The Tim Ahlman Podcast
The Tim Ahlman Podcast is your go-to resource for inspiring conversations that equip leaders to thrive in every vocation, inside and outside the church. With three primary focuses, this podcast dives deep into:
Leadership: Learn from experts across diverse fields as we explore how their insights can shape and sustain a healthy culture in the local church and beyond. Over 60% of listeners expressed a desire for practical discussions on cultivating thriving environments—and that's exactly what these conversations will deliver.
Learn: Engage in deep theological discussions with scholars who illuminate how Christ is revealed on every page of Scripture. Together, we’ll bridge theology to the realities of a post-Christian America, ensuring practical application for today’s world. This segment aligns closely with the themes of the American Reformation Podcast and resonates with the 60% of you who crave more exploration in this area.
Live: Discover healthy habits that empower leaders in all vocations to become holistically healthy. As followers of Jesus, we’re called to lead not only with faith but also with physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being.
Join Tim Ahlman as we navigate leadership, learning, and living with purpose, so you can lead with strength, wisdom, and a Christ-centered vision.
The Tim Ahlman Podcast
Engaging Young Adults - Faith and Technology with Wes Smith
Have you ever wondered how to bridge the gap between technology and faith? How to engage young adults in a meaningful spiritual journey in today's digital age? Join us as we explore these questions and more with our remarkable guest, Wes Smith. Wes is a tech professional and active member of Cornerstone Lutheran who brings a unique perspective to his role as a young adult ministry leader.
In our chat, we peek behind as Wes's candidly shares personal experience and his faith journey. He opens up about understanding Lutheran beliefs, managing the challenges associated with young adult ministry, and the importance of building relationships in today's digital-centric landscape.
As we delve deeper into the conversation, we uncover insights on the church's role in evangelism and how it transcends beyond just the pastor's job. Wes emphasizes the importance of multiple exposures to Christ in one's faith journey, likening it to brand awareness in the secular world. We conclude our chat with a discussion on equipping the faithful for evangelism, highlighting the need for humility, openness, and learning from those around us. Join us for this enlightening conversation with Wes Smith as we navigate the intersections of faith, technology, and evangelism.
Hello and welcome to the brand new American Reformation Podcast. We long to see the wider American Christian Church fall more in love with Jesus by learning from the practices of the early church and other eras of discipleship multiplication. We want to hear from you, make sure you comment and leave a review, wherever you're watching or listening, to tell us what God is doing in your life or how you feel about today's conversation. Lord, have your way in us. Let's dive in.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the American Reformation Podcast. This is Tim Allman, and today I get the privilege of hanging out with Wes Smith. Let me introduce you to Wes Smith. We met on a phone call and I was just impressed with this young man's leadership zeal, his joy for the Lord and his passion for the local church. He's a dedicated disciple, community leader and tech professional based in Carmel, indiana. Born and raised in a Lutheran Church, missouri Synod tradition, wes Faith, though, has been a guiding force in his life. He's an active member now at Cornerstone Lutheran. He's on their governing board. We're not going to talk too much about that because we don't want to lose too many listeners, but he's working hard. As a governing board member, he helps lead his young adult ministry as well.
Speaker 2:Professionally, wes holds a master's degree in human computer interaction. He's a smart dude from Georgia Tech and currently works as a user experience manager at a prominent tech company. His passion for bridging the gap between tech and user needs has led to successful innovations in his industry. Beyond professional and church commitments, he's a loving husband and a proud father with one child who is now with Jesus awaiting the resurrection day One child by his side and another on the way. In his free time. He's an avid sports enthusiast. We were just talking about the troubles and travails of being a Tennessee Titan fan and a Denver Broncos fan. Right now, I don't know if we're going to spend too much time there because it's too painful. The wound is open. Wes is also dedicated to maintaining an active lifestyle through running and exercise. We may talk about human fitness, just using our bodies to glorify God today as well. So, wes, thanks so much for hanging out with me today on the American Reformation Podcast. How you doing, man?
Speaker 3:I'm good, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 2:I have a great strike for you.
Speaker 3:That's ChatGPT Bio that I used to create Fun times.
Speaker 2:Oh, so did you just throw your bio into it like a big one? And then it threw this in.
Speaker 3:I gave it like seven bullet points and it created that.
Speaker 2:And I tweaked it a little bit yeah Took me less than five minutes.
Speaker 3:It did, yep.
Speaker 2:ChatGPT man. You know I tried let's just hang there for a second. I tried to write some blogs with ChatGPT for a minute and people, if you went back and looked at United Leadership collective blogs, you could probably find the ones that were. So I love doing things efficiently and effectively, but I found, as a writer that it was a little too wooden and stale, and maybe it's because I didn't give it enough time for it to learn my voice. It's probably fair, but I've gone back to just writing my own blogs. But there are some unique ways that ChatGPT can be pretty helpful. What are your thoughts regarding that?
Speaker 3:Yeah, obviously use it here. Yeah, I think you give it a good prompt and it can give you solid output. So when it first came out, I started just going down that rabbit hole and decided some of my friends who have theological master's degrees and what they wrote their thesis in which I could never begin to think about. I was like I'll just put what they've told me about their thesis in there and see what happens. And I go and I send it to them and I'm like, look, took your job. And they just laughed and they're like, yeah, if it was a high school paper, so it's not good for full-fledged writing, but it's really good for helping create ideas and surface thoughts and doing little things like this.
Speaker 2:I agree, and I think the written word is always going to be necessary. This is one of the main reasons we are created in the image of God and those who follow the Word made flesh, which is Jesus. So I don't think AI is going to overtake us in needing to articulate our ideas clearly and concisely, but it can serve as a help. So let me dig into our opening question. Always, how are you praying for Reformation in the American Christian Church West?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so I'm praying that just many churches they move from whether it's just an inward, solely inward focus and a solely or solely outward focus and do both. So we need churches that both reach out into their communities in their Monday through Saturday lives and really touch people outside the church. But we also need the church to build us up and that's where we go to get God's gifts, and I think there are so many churches that on both sides are indexing too far, and so there's just a need that we have churches that are passionate and they do both, rather than just close themselves off or don't take care of their own.
Speaker 2:I mean, that's what Jesus said right, Go and make disciples. How Baptizing, teaching this is discipleship. But then it's a plural disciples. There's this expectation that there's going to be more and more who are coming in. So, yes, both and two sides of the same coin, absolutely. So I was impressed when you wrote to me your faith story and how you left, almost left, the Lutheran Church, missouri Synod, and really this could maybe have been any denominational church but any mainline denomination, but how you almost left the church body because of our lack of emphasis in young adult ministry. We talk about that and I resonated with that because I agree it is. The young adult demographic is one of the and I've been a pastor now 15 years one of the hardest demographics to engage and that doesn't mean we just kind of say, ah, we're only exist for Gen X and beyond or whatever. But yeah, tell us that story and really some helpful tips for how pastors and churches can start to engage your generation Wes. This is good, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think what's interesting is it starts for me more of rooted in my stubbornness and my weaknesses and then God turning that on its head just to spill the lead right there. But really it started growing up. My dad's and LCM as pastor he's at Fort Wayne grew up on the campus on the Fort Wayne Seminary, and some of the things that were instilled in me not necessarily explicitly by my dad or necessarily the folks around me, but just you know, intuitively was to be a good Lutheran, you need to get married, have as many kids as possible, raise them up in the church. And so I just when life, assuming I'd probably find my future wife in college, so on and so forth. So then, once I got to college, I started dating someone. We dated for three and a half years past college, then moved on to become engaged and within a month after engagement she broke it off. No, no real knowledge why. Obviously that was. That was really hard. And so I was in a town of about 20,000 at the time town city, whatever you would say but there wasn't a huge young adult, especially LCMS young adult crew in the area. And so I, just you know, I doubled down within my church, but I really didn't get a strong, strong presence or strong opportunities to meet other folks there, and so, as you will start to see throughout my story, a lot of it's brooded around, a lot of my trials have been around relationships. And so, as I began going into the real world, trying to seek out a God-pleasing relationship, to find someone to marry again, have children, raise them up in the church, I started seeking out strong Christian women, not just Lutheran but Christian women, and didn't particularly worry about the denomination. And fun backstory name is Wesley, john Wesley.
Speaker 3:My mom was a Methodist growing up until she met my dad, so so there's a connection there and that's something my mom always said it just has to just be a Christian, Right, just married a Christian. And so I started to begin that doctrine in theology matter but didn't know what to do with that Right, and so it was just like, okay, this matters, it's important, but I think I still at that point this was probably three, four years after undergrads assumed, yeah, you know, I'm, you know, still going to marry someone and they're going to become Lutheran and we're going to just go to the LCM S church in the area that's close to us, and so I continue to double down and I've been blessed by so many amazing pastors, whether it's in Finlay, ohio, atlanta, back here in Indianapolis just so many, so, so, so much care, even without the young adult kind of components, because of just sheer numbers. And so I started trying to reach out online, joining groups, and what I started to find out is I'm to Lutheran for non Lutheran for non Lutherans, but I'm not Lutheran enough for Lutherans, and that was kind of my motto, probably about 2015, until I met my wife, and so I continued just looking, looking for that relationship and just spin my wheels. I met someone when I moved back to Indianapolis and she went to a non denominational church, and so she was a strong Christian. But as we started to really get serious, started to realize there's a big gap in someone who has a more Baptist leaning theology versus Lutheran theology, to the point where baptism, the Lord supper, matter. And at that point I was I was like, okay, am I going to get married? Do I need to double down on Lutheran church? And really started questioning things and started attending church with her at her non denominational church, and I was so every week. It was week on, week off. I was kind of splitting time between the two.
Speaker 3:And as we continued the one thing there, they think there were a couple of things that started to like swirl around in my mind. So one of those was I don't think I could live with myself if something happened to a child, if they were not baptized. And then the second thing was I can never write off being called to be a pastor. I don't think to let me preface that by saying I don't believe God is calling me to be a pastor today. I think he's been putting me in a place and has given me other gifts, but that's one thing I'm never going to write off. So if you start marrying someone that is non Lutheran, now you're getting into, okay, you're probably not going to be an LCMS pastor and you're not going to necessarily turn around and be a non denominational pastor because of your Lutheran doctrines.
Speaker 3:So that's when I really started to get really, as I started to have some of these thoughts get upset. I'm like we were taught the catechism growing up. I can. That's not resonating Like the Bible versus in the small catechism are not resonating as I'm going through this. This should, this should be easy. This should be sold to this Baptist, strong Christian right, like we're equally yoked, is what I thought. Like why is this a problem? And so I got really upset but luckily, my dad being a pastor, I had a nice source to ask a lot of hard questions to, and a brother-in-law and one of my best friends were in seminary at the time and so, like I'm sure, I interrupted them with way too many questions. But I started to dig into, you know, the depths of Lutheran theology, started to dig into other teachings John MacArthur, john Wesley, you know some of the reformers and really started to see the differences and why it truly, truly, truly matters.
Speaker 3:So about that time when I really started digging in probably six months into digging in hardcore, my brother-in-law he actually was at his vicarage and it was his send-off and that's when I had the real realization like I can't write off being Lutheran, I can't write off potentially being called to be a pastor, because also I know if I don't think I'm called to be a pastor and I write it off, I'll have a burning bush in my front yard. So there was that. And then I think the other thing was with my church. Specifically, I had gone through the membership, the membership discipleship course, to become a member that everyone goes through at Cornerstone and I had indicated, yeah, I'm really interested in a young adult ministry and presence. But there really wasn't one. So they set up a meetings to brainstorm when I was out of town March of that year.
Speaker 3:So August rolls around, that Sunday drive back to Indianapolis from my brother-in-law's send-off and almost first thing in the morning I come in and email, I says hi, young adult ministry leaders. And I was like I haven't been engaged, but this can't be a coincidence. And so, as that started to go, there's so many great ideas just being tossed around Like how can we start engaging young adults? How can we really build this ministry up? But there was just ideas, there was no coordination, no organization, and so I just I had a slower job at the time and so I just started to throw together calendars and just coordinate everything with everybody.
Speaker 3:And then got an email, maybe a week later or two, from one of the same person and said, hey, wes, I can see you're be the young adult leader ministry leader. And I was thinking, well, this is awkward. And so I was like, well, this, this can't just be a coincidence, this is. You know, I could continue to be stubborn and ignored. I could continue to learn from it and so. So, yeah, and so then I just dug on in at the young adult ministry and it's eventually where I met my wife. We were, we were working on leading it together, and obviously, all the blessings that have come from that.
Speaker 2:So wow, Wes so good man. Thanks for sharing your story, and a couple of things I'd like to drill down on is what did you mean by you were not Lutheran enough for Lutherans, but to Lutheran for non-Lutherans? I thought that was a fascinating kind of discovery on your part, and I think I know what you mean, but I'd love for you to more clearly articulate that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so a lot of the folks that I have hung out around with most of my life have we consider them the self-proclaimed confessional Lutherans, which in itself is a loaded term, but I wasn't necessarily all on like what that meant and implied and so like I wasn't like so rooted in trying to keep things traditional and not think about things differently. So I think one of those are the impacts on young adult ministry. Right, so the church is the church, so everyone is one homogenous group and we get together. And so that means if there's not a lot of young adults, you as a young adult, your only opportunities are spending times with folks either a lot older than you, a lot younger than you. I think we do do a. Really, even though I was frustrated at kind of catechism and that piece of what we do, I still think we do a really good job of faith formation in our church, going through catechism and most of our churches, and then we do a really good job once you know, especially as you get towards the older ages where your kids start to graduate and move out and everything like that, but that in between where you're a young adult, you might be starting a family at space.
Speaker 3:I. It's probably always been complicated and complex to manage. But now imagine a world where there's social media, where you're not just going out and meeting people as easily. The church isn't that watering hole anymore. Like how do you do this in a God pleasing way and find someone who's equally yoked, and all that? And so I think the challenge for me was that I just I didn't. I also probably didn't fully understand what it meant to be confessional Lutheran at the time. That I have since learned, and so I think just that self-proclaimed designation and kind of looking at other forms of worship and other things like that in such a negative manner, just I just don't really have that approach or thought. And so that's, I think, the most interesting aspect of not being quote-unquote Lutheran enough.
Speaker 2:The worship piece, and it's worship.
Speaker 3:But it's also like we talk about writing and how you write. Like I'm very much more on the Communicates succinctly and like all the folks in those groups, they're just, they're amazing at writing, even if they don't have a background in theological education. It's just they, they can write beautifully. And that's just not me, right. And so there were just different bits and pieces of being more of like on that traditional side of things that I just that, I just have just don't embody right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, that's, that's fascinating. Would you talk a little bit about your journey of leadership in in young adult ministry? Because in my experience you get a whole bunch of young leaders and I, you know, I still kind of 42 or whatever, but I remember what it was like to be 26, 27, and kind of have all of these ideas. But then I think that the general sentiment sometimes with younger leaders is a lot of ideas but not a lot of action, A lot of ideas but maybe not the systems to start and sustain respective ministries. Right, and it sounds like you're trying to bridge that gap right now in your current context, right, At least, as you moved into that leadership role, Tell us that story and maybe kind of dismiss some of those generalities that we may have about young adult ministry.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think the LCMS especially at that time when I was starting to really kind of have my my rough patch, we'll say started the survey and all the research they started doing around young adult ministry, obviously knowing it's important, and some of the outputs made made a lot of sense. So when I kind of got dragged in you know, dragged not really screaming, I was more quiet than that but dragged into leading the young adult ministry, one of the things that I think you just the thing that you do is you just want to, you just need to execute, like just pick something and go with it, evaluate change. I think a lot of people have a hard time coordinating and making sense of all those, those things and getting it all in there. And so I think it starts as simply as pull out a calendar, do two or three things every month and keep it simple. And so what we did initially is we probably had four in the fall, four events in the fall, like a bonfire and a couple other small things, just fellowship related events, and through that started to see who really was engaging and everything like that.
Speaker 3:And so I asked four or five folks hey, would you like to join me on a leadership team with a specific mission for what you're doing. So I said, hey, can you. I asked one person, hey, can you do social? Hey, one person, can you? Can you do service based work? And then, hey, one person, could you help with running a Bible study? And I got a lot of no's for the Bible study. I got a lot of help for other things, but not the Bible study. So actually that's how my wife and I got to know each other. She's like, yeah, I'd like to do it, but I might need help.
Speaker 3:So the person that had kind of brought us all together at Cornerstone had just picked from right now media, Just a adulting was the name of the Bible study. And so I was like, okay, let's proofread this, let's make sure like there's nothing going against our Lutheran beliefs and doctrines, and like let's tweak it if we have to. And at that point I'd had my experience where I was able to dig in and start to see through the weeds and then, plus being able to lean on my dad has always been, just, you know, such a great help. And as we dig in, we're going through each lesson together, spending time together, learning, getting to know each other through that discussion. Each and every successive lesson got harder and harder and harder to keep original. So it was kind of like a downward slide until, like I think, the second to last video in that study, the pastor that was on there said something to the effect of if you're looking for the one you're not trusting God, just go and marry them. That's interesting, and so that's when we had to basically rewrite that entire thing, right? And so that's when we learned Bible studies are hard and there's a reason people are scared of them, and so we continue to just try and keep it simple have a Bible study once or twice, trying different things, different times, different locations, to see what kind of resonated.
Speaker 3:Another thing we did is we tried to have some consistent types of social meetings. So one of them I termed fishbowl theology. I don't know if you're familiar with like the therapy technique of a fishbowl, but you can throw questions in there, throw it in the fishbowl and then just pull it out and you answer the question. And so I was like, well, I'm going to put our pastors on the hot seat. So we started inviting one pastor once a month in the non-crazy months of a pastor's life, to come going out and eat with us and whoever wants to come and meet and throw all your questions that you have for them in the fishbowl and we can have the discussion and it can be silly, it can be get to know you, it can be theological, it can be problems. You're having Whatever is on your mind, throw it in there. And that was one of the best attended events, pretty consistently, that we did have across the board. I love that.
Speaker 3:So yeah like I said, if I would sum it up, it's just execute. You're going to learn a lot. There's going to be a lot of things that are a lot harder than you believe, but it usually takes just one person to kind of get the ball rolling.
Speaker 2:That's so good. Thank you for leaning into execution, build, measure, learn and just gathering people together around things that they want to talk about. It's really as simple as that, and there's a lot to talk about Wes yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, All right cool.
Speaker 2:So you dated an atheist for a while and you kind of ping this with some unique questions. So tell us a story of how you answered a number of these atheist questions. Because I think in your generation and really in our early maturation stages, you're kind of entering into adulthood and you're just having all of these kind of existential crisis kind of questions from time to time, and when you date an atheist those existential questions are going to be pretty profound. So tell us about that story.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So, like I said, even though I at one point thought about leaving the LCMS, I was still always rooted in my faith, always sought out the church and so kind of the whole origin of me, even dating an atheist. Looking back it was not smart, but it was what it was. It's part of my stubbornness that God has used for good Right. And so at one point so we sat together in a lab where we did a lot of our master's work together.
Speaker 3:That and three other guys who were very strong Christians and she didn't have a lot of influence by strong, good males, a lot of abuse, a lot of all that I mean it was sadly so rampant in the world.
Speaker 3:So I remember one question she asked me at one point is you and those other three guys are just different and you're generally good guys?
Speaker 3:Why and that was probably the first question that I didn't even realize was that first opening to being able to have a faith conversation with this person?
Speaker 3:And so then maybe we didn't date for long, because obviously there's a lot of challenges with that. And I think the biggest thing is is I was convinced that she was interested in going to church with me, because I was, because it was important to me, not because she was actually interested in in church, and I was like, oh, god does all the work. You know, I'm a good Lutheran, god does all the work, and so therefore, just get her in the church and then my job is done Right. And so as we, you know, for the few short months that was there, we just just had a lot of conversations around creation, around a lot of these other hot topics sanctity of life, just generally what my faith is and why I have it, and everything like that, and so it was definitely my first real, true, I would say, exposure to some of those direct questions Can't say I probably answered them the greatest, but you know, the more reps the better.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, absolutely so. What question do you think is top of mind for those who are pre-Christians on their way to Jesus today? I have my thoughts on this, but would love to get love to get yours. So biggest question or biggest roadblock maybe you could say that, because this question isn't answered it's a big, big roadblock for people a meeting and following Jesus.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I don't know if it's just one question.
Speaker 1:I think it's perception.
Speaker 3:They've probably been burned by folks in the church in the past, or they just see the hypocrisy of the church and or never been exposed to it. I think the one question that doesn't get asked that they will eventually ask, but it doesn't get asked enough and sometimes I think people probably Jesus Duke way too soon in relationships. Are you familiar with that phrase?
Speaker 2:Sorry, just no, that was a brand new one. Yeah, john.
Speaker 3:A Cuff in one of his books I'm sure you're familiar with John A Cuff in one of his books.
Speaker 3:He has a little joke about Jesus jukeying. So it's the idea of like how's the weather today? And then you say, well, the weather is great because Jesus died for my sins, and it's just like you know that, not genuine conversation or relationship, and always this kind of ulterior motive. But the thing that I've realized and probably in the next topic that we do talk about, that we have on the list, it plays through too it's you are just different, why Like? It's a genuine curiosity of like. Why are you different than everyone else I meet? And it's not in like a mean spirited way, it's very much like I don't. This is just blowing my mind. I don't understand right, and I think being able to answer that question is a big step ahead with all your folks who probably, who aren't, who aren't church or are, you know, atheists or agnostic.
Speaker 2:This is one of my. I love that. This is one of my biggest prayers for the church today is that the outside world watches the way we even treat one another and we're supposed to be known West right by our love, by our care. And if we lose love for screenings 13, you lose all points of doctrine and theology, because God is love and he's revealed himself to us and the person in work of Jesus who came and did life with the broken, persecuted you know sinners just the prostitute, the outsider, the least loss, the lonely, the marginalized.
Speaker 2:So unless we can talk with charity and love and kindness and disagree agreeably about points of doctrine and practice within the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, which is our context, we have a little right and I think we're clinging gong to those who are outside because it is love that wins the day and that doesn't mean a lack of truth. That is not mutually exclusive to the truth of who Jesus is and how much he loves us and how he is the way and the truth and the way to life. But yeah, I'm just praying for a posture of love, just like you've shown in your life and your friends. What an amazing witness You're, just different. I just pray that a lot of pre-Christians would just be asking that because of the way they see a street one another, toward them and with each other. Any thoughts of that, though, wes.
Speaker 3:No, I completely agree. I think one of the things for me that the quote I don't even know, because you know Luther's constantly misquoted so we never know what's his quote or not. I think it was a Lutheran quote that said God doesn't need your good works, but your neighbor does. And to me that just really strikes a chord. Consistently, as I reflect it and as these in the moment, you don't realize these situations and these simple questions of why are you different, like what that actually means. Right, and by then, as you reflect and you start to see that, you really begin to realize that you know, for salvation purposes God doesn't need our actions. We're saved. That means we're free to go and do our best and we are forgiven when we fail. And then when we do it well, it's all God working through us, right?
Speaker 2:Amen, it's facts. So, yeah, that's just good theology, man, and it carries us out in mission to the world and I think it's a winsome witness right now, in a very polarized, divided day and age. All generations right now should be looking at the world and just saying, man, this ain't working. The way we're treating one another in person and online, man, this isn't good. Like the anger that I feel at the whatever it is issue that you look at in the world like this isn't the way of Jesus. The church should have an answer.
Speaker 2:The church does have an answer for that. You know. It's the person in work of Christ moving in and through us and hopefully we just have this contextual hospitality, over the top hospitality to welcome people with a variety of different perspectives toward the world, recognizing they're created in the image of God and desperate need of the love of God and the person of Jesus. So thank you so much for modeling that for us. I'd love to hear your story. Have you talked about Bible study? Good, bible studies are hard, but how did you help a friend dig into God's word after totally writing off the church? I'd love to hear that story.
Speaker 3:Yes, I wouldn't even say it's a, I don't even know if I can take credit other than continuing on the same trend. So I'm a little bit of context to that. One of my friends recently told me that he is started to do a Bible study with some other folks, and so the backstories. I met this friend in Indian when I moved back to Indianapolis at the company I worked at. He moved on to a new company. Eventually I followed him over. We had a lot of shared interests but it was clear we were morally, philosophically, just different than each other and that's okay. And so then, as we're continuing to work together at this second job, some other strong Christians are there working with us as well Still the minority, but we're still there and working together.
Speaker 3:And it was funny because he always said he started to adopt some of my thoughts about career progression and how you play the corporate career game and everything like that. And then he said hey, wes, I feel like I'm coming more like you. But there's three things I'm never going to do. I'm never going to drink, spark energy drink, and at the time that was a problem for me. I'm never going to listen to country music and I'm never going to get in a church and I was like, okay, fair. And then one day he came to me the coffee shop had closed or whatever and so he needed some caffeine. He's like, hey, I need to connect, can I have some spark? And so I was like, check one now. It's, now, it's on.
Speaker 3:And so then, kind of the thing I chuckled about and gave him a hard time about, so for my wife's and my wedding, we viewed our, especially our ceremony is more of a not just for us, but also a witness with how, with the hymns we chose and everything, knowing most of the folks that coming were not necessarily church or Christian. And so when, when I was waiting for the receiving line, like I was so like minus, getting married to the love of my life, this was like, probably, like you know, that probably took up the first three bits of excitement. But then, you know, the fourth was him coming through that receiving line and I could be like, see, I got you into church and you're going to listen to country music at the reception, and so, unfortunately, they were running behind because our timing was just a little not standard and so they ended up not being in there. It's like ah, you know, oh well, it just wouldn't a funny joke, more than anything. So then at some point I don't remember if that was before this or after this, but he had, he and I were talking and he says isn't it funny that all my closest friends are Christians, and I don't know how to say that he's like but you all are just.
Speaker 3:And again it went back to the same concept of you all are different. And so then, you know, we continued to, even after I left the company, we continued to stay, stay in contact and stay good friends and everything like that. And then one day earlier this year we're texting and he goes oh yeah, by the way, this other guy that worked with us at that company, he, he and I are doing a Bible study and I'm starting to dig into the Bible and I was like what, what? And so I was like I was like you know, great. And so so you know I really can't take full credit other than just being part of that journey, right, and just being in the world, but not of the world.
Speaker 2:Thanks for thanks for being present. You talk about brand awareness and how, how often it takes a person to adopt a respective brand, and we could talk about Jesus. Obviously, he's way above any any respective Nike brand or anything like that, but exposures to Christ, seven plus exposures talk about talk about that and being one, one part of that person's journey toward Jesus, toward, toward the faith.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think my experience isn't. It's just. I mean, within the last couple of years I've had the realization around this, but my experience has taught me where each moment in interaction we have somebody is is one chance to interact. So when we think about some of the branding theory that takes place they they talk about seven exposures before someone looks to you or associates a meaning to a brand, and so there's just this continuous loop of exposure and you're not necessarily going to be that only exposure. You might be the first exposure in their journey, right.
Speaker 3:And I think while it, you know, it gets into some of the secular thoughts of like branding and everything like that when things work.
Speaker 3:I also can attribute that to maybe there's something going on that the secular world might say here's the science behind this.
Speaker 3:But the way I also look at it is it's like it's also when God works, he works, and maybe we're just finding ways to describe how God works right in different ways. And so I think when we think about those seven exposures, it's just hopefully it gets anyone that might be hearing this for the first time just jazzed and excited, knowing, like you don't have to have all the words, like I certainly didn't. You know, I certainly stumble over my words and whatever God helped me get out, it got out right. It had nothing to do with how eloquent I could talk or share the gospel right, because at the end of the day God's doing the work. So one book that helped me with this realization was Joining Jesus, and that book in itself helped me realize that it's God doing the work through us and so obviously we need to be there, but God is doing the work, and so that, and that completely just removes all the pressure involved and just know you're a part of everybody's journey that you touch.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's Greg Finke, he's a good friend and, yeah, joining Jesus on his mission. Powerful, powerful, the God's already there, god is ahead, God is above, god is beyond, you know, and it's just partying. Having the kingdom lens, the mission lens to see. Wow, god, I get the privilege of being used in a beautiful way to bring people to a realization of how much you love them. Like this is the greatest thing of all time. Coming down the homestretch here, what are your prayers for the church at large, but namely the Lutheran Church of Missouri Synod, especially as we try to engage pre-Christians and young adults? There's some of your big prayers.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean I would. My biggest prayer would be that we don't close ourselves off to thinking, oh, if we just have the word rightly preached, if we just administer sacraments rightly, which is so, so, so important, right, but I think it goes back to my original prayer in the beginning of this conversation around if someone doesn't know you're there, how are they going to receive those gifts? Right? And so, being thinking that, not being able to share the gospel until they kind of get in, I think the story that I've seen some pastors in a Bible study ask okay, they'll say, okay, whose job is it to do? Evangelism, is it? And then most people will say the pastor right. And like I mean, it's just, it's not in this day and age, thought of that like that's everybody's job. And so I think, when it comes to that, that we don't lose sight of either proper administration and all the gifts that God gives us through the church, but also that if folks aren't coming through the doors, we're never gonna. We're never gonna receive those gifts.
Speaker 2:What words of wisdom would you give to someone like me? Yeah, I'm a middle-aged guy, do my preaching thing and then do my leadership thing and I just don't have maybe the intention, the consistent intention.
Speaker 2:I'm speaking hypothetically here because I believe we do have a lot in our congregation intention around evangelism, but I think a lot of times it's just so overwhelming. I mean, how do I even start to go about training all of the baptized to carry the message, the love of Jesus, and the message of Jesus out into our community? So I think we relegate. Well, it's just a pastor. He's been trained to do all these types of things. So if the pastor doesn't have this like developmental mindset, like he's a doer, not a developer, we're gonna have a hard time with this. What words of wisdom would you give to the pastor who says man, help me. I don't know exactly what needs to change in my world so that I can equip all of the saints to be more evangelistic.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, I definitely don't have a good answer for that, but I would say it just. It starts with one person. It just takes one person to get the ball rolling. So if there's just one person in your congregation that has a mindset or a passion around this, just start with them, see what they need, what are they struggling with, and begin to move from there, because it all takes is one.
Speaker 2:Dude, my drop Wes, yes, yes. Rather than just looking at all of the, just find the one, find the two, find the three, the small group of people, and say and be honest with them, I don't know exactly how this is gonna go. I've got a lot of thoughts about who God is and how he relates to us in the world, but I've never led an evangelistic movement before out into our community with any sort of intention or even structure in time. So would you just come to the table with me and help me dream, because we talk about this a lot in the ULC. I see in you one, a love for the Lord and a love for speaking the words of Jesus in the hopes that the Holy Spirit would work and bring people to faith. And I just need you. I just need you at the table. I need to learn. I take that humble posture. I need, as a pastor, to learn with you and from you, man. That would go so so far. Anything more to add to that?
Speaker 3:I think the other thing, too, is just keep an open mind and understand that. Well, yes, there's some forms of persecution in the church. We're not facing hangings, but we are facing cancellations and all that, and that's, I think, a big hurdle for a lot of lay members. It's well, we have all these other vocations husband, father to provide, and so how do you do that and continue to provide Some of that? It's trust the Lord, but also it's getting people comfortable with that, and as a pastor you have so many challenges.
Speaker 3:I know it's hard to be a pastor, obviously, I observed that firsthand. But at the same time, unless you're out in the communities, you're in a bubble and I feel like sometimes I find myself getting a little jealous of that bubble because there's less worry around some of that, whereas you're like, okay, God's going to raise up the church May not be in the form we see it today, but he's going to sustain the church to the end of time. And so there's this temptation to just sit back in a bubble and not realize that the experiences that your lay members are having in their Monday through Saturday times are just going to be. It's hard and you just have to realize that and help equip them in the best ways possible, so that they can feel comfortable and confident in doing so.
Speaker 2:Yes, amen. Wes, this has been so much fun. Thank you for your wisdom, for the intention you put, just to have an awesome Jesus focused evangelistic focus conversation today. I've learned a lot from you today. If people want to follow you or connect with you in any way, how can they do so, Wes?
Speaker 3:Just reach out on LinkedIn, probably the easiest place to do that.
Speaker 2:Wes Smith, the one and only from Carmel, Indiana, right Cornerstone. Cornerstone is a vibrant congregation. Your congregation is very, very well respected within the Lutheran Church in Missouri Synod. So thanks for serving so boldly and winsomely, Wes. This has been so much fun. This is the American Reformation Podcast. Sharing is caring. Please like, subscribe, comment wherever it is that you take this in. We promise to have more Jesus centered, Reformation focused conversations with leaders like like Wes, Just seeking to be faithful and carrying the never changing message of Jesus, a crucified and risen one, to a dark and dying world. It's a good day. Go on and make it a great day. Thanks so much, Wes. You're the man bro.
Speaker 3:Thank you.