You need to find out what your ministry is and fulfill your ministry and be open to other people, misunderstanding it and not supporting it. But if you have some people who are close to you and they know you and they walk with God and they can help you verify and go in that direction, you just do that. And things are going to be just okay or great.
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Well, Hey, podcasts , family, and welcome to episode number 294 of the L three leadership podcast, where we are obsessed with helping you grow to your maximum potential and to maximize the impact of your leadership. My name is Doug Smith and I am your host. And today's episode is brought to you by my friends at bear tongue advisors. If you're new to the podcast, welcome, I'm so glad that you're here and I hope you'll enjoy our content and become a subscriber.
And if you've been listening to us for a while, thanks for being a listener, and it would mean the world to me. If you would leave us a rating and review on apple podcast or whatever app you listen to podcasts through, that really does help us grow our audience and reach more leaders. So thank you in advance for that in today's episode, you'll hear my conversation with Brian tome. If you're unfamiliar with Brian , let me just tell you a little bit about him.
Brian is the founding and senior pastor of crossroads church, 2017 fastest growing church in America. Brian's authored four books, including his bestseller, the five marks of a man. He also hosts the aggressive life podcast. As an entrepreneur. Brian has opened several other nonprofits and started man camp, which is a primitive weekend camping experience that has helped tens of thousands of men reclaim the code of manhood as an avid adventure motorcyclist .
Brian writes tens of thousands of miles and camps more than 30 nights each year. Brian has also released an adventure ride TV show called Phantom lake, which is available on Amazon prime. He's married with three children and lives in Cincinnati, Ohio. And I met Brian through one of my mentors, Denny Patton, and Denny's been on this podcast and he recently passed away, but Denny was the one who actually led Brian to Christ when he was a young man and he became a mentor to him .
And, you know, I just read Brian's bio, which is really, really impressive. And Brian's doing a lot of great things today. But as you listen to this interview, as you listen to how what Brian's doing, I want you to think about that. Everything Brian is doing today is the result and can be tied back to someone specifically Denny influencing his life. And so leader, I just wonder to remind you that as you influence and develop other leaders, you never know who you're investing in.
You never know who you're influencing, and you have no idea what they're going to do with the leadership that you instill with them. I'm sure when Denny was investing in Brian as a young man, he had no idea what Brian was going to be able to do with his life. And it's just amazing to see that. So I just want to encourage you leaders keep investing in leaders, keep investing in young leaders. You have no idea who you're influencing and asked for the conversation.
You're going to love this conversation with Brian . You're going to hear Brian talk about adoption. He was actually adopted and he shares some thoughts on that. He talks all about leadership. He talks a lot about failure. He had some really interesting insights on failure that I, we talk about character develop . And probably one of the biggest things that I got out of this interview is Brian talking about why it's so important to focus on your ministry, your ministry.
And you'll hear him talk about that. I think you're going to love this episode, but before we get into the conversation, just a few announcements. This episode of the L three leadership podcast is sponsored by bear tongue advisors, the financial advisors at bear tongue advisors, help educate and empower clients to make informed financial decisions.
You can find out how bear tongue advisors can help you develop a customized financial plan for your financial future by visiting their website@beartongueadvisors.com . That's B E R a T U N G, advisors.com, securities and investment in products and services offered through LPL financial member FINRA, and SIPC bear tongue advisors, LPL financial and L-3 leadership are separate entities. I also want to thank our sponsor Henny jewelers.
They're a jeweler owned by my friend and mentor John Henney and my wife, Laura , and I got our engagement and wedding rings through Henny jewelers. And we just loved our experience. Not only do they have great jewelry, but they also invest in people. In fact, every couple of that comes in to get engaged at their store. They give them a book to help them prepare for marriage. And we just love that.
So if you're in need of a good jeweler, check out Henny jewelers.com and with all that being said, let's dive right in. Here's my conversation with Brian tome . Thank you, Brian, for being willing to do this interview. And why don't we just start off with you just telling us a little bit about who you are and what you do .
Yeah. My name is Brian tome. I was born at a very early age and , uh, and then I was adopted, which is actually part of my spiritual story as well, not just my physical and family, sort of my spiritual story, because I got adopted into a family who was at birth, but still physically, I was adopted into a family that model spiritually. What happens to us when we get adopted into the family of God, known as naturally born into the family of God, all of us who are in the family of God.
There's a moment when we are adopted into the family of God. That's , uh, that's the , uh, the new Testament portion. The Bible makes really clear. So that, that whole thing of, you know, inclusion and bringing more people into the family has been a driver of mine for my whole life, whether it was new kids coming into the school year, halfway through, or me wanting to friend them, or whether it's now leading a church.
That's a pretty big, it's pretty big because we want you to want to draw more and more people in to be in our midst and be with God. So I started church in 1996 called crossroads in Cincinnati that has a bunch of different locations. And coming out of that, we also search , uh , starting some other nonprofits , just spinning things off to be about more than just gathering in a building. We started some other nonprofits.
They link center that helps the working poor ocean unpolished, which are entrepreneurial efforts for people who want to start their own businesses or take the business public. Uh , also , uh, camping ministries. We do a thing called man camp, which we , uh , most recent , we drove 32 different states, 1500 gods from 32 different states in a primitive , camping, camping experience in the woods. It was kind of fun. So that's my deal. And I try to live life and laugh and have fun. That's me.
Yeah, man. I love your podcast is the aggressive life. It was funny. I was thinking about that. I started blogging in like 2007 or something like that. My first blog was the intense life. So I liked the aggressive life better. Um,
As in, like, as in, you were in a tent or it was intense, they were in multiple tents or it was okay .
That's awesome. A few questions on your story on the adoption front, you know, you hear a lot of stories about, you know, boys or girls that were adopted, who basically really struggled with the fact that their parents didn't want them. It sounds like you had kind of an opposite experience because of the family that you were adopted into. Can you talk about that?
And you know, did you struggle with that at all or because of the family you had where you just get in , didn't have any wounds from that?
My parents play it perfectly. I don't , I never remember learning when I was adopted. So it was perfect because they told me all the right things. They told me, you were loved, you were special, you were one . And we wanted you. I heard that very, very early. They, they, they really did a well, and they also, what was great about it, which people are adopting today. And I'll just now I hate to jump into something controversial, but this is a pretty common thing in adoption.
I didn't have any contact with my birth mother or birth parents, none. And that's the way it should be. It would be utterly awful. If when I was a kid now was struggling with the discipline of my parents, if I kind of was thinking, wow, but if my other mother, if I was with her and I just saw her last month, or I was with her on Facebook or something like that, that would have been, that would really, really mess with my identity, messed me up.
So I had a great experience being adopted and being a family. Now, having said that thing that is true is that there is a primal wound that goes to those of us who were adopted. Most of us have experienced this where the person who we were with in symbiotic relationship with pun intended in the symbiotic fluid of my mother, when all of a sudden you're separate from her. And this sounds like psychobabble sounds like it doesn't make sense. You feel rejection. Uh , I would always hear that.
And I would say, what , what are you talking about it? I never felt rejected when I was, you know, 14 or 15. I never, I never, I don't know. I don't know what you're talking about. But then , then as you think about it, when you're age 40 , uh , I look back at age 40 and I realized, wow, there is absolutely pattern of me acting like an orphan of me being concerned that someone's going to reject me.
If me , of me overreacting, when somebody leaves the church that I started, because it's like, I feel like I'm rejected. So there's, there's still a primal wound there that makes you very sensitive to people leaving you and walking out on you, which inversely caused you to be very, very loyal to anybody who's, who's loyal to you . So that's some of the baggage that , uh , that I have with being adopted.
Are there any other advice you'd give to parents who are either thinking about adopting or that have adopted and are kind of navigating that ?
My first thing is do not try to be enlightened and have two sets of parents that they're adopting you. Bright Tate , the child, I think is an awful decision. Yeah , no . Let me tell you why. From a spiritual standpoint, from a spiritual standpoint, the thing about kids is they need to be told who they are today. We have parents who think it's a great idea to not even tell their kids what sex they are. Don't tell their kids what gender they are.
Let them just decide on their own, whether or not they're male or female. That's a horrible idea. You can tell your kids. You're a good boy. You can tell your kid , you're a good girl. You , you , you can tell them that you telling them their identity is important. Jesus gets his identity from his heavenly father who says to them , this is my son in whom I'm well pleased. He says that two times in his life and his baptism and also the transfiguration. So you have to give your kids a Denny.
And if you're chill, if your child is having multiple parents and has the possibility for multiple families, and they're able to see a person who they came out of that womb, and they think in their mind, I could have been with that person. I'm telling you that will wreck their identity. I don't, I don't know how I could have done it to be disciplined by my parents and then wonder. Yeah, but I wonder what Susan, my other mother would have done. Yeah, but I w it's, it's really rough.
I actually met my, my birth mother a few years ago, ago . I'm glad I did. She died not too long ago. Unfortunately it just of old age and stuff like that, but I'm glad I was able to connect with her. But when I connect with it connected with her and the first meeting, she said, you are a Haskins. He said, boy, that that knows that I showed you a picture of you or a Haskins.
And even as a very self-confident hearing someone tell me that I was something else that I had a different name attached to me was really rocking my world. I recall it against I didn't. I started not to be rude to her, but I told her self inside. No, no, I'm a tome , not a Haskins. I'm a tome. I am a tome to be a child. And in your mind, be ping pong back and forth between two different sets of parents or two mothers or two fathers , uh , just brutal.
So that's one thing I would say to anybody who's adopted, just try as best you can to have your child in your family period. And you get to be the one who sets their identity, tell your child who they are that would relate to any parents. And , uh , beyond that, no , just be a great parent, you know, do the , do the normal stuff, love your kids, discipline your kids, train your cat up in the winter , which is you go. And when he goes older , he will not depart from.
Yeah. I've never heard that perspective. It's pretty fascinating. Uh, you related to being adopted, you know, you talked about being inducted into the family of God. I actually learned about you through Denny Patton, who is the man who led you to Christ, was the family you grew up in believers. Did you , you know , I'm just curious. What did that look like? And how did Denny, you know, a lot of people listening to this have listened to your interview with Denny and been impacted by it.
How did Denny specifically impact you in such a way that changed your life forever?
My parents were , uh, were churchgoers . Uh, they were Christians in the way in which they knew, which was churchgoers . And I speak in the past tense. Now they're , they're more than church goers. They're definitely followers of Jesus now. But you know , growing up there were, they were just growing up. My mom play the organ. My, my, my dad sang in the choir.
And , uh, as I aged, as I got older and older in life, I mean old and, or like, as I got to be 7, 8, 9, 12, 15, I found myself at 15 in this church, my parents are up front doing Oregons and choir things. This cook on what in the world am I here for? This is, this is insane. But over the soul guy, I remember him. You starting to fall asleep in the pew beside me. And I remember thinking myself, what are you doing here? What you, you obviously don't want to be here. And yet you're here.
When I don't have to be here, I will not be here. Church had just so turned me off. And I associated church with Jesus and Danny was, and it sounds, it sounds trite to say, but he was a cool guy. He was cool. Guy was around the high school. He had a young life club and he just had a personality and he would go to football games and he would heckle me from , uh, from , uh, on the bench while he was standing on the track, outside the bench. I said , come on, Tom , do something, do something.
It's just trying to build bridges by stupid humor, that kind of thing. And , uh, I just , I learned from him what, what it meant to have a relationship with Christ versus an attachment to the Christian religion. Huge difference between the Christian religion and a relationship with Christ. So through him and him getting me involved in young life. Cause at that point he was young life leader. My life was forever changed. I'm thankful for it.
Yeah. I'm curious on the whole young life church, then you obviously planted a church and decided that was the way to go. But it seems like young life's focus is all in relationships, right? It's like relationship is, is the model, but friendship, ER , I forget they're saying, but you get it. It's all about relationships where church tends to be. Hey, come and gather, come and see. What , if , what have you learned or how did you implement that when you planted a church?
I'm just curious how you viewed both ministries.
Well, I don't know exactly what your life is in is now I've interacted with folks who are in Manulife. It's obviously doing some really good things. I don't know if they still stay the same phrases that they did. Oh gosh. How long ago is , believe it or not. The last young life meeting I was in was 40 years ago. Gosh. Yeah. 16 to 56. But the , the big buzz phrases back then was you have to earn the right to be heard. It's about relationship. You start with the relationship.
You earn the right to be heard. That was a big, big deal. No big deal with young life is have fun. Uh , there should be a sense of humor. A sense of levity. Another thing about young life is leverage camps, leverage experiences that are outside of your normal thing. Not a thing that was part of young life was talks that are relevant in real life. And kids can understand. Another thing was young. Life was music. That is the kind of music kids want to sing to .
Those were all radical, radical concepts. When you're coming from a very churchy background, then you're not interested in God. And your 16 year old, like seriously, like mindblowing there's humor and God and music. I like, and there's an energy in the room. Wow. Those elements today should be applied to every church.
And every adult context there is what, what adult doesn't want to have music that's in line with the kind of music here she likes, what adult doesn't appreciate humor when adult doesn't appreciate some sort of outlet for being a place where they're normally not, whether it's a camp or a mission trip or whatever it is, what do we have to do to be creative in our, in our events? So yeah , crossroads has been called before a young life for adults. Great. I'll take that.
That's a high compliment young life for adults. I'll take, that's what it is. We, we don't want to assume that anybody believes everything. As soon as they walk in the door, we want to give them a positive experience where there's some humor. We want music that's in line with a style that they want to hear. We want to talk that is appropriate to where they are in life. Yeah. And I think that's part of why churches like ours are growing all across the country.
People keep saying that the main church is going to die. Big churches are going away. People always saying that for 50 years, actually third 30, 40 years, people have been saying that. And there's only more large churches and all the large churches are only getting larger. Th there's there's something about how ministry has done this way. That is attractive to the , uh , uh, to the average human mindset .
Yeah. I want to talk to you a little bit about your leadership journey as well. It wasn't Denny. I forget who I was talking to. Someone that knew you, you know, when you're in your twenties or however old you were, when you hung out with Denny and they were like, yeah, no one would have ever put money on Brian doing what he's doing today. So, so talk to us about man.
What did that journey look like from potentially someone with little potential to, you know, leading one of the largest churches in America and everything else
I got to tell ya . I am. I am so thankful that you brought that up. I'm so thankful that you said what you said because it's a hundred percent true. Doug , it's a hundred percent true and it's only God gets the glory. I've said that to the people who are around me and I don't, I don't think people really believe that. I think there is unfortunately a bit of a larger than life thing that, that gets attached to you. If you lead a large thing.
And so people think you're actually smarter and better than you actually are, or people think that you actually had some special leadership DNA that was dumped in you, a birth that made you be able to do whatever you want. And I tell people that regularly, nobody who knew me when I was 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, nobody, nobody would have ever envisioned. I would be doing the things that I am right now.
I was utterly undisciplined, utterly and completely took me seven years to get my four-year degree. Not seven years, be a doctor seven years to get a four year degree. Three times I went through accounting one and nobody, nobody would have thought that I would have add any level of discipline to do anything or start anything. I was petrified to talk to people. I didn't have a, a personality or confidence to talk with folks. I went to my, one of my class reunions , uh, years and years ago.
And I bumped into my very first girlfriend, first person, I , I took out to , uh , a homecoming dance. And she said, you just never talked. You just never talked. I didn't know how to interact with anybody. I was , uh, you know, my family was not all relational and conversational. And so I wasn't relational and conversational. I come from, you know, nuclear scientists and stuff like that. So I didn't, I didn't have this like communication thing that was, that was going on for me.
I didn't have any sense of a vision or future or something. God was calling me to. All I knew is I think I'm going to hang out with kids and do student ministry. I could go on and on and on. So yeah, I'm , I'm glad Doug that , uh, you're, you're another person who's heard that from somebody. I don't know who they are, but I'm not just trying to give it an interesting story to literally, literally to God be the glory.
Anything that's happening in and through me is solely because of how God has grown me, what God has given me and what God has gifted. If there's no natural DNA talent that has gone into doing what I'm doing right now. Well , I shouldn't say that now .
No, I'm with you. I'm with you . When I start , I want to hit the other end. Yeah . It's like, obviously God had to do a work, but something had to switch in you to , you know , if you had no confidence, no ability to speak, clearly, all of that has changed over the past. However long it's been. What started to change? When did you start to see yourself as a leader or potential leader? What did that growth journey look like from, from no confidence to where you are now?
The no-confidence was just related to being able to have conversations with people and be around people of the opposite sex and that sort of thing. That was, that was a big, big deal with that. But I do, I do look at my past and I can see that if I'm in front of a group of people and you just stick something in my hand and have me talk about it, I've been pretty good at that.
That that's a God-given ability that th that he's given me that wasn't unlocked until I received Christ and received the holy spirit. But that was, that was there. That was one that was one of those gifts. And I think that still exists today.
So that would be the speaking end , but even on the leadership end, I know you go from , uh , where you were at 20 to leading what you're leading today. What did, what did that turn ?
Okay , well, there again, there again, everything I led before I came to Cincinnati star crossroads failed, everything I led, wow. I never had a student ministry that everybody in the community was, oh, that's the really they'll happen. Student ministry here in the community. Oh, every time I had a goal for how many kids were going to take the camp, it's feels like I would never got there. Anytime I had a dream for some event, the event never was the way it was. Uh, you know, I worked hard.
I really did. I worked hard, but maybe I worked in an undisciplined way. Maybe I just didn't put two and two together. Maybe, maybe God was preparing me with a lot of failures so that when I had success, when I had success , uh, he would get the glory and I wouldn't get the glory. I just gradually grew more fruitful. I was trying to be faithful, but I gradually grew more fruitful. The very first weekend, the crossroads started March 25th, 1996. We had this core group of 11 people.
I gone out and recruited a bunch of other people to be in the core . Cause we need people to park cars. You need people to hold babies set up, tear down inside is middle school, all that kind of stuff. And we wanted to have 200 people the very first, the very first weekend, which in 1996, in terms of church plants, that would be unbelievable to have 200 people. And we worked hard for, we had some volunteers who were bright and marketing. They were all 30 years old.
We have some marketer, markers of Proctor and gamble. They're working on our mailers, you know, with any social media, those mailers . And we were stopping these mailers and all these things. It was going on a big, huge thing for months, laptop again . And then the night before we were going to start, I have this awful, awful feeling in my stomach of, oh no, God, it's going to happen again. Oh, I know this feeling. There's big expectations. You work really hard.
And then it just doesn't work and it's going to happen tomorrow. And I really grief for all the people who were in the core group, because I'm used to this, this happens to me all the time, but I'm just not, I'm just not used to this for them. I grieve for them. So I go in, we set up, I take, I go sit in the front seat from the , in the front row and I decide that I'm not going to turn around and look behind me because if I turn around, look behind me.
And when I see a sparsely filled room, I'm just going to get the press and it's can throw me off my game. So I'm just going to stay there. I'm going to look at the music. I'm just going to stay doing that and I'll get up and do my regional preaching . Well, we have this volunteer come up. His name is Steve Andrey and he whispers in my ear as the music is going. He says, when you get out there, have everybody squeezed in. So we can see everybody. And I turned around in this 600 seat auditorium.
I just saw a bunch of people's like, wow. Wow. That was really, really cool. And I can't say dog, why , what I did differently from that moment to a year earlier when I lived in Pittsburgh, I , I can't say what I did. I, I think things just pot was, it was it, God was preparing me by not allowing me to have success. So I would remain humble. Was it, was it, there was a gradual accumulation of leadership skills that they, they started to, to build on each other.
And it finally caught was it that I was in environments where there was unhealthy things happening. That was, that was holding back. The thing that I was trying to start, I don't, I don't know which one of those three or which, you know, which combination of those three it was, but I can't say like, that was the leadership decision that I stumbled on and then took off from there. It was just a gradually gradual accumulation of leadership and just diligently applying it .
Yeah. I love what you said. Maybe God was preparing you with a lot of failure for when you had success. If you had to speak to leaders today, maybe someone listening, who they feel like you probably felt in your twenties, that everything I touched seems to fail. It's never what I want it to be, man. I just want to throw in the towel and give up. What would you, what would you say to them?
One , I get it. Uh , that's where I was. Although I would never say I'm going to throw in the towel. I just didn't. Didn't have a quit bone in me. So frustration was there, but there just wasn't any, any turning back you , you have to feel and you have to personally own versus a . And why come? Jesus says, put your hand on the plow and don't look back. People who are in ministry and are considering getting out of ministry are never fruitful in ministry.
You, you, no matter how crappy it is or frustrating it is, if you're called you gotta, you gotta put your hand to the plow and, and just go forward. So the second thing I would say to those who are frustrated to feel like don't want to tell, especially those who were in their twenties. If you just stay in the game and you stay teachable, you're going to be awesome in a few years, just because other people are better than you will have quit by then. And you'll be the only option left for someone.
I mean , really like there's, there's plum jobs that are going to open up. There's plenty of opportunities. They're going to open up because there's very few people that have any semblance of discipline and integrity to stay in the game. So just stay in the game. It was really, really weird. Doug, when crossroads started, I was just the weird guy in Cincinnati who was doing things that people weren't doing.
Now. We do things like churches do all the time, but when we started, no one was doing videos, produced videos and service. No one, no one was having their sound be at 110 decibels during worship, no one was giving out free coffee and bringing it into the, into the worship . I don't want to say no one. I mean, no one, no one, no one was giving away free cassette tapes of the week's message and buying duplicate and giving them away. Not sign. 'em give 'em when I say no one, I mean, no one.
And though that innovation kind of drove us for a bit and also caused us to be seen as very on guard, very irreverent, very risky. We would, we would play clips from R rated movies of back in the days , you'd go to blockbuster and you get a blockbuster tape the night before and you queue it up and you put it in the VCR. You would actually play a scene. You receive ? What about Bob? Yeah, of course. Yeah. Okay. So what about Bob bill Murray?
He's got this, he has this , uh, th that this part where he's trying to , um , convince the doctor that he's, that he's crazy. And he has this scene where he says, there's two kinds of people in the world, those who like Neil diamond and those who don't like their environment. Do you remember that whole scene ? You know , he's worth Roger. Okay. So , so, okay, great. Let's do it . We'll use this to illustrate somebody who's diluted. So it had acute up put putting the VCR.
What I didn't realize, or we didn't realize is what you have acute up and you put it in the end , you put it in the thing. It rewinds like two, three seconds. And in that two or three seconds, that's when he was telling the doctor that he had Tourette's syndrome. So I start this thing and the church, I , I don't know what the listeners are in your, in your audience. So I , on my podcast, I would swear there's somebody that comes in and then there's two types of people in this world.
Those it's a church . Oh my God . That is not good church right there. Right. So anyway, I was , I had this reputation of, you know, just being irreverent guy on the edge, loose cannon. And then what do you know? All of a sudden, and I do mean all of a sudden, like for , I think for 10 years, crossroad has maybe 10 years, 15 years old. And I was the, I was the longest tenured senior pastor in the entire city of Cincinnati.
Wow. Except for one or two folks who were African and African-American context , Damon Lynch, senior , uh, as an example, I just sat back to stay that , to say, very few people have staying power. So if you convince yourself, you're going to stay, you convince yourself, you're going to walk closely with your God, which will always mean you will have incremental improvement, incremental leadership. That is a flywheel that hopefully by God's grace will eventually catch for you.
But for many people, they never see a catch because they're always jumping on the next fad thing. If the next program that's going to do it, they're not dealing with things of character and things of the heart. And they don't stick around long enough to actually see success.
You're not going to believe this, but I was in youth ministry in like 2000. I don't know when your list, like 2008. And we went on a ski trip or something like that. And I was in charge of bringing movies. And literally I brought one about Bob . So I'm like, oh, that's a good movie. So I throw it in, in that exact scene. You're talking about where he says he has to rats . It just starts going off. And all these kids just turn around and look at me. It was, it was absolutely beautiful. That's so
Exact same thing. Exactly . That's hilarious. That's great.
Uh, I want to talk to you about character development. You talked about a lot of people that don't stay in the game sometimes it's because they throw in the towel on the quit. Other times it's cause more failure. I have a few questions on character, but I guess just big picture, you know, how can leaders grow and develop their character in a way that actually sustains them to get to their finish line? I actually just listened to your podcast with , uh , Steve Carter.
And I forget the other passenger's name about the rise and fall of Marcel. Yeah . And it was just like, man, there was a guy that made it to the finish line intact . And it's like, man, how can we, how can we have more leaders do that? What would you say?
It's Doug? It sounds so trite, but it's really simple as to walk humbly with your God. I think having a goal of finishing well is fine. I mean , there, isn't a goal of not finishing well, right ? I think having a goldfish one , but, but certainly having a goal to not morally screw up is not going to build a great life.
But when you walk humbly with your God, you stay in teachable mode and you never get carried away with any sense of success or importance that, that you might have that's that's where people lose it. Right there is. They don't walk humbly before their God. I think you don't think you'd come up with that podcast. You just mentioned. There's a number of people who some would say, well , gosh, I never, I never saw coming when that guy went down.
And when you get older and you've been around the block a few times, which I am now you say things that you can say that you weren't a total just jerk when you would have said it when you were 24. But when, so I never saw it coming. And a couple of these guys just go, you're kidding. Right? I did. How did you not see this coming? How'd you see this coming? I talked with the guy and he's always looking over my shoulder to see if there's somebody more important than me that he wants to talk to.
What do you mean? You didn't see this coming? What did , what do you mean? Didn't see a comment that is, that is that his staff adores him and applaud. I there's someone I know when they walk into a room or they walk into a room, the staff is taught to stand and applaud. And that's what they do. There's some just really weird stuff happens because people are not walking humbly with their gut and you walk humbly with your God. Those things just aren't going to have any place for you.
I'm not saying you're going to be selfless , but those things are what will keep you strong and will enable you to finish strong. Billy Graham had those things, right? And he finished strong Ravi Zacharias. I mean , I remember the first time I heard Ravi Zacharias , uh , is like, what a jerk. I need to go back and listen to Rob . He was always condescending. Whenever he spoke, he was condescending. Like, if you don't believe this is look how much smarter I am.
And he never said that, but he was very condescending. And Christians, Christians would, would look, look over that, overlook that because what he said was so good if we just wrote it down, but he was incredibly condescending and incredibly prideful. At least that's the way I took him to be. And look how he finished. I have a good friend of mine who I realized Ravi Zacharias. He said, I actually read the 3000 page report that came out, that the organization had had audited.
And this friend of mine said, that's really weird. He was like a spiritual hero of mine. And I don't even think the guy was a Christian. I said, you're kidding wise . And he started telling me things that were this 3000 page report that were actions and attitudes that he had committed for decades, decades. And like, how can somebody walking with Christ? Do these things repeatedly for decades. Walk humbly with your God, never be impressed with yourself.
There were feeling like you're the smartest person in the room. Best idea has to win . Not your idea. Best idea has to win . I love my team and they know I would sell Tom, Hey, love to be wrong. I love to be wrong. I'd love to be wrong. When somebody else has an idea that I thought was a bad idea and we go with it and that was the right thing. You got to love to be wrong. You gotta , you gotta, you have to love the right thing to happen instead of have your thing happen .
And earlier that, you know, you've always been a little bit edgy and I'm just curious, you know, like I was laughing the Steve Carter interview that you did, you basically cracked open a beer to start the conversation as a leader. I've seen you talk about things that I wouldn't hear other leaders talk about, which I admire in you when it comes to like drinking, swearing, you know, talking about issues. How have you viewed that as your leadership? I know there's camps.
That'd be like all that's great. And then there's camps. That would be like, what's wrong with Brian ? You know , I'm just curious your viewpoint on that. Yeah .
Well the, you know, the new testaments does do the work of evangelists , endorse, suffering, fulfill your ministry, fulfill your ministry. I think we miss this. We think that all of us have to have Billy Graham's ministry or all of us have to have name your favorite mega church, pastor ministry, or name your favorite student ministry, or name your mission work, mother Teresa's ministry. He has fulfill your ministry.
Your not my ministry, your ministry, who is it that you are called to reach and what does ministry God's called you to have? So my ministry is to speak the native tongue of the average dude, to try to reach and grow that person that isn't going to be reached and grown by other really good folks. And , um, I happened to like beer and I happened to drink. And so I'm not going to hide that.
I'm actually going to have events called man camp, where we have intense prayer and we have four dozen kegs of beer that were kicked the last time, you know, amongst 1500 guys, you know that my ministry, right? That's that , that that's, that's what I'm doing. A lot of four letter words slip out every once in a while. Um, I don't think they've ever happened on a onstage at crossroads on Sunday there , the reputation is there, but a lot of four letter word come out and I'll do it intentionally.
Not for shock value because I feel it reaches people who example. Um, I won't use the word, but you'll know where I'm talking about. Just cause I have some sensibilities, Psalms there's different categories of Psalms. The Psalms are wisdom literature. The songs are not supposed to be used to form your theology like Psalm five, five Psalm 10, five talks about God hating people. And I don't think that that's right for us to use those as a part of our theology.
There's certain people that God hates what's to be understood. There is at the Psalmist David or other people who are doing the Psalms are processing and prayer things before God, there is good theology. And the song just gotta be really careful. Like Psalms also to that, David says bashed their infant's heads against the rocks. You're not going to find a theology that says, well, here's the situation we're infant's head should be bashed against rocks. Now God, he is, he is lamenting.
David is how he's mad. He's angry, he's frustrated. And so he's going to God and crying out the gods had gotten so frustrated, bashed her infants heads against rocks. This is what our prayer needs to be. We need to get away from nicety prayers and actually talk to God the way we want to talk to them . Actually give him what our actual feelings are. And so at a , at a man camp, a bed recently, I talked about the last year and a half of my life just being hard and awful.
Uh , if this has been, it's just kicked my up one side of the field down the other COVID race stuff, debates about policy politics, masks, vaccines, people not happy, but this, this , and I said, I go before God in prayer, more than ever, I've just gone to him as come . Like that's a literal prayer. I pray just, it's just lamenting like, oh , it's a crime of hearts . Frustrating. Right?
If David, if David can pray bash the , the heads of infants against rocks and he's not judged by Christians, can I just say that? But that's and most guys, when they hear that go, I get that. I understand it. Wow. That helps me go. And there's a lot of people that'd be, that's very hurtful to them and that , uh , the harms are sensibilities and they disagree with that and they go to churches and they listen to people that is their ministry to speak a language that they understand.
Uh, so I'm not, I'm not trying to say here's why you should have alcohol and swearing a part of your life. I am saying, if you're going to have a fruitful ministry, you to figure out what your ministry is, eventually you have to stop being a cover band. Cover bands are great to go to this. Do people like cover bands, but cover bands, don't change the world. You got to figure out your own, your own music.
There's a mic drop right there. The other thing I think about getting to your finish line is not burning out. And I was actually just reading. I think I read somewhere that you, in the second year of crossroads determined that you would take, I forget it was like seven or eight weeks off of summer. And I think you've done that every year, correct me if I'm wrong, you know? And now, you know, it's revolutionary now that you know, pastors should take a sabbatical every seven years.
It seems like you kind of implemented that rhythm early for anyone I heard was doing it. Can you talk about that and what your advice would be to leaders and taking time off, not burning out
Did that? I , I got that. Uh, I got that advice from bill Hybels. Uh , we'll agree who , with somebody who didn't finish well, but you know, a lot of things that bill said or right in the money and very helpful to me and that was one of them. So yeah, I've been taking six to eight weeks off every year , uh , since the second or third year of the church. And , uh , you gotta be humbled to do that because you look like a real jerk to people in the church.
When you start doing that, you look like you're just lazy. Like you're, you know, you're just trying to phone it in. Cause people are like, geez , man , you got to justify why you do that. And so I would justify it. I would read a book a day or book every four days and take notes. So I'd have something to preach and I would give people reasons why I was doing it. And then eventually it will get the place where someone say, it must be nice. I would go. It is nice. Yes. It's awesome. Very nice.
Yes. Thank you. Yeah . Thank you. And you should do it too. And guess what you could do this. People don't realize you could do this. You could go to your employer and make it part of your compensation to have that much time off. Or if they don't want to give that much time off , you could buy those weeks. You could do this. And because, because I'm lasting and I'm thriving, that's just something I'm going to keep doing.
And I have kept doing, I , um, I've been at the wheel for a while and if I didn't have that, that amount of time off, I know that I couldn't be at the wheel a number of years ago. I thought about changing it. And a good friend of mine said, man, I don't know. Maybe you shouldn't change it. That sounds kind of like the bipolar person who starts feeling good and they feel like they can go off their meds. You probably need to stay with that regimen. And uh, and I have , yeah . And here's the thing.
You talk about leaders, sorry. That's just my story in that, the reason, the reason why people don't take time to play. And I don't mean take time off your me very clearly. Sabbath is not taking time off so you can catch up on your email . Sabbath is not taking time off. So you can read a Christian book to help yourself in leadership or get some more Ponte or something to speak on. Sabbath is doing something you wouldn't otherwise do. It's something that is playful.
You mentioned my podcast that had somebody on recently who quoted Winston Churchill. The Winston Churchill said he who works with his mind rests with his hands. And so taking time off for me means I'm doing something active. I'm riding a motorcycle. I'm working on my truck. I'm doing a house project. I'm camping. I'm , overlanding something that you have to figure out. What is recreation for you that recreates you. And you've got to do that and do it regularly. And you got to see you doing that.
He's not happy. No, no parent wants to see their kid studying 24 7, no parent wants to see their kid and they take them on vacation and they go to the beach wanting to stay in and work on his term paper. No parent why that parent would say, this is, this is unhealthy. God's saying that to many of us. Cause he wants to see us laughing and take time off. It's critical.
Yeah. It's evident throughout our time together that you're passionate about men. Uh , you do a lot, you do man camp. You mentioned you've written several books for men, including your recent devotional called move. Where did this passion for men come? You know , what are you doing about, what's your message. What do you want men to know?
Well, I'm passionate about women actually like women, a lot more men married to one, I've got two daughters. Crossroads has as many or more, more women than we have men. Uh , so I just, I feel like I needed to say that, like I sometimes get pigeonholed by some who like, oh, well you're the, you're the man guy. You're the Steven or Steven , uh, John Eldridge kind of guy. I'm not men's ministry guru.
I do focus more on men than women in terms of thinking leadership decision and preaching because men aren't being reached because men aren't being developed. That's part of my ministry. And I would say it needs to be part of more churches ministry. The average church is overrun and overwhelmed with women. The church of women for women led by women. And I'm okay with all that, by the way, I believe women should lead. I believe women should teach.
I believe women should be in the ruling class of the church as elders. That puts me in the minority in some camps. But I, I do, I am, I am pro all that. My daughter is one of our community pastors. So I have a high, high, high view of women. And because I have a high , high view and I have a real hurt over a lack of godly men that are aligning with women. There's just more good women than there are good men in the church. And that's because the church has been oriented that way.
If the man eating lion came into a church, it would die of starvation because there's just not many men. There's, there's some males there, but there's just not many men. Uh , as a percentage, as there are women, women are , we just know this, right? But I just, I had met with a Christian agent or a book agent just before we had the podcast interview. 90% of Christian books are bought by women. Women are the ones reading, the Christian books.
Women, women are the ones who were in , in the pews or in the auditorium chairs. Uh , women are the ones who the Bible studies are written for and take off. Women are the ones that have the conferences. Why? Because you can monetize a woman's conference. Can't monetize a men's conference. No, one's done that since a promise wipers , roaming promise keepers, because women are just more, more open to that.
So yeah, I do have a calling to try to run after the one and the one versus the 99, the one is male because there's plenty of people reaching women. There's not many people who have the tongue of a man that are able to reach men alongside their wife.
So good. We'll include links to all of your books that I'd highly recommend any man listening, please go out and purchase those. At the time we have left, I want to jump into the lightning round, which I know you have your own lightning round as well. Some people listen to your being shortened, some people don't, but uh , just a bunch of fun questions. I do want to start with adventure though. You know, I love following you on Instagram. Encourage everyone to follow you.
You're always on an adventure man. I'm like, dang. It must be nice. So yeah .
Oh it is. It's very nice. It's very nice. Yes. Yes. Thank you. Let me stop right there. You know, that is true. It is nice. I'm not real world for people to, to model their life after me at this point, relative to adventure. Okay. I'm 56. I'm in my prime income earning years. I'm earning more money than I ever have. This is a prime earning years now. And all my kids are out of the out of the house and all my kids are married and all the college loans are paid off all that stuff.
And, and on top of that, I've worked for 25 years to build an organization, an organization that takes stuff off my plate and can enable me to function. When I go do adventures that very few people have all those things line up. So I just opened someone, looks at my Instagram feed and they don't feel like they need to be out doing as much stuff as I am away from their , their gig. I'm in a unique season of life. Yeah ,
No, I love it. And Hey, that just gave a bunch of us young leaders vision for where we could be, but on the adventure side and it actually, I was going to say your bucket list. I read a post. You did . You're like, I don't have a bucket list. I have a to do list, which I was like, boom. Um, but I'll do the things you've done. You know, what is something you've done or a few things you've done that you think everyone should experience before they die.
Absolute . I don't care who you are. If you're in America, need to get your to the grand canyon. It is the greatest thing in America. It's stunning people from all over the world go and there's people who live in Flagstaff and our way have never been to grand canyon. You have must go to the grand canyon. It is an occasion. It's a canyon and it is grand is what it is. Uh , that's one, the second one, if you're a motorcycle drive rider, if you are, you need to ride to Alaska and back.
Wow. All right. What's something left on your to-do list that you haven't done yet, or the bucket of ,
Well, as I said, in something you heard me, I don't, I don't have an ongoing running list that I'm checking off. I have something across it . Ooh, I need to do that. And then I make sure I do that as soon as I can and try to figure it out. So the one thing that's on my list right now for that, that I'm working on is a hunting trip to Alaska.
Awesome. All right . What's the best advice you've ever received and who gave it to you?
Steve Sjogren, former pastor at the vineyard church in Cincinnati, talked to me before I started crossroads. And he said, every day, when you look in the mirror, tell yourself you are a gatherer. You're not a pastor. You're not an or Raider . You're a gatherer. You get up every day. You need to gather people to the vision.
Hmm . If you could put a quote on a billboard for everyone to read, what would it say?
Make aggressive mistakes ,
Best purchase you've made in the last year for a hundred dollars or less.
Ooh. A hundred dollars or less. He's a good question . Is dirt. Are you hearing these? This is a good question . There . You gotta be looking over my producer over there. Who helps you with mine? That's good stuff. A hundred dollars or less. I'm going to go with a massive size bag. And I say massive. I'm saying it's got about a hundred pairs of ear plugs in it. Massive, huge ear plugs are the secret to sleeping when you're outside of your bed. Okay .
Interesting top , uh, it could be one or two top book that's impacted you and you find yourself giving away. Most often
I would change every month. That would change every month. Uh, okay. Right now I think the book, most recent book that John mark Comber came out with called , uh , live , no lies is utterly fantastic.
Favorite podcast other than your own.
I go in cycles on those as well. It's it depends on what I'm into that month or that , uh, um, why is this so
Hard? Uh , you can name three. It's fine.
Okay. The ones I ping pong back and forth to XL mountain gear, you sell backpacks and they do. It's a hunting bot podcast, Stephen Mansfield podcast, the 15 minute thing on politics and current events and art of Manliness. Those are my , uh, my , my three most regular podcasts. Listen to,
I haven't heard any of them. So check them out. Thank you. Uh, do you have a favorite failure that led to success or an important lesson?
Well, as I mentioned earlier, just about everything I did before I came to Cincinnati was , uh , you know , was a failure. One failure that we had was our very first Christmas show that we did. It was, it was just awful. It's called imagine. And you can't imagine how awful it was . It was really, really bad, but we try to do our own Christmas show and it was a try. And then the next year we totally change it , tried another one and we kept tweaking it.
And then that thing became a weighted, which is , uh , played a off-Broadway or at a local house, like the Aronoff theater in Cincinnati. And last time we ran our sites across shows. We had 115,000 people attend being looked at and be made into a movie right now. Wow . And all of that came out of the failure of trying something that didn't work at all called . Imagine it's
Amazing. What's your greatest leadership pet peeve. It
Is stunning to me after all these years, I'm still the guy that still notices paper in the parking lot and stops and gets picks up the paper. I'm still the God that notices when I'm in a room that the Cove baseboard is coming on , glued needs to be handled. So it's a pet peeve that I would have thought that more people would notice those things and be picking up and doing those things. And I'm still doing it.
And I don't know if that's just because that's the owner mindset that'll always be with you. Or if I haven't developed people to be able to notice those things, that's a massive pet peeve, which by the way, that's an amazing book , um, for your listeners talking about leadership, the ownership , uh , what's that called dirt, the ownership, the owner's dilemma, I think is what it is. And they talk about that .
That how a founder is an owner and when an organization doesn't have an owner mindset, it goes down.
You get to spend time with a lot of high quality leaders, interview them on your podcast. You have a question that you always ask when you get to meet with someone that you look up to bill Hybels in the past, et cetera.
Yeah. I think I, I like asking them a couple of things. I just give them an open-ended question. What is it you think I need to know one guide . I asked that too . He said, he said, you need to know that you'll never have the same money as the people you do ministry to have. And you're talking to student ministry . So these kids are going to have tennis shoes and their parents are going to buy them or be more expensive than ones you're going to be able to afford.
And he told me, I was like, yeah, interesting. Okay. Okay. He told me that when I was 19 years old, I think it was, and here I am, 56 making great, great Jack . But I'm with people who got more than me and have stuff that , that , that I don't have. And that is just very, very true. So you never know you're going to get, when you ask a leader, what is it? You think that I should know?
The second thing I like asking is what's God teaching you now, you know, Jesus says my father's always at work up to the present time and I too am working. So I like hearing how Jesus is working inside of other leaders, because it might be a clue of what God wants to work inside of me.
So what , what is God doing in your life right now? What's he teaching you?
I think he's teaching me about the role of, of, of father. My role of father in many ways is, is done because I don't have any kids in the house, but all of us still want to be fathered well by our dad or parent well bought by our mom. But I'm also seeing how God is still fathering me, how God is still nurturing me and how I need to turn around and be a father, at least from afar to , uh , to a lot of people.
Last few questions. If you can go back and have coffee with 20 year old, Brian, who apparently had no potential, what would you tell him ?
Oh, that's good. I think I would tell them , Hey man, I come from the future. I would tell them, amen. I come from the future. Let me tell you, you're going to be fine. Stop comparing yourself to other people and thinking that you're getting behind and thinking that the right opportunities are not coming your way and you're being left in the dust. You're going to be fine. Just keep doing the right things. And eventually things will fall in place.
And on the other side of your life, when you get to them, what do you want to be remembered for?
That question has changed Doug. So when I was 30, I would have answered that in some such way of , uh , I want people to say, Hey, Cincinnati was different because of that guy who was different now, where I am, I want to be just counted among those people who lived the faithful, fruitful and fulfilling life and finished well, wow.
Anything else you want to leave us with today?
You need to find out what your ministry is and fulfill your ministry and be open to other people, misunderstanding it and not supporting it. But if you have some people who are close to you and they know you and they walk with God and they can help you verify, you can go in that direction. You just do that. And things are going to be just okay or great.
Brian . This hour exceeded my expectations. Thanks so much for your time. Thanks for your leadership in the world. It matters. And a fluid . Get to do this again, sometime
My pleasure, Doug . Great, great questions made me go down memory lane and go internal in a way that I haven't for a while . So you're a good interviewer and you've got a good podcast here. I'm honored to be
On it.
Well , Hey leader , thank you so much for listening to my conversation with Brian tome. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. You can find ways to connect with him and links to everything that we discussed in the show notes@lthreeleadership.org four slash 2 94. Well , Hey, leader of the new year is coming up and I'm sure you're starting to think about what goals you're going to set and how you want to grow in the , in the new year.
And if you really want a 10 extra growth, I want to challenge you to either launch or join an L three leadership mastermind group. In the new year. Mastermind groups have been the greatest source of growth in my life over the last six years. And if you're unfamiliar with what they are, they're just simply groups of six to 12 leaders that meet together for at least one year in order to help each other grow, hold each other accountable, achieve each other achieve goals and to do life together.
So if you're interested in learning more about masterminds, go to L three leadership.org forward slash masterminds. And as always, I like to end with a quote and I'll actually quote a scripture that Brian talks about in the interview. Cause I loved it so much in second, Timothy four, five, it says this, but you should keep a clear mind in every situation. Don't be afraid of suffering for the Lord. Work at telling others the good news and fully carry out the ministry.
God has given you your ministry. I hope this episode encouraged and challenged. You know that Laura and I love you. We believe in you keep going, keep making a difference. Don't quit leader. The world needs you to leave . We'll talk to you next steps .
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