competing with me and I'm not competing with him.
And so as the church got bigger, it's just the way we've always done it. And yet I'm not on the platform because I'm a woman. I'm on the platform speaking because it's the gift of my life. And so even though he is the senior pastor of our church, we co lead it together. But I know exactly that where he leads and his strengths are, and then I lead where my strengths are. And so it's this perfect synergy that we get to lead the church together.
And I think it's one of the beautiful things of watching women be released into their calling. Because not all wives in ministry are called to preach and teach and lead churches. But for those that are, I feel like it's given a beautiful picture to say, hey, you could do this together and you can actually do it well, because the church has always needed a female voice. Cause it's been so male dominant for so long.
And I think it's why the church naturally has always gone towards women's ministry. Because we've just never had ministry for women on a Sunday from women to women. And therefore we've had to go and find it in our spaces alone. But I think God's always called us together. And so there's time and place for men to get together, there's time and place for women to get together. But wouldn't it be amazing if we could have women speak to men and women and men speak to men and women?
And I think that's like a perfect harmony. And so that's how we do it. I love that so much. I. I preach and so I travel and go places to speak And I can't tell you how many times churches have called me in for a weekend to speak on a topic for women. And it's almost comical, like, oh, okay, so once a year, you have a series where you have one message that's specifically geared towards women, and then the other 51 weeks of the year, you do not. Exactly. So it's so crazy.
I love that you guys are doing this together. How do you keep home, home and not home, your. You know. Yeah, office. It's taken a minute. We had to really be intentional because at the beginning, you know, when you're all hands on deck and this thing's growing faster than we can say hallelujah, it was just like, always talking about work. And then I think one day my husband said, I think we're becoming workmates, and I don't like it.
And I said, all right, well, we're gonna have to set some boundaries. And so we just set boundaries. We do a date night once a week where we don't talk about work. I don't open things up about work when we're about to fall asleep. We just make sure bed is sacred for the right things, if you know what I mean. So sleep and intimacy. You don't want to be bringing all that junk in, and you don't want to be talking about people. We had to really put that boundary in.
But also, I think because we love what we do, we also get to enjoy, you know, talking about things and being together with things. But we've really had to prioritize family, each other, and take rest. You know, we didn't do that very well in the early days. And so now we've learned how to take rhythms of rest. You know, we take July to just recalibrate. Don't think about work.
Our team are fabulous now, so there are ebbs and flows, and you really do have to be intentional, but it's so part of our life that you don't want to either compartmentalize it. Don't talk about work now, because it is so part of our life, but we've made it work somehow. We just say there's no balance, but there are priorities and there are boundaries, and we just stick to them. Yeah, that's awesome.
You wrote a book called the Opposite Life, and it sounds like you dive into this idea of God's upside down kingdom. Can you tell us more about why you wrote it and what you hope we get out of it? Yeah, I wrote it because it was really what I was teaching my church at the time. Just elements and principles of this. But I think so many of us want this beautiful life, right? But we've forgotten the basics of the kingdom principles of God.
Like we justify holding unforgiveness against somebody who's hurt us because it's our pain, but God asks us to love our enemy. You know, when we want to get somebody somewhere, we almost use the world's way of like climbing the corporate ladder to get where we want to go. But yet God says the first, you know, if you, if you want to be great, learn to serve first.
And everything about Kingdom, everything about Jesus is opposite to how the world operates and opposite to how our flesh actually feels most comfortable. And So I wrote 20 principles that basically you're going to face all 20 at some point in your life and you have to have the God principle attached to it, otherwise it wreaks havoc.
You're to going, you're going to be anxious, you're going to be fearful, you're going to be disappointed, you're going to live in bitterness, you're going to live in resentment, and you'll be justified in it. But when you line yourself up with how Jesus lived his life, he lived in a very different paradigm. Like even I think about politics right now. You know, we are so hell bent on wanting a political system to be the answer for our religious freedom or to be the answer for our Christianity.
But Jesus didn't come and do that. He's like, no, this is going to rise and fall. Like kingdoms will rise and fall, but my kingdom will remain. So guys, let's go low. Like, I'm not here to go fight the Roman Empire. I'm going to go and give myself up for humanity and die. Like this is a whole mindset set shift that we have to come in. A realization that if we really are disciples of Jesus, we can't act like the world.
And I was just so taken back with how many Christians act worldly, but yet we've got the word of God telling us to act otherwise. And so I wrote this book to say, if you really want a blessed life, learn to forgive, learn to let go, learn to be second, learn to lay down your life, learn to worship instead of worry. Like, replace all this junk that the world's telling you to go after, seek the kingdom first, not all your accolades and rewards because they're futile.
So I talk about all of these principles that Jesus really shared and I've lived them. And I look at my life, it's full of peace, full of joy, it's not void of issue, but I've overcome every single one of them. It's not that adversity isn't going to come to your life, but when it does, you've got the tools of how to overcome. And so most people look at my life and they're like, wow, you're so blessed. And I'm like, yeah, because I've implemented the principles so that I can live. Blessed.
I love it. I'll have to get myself a copy. I am sure that people have written in message, do whatever. After reading this, what are you hearing is happening in people's lives as a result of them sort of flipping their life upside down? People will write to me and just say, this book has changed my life. Like, this is the best book I've ever read. This book is so convicting. This book is so challenging.
But when I've applied the principles, I've watched my, you know, the people that I've had unforgiveness towards actually bring reconciliation. I don't have resentment in my life anymore. I don't have anger anymore. I. I had a wound where I used to worry about everything because I felt like God had abandoned me. But now I just worship and I thank God for, like, I can't tell you how many people go, this has. This has changed my life. And so it's the. It's. Honestly, it's pure scripture.
It's not even my opinion or it's not my ideas. It's what God said. And I just think I simplified it because sometimes we can read the Gospels and get stuck in the weeds of everything. But I took the main principles of what he was sharing and I put them all together so that you can go, oh, this really is kingdom living. And when he says, seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all the other things will be added unto you, what is he saying?
He's saying, seek the way I do things the right way, and then watch your life. Everything else will be added to it that you want and you desire. The life you've always wanted is in seeking his kingdom first and then doing it in righteousness, his way. And then everything else follows where we want all the stuff without seeking him first and doing it righteously. So flip the narrative. The upside down kingdom is actually the right way out. We are the ones that are upside down. So it's, it's.
It's a. Just a sweet book, great practical application. I love that so much. Well, Alex, I could ask you a million questions, but we don't have all day to hang out. But my last question I want to ask you is when you took us all the way back to being in Melbourne and God saying, hey, would you leave nothing to go to nothing? And you said, no, I don't want to do that. And he closed in on you.
He made a way where it felt like there was no way brought you here, and clearly has unfolded a vision beyond what you could imagine back in those days in Australia. You mentioned in this interview that sometimes he gives you little glimpses. I'm curious, as you look ahead and you think about the next 10 years, what's the little glimpse that God's given you of the vision that he's going to continue to unfold?
Or what's the dream that you have in your heart that you are slowly hoping he unfolds in the years to come? Yeah, it's funny you should ask that because I, as we've entered in this next 10 years of my life, I turned 50 last year and I felt like God was like, you've got 10. And I know I've got more than 10 years, but these next 10 years for me are the ones that really count of doing something that leaves legacy.
And I felt like God say, be intentional with everything that you get invited to do or that you dream up doing, because this is about legacy. It's about who comes behind you. And honestly, to be honest, I don't know what that looks like. I don't know what God's actually called. I feel like I'm in that process of leaning into that and praying into that.
But I do know that it's for the next generation to come behind me and so that I can pass the the baton onto them for greater vision and so that they could take whatever we've pioneered and actually make the church great. And my heart right now is that I would see souls saved on Mass like I've never seen before because I'm actually feeling more arrested if that's the right word of that. This gospel is not for us, it's for the world that's dying.
And what am I going to do to get that gospel preached to the highways, byways and to the ends of the earth? And that's really what I'm passionate about. And I think God's going to do something miraculous because it's not about me speaking in more places or me writing more books, or I want to see soul saved, delivered and set free. And so whatever that looks like, I'm just going to say yes to.
Well, I can't wait to see what God does in the next 10 years through your life and the ministry that he has started through you. And thank you for hanging out with us today. I know there's going to be so many that want to get your book and hear more about you. So how can they follow up with what you're doing? Yeah, I have a website, alexsealey.com I'm on Instagram as Alex Seeley, the blogging co. I preach most weeks.
You can get sermons online, Tailor made and often opposite life of my two books. You can get them on Amazon and. Yeah, that's it. I love it. Thank you, Alex. Thank you. Hey, friend, I hope you just listened to that episode somewhere where you could jot down as many notes as I just did. I don't know about you, but there were so many things that Pastor Alex just dropped that I was like, oh, man, I gotta write. I gotta write this down. I gotta write that down. What an inspiring story.
Don't you love how God can take nothing and make something so absolutely beautiful? He can do that in your life. He can do that in my life. And if we take. I love her, her illustration of the acorn. God hands us an acorn. I have a feeling there's an acorn in your hand right now and he's asking you to believe that he can grow a giant oak tree and do something beautiful.
So, friend, let's you and I have the kind of faith to believe that and take leaps and be brave and say yes to God's calling in our life. I'm so glad you hung out with me today. If you want to continue to be inspired in your faith and you want to keep colliding with Jesus and growing, make sure you subscribe to this podcast. You can do that on any platform where you're listening and we will catch you next week. Keep colliding, friends.