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
Bound, Burdened, Broken: A Framework for Gospel Listening
What if our cultural moment isn't "post-Christian" but rather "pre-Christian"? This shift in perspective could transform how we approach ministry and evangelism in today's secular world.
Dr. Dean Nadasdy, President Emeritus of the Minnesota South District of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, draws from decades of ministry experience to share insights on effective leadership and evangelism. His pastoral wisdom challenges us to reconsider how we approach relationship-building, lay mobilization, and gospel communication in today's church context.
• Relationships remain the most enduring aspect of ministry—contrary to the advice not to befriend church members
• Equipping laity for servant ministry through intentional systems helped Woodbury Lutheran achieve roughly 66% member participation
• The apprenticeship model paired new volunteers with experienced ministry leaders to ensure smooth transitions and proper training
• Clergy dominance can prevent lay people from fulfilling their calling to serve in Christ's mission
• The "bound, burdened, broken" framework provides a practical approach to contextualizing the gospel for specific needs
• Stories engage emotions in ways propositional truth alone cannot, making them powerful tools for gospel communication
• Modern parables can effectively communicate timeless truths to contemporary audiences
• Shifting from a "post-Christian" to "pre-Christian" mindset transforms our outlook from defeat to opportunity
• Our Lutheran theological foundation—commitment to Scripture, grace-centered theology, and Christ-focused proclamation—positions us uniquely for effective ministry
• Vibrant communities driven by mission, not institutional structures, will attract those seeking authentic spiritual connection
Welcome to the Tim Allman Podcast. It's a great day to be alive. I get the privilege today to one. Invite you to rest in your identity and the joy that Jesus has over you. He smiles over you and your work, whatever your vocation is, and feel free to smile back. Today I get to hang out with Reverend Dr Dean Natasty. I have been highly, highly respectful of this man and his work and honoring of this man and his work over the years. If you don't know, reverend Dr Dean Natasty he retired in 2008,. President Emeritus of the Minnesota South District of the Lutheran Church, missouri Synod. His parish experience includes pastorates at Woodbury Lutheran Church. Shout out to my friend Tommy Fotenauer. He's been on the podcast before and he was there at.
Speaker 1:Woodbury from 2000 to 2012. Well, tom's the best right. Dean's academic degrees include the following BA in English at Concordia Senior College oh, that goes back Fort Wayne, indiana. And MDiv from Concordia Senior College oh, that goes back Fort Wayne, indiana. An MDiv from Concordia Seminary in St Louis. An MA in political science that's pretty cool From SLU University of Missouri in St Louis and, man, a doctorate in literature from Concordia University in Nebraska and Concordia University, st Paul. You've been around the Concordia world there, dr Mattis, for sure, haven't you? Well, before we get going, I mean, you have so many. I could list all of the books he's not just read that would be very long but written, even with CPH, and this is going to be a lot of fun today, dr Natassi, how are you doing, brother?
Speaker 2:Good, Great to be with you. I've not done a lot of podcast, so this is. I'm an old guy, so this is a new experience for me.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you, and you're a gift man, this is going to be great. So let's go back a little bit. I mean, you've been, I guess, out of the parish experience full-time for over a decade now, is that right?
Speaker 2:2018, I retired being a district president yeah, 2012,. I went from Woodbury Lutheran to be a.
Speaker 1:DP. Yeah well, thank you for serving as a district president. What are your top two or three memories of leading a local church over the decades? What did you love the most?
Speaker 2:as you just look back, Well, it is interesting that when I look back what lingers with me are the relationships, relationships with staff people, with lay leaders and just with the members of the church. My closest friendships in my life to my adult lifetime have been in the church. We were told not to make friends with our members, but I wouldn't have had any friends if I hadn't had those relationships. So the relationships linger most, I suppose. Then too I was always strong on emphasizing equipping the laity for servant ministry. So education we did a lot with adult Bible study.
Speaker 2:I was from the era where we did the Bethel Bible series and crossways and so forth. I can remember at Woodbury doing 100 verses in 100 days where members were invited to memorize a scripture verse every day for 100 days and they were held their feet to the fire by being partnered with other members. That was interesting because I remember we had kids who held their parents accountable for memorizing scripture, which is kind of a reversal. It was kind of a nice reversal. So that was a big deal. The education thing. Thirdly, I think, just the emphasis on the arts. I was big on theater and drama and we had a standing drama team every year for a lot of years. And then the visual arts festivals that we did, where we would hang the art in the sanctuary and then I would use the art? Um in my preaching. I'd preach from different art pieces and pray from different art pieces um. So those three things relationships, education and the arts that's a great summary.
Speaker 1:I I, if you know're we're just a couple of decades apart, but I think even now, pushing 20 years, I'm going to look back and have it be very, very similar to that focus. It's all about the people. And going back to what you said about relationships, I don't know if that's the best advice to say never have friends in the church.
Speaker 1:What words of wisdom? I don't think it is. Yeah, what words of wisdom do you give, though? Because there is a line and you can kind of cross it, and the pastoral ministry is an office to be respected, to be sure, but at the same time it's you're accessible, I think of the ministry of Jesus, right? I mean, he was accessible. You call me teacher and rabbi. I guess I am, but I've called you friends, right? He had friends with the apostles, and so especially with like, we're a larger church, woodbury was a larger church. You can't be like close, intimate friends with two, three, 400, there are 4,000 people, for goodness sake, right?
Speaker 1:But you certainly can have kind of an inner circle and an outer circle and a circle that you're mobilizing, equipping and training.
Speaker 2:What words of wisdom do you give? That's the Jesus model for friendship. That's the Jesus model for friendship is that inner circle? And it doesn't mean that there's a power circle, it just means that there are people with whom you're especially vulnerable and you hold yourself accountable. I always had an accountability team that I worked with to hold my feet to the fire in terms of being faithful in ministry and honoring the goals that the congregation had set. So, yeah, I think the relationships are at the core of any ministry, and that's certainly been true in my ministry. I don't remember now why I would stay up in the middle of the night worrying over a voters' meeting coming up. I don't even remember what those voters' meeting struggles were about, but I do remember the relationships and they're just, they're treasures in my heart. People that I worked with. God gave me great people, especially lay people, but also staff. I surrounded myself or I should say God surrounded me with some tremendous people that really made the ministry work, love that I think you were known for memorizing names.
Speaker 1:Don't you have an exceptional ability to memorize names of people? I don't know where that started.
Speaker 2:I've heard that before, but I don't know if I agree. At Woodbury there were 4,000 members and I could name 3,000 of them, but there were 1,000 that I. It was beyond me to get all of them. I'm fairly good with names, but I'm not great with names. I know others who are better than I with calling people by their first name.
Speaker 2:Nowadays everybody grabs a name tag when they go into our church. I'm still a member at Woodbury Lutheran, so everybody has a name tag on, which makes it wonderful for communion, and when you meet somebody you can call them out by name, which is super.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're doing name tags as well, but I will say 3,000 out of 4,000 is pretty good, dr Natasty. So tell us a little bit about what you did with Lay Leadership Development. This is a podcast of the United Leadership Collective. We talk about leadership a lot. Can you think back to some of the most winsome ways you were trying to raise up leaders from within the congregation? What were some of those strategies and attempts, especially around theological formation, dr Nadesi?
Speaker 2:Right? Well, I think for us it was more oriented towards servant ministries. We brought on a full time director of servant ministry. So when you came into our church there was an inventory you did on spiritual gifts and the your preferences in terms of where you'd like to serve in the church. And then we had every position had an apprentice. So you were assigned to a person who held that position in the church as servant ministry. So my, let's say, it's an audio tech and you spent several months as an apprentice to that person. Then you moved into an audio tech position and we tried to do that with everybody who came into the church.
Speaker 2:We're very intentional about finding their strengths, their gifts, where they wanted to serve and making sure they served. And I forget the number, but at Woodbury Lutheran especially, the number was huge in terms of the percentage of people. I think it was like two thirds of our members were heavily involved in some form of servant ministry in the church. And then the education thing tagged on to that, that while they're serving you're also equipping them for service in the church. And that's done through small group Bible study primarily, but also large group studies that we had.
Speaker 1:How much weight do you give to your servant leadership development kind of invitation, your apprenticeship to theological formation? How much credit do you give that attempt to the growth that Woodbury Lutheran have? How intimately connected or not do you think was that invitation? Because two-thirds serving is extraordinary, I think in many churches Dr Mattis, praise God.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it's significant. I think there was a surprise element to it. When people came into the church they were surprised that there was an expectation of this. But then if you can match them to a ministry where they're truly gifted and there are hundreds of ministries in a large church that they can take on it's really fulfilling and probably that moves over to a contagion that they share how fulfilled they are in their ministry at the church and leads to other people coming. I don't have any stats on that, but I'm sure it works that way.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, and what we've noticed is a good next step after worship. They've been with us two, three times. You get them into either a meet the pastor, a start here, whatever you want to call it into, a and maybe a six weeker in terms of who we are and what we believe we call it belong into, engage Like. People are eager and the first thing after like, as we get them into that sort of a journey, is to talk about service. For many years we were talking small group, but now we talk we want people to be in small group, to be sure, but service is one of the first invitations out of that sort of onboarding experience into who we are and where we're going as a ministry. Did you find the same thing? I mean, it's a lot about service because you meet people on these respective serve teams and then relationships develop pretty naturally. Is that what you found, dr Nadasi?
Speaker 2:Very, very much so I think. Otherwise there's this flounder thing that happens that you're there in worship and maybe you're not there in worship and you kind of get lost in the maze of a large church. So, finding something that truly is servant-oriented, and you have to have the theology underpinning that that it's Christ-like servanthood. So we're using Christ as our model for that and our motivation. We want to serve him and so that becomes a vehicle for really fulfillment. It's not about fulfillment, it's really being more and more like Christ. It's who I am. I want to be more and more like Jesus. That drives the ministry.
Speaker 1:You mentioned identity.
Speaker 2:We were talking before we got together. You mentioned identity, and that's just crucial. I think that we need to know who we are, and our identity is primarily that of a servant, a Christlike servant. Yes, Amen.
Speaker 1:Well, you've lived that out your entire life. Praise be to God. So what are the top two or three as you look right now, 2025, what are the top two or three biggest differences today in leading as a pastor? And we got pastors listening, but a number of lay leaders listening as well, and so this is maybe helpful for them as they pray for care, for love their pastor.
Speaker 2:What are the biggest differences today than maybe when you first began in ministry, dr Nassi? Well, I have a sense that over the course of the years my ordination was in 1973, so 50-some years pass and I see a clergy dominance, particularly in the LCMS now, that doesn't recognize the value and the necessity of enlisting the laity in the mission of the church. So that's something that's changed. I didn't sense this overwhelming centrality of clergy in the life of the church and that's in no way showing lack of respect for the office. I have tremendous respect for the office of pastor, but I think too many churches in our tradition are run by pastors and there's not enough opportunity for lay people to serve. I think worship is more challenging these days than it was. I have a feeling that maybe we're by the worship wars in the LCMS. I think worship is more challenging these days than it was. I have a feeling that maybe we're by the worship wars in the LCMS, but there's still this division. I love contemporary Christian music, but I'm also concerned about losing the ordo.
Speaker 2:You know the order of worship that's been there since 150 AD with Justin Martyr. You have signs of the same sequence of events during worship. So worship's gotten to be a bit more complicated. And then I think, in terms of pastors again, I don't sense the mutuality and the collegiality that we had 50 years ago. We could duke it out at a Winkle at a pastor's conference and then still go out and have a beer together. I'm not sure that's the case anymore. I think there's a division among clergy that isn't very healthy and there's an isolation. The loneliness of ministry has been there for a long time, but it just seems to be even more so that too many pastors are trying to do it on their own, without the support they need.
Speaker 1:That's a sobering list. I pray for engagement of the laity this podcast. We talk a lot about the Royal Priesthood of All Believers and I'm an active pastor that gets the privilege of having hundreds of leaders who are around me. And that's just because it's a larger church. If you're in a church of 100, hopefully you at least have 10 to 15 kind of key leaders who are around you, lifting up your arms, caring for you, praying for you, partnering with you, carrying out the ministry and all of the tasks. You know that you think of the deacons, the deacon type tasks that need to get done within the church. If there's a pastor, that's like in a smaller church and he feels like man. I got to be all things to everyone and maybe even justifying it according to Paul's words. That's just a heavy, heavy burden. And Jesus came to give us a light yoke. His touch is light and if Jesus actively I just preached on this just yesterday.
Speaker 1:I come back to Luke 9 and Luke 10, the sending of the 12 and the 70. And it happens in Mark 2, right before Jesus feeds the 5,000. And right out of that kind of a humorous thing, dr Nadesi, was Jesus just sent them to proclaim the kingdom to heal the sick and to cast out demons, and they do, and they come back to cast out demons, and they do, and they come back. And then Jesus moves into this big quandary of feeding 5,000 plus people out in the midst of a desolate place and says you give them something to eat. And their mind immediately goes to there's no way we could possibly, you know, like our pastor's, inviting partners, others to come alongside them to do the work with them, because I'm in a context right now.
Speaker 1:It's so much fun Our leadership development, all the way up to Vickers and potential future pastors. It just is. I don't know why we'd want to do it any other way. And I think a lot of times pastors are living with, yes, because of social media and the internet and you can see and listen to preaching. So the comparison, the competition which is the thief of joy, right, that's just so palpable. And then what I've experienced in our denomination I imagine it happens in other, in other tribes as well is an ever increasing tribal nature around people who agree with absolutely everything that you do and you agree with absolutely everything that that they, which to me, dr natasy, sounds very boring like I want people to challenge it's.
Speaker 2:The same thing goes on politically in the nation. People get only hear what they want to hear from the people around them that they want to be with, and that's that's separation from the world. That's not being in the world, and we need to be in the world, not of, but in it for sure. I think. The other thing is I think the dominance of clergy trying to go it alone cheats laypeople of the opportunity to serve the Lord, and that's really sad that we're cheating laypeople of their opportunity to serve when we try to do it all and just think of the ministry that could be done if we mobilize the laity in every congregation. It'd be amazing to see the laity take over.
Speaker 1:It is amazing. It is amazing and unfortunately, to your point. On the one hand, I think we're by I guess you will the worship struggles, and I think where we need to agree with those that have only organ and only hymnal, where we need to agree is on the ordo. 100%, a hundred percent. I'm with you there. The scripture doesn't say anything about drums and guitars and things like that. I love that we're writing more Jesus centered, confessional Lutheran songs now Shout out to the songwriters initiative is invocation through benediction and everything that kind of goes in between confession, absolution, obviously, the sacraments, the Lord's Supper, you know, and I'm a fan of the Lord's Supper as consistently as you can possibly have it for the edification of our faith, the forgiveness of our sins. I say more there around. I think this is where we should and could unite, I think in the LCMS, dr.
Speaker 2:Nance, I think. Several years ago, when I was on the Council of Presidents, we came out with a statement that we all agreed on it, which is very rare on worship and basically the substance of the statement was what matters is the ordo and I think leadership in the Missouri Senate has stayed with that idea that we want to see the ordo honored. And if we can do that, if we can honor the sequence of events which is, it's just masterful to see the flow of a worship service through the traditional ordo, if we can all agree on that, that's really something to rejoice in. And the style of worship, the music used, the instruments used, I think that's a matter of taste. It's going to vary from church to church, from person to person, that's very evidently, adiaphora.
Speaker 1:We need to do a better job, I think, Dean, of listening to one another. You talk a lot about listening. I believe it is a skill that can be deepened. So talk about the three primary needs of those we listen to. You say they're either bound, burdened or broken. Would you kind of take us to school in the art of listening, Dr Natasty?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm really big on listening. I think that a place where that could begin would be in worship itself. I remember, as a district president, visiting churches that were calling and the number one thing they wanted in a pastor which I heard over and over again was we want a dynamic preacher. Well, I got so tired of hearing that. Finally, I said to these groups you know, what we preachers are interested in is dynamic listeners. We'd like some people out there who are actually listening.
Speaker 2:Listening dynamically, which means bringing your needs to that sermon, preparing for the sermon by reading the text ahead of time, talking about the sermon before it's even given, but to give the sermon some life and really truly listening with my needs in mind as I listen to a sermon. That said, the other thing that I like to talk about is gospel listening listening with a heart for sharing the gospel. So a lot of times our people aren't ready to share the gospel because they don't have an apparatus for it, and so I don't know where I picked it up. I don't think it's original with me, but somewhere along the line I picked up this idea that every person's needs can be summarized in three words they're either bound, burdened or broken. Now, for each of those there's a gospel message. So if the person I'm listening and it sounds like they're talking about being addicted and tied up and they can't get out of this mess they're in, that's being bound, and the gospel message is going to be one of freedom, of being set loose. So I'm going to frame my evangelistic conversation with the gospel message for them that talks about being free.
Speaker 2:If I'm burdened, burdened with grief, burdened with overwork, burdened with a load that just I can't get rid of, then the gospel message is going to be rest in Christ, he promises us come to me all you who are weary, and I will give you rest.
Speaker 2:So the whole idea of relief and rest would be my gospel message for the burdened, for the broken, that person who's broken in relationships, who's a broken person who lost their wholeness Well, the gospel there is wholeness. It's peace, peace and relationship, especially for those who are in broken relationships. I've challenged Bible study groups to see if they could come up with a need that doesn't fit into one of those three categories. It's pretty hard and the reason you're using this I call it an apparatus is that it has you ready to witness, because you're listening. Where do you fit and what gospel do you need? Because the gospel is a jewel that just rotates in all of its fine shining points and to know that I've got a lot of opportunity here for witness, but I need to vector in on this person's specific needs. That's gospel listening.
Speaker 1:Hey, listener, if you're not taking notes right now, I don't know what's going on. If you're driving, don't take notes for sure, but you need to go back. And that is such a marvelous handle for evangelical proclamation in everyday conversations.
Speaker 2:I like the word handle. You borrowed that word handle. It's a three-handle.
Speaker 1:Like you've never said that, dr, this is so much fun. Well, you do a lot of work around preaching and what I've loved about your preaching style which we're different I would be probably louder, that's kind of how Jesus made me but you're very storied, you're relational and you're working on a book right now called the Power of Parables, and would you connect, maybe, story to listening? I don't know if that's, I didn't ask you this question, but is there something around listening to a person's story deeply that unlocks one of those three Bs bound, burdened or broken that allows then maybe the story of Scripture, the power of Jesus' parables, to come alive and even use that as a gospel? Handle, dr Natasy, anything to say there.
Speaker 2:Handle, dr Nadesi, anything to say there yeah, if I focus on personal evangelism, what are the stories from my life that make a difference for my witness and what are the stories that I have that have to do with being bound or broken or burdened, my personal stories? Those are crucial for personal witness. In terms of preaching, I think Jesus understood the power of parable, the power of story that it takes a plot line and along the way one begins to see connections with the faith, with the truth. I think it was Emily Dickinson who talked about telling it slant that sometimes it's not good enough to just list three propositional truths from a text. It's not good enough to just list three propositional truths from a text. It's more important, probably to get people ready to learn those three propositional truths by listening to a story that's significant. And these need to be stories that are kind of along-the-way stories.
Speaker 2:Jesus told his parables. Think of Luke, the travel narrative in Luke going to Jerusalem that's where we get these wonderful—think of Luke 15, the lost parables. Those are on-the-way stories. They're stories that we're moving, we're in life together and we're recalling or we're making up a story. I love to create a parable that's more contemporary, that kind of reflects the truths of parables that Jesus told, and that's what I'm trying to work on. What do contemporary parables sound like, look like, and how can we use contemporary stories to do the same thing that Jesus' stories do? But they need to be connected to the Word.
Speaker 2:Homiletics got kind of diverted for about 20 years or so into narrative preaching, which was, you know, a guy would get up and all he'd do is tell a story and left it to everybody else to figure out what it was. Well, jesus rarely did that. Sometimes he did that, but that doesn't work real well. I think we came back to the need. We're preaching truth here. What we want to do is communicate truth, but the way to get people ready for that is to get them engaged with story.
Speaker 1:Well, yes, 100% agree. I guess that predates my time in preaching. I agree, I guess that predates my time in preaching. Story in my learning was always toward gospel proclamation on foundational law, gospel, truth. You know I don't know with with Dr Schmidt or or, yeah, anyone, that I learned from that. That was one narrative. Preaching was definitely a tool in the tool belt, if you will, but it was always toward, whether it's inductive or deductive, it was always toward a very clear proclamation of foundational truth, law and gospel. So that's, that's it Go ahead.
Speaker 2:Our tradition is so strong on truth that we didn't fall into that trap. I don't think there are very few purely narrative preachers in the LCMS. There might have been a few, but very few, because our training didn't allow for that, as you just said yeah, no, I think so that's good.
Speaker 1:So would you tell a contemporary parable that the listener because I know you're working on this, the Power of Parables would you just give us one example?
Speaker 2:of a contemporary parable yeah, I'm working on one this morning that and I don't have the storyline completely filled in. But the storyline is basically that of a mother and daughter who have deep resentment with each other over something that happened in the daughter's teenage years, and the story unfolds as that resentment leads to the daughter. The resentment is in her heart. She gets deeper and deeper into trouble, and I'm at the point of resolution here. How do I resolve their trouble? Well, the text is the resentment that grows deep within us when our heart gets full of resentment, and also the idea of the unforgiving, the cost of unforgiveness in our lives. I just heard a great sermon at our church on unforgiveness, and so that prompted this. What's a story? And I think rooting it in a mother-daughter relationship rather than a father-son is kind of appealing to me because it kind of breaks the mold of father-son. So that's just a and that's in process. I could have given you one that I got all filled out, but you've heard some of those I think I have.
Speaker 1:So there's a lot of people, leaders, theologians and philosophers who are talking around the power of story, rather than just propositional truth, for changing the human heart. What is it about story that ultimately connects, transforms, mobilizes us for love and good deeds as Jesus followers?
Speaker 2:Dr Mattis, Well, I think there's no question that it's the affect of a good story. It's how it engages the emotions that we're so heady sometimes in our preaching and it's wonderful. I mean, we're great on truth laying out truth. We do a great job with that. Wonderful, I mean, we're great on truth laying out truth. We do a great job with that.
Speaker 2:But to bring the heart to that in the book I did on the beautiful sermon, one of the beautiful things about a sermon, when it's working, is that it engages both head and heart. It's both cognition and affection, and so it's not uncommon, I mean, for pastors who are good storytellers, to see people dropping tears during their sermon. It's because that story connects with them. We used to have a weepers club at one of the churches I served. I always kidded them mostly women who would cry every other sermon and usually it came at a point of a story that just touched their hearts. So that's the power of story it brings affect and it doesn't hit people in the face with truth no-transcript of the fascinating things to me is to contemplate.
Speaker 1:for almost 300 years the Christian church didn't have the Bible as we know it today. Right, it was. It was a gospel here, a gospel there, an epistle here, an epistle there. And how did they know? How did they know what was true? It's because it was connected to who Jesus was and what he'd done. And I love John. Right, if all of the stories are written, all the books couldn't contain. There's more that we could have said. But these things are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God, and that by believing he may have, you may have life in his name. I mean stories give stories, give life, right, and I think this is the heart of evangelism for today. Who cares what I think the Holy Spirit thinks like? Tell a good story that connects people to the heart and mind and the love that God has for us in the person and work of Jesus, anything more to say there, dr Nattis.
Speaker 2:Well, the story needs to have the ring of truth to it too. It can be a made-up story. I'm not sure all of Jesus' parables actually were historic events that happened, like the prodigal son and so forth the two sons of one dad but they need to have the ring of truth to them. That's really important as well as you tell the story. The other thing about stories that I found is every church has its own stories too that belong to the oral tradition of that church.
Speaker 2:And I can remember at Woodbury, the founding pastor of Woodbury, his mother-in-law, said to him well, the problem with you is you'll let anybody into your church. Well, that became a story that got told over and over again, because he did. He welcomed sinners into the church and it was just a great story. I used it several times, probably too often, because it was so powerful. You'll let anybody in and there's a plot line with the story and so forth, but that makes the point. Every church has its own stories that need to be honored as well and recalled, not just on anniversary years but repeatedly, to keep those stories alive in the life of the church. So good.
Speaker 1:Last couple questions here. I don't normally do this on my podcast, but since your entire ministry has been in the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, what are the top three threats to our life together right now? Do you think Dr Natasty in the LCMS?
Speaker 2:Well, I'd say, first of all, probably the lack of Christlike servant leadership flourishing in our congregations. We've talked about that, the need to get lay people mobilized. Pastors are still their leader, but the pastor is responsible to multiply ministry in this church. So that would be one of them. A second one would be and I've harped on this for too many years it's just confusing ends with means, or confusing means with ends, I guess, is better. So those in our church whose heart I'm sure is true who say the mission of the church is to present Word and Sacrament in worship, that's the mission of the church. Well, that's not the mission of the church. That's the means, that's the empowering of the mission of the church. The mission of the church is to make disciples, to multiply disciples. So the confusion of the means, which is where we get our strength from the Word and sacrament, that's a means, it's not an end in itself.
Speaker 2:That's been around in our tradition for a long time and I think that's kind of tragic that it is, and one that I'll just highlight that I think is outside of the Missouri Synod I think the church generally is facing this is this neo-gnosticism thing of. I'm a secular spiritual person. I don't need the institutional church. I think some of it's a generational thing, but I worry about the institutional church as it represents the invisible church of Christ. Where is that heading in a time when being spiritual seems to be enough for people? Those are three threats. That's a great list, yeah.
Speaker 1:That's a really great list. To the last one, as a guy that's still kind of in the trenches right now. I think that's shifting the lie of the enemy that I can follow Jesus or maybe just follow a spirit or out in creation or apart from gathered group of people. I think that lie is being exposed right now by the Holy Spirit and we're I mean this is just one signpost and again, we're a fast growing community but many of the people who are coming into our church one, they, they, they don't have a long history, like maybe it's a parent or grandparent who are connected to a Catholic church or something like that they have.
Speaker 1:I'm just thinking of one family I just met for the second time. They came back for the second time. They've never, they've never been a part of a local church and they have an eight and a six-year-old, a girl and a boy, and he's never so she has this kind of Catholic background and he is completely a nun, n-o-n-e-s right, no spiritual foundation. But there's this heart cry and there's a friend who invited them multiple times over multiple years and they finally came and they're coming back. It's unbelievable. So for us we have 61. And I bet Woodbury is similar, and if you're in an urban suburban area that happens to be growing, like ours, I bet you're experiencing similar trends. We have 61 documented first-time guests in two and a half weeks in the month of March, dr Nasty.
Speaker 1:Wow, that's fantastic, and that's that's people that let us know they're they're here. There's many others that don't even let us know they're here. So, like there's never been a greater opportunity in my, in almost two decades of ministry, for us to invite and give tools and handles and invitation to our members, to invite their friends and neighbors and family members who are far from Christ, to come and experience his love, his care, with a group of people, namely the visible local church. I think it's a turning point right now. Dr Nassi, I'm very very excited about this.
Speaker 2:You think it's generational.
Speaker 1:I mean, yeah for sure. But I think the generational lie that I can be spiritual and not connected to a group of people I don't even like to use religious, but spiritual. And what is the core source of that spirituality? I think the Holy Spirit is at work. I know the Holy Spirit is at work, pointing people to a desperate need for, ultimately, christ, the crucified and risen and reigning, one who's quick to return to be and maybe this is a heart cry, and I could be, I'm an optimist so I could be kind of overstating this trend. I think it's going to take time and probably multiple generations. We're certainly far from a Christian America, to be sure, but I think the percentage of people who are recognizing, especially through COVID, right things have accelerated. Dysfunction has accelerated, addiction, despair, you know, being a slave to your phone and a slave to your all these things are kind of accelerating. That, I think, are leading many to a point to say maybe I'll give that Jesus guy a try.
Speaker 2:And that's the case. Yeah, praise God.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. Are you seeing that in your context at?
Speaker 2:all, I think for me it is somewhat generational. I'm seeing a lot of younger people expressing interest in the church. It's that our kids. Well, kids that are 18 to 25, that age group, Is that Gen Z? I don't know if I have all that right or not.
Speaker 2:No, that's right, yeah, gen Z I think we're more open to the value of community, even if it's an institutional community. The thing to do, I think, given your optimism, is for the church to present itself as a community of followers of Christ, not as an institution. If people see institutional things attached to the church, that's not going to draw them still, I think. But I think when there's a vibrant community that's that's driven by its mission, with a leader who's committed to the mission and has people truly following that leader, that's exciting.
Speaker 1:That's exciting. It's very, it's very exciting. I'm so pumped for what God is doing right now.
Speaker 1:It's a it's a transitional season right now from post-Christian to pre-Christian, traditional season right now, from post-Christian to pre-Christian and, I think, from maybe hostile and suspicious of the gospel to more curious and open. I think we're seeing that shift and that whole shift is probably going to be the entirety of the rest of the 20, 30, 40 years, god willing that the Lord allows me to be a communicator of the gospel here. It's going to be slow, but I feel like the flywheel effect will pick up, especially for those churches that are open, that are hospitable, that are kind, that are mission-focused, that want to be about advancing the mission of Jesus, that want to be about training up and equipping the saints for love and good deeds, to communicate clearly, with a listening heart, who Jesus is and how much he loves them. I think the opportunities are there and I'm praying that the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod wants to get on that kingdom-expanding train because it's moving down the tracks. Dr Natasy, it's very exciting.
Speaker 2:I think your post-Christian, pre-christian thought. Just on that quickly. For me as a pastor, it would be more important to view those people who are seeking or unchurched or nuns whatever, to see them as pre-Christian as opposed to post-Christian. Post-christian has always felt to me and I know there's a lot of writings on the post-Christian era that seems like we've thrown the towel in. I think it's better to say we're in a secular society, just as Jesus was in a secular society, and that's pre-Christian. It's not there yet, but that allows for the thought that we've got an opportunity here to make them Christian, to have a mission to this time. But the idea of post-Christian has never appealed to me very much, so I'm glad you see a movement away from it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:You should be talking pre-Christian in our language. Language matters.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And are we optimistic or are we negative? Are we only for ourselves? And are we fearful and protective or are we hopeful? And it appears as if Jesus, when he launched the greatest movement of all time, was very, very hopeful for a small group of people radically changing the world. And they did, and we continue to, by the Spirit's power connected to the Word. Final question as you look at the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, greatest strengths that you're like, these strengths cannot, will never praise. Be to God by the Spirit's power be compromised. Any thoughts there, dr Vesey?
Speaker 2:That one's kind of an easy one in terms of strengths, no question. But we're blessed to be in a denomination that is completely committed to the inspiration and heresy of the Scriptures, that we really are rooted in the Word of God, scripture alone. Then I'd add to that the other alone. They're all important, but the grace theology that we have is tremendous. The Christ-centered theology, the preeminent Christ, all of that is so crucial the biblical literacy that's been there traditionally within the LCMS, that people who've been raised in the LCMS generally are more biblically literate than those who are from outside. I think that has been true but continues to be true.
Speaker 2:I worry sometimes about the lack of significant Bible study in a lot of our churches. We have too many churches that don't even have Bible study going, so they have to depend on the pastor's sermon to be the Bible study they get. I hope something can happen with that, but still, biblical literacy would be a strength. And then our emphasis on education historically has been amazing. From the beginning we were often starting schools before we started the church. We were interested in educating students and that gave birth to the Concordia University system and all of the blessings that have come through that. I'm a product of two of those three of those schools, two of which are closed now. So anyway, I guess primarily the beauty and the depth to which we take our study of the Word has been a strength of the church For sure, and that will not stop.
Speaker 1:We did a podcast recently, Jack and I, on Lead Time. The other podcast we do on the Pew Research study that just came out, around 20. 20, it's declining. People who read in the LCMS, the Bible, one time a week or more, went from like 33% and you can fact check me on this, something like this to 25. I remember the 25% to 25% of our members. So there are some declining statistics regarding prayer and time in the word. But from a leadership perspective and I think from a pastoral and pastoral training perspective, we're a people deeply committed to the word and I pray, we invite all of the priesthood, of all believers, to be committed to being in the word, to be storied and then sent by the word of God. Hey, Dr Natasy, this is great. We're at time. I've had so much fun getting to know you better. Thank you for your generosity, for your kindness, for your courage and leadership down through the years. How can people connect with you? And you know, if you want to promote a book or two, feel free to do so now.
Speaker 2:Well, the Beautiful Sermon book has just been out a couple of years. That's really written for pastors to engage visual arts in their preaching but also to recognize the importance of a beautiful sermon. That is, a sermon that has the elements of beauty from God to Christ, to the gospel, to we mentioned head and heart. These are things that make a sermon truly beautiful. And the book lays out some of the elements of beauty in a sermon and introduces especially art pastors in our tradition to aesthetic theology because we have no training in the theology of beauty. So the book is titled the Beautiful Sermon. Concordia Seminary Press put it out but you can get it on Amazon.
Speaker 1:Love that, Love that. If people want to reach out to you email, is that something you can give?
Speaker 2:Dean Nadistee at gmailcom. Dean Nadistee at gmailcom.
Speaker 1:Love it. This is the Tim Allman Podcast. Like, subscribe, comment. Wherever it is you take in these conversations and we pray that joy and hope, listening and a desire to hear stories and connect those stories to the greatest story of all time, which is God's love for us in the person of Jesus Christ, would be what is most beautiful in our head and in our hearts and something that leads us to live it out and proclaim it. Thank you, dr Natasy. It's a good day. Go make it a great day. You're a gift brother.
Speaker 2:Thanks, tim Blessings, thank you.