Lead Time
Lead Time
Bridging LCMS Theology: Intellectual Tradition Meets Digital Mission
Tim sits down with Brian Stecker, associate pastor at Trinity Lutheran Church in Waconia, Minnesota, and creator of the "On the Line" podcast, to explore theological leadership in today's changing religious landscape. They discuss how traditional Lutheran theology can engage with contemporary culture while maintaining its rich intellectual tradition.
• CS Lewis's powerful influence as a bridge between classical education and modern thinking
• The importance of story in cultivating Christian imagination and faith formation
• Brian's unexpected journey from business to pastoral ministry through Tolkien's stories
• On-the-job pastoral learning and the value of theological "soft skills" in difficult situations
• Understanding the pastor's role as a leader within proper theological frameworks
• The LCMS's significant opportunity to expand its digital media presence
• How intellectually substantive content is attracting audiences contrary to conventional wisdom
• The "unfair advantage" of traditional theology as younger generations seek deeper roots
• Building unity within the LCMS while engaging diverse perspectives
Connect with Brian's work at ontheline.net or visit Trinity Waconia's website to learn more about their ministry.
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This is Lead Time.
Speaker 2:Welcome to Lead Time. Jack is off today as I get the privilege of hanging out with a brother who reached out to me. Gosh a little over a year ago said, hey, I got a newer podcast and we're looking to start conversations with people who have diverse opinions across the LCMS with a desire for us to unite. And I was like, wow, that kind of sounds similar to some of the intentions that we've had on Lead Time and my own formerly American Reformation, now my own podcast wanting to learn with people inside and outside of the LCMS to unite in mission to make Jesus known. So he's Brian Stecker. Brian, how are you doing, bro?
Speaker 3:It's good to sit down with you.
Speaker 2:I mean, it was nice to do it in person when you were here, but this is great too. Great technology, yeah, thank you. He is the hosting creator of On the Line If you've not checked it out, you definitely should the hospitality, the intention, the desire to sit down face to face, because, while technology is great, I love that you have that approach and I love that your congregation is supporting that as well. He is also one of the if you've heard of LIT not I-L-T, no LIT Lutheran Institute of Theology. He's working with a number of theologians and pastors to provide a gift to the wider church, not a pathway toward ordination, it is just training for lay leaders and I think it's a wonderful pursuit. We need more of this in the LCMS. He's an associate pastor at Trinity Lutheran Church in Waconia, minnesota. He studied business at Ball State and earned an MDiv from Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne. He's living in Minnesota with his wife, raylene, and their three children soon to be fourth child all of them under five, five years and under and he is committed to equipping the church with engaging, high caliber theological content.
Speaker 2:So, brian man, what a joy to be with you. This is going to be a lot of fun. You mentioned and we didn't get to go into it when I had the longer conversation than this is going to be. This will be around an hour or so. I love that you have long form. You're like Joe Rogan style man Really really long. It's great and it allows for a lot of conversation, a lot of different directions for people to get to know one another better, and I love it. So we didn't get to talk about CS Lewis. That's where I wanted to start today. Tell me what you love most about CS Lewis and how he's kind of shaped your theological mind brother. Yeah, so you know there's probably two routes.
Speaker 3:So you know, anyone that knows me knows he's probably one of the most influential teachers, and that's not to take away, of course, from the confessional training book of Concord. You know Bible, but you know kind of extracurricular individuals that have had an impact and two things I'd probably say about him. I think there's been a subjective kind of impact that I can speak to and then an objective, and the subjective one for me was I did grow up reading Chronicles of Narnia, so some of those kind of imaginative stories I think formed some of my imagination, which was helpful. But during college, as most people do, you kind of go through those kind of challenging times where you're questioning things and it kind of, you know, trying to grit your teeth on being an adult, and that can be kind of returned to or read for the first time the Great Divorce at like, a particular time where I had some questions, kind of struggling through some things, read it in one night and it was just an overwhelming experience and it answered questions, it opened my eyes to things. I think it kind of reinvigorated some of that imagination that I had and from there that was kind of towards the middle of college, but that's kind of what I think started to get me interested in theology in a deeper way.
Speaker 3:So I started to go through his works and the one thing that I've noticed is so I've read through most of his works, many of them I've reread but something happens when you spend a lot of time with one author, and that is you start to learn not only what they've said but you kind of learn how they think and how they process things. And Lewis is a very he's, very he's very much trained in logic. So when he goes to these questions he articulates them very well. So I got to the point where I could say what Lewis said on something, but I could also make a pretty accurate guess of what he would say about something he didn't say, because I knew how he thought, I knew his framework, I knew the way he articulated things. So, subjectively speaking, that's, he formed the way that.
Speaker 3:I think he formed my imagination and I do think that's one value of studying one person in depth is, you know, if you just read one book or if you just read an article or something, you can take it out of context and you can miss what he's trying to say. But if you read a lot of one author, you can kind of get the, you can get an understanding of their mind and then you can place their points into that grander scheme and I think that very much kind of forms you and gives you an accurate look of what this individual is thinking through and what kind of lens they're understanding things through. Yeah, amen.
Speaker 2:I mean, anybody that's read Luther would say the exact same thing with great depth, as you've also read a lot of Luther. Like if we, just for case in point, if we just read on Luther and the lies of the Jews or on the Jews and their lies there we go Like that would be a very poor right and some people do, right, they just know this kind of cursory understanding of who Luther is. But why for that point? Why did he say that? It's because he had a strong desire, along with the Apostle Paul, for the chosen people of God to come into a right relationship through the promised Messiah, jesus. So go back to Lewis. What about the great divorce? Captured initially your imagination and then use that as a springboard to help us think critically about things that maybe CS Lewis didn't say. So two part question, but you think he'd speak into. And how would he speak into 2025, as we're going on mission to make Jesus known today, brian. So go to the Great Divorce.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so the Great Divorce is Lewis is he's kind of taking his own version and he's not really duplicating, but he's taking the same approach that Dante took in his trilogy, right. So there's kind of this pilgrim aspect and he's answering the grander question of what is heaven and hell, and you know. So one of his theses is, you know he'll say, hell is the greatest monument to human freedom, right, and he'll also make the point that hell is locked from the inside. Point, being those who are on hell choose it, right. So that's kind of the grand overarching theme. But then he does it through all of these different conversations that Lewis is having in a dream or a vision or you know, kind of whatever it is.
Speaker 3:But what happens is he interacts with all of these different people who choose not to go on to heaven but to return back to hell, and so it's a very reflective process, so like one that would be very applicable to someone like you or myself. Is there's an individual who's an apologist for Christianity, so he's all about like debating, and so Lewis is very much in this one, reflecting on himself because he is in that role. But this guy is so interested in kind of debating the resurrection or debating the validity of historical things, that he actually becomes uninterested in just kind of the beatific vision or actually understanding God or faith. So he actually refuses to go back. He wants to go back into hell because he wants to go back to these like conversations and debates and such. So it goes through a lot of different areas where it just kind of it makes you introspectively reflect on your own conversations, that you have your own goals, what your life is geared towards, and it kind of breaks down those barriers. That's one of the beauties of the Great Divorce, which is, you know, kind of allegory. You know it's certainly fiction to where some of his works are nonfiction. So that's certainly one snapshot, another one, if you kind of want to bring it into today, maybe I would say two things. This is something. So this is kind of get into that objective realm of why I would endorse reading Lewis. So him and you could throw Chesterton and Tolkien into this group too, and there's a couple others but you know George McDonald and such, but they're kind of on the last cusp of those that were part of like a true classical education.
Speaker 3:So educational reform was happening during Lewis's time and that's why he writes, like the Abolition of man, which is a very prophetic book about the movement of education in the West. And so he doesn't. He's not an inheritor of that change, he's still an inheritor of the way that education was done, which means he knows how to read Latin, he reads all the great books, he knows Aquinas, he knows Augustine, he knows Luther. You know you go through the, you know Dante, all of this. So for you or I, like I haven't been trained classically, really I think I got a little bit at seminary, but you know some of those books. I can go back and read them, but they're tougher for me to grasp a hold of. For one, they're translated into English, which adds a level of difficulty. Two, they're written in some ways that we're just not trained to read.
Speaker 3:But Lewis is an English speaker who who has one foot in modernism, so he kind of understands our world still today. He's not too far back in history, but he also has one foot in the classical realm. So he's one of the great kind of entry points of understanding the wisdom of, you know, the previous 1800 years. He's got access to that and he's able to articulate it into our modern context. So that's why I think he's very kind of prophetic in that way.
Speaker 3:And so what kind of things does he speak to?
Speaker 3:Well, he understands the first movements of modernism. So, for instance, like, where do ideas come from? You know if you go to, if I go to the Mall of America, you know it's about 30 minutes from here and I walk around. Everybody, all the kids in the Mall of America are Marxists, right, or they're Nietzsche, and it doesn't mean, like they might say, I'm not a Marxist, but those, those ideologies have seeped into our culture.
Speaker 3:That doesn't happen in like 20 years. That happens, you know, it takes a hundred, 150 years. So Lewis was seeing the first movements in the academic system, cause that's where, that's where these things start, and then they move into the students and then the students grow up and become influencers and they educate the next generation. So eventually, eventually, it just gets seeped in. So Lewis Lewis was, he had his finger on the pulse of what we're dealing with today because he was seeing the first movements of it. But I think he was able to wrestle with it in a clear way because the air hadn't quite yet been polluted with these ideas. So yeah, that's kind of my endorsement for Lewis and that's one of the reasons that I appreciate still reading him.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so good. What are your thoughts regarding Luther and the or, I'm sorry, I said Luther CS Lewis and the power of story? There's a number of philosophers today who are saying the enlightenment vision. We've completely walked past the enlightenment vision that science and humans can figure things out right and that there's a grounding meta-narrative that every human should be, is attuned to. But again, hell is locked from the end. But we don't. We'd rather not be connected as a creature in God's creation. The power of story because Tolkien and CS Lewis I mean that's what really made him put him on the map was the Chronicles of Narnia right and grounding people as an evangelical tool Wasn't apologetics, it was story. Say more about where we find ourselves today and the power of story, brian.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I might reference Tolkien here. You know, in some of the questions we talked about beforehand, you know, I think it'll apply well to you know, kind of what made a pastor. So he certainly has applied here. So one of the challenges I think, like the church has today or that we have, chesterton puts it this way. So Chesterton says that the modern man needs to become a pagan before he can become a Christian, right, so once again, like, if you don't understand Chesterton, you know you'd hear a statement like that and you're like that's crazy. Why would we want, you know? But what's his point? His point is, if you look at, like the pagan culture John D also, they were built on stories, right, just think, just think like oral culture, right, Stories are big. So what happens is it forms your imagination, stories do, and it creates kind of these narratives. And you know so, if you go to Africa, like missionaries in Africa will speak this way, where they'll say they have these stories of good and evil and battle in the spiritual realm. So when the Christian message comes in there it affirms some of these things. It's like, yeah, like there is a spiritual realm, there is this battle between good and evil, and you know here's where victory comes from, so you can fit into that narrative. That's already there, the gospel message.
Speaker 3:So Chesterton saying the modern man who has lost all imagination lost these kind of proper. I mean everyone's got a story but lost these kind of deep meta narratives and we've had a very simplistic, only scientific method type, thinking that just naturally. I mean like once again, if you go to the Mall of America some people might say there's a God, but for the most part we operate as if there isn't a God, like we're kind of practical atheists in the way that we live or think. So our stories are just kind of they're down below the clouds, just kind of down here. So when Christianity speaks to that it's got a two-pronged issue, like one. It wants to articulate that truth, but it also needs to break through the clouds and kind of open up the imagination to understand the reality of the divine, the spiritual realm, like these archetypes that are flowing through.
Speaker 3:Story is a necessity to start to train children in this kind of imaginative process. So Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia does this very well, I think Tolkien's trilogy and you can go to Hobbit and such too. But Tolkien's works might be the best at this because they are richly, you know, mythic in nature. So they create some of these narratives, and I could certainly speak more to that. But that's that's why I think story is so important, because you have to open up the imagination, because if not it just becomes like doctrine, and doctrine is of completely essential, but doctrine is supposed to also move us towards. You know, it's like I can read a great systematic book and that's necessary, but it's supposed to kind of move you then into once again that faith that's vibrant and believes and sees these kind of grandiose things that God articulates to us.
Speaker 2:That's centered in a God who created and his rebellious creation fell, and he loved that rebellious creation enough to send his son. And now, through faith in his son, given by the sent Holy Spirit, we are sent in mission to make the triune God known. We've been grounded to the greatest story of all time God's love for his fallen and rebellious creation. Praise be to God. So you mentioned Tolkien. I've heard the story that Tolkien looked at CS Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia and said, oh, that's kind of cute, you know, like a lion and all this kind of stuff. Like, let me tell you another story Like this is a deeper grounded story. Is there some validity to Tolkien and Lewis kind of giving each other a little bit of something? You know? Were they competitive at all? It seems like they were really good friends, know, who just like to banter and loving, lovingly challenge one another. Is that a true story, brian?
Speaker 3:from what I understand it is and I think, I think it probably gets, I think it probably gets exaggerated.
Speaker 2:Yeah, probably yeah obviously they were.
Speaker 3:They were best friends. They were brits. Brits have that kind of humor, right. So I'm sure they were. I'm sure they were poking at each other, or maybe tolkien more so at lewis. That said that they are doing two different things. Like Tolkien is very straightforward I'm like I'm not writing allegory and Lewis is like Aslan, jesus, right there. If you go to Lord of the Rings it's like, well, like Frodo is a type, gandalf is a type and Aragorn's a type, so right, so it's not so straightforward. He's trying to like, pull out elements of like what's the king of Kings? What's kind of this, this divine wisdom coming down in gandalf? And then, of course, like the servant that suffers. You know, the suffering servant is kind of frodo, so he's much more nuanced. They're different audiences, right, my? I'm reading the chronicles of narnia with our three and five-year-old, or at least the line the witch in the wardrobe seems accessible to them. I can't open up the fellowship of the ring and go through 60 pages of like concerning hobbits with with my kids. So they're geared towards different audiences.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's good. All right, let's get into your story a little bit. How did you know you wanted to be a Lutheran pastor? Who, or what, most influenced you? Tell that story, brian.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's one of the questions you get asked, I think, the most, and I don't have a good answer. I don't have a great answer for it. I's just kind of one of the things that happened. It wasn't a long draw, I mean. So I didn't grow up wanting to be a pastor, you know. One data point is my father was a pastor. I graduated college with business and psychology. I went and worked in Indianapolis and it took a little while, probably, you know, probably halfway into that, like maybe six months into that, the idea maybe started to creep in and probably by 10 months I was enrolled in seminary. So it happened very quickly for me Now. So that's kind of the simple answer is you know God works and you know sometimes things just kind of happen.
Speaker 3:But when I reflect back and this is where Tolkien kind of comes in, or does come in, when I reflect back I think what took place was these stories were placed in my childhood early on. So I would listen to first the abridged version of the Lord of the Rings and then eventually moved on to the Unabridged and I would just listen to those when I would go to bed. So the stories were kind of deeply seated in me, right. So then I think, you know, I got my degree, I went on and I was doing some entrepreneurship and then I was doing logistics broking and I was doing that and I just there was a longing for I wanted to be part of, like the good fight. So in other words, like in these stories, there's this, you know, battle, there's this battle of good and evil and there's these characters you follow that go on the front lines. And there's even this great scene with Sam. I think it's in the movie, towards the end of the second one, where Sam kind of gives this speech and he says well, frodo, remember all those stories that we read, the ones that really meant something and how could everything go right when everything had gone so wrong? But those are the stories that really mattered.
Speaker 3:And maybe we're in one of those stories and I think that kind of articulates that point. Is you in that story you don't want to be the Hobbit back in Hobbiton, like smoking your pipe and having a pint, like you want to be Legolas or Aragon or Frodo, you want to be on the front lines. And I think that's where that story kind of cultivated that in me and although I couldn't articulate it at the uneasy with my job, because I felt like I wanted to be in a really important battle, like fighting for something that on my deathbed I can look back and say that was a fight worth fighting. So I think that is what moved me in.
Speaker 3:Was this battle for the West, this battle for good breaking into evil, dealing with these weeds that have grown up in our society, that are kind of attempting to choke out this gospel light, and so wanting to be part of that battle was, I think, what drove me. Now, if you would have asked me in my entry exam to the seminary, I probably would not have articulated that. I'd have been like I don't know, like I'm kind of interested in theology and my dad was a pastor and he seemed pretty happy. So you kind of learn these things as time goes on.
Speaker 2:Yeah, our stories are kind of similar, with the dad being a pastor. You don't really know. We don't know much of anything, brian, to be quite honest, truth has to be revealed to us and I don't know how all of this is going to end. So the spirit of adventure and following, listening to the voice and Jesus being out ahead, he's obviously within, but he's definitely on the move and the call is to something like voluntary self-sacrifice for the sake of the gospel and for the sake of mobilizing leaders to know who he is. But if you had, if you have asked me at 26 years old, are you going to be having podcasts around all the topics that I've had podcasts? I don't know. No, it's not on the, it's not on the agenda right now, but it you know. The way God kind of made you becomes unfolded in time and I appreciate the way the Lord made you as you entered into your congregational life. What were you like man? I was ready to go and then what you know so much of our work is on the job, training right when you get in.
Speaker 2:And each congregation has unique culturals. We preach the cultural implications, we preach the sermon on the necessity for rituals and rites, but those, those rituals and rights are not for themselves. They are for something. They point us to, obviously God in the divine service and his work for us. But there are certain things in our churches that are unique. We ring a bell seven times out here. I know you have a bell as well, but if I were to get rid of the ringing the bell seven times, like I'd be. It's like that's not in the divine service, but we ring the bell here seven times at the end of the service. We say God is good. All the time we have all of these kind of contextual rituals. This is a I inherited a congregation that is very much focused on raising up leaders from within the congregation, like that's a strong, strong values. What did you, what were you prepared for and what were you like? Wow, that's. I didn't see that one coming, anything there.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So I think I was properly prepared in the way that I could be. So I think there's certain things you just have to learn on the job, you know. So, for instance, my, my very first day in the office I was, I was half, I had unloaded about half my books, so I still had boxes around, and a lady called and it was her son had just committed suicide. Her son was a high school student and they weren't members of the church. So day one I was sitting down with this lady and the grandmother some mother and grandmother whose son had committed suicide. I think it was either that morning or the night before. And so I can, I can confidently tell you I was not prepared for that. But I can also confidently tell you there's no way that I could have been properly prepared for that. You know, and I would reflect on, you know, and if I look back, I would have had that conversation different. That being said, it was appropriate for a pastor on his first job and you know I was able to articulate the gospel to them. You know I might have framed the conversation different.
Speaker 3:Or, you know, maybe gone into the sanctuary and spent a longer time praying, point being, you know, those kinds of situations the first time you're watching somebody die, there's just no way that you can be properly prepared, and there's a lot of situations like that. So you know, kind of what I valued in retrospect was, I think that like the goal of like the seminary, like it's kind of trying to train your soft skills more than your hard skills. You know, because we had some practical classes that dealt with some of these counseling things and I don't know how much I used what I learned in those classes, because you just have to, you have to be in the situation and you have to kind of react and adapt and then reflect and then do it again. So I think it was really just those, those soft theological skills, that kind of polishes, a way that you think, in a way that you process. And I think that's my reflection at least is that that's one of the big things is you become, you become kind of trained in that way.
Speaker 3:It's kind of the same with, like sports or wrestling. You know, I was a wrestler growing up and you know, when you wrestle it's all about soft, it's all about you understand. Your body becomes like water, like you need to understand how's the other person moving, where's their weight distribution, where are they pressing? And it becomes second nature to where a good wrestler is not really thinking like I'm going to do a half Nelson, now, you're just, you're just responding and that's so. Wrestling is all about kind of soft skills that then move into hard movements. And I think the pastoral training is the same too, where, like, it sets you up so that you can think theologically, you can think with a gospel center when how you're going to communicate in these different situations. And then you get thrown in those situations. Then you, you come out and you go like, oh, that was tougher than I expected. And then you got, I should have done this, should have done this, and then you do that the second time, if that makes sense.
Speaker 2:So yeah, yeah, no, I think the best in theological formation is when you get taught how to think. There's frameworks, right, and not necessarily what, dogmatically what, but how. And I felt super well trained and then you work it out as you get into the parish and certain experiences. I can place myself back in the classroom with some of my favorite professors and draw on that wisdom. But it's not just one person, it's like a collective. It's kind of like the Holy Spirit is responsible for it, right, there's like a collective wisdom that comes. And so, yeah, shout out to everybody who works to train up the next generation of leaders. You're doing a mighty, mighty work and we need more leaders being raised up and love and pray for everyone in our seminaries, for sure.
Speaker 2:So let's talk about leadership. This is a leadership podcast, right, brian? And how is pastor, as you articulated right now, in 2025, seen as a leader? And how is pastor as leader framed up? Maybe appropriately? And how could it be framed up inappropriately? How have you heard? And so just use some appropriate and cautionary language toward seeing pastor as leader.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's a good question, certainly with a lot of nuances as I reflect on it.
Speaker 3:Maybe I can go two angles. Maybe I'll kind of go first to where maybe it's I don't want to rule this out, but this is not like the main focus and that is, you know, as a pastor, you're a leader within an area right, but you're not necessarily a leader in everything right. So, you know, I think sometimes as a like as a pastor, sometimes you can come with this notion, or I'll hear this notion articulated, sometimes where it's it's like you have to be a leader in everything right, and that's not really the case, like I'm not trained to do certain things. So, for instance, when it comes to like marriage counseling so I do premarital counseling, when I do weddings and we focus on for the most part, like what is the theology of marriage, you know, going into Genesis 1, 2, 3, getting into Ephesians 5, elsewhere, and kind of trying to paint a picture of here's the lens by which to understand how God articulates about marriage. And I've been married for a goodness handful of years, seven years.
Speaker 2:I'm 20. It's easy to remember. I'm 20 right now, 20 more than five.
Speaker 3:There you go, so I've got. I've got some nuggets of things that I've learned, but at the same point there's there's couples in this congregation that have been happily married for 45 years and they probably have a better capability of speaking to some of the practicalities of marriage challenges than I do. I've got, you know, seven years of marriage experience and a great theological framework. So if you want a theological framework, I can lead you through that. I can also give you some tidbits based on my own personal experience, but that doesn't mean that I'm the go-to person for marriage right Now. Maybe someone goes and gets an MA in marriage counseling or something like that, where they have extra training. But you know. So there's a lot of areas within the church and without where you know I say how do I give you my thoughts on this? Or well, here's something that God says. But you know I'm not the end-all, be-all right, and I think that's an important clarification too, because sometimes you can feel like you have to wear all these different hats when really, like your, your hat is. Once again, your soft skills have been trained theologically to process the goodness, the truth and the beauty of scripture and how this is portrayed and then how it interacts with the world around us, and you should be a leader there and you should feel confident that you can speak within those areas with clarity, right, and with boldness, when you do that within its proper realm and when you're confident about that and when you truly believe it and people can see that right In the way that you're passionate and you're excited and you're willing to jump in and tackle these things or someone has a question and you don't have a right answer, like you're going to go research that and get back to them. Those are the areas where you should be leading as someone who is, you know, all of the Paul's letters to Timothy, right, all these kinds of things like being a good father, being a good husband, you know, having a good reputation, that you're living out this Christian faith as well, and then this kind of boldness and clarity and being excited to teach about it. And if you do that, then I think people will gravitate towards that.
Speaker 3:And there's all these other leaders and influencers that come into their life within the body of the church and all these different areas, right, which is kind of that emphasis of the pastor is a pastor and that's a essential and bedrock position within the church that needs to be kind of maintained and held up. But then there needs to be all sorts of other leaders. To your point, right, like there needs to be elders, there needs to be individuals that are really good at finance. There needs to be all of these other people and we need to be able to say and this skill set is really important for our church too. Right, they're not intermixable or interchangeable, but they're all important. So this raising up of leaders, or the body of Christ that can do all of these different things, I think is very important.
Speaker 2:Well, the Apostle Paul hits on that quite spectacularly in 1 Corinthians 12, romans, chapter 12, talking about the various gifts. I find it fascinating that both of those letters are written not to a person but to the church, right? So the church is going to need Ephesians 4. They're going to need under the office of holy ministry and I don't really want to go down the APEST pathway, but he does talk apostle, prophet, evangelist, shepherd, teacher, right, and I would say that that's one office with maybe some different nuanced gifts. But nonetheless, there's going to be different roles within the church and you better not lead from a place of positional power. You should be clear about what your responsibility are, and for us it's it's warden sacrament, right. But, man, there's a lot of, a lot of things that are beyond that. Let me. Let me tease something that some of my friends would would probably agree with and others maybe not, as not as much. And we're still brothers in our church body. What's the role of pastor as visionary leader? That's a loaded word, right? So thinking of, so does the pastor? Is there a vision Sunday? Is there a here's where we're going? And here's kind of some of the strategy, maybe not all of it, but here's how we're going to get there. It's going to be fueled with love for us and for one another and for the world.
Speaker 2:You could make a case, and I just got off a podcast with an attorney, alan Hoffman, who walked devotionally it was fascinating Walked devotionally through Jesus's high priestly prayer in John chapter 17 and equated that to a visionary speech. Right, my hour has come. I've done everything that's needed to be done. The cross is ahead, and then there's this future reality for what's going to happen on the other side and you're going to be a part of it, disciples, and you'll have joy and stay united to one another in Christian love. And there's others who are needing to hear this word and believe it, and you're going to be proclaiming that word by the Spirit's power. So John 17, you could say Jesus is definitely offering a preferred future and the disciples invitation into that preferred future by the Spirit's power. So any take on visionary leadership. I think this is where I think in our church body, we should get clear with our language and not be flippant with it. So thoughts, brian, and I'll piggyback.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I don't think this is an area of strength in mind. I haven't looked into this too much and I'm an associate pastor, which means when a lot of these kind of macro decisions come, I'm kind of a consultant, I can pass it off to Pastor Duncan and say, yeah, there you go, buddy, you know. So there's, there's that, you know. I mean, one thought as you were speaking was and this is more macro than micro, I guess, but you know that, you know I desire that you would be one, as me and my father are one. You know that language there, and I think that's something that should always be applied or taken seriously. Right, and you know we talked to Bill Weiner about this and he made a good point that unity is also that we would speak in unity, right, so there's kind of this theological integrity that is built into that, right.
Speaker 3:So like, in the same way, it's not like Christ is saying you should be one with the Mormons, right, so it's. You know it's obviously not that, but there should still be this desire that you know any kind of any kind of quick move towards fragmentation or splitting or anything like that. It's just it does go against that spirit and it doesn't mean there's never a time right, like, obviously, as we as Lutherans would say, there was a time where, even though it wasn't the prime goal of the start of it, but there was kind of the split between Catholics and Lutherans, if you want to call it that way, but like, and that those are built over real issues that you couldn't break past. So there are those times, but any kind of at least emotional movement towards we should split and that kind of a thing, whether it's within a church or in a broader spectrum, that's never good.
Speaker 2:No, I agree. I agree I would say the pastors. To answer my own question, I don't think his primary role is visionary in the secular sense. Is visionary in the secular sense I think there is a role for a vision toward reaching more people with the gospel and then having the congregation, with all of our varied gifts, figure out how we go about doing that in our respective context. But hopefully a pastor would let us consider how to love and spur one another on toward love and good deeds, that there would be this kind of galvanizing, spurring on component to our preaching, because the days are too short to not want to reach more people with the gospel and give them a vision of what the true good life looks like connected to the triune God. That's great.
Speaker 2:Let's get into your podcast a little bit. Amazing success reaching. You know a lot of people, I'd imagine mostly within the LCMS but probably outside in the broader Lutheran community of those confessing Lutherans, of which there are a number of smaller tribes even in the United States and that kind of looked to some of us in the LCMS and you know we share in many respects a very, very, very similar confession and so they're looking in and watching. You know your podcast. You know we share in many respects a very, very, very similar confession and so they're looking in and watching you know your podcast, this podcast, and trying to kind of discern where are we and where are we going right now, and I love that you kind of. You know we've dealt with some of the pain points I would say in the LCMS. Your aim is as I can from an outsider looking at it isn't necessarily to do that, but to just set up a place for wonderful theological conversation. Say more on why you started on the line, brian.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the goal is definitely intellectually forward, right, and that might be kind of a niche, so I'll get out. I won't bring in the internals. So the internals are how Trinity united around this and that's the only important thing to note there is Trinity. My church has been completely behind. This is not a Brian Stecker thing, this is my call is associated towards this At this point. That was a change. And then the district also supported it, not necessarily financially, but they said you should do this, we're in full support of it. So we had some unity around that.
Speaker 3:But really, where kind of the idea drove from was I would strongly urge that the LCMS and the Lutheran church is drastically behind in the media space, and that's not to take away from issues etc. You owe Brian Wolf, like there's people that are doing this. But if you go, so for instance, if you go to the Catholic church, who's probably one of the best ones they've got, they've got well over a hundred channels that have over 100,000 subscribers. Many have over a million and most of those are well above 100,000 too. So they're a bigger church body, yes, but if you were to take that and reverse engineer that back to the Lutheran church, we're not there, we're still. We're drastically behind, and the proof's in the pudding and you could go into some of the numbers or examples, which I won't necessarily take the time to do, but that this is a very necessary way to engage, particularly millennials Gen X is thrown into there too, but millennials Gen Z, like this is, people are engaging in the media space and many Catholics have found a way to Pints of the Quietness is the one that we first reverse engineered, and then Word on Fire is another one. That's more associated with what we're trying to do with lit, right, but they're putting intellectually serious things out into the space where that is heavily demanded and what they're doing, a lot of things.
Speaker 3:Once one, there's a huge conversion towards Catholicism through this. Okay, like these resources, right, and they're always pushing people towards. You know, go to mass and find your local parish. But then also, what they've done is they've been able to because of the kind of momentum behind this. Now you find, like Bishop Barron sitting with Jordan Peterson on his round table discussion on the gospels, for instance. So now there's like a plugin where now the Catholic church is being represented in this, like very widespread space that's hitting seekers, you know, agnostics, Christians across the board. And if you've got like a seeker that's kind of becoming interested in Christianity and is somewhat intellectually oriented, and they come across Bishop Barron in this structure, which church are they going to? They're going to go to the Catholic Mass. They're not going to stumble across the Lutheran Church, and that's exactly what you have to do. If you're entering through this space, is you kind of have to stumble upon.
Speaker 3:Once again, I'm not taking away from issues et cetera, because they do have a huge following and they they have done this throughout their time in a very big way. So I'm not trying to minimize that, but once again, a hundred channels, well, over a hundred channels, over a hundred thousand subscribers and more, and uh, and we were not in the long form space, and there's other couple other spaces that we haven't gotten into, and that's, that's part of the our kind of growth plan or is, to use your words, like you know, it's part of our vision. So it was, it was really a reverse engineering aspect or approach, and it's, it's certainly served well. So far We've exceeded some of our goals.
Speaker 3:But I mean maybe, if I can put it in two other ways one, you can have truth, which we have right, but you have to be able to express it within beauty, right. So it needs to be expertly done, expertly professed, and we need to take that very seriously. We need to shoot a serpents in this way and be very, very smart and diligent in how we we get that message out Right. If you have the truth and you hide it underneath a rock, you know like, ok, good for you, you've got the truth. So, yeah, so that's. That's what I love about podcasts is I get to make friends with people that I may not have been friends with, and do you have an intention?
Speaker 2:I mean you invited me on, but are you? Is there kind of across the spectrum of the LCMS in all of our various contexts, and is that a part of your aim to try and be a bridge builder at all? Yeah, go ahead, Brian. What are your thoughts there?
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's certainly built into it and, to be honest, we have had some people from other denominations on too. We're working a little bit more on that. We've reached out to a handful of people and a couple have said, yes, that we'll have on in the future. So we do kind of want these, like you know, across the board dialogues. I think that's very helpful. So for lit, for example, you know we've got, we've got Bierman from St Louis, we've got, you know, beck with Beckman, and I'm going to go through the names. So we've got Adam Coons classical college, both seminaries and the Concordia system covered, along with some other other areas. So that is kind of our goal. We do want to unite this. We do not want to be a fragmented podcast.
Speaker 3:That being said, our first fragmented podcast, that being said, our first kind of our first move or our first goal, is intellectual conversations, and I kind of take the Joe Rogan approach of what are you interested in, right?
Speaker 3:So when I find someone who's like written a book or an article or speaking on something, or is recommended based on something, I say that's something I would like to learn more about. It's that's kind of the first mover, is that? And one of. The one of the things we've learned is you can almost track it and for the most part, the more intellectually heavy the topic is, the more views. The more average duration, the more engagement.
Speaker 3:So one of the theories as we started was throw out this idea that you need to kind of like tailor things down like you know, teach it at like a freshman and high school level, and I think that's been really that's been disproven in the public spectrum. When you look at who are the popular speakers, they use intellectual language, they're very articulate, they're tackling deep ideas and that was kind of our theory at first and we found that when you've got someone who's dealing with a very deep topic and diving deep, people are very much engaged in that. We've got a very intellectual audience here in the LCMS, which is good, and then trying to leverage that and build on that.
Speaker 2:Love it. What have you learned about the LCMS in having the range of conversations you've you've had? What are your biggest takeaways?
Speaker 3:Yeah, the first one would be that that we and that's what I think that's you would say that just historically, looking at the Lutheran church, you would say we're a very intellectually heavy church. Like you know, if you look at even just the numbers for schools in America, like we, we weigh, we shoot, shoot far above our waist, like you know, as far as the amount of schools we have, like we take education very seriously. When you look at the way we articulate doctrine, like the book of Concord and such like we, we, we dot our I's and cross our T's, we're not kind of flippant, you know. Like we've I've got a good friend from the EV free church and he was a pastor there and what you know his story that's really interesting is he kind of came across the early church and found that the sacraments were important and he was kind of wrestling with this and he would kind of teach on this and then he started talking to a senior pastor about it and the senior pastor's like it's like, yeah, like I don't think there's really much to the sacraments and that's okay, right, that's not in the LCMS. Like we're, we're very, we're very, we make sure that we are intellectually forward and we, we dot our I's and cross our T's theologically. So that's, that's in our makeup and I think we need to be able to articulate and feed into that in this public public realm. And the data has shown again that that that is actually true. Like our lay people are very, that is actually true. Like our lay people are very, they're intellectual heavyweights, right, and they want to wrestle with these things and be able to articulate those things. So that's one.
Speaker 3:Two, we've got great resources, and by that I mean, you know we've had what we've aired I think 69 episodes or something. So we probably recorded 79 or 80. And you know, across the board, I just come across people that are very impressive in all sorts of different ways. I mean, you know your wisdom on leadership training, you know, and your doctorate's degree there, like that's a great resource. You know we've got people that are experts in the early church, experts on ethics. I mean, across the board, these are voices that are quite profound and you know. So that's one of those goals is to give them an opportunity for you to learn from these individuals who have a ton to teach and the wider world could value from that. So we've got a gold mine of wisdom. You know right here that we, that we want to share with the world. How do we.
Speaker 2:I couldn't agree more. How do we keep from collectively becoming arrogant with what we have? And what do you have that you haven't received? Paul says right, there's, there's nothing that isn't coming down from above, and to whom much is given, much is required. And how? How is our intellectual, how do our intellectual heavyweights continue to offer what they've come to deeply believe in?
Speaker 2:But recognize this is the power of, I think, a posture of humility. Recognize that in knowing something about this topic, you know leadership, development, culture, healthy system structures, that kind of stuff. There's a whole that, because that's where I've spent a lot of time. There's a whole host of other topics that I'm not, I don't know and I got to learn and that's why you I think you and I both have the same approach is like, oh, my goodness, the world is so amazing and there's no end to what we can learn, and the end result being, brian, that, wow, I know pretty much. I'm practically I'm a big deal Anchorman, because I know you know something about something. But no, the end result should be I know so little about most things. Right, if you've done deep, deep work. I think there could be this collective arrogance in the LCMS that we must. We must guard against, or else we may end up making idols out of our intellect, rather than the one who has given us our intellect. Brian, anything to say? Say there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, probably three thoughts, you know. First, to kind of to that, that curiosity point, I think Chesterton says the chief sin and he's being a little bit satirical here, right, it's Chesterton. So he's not actually saying this is like the prime sin, but he's saying one of the chief sin is boredom, right? In other words, like the whole world around you is amazing and there's so many other people that have so much to offer like curiosity and that's. I think that's it, that's the one skill set that helps me most. It's the curiosity where, when I sit down with a guest, right, and then that's, and I love that because there's just this wealth of knowledge that I can be curious and and learn from right, so that's that helps in that realm.
Speaker 3:One, two. I'll say maybe two other things on this. So two, arrogance not the right word I'm trying to think of like the right word, but there should be. I'm going to use arrogance and I'm not using this as, like, the correct term, I just don't have another one but there should be a little bit of arrogance in that. I mean, like there's swagger, that's the right word, like there should be some swagger and confidence. You know it's in the same way to where, like when you're preaching, it's not swagger like you're, you're egotistical, but there's this like confidence of like, like, yeah, like like if you go out there and you listen to the other thinkers that are around in your community, like they don't have this to offer, and it doesn't mean Brian Stecker's offering it, it means we're, we're discussing it and the Holy Spirit is bringing it here. So that's the one like I. So there should be a little bit of that to this.
Speaker 3:Third point, which you know is kind of the caveat to that right, is when you look at the, if you go to the seven deadly sins, you've got pride.
Speaker 3:Pride is number one.
Speaker 3:When you go through the three temptations in the wilderness, you know pride seems to be the pinnacle, along with kind of this desire for honor.
Speaker 3:You know, if you kind of go through the three, the flesh, the desire for honor, the desire for power, so we should always be wary of where does that boastfulness goes, and Paul speaks to that. It's like I'm going to boast in the gospel right. So for Lutherans you should be able to say you know, what we have here is a proper framework so that the gospel does not get muddled and so that this good news and the truth, the goodness and the beauty can be properly exposed and we should boast in that. We should boast boldly and confidently, right, and raise your head up high as you have it. At the same point, if you're boasting in that what you have received, it can't lead to like an intellectual boasting of like look at me, right. So it's all about kind of that orientation of that, with the two issues being if you minimize both and you become kind of passive or like, or if you kind of elevate yourself and then you become the egotistical megalomaniac.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, good. So Jesus has so much confidence? Yeah, right, Jesus has. He trusts fully in the Father's mission and he holds that confidence in a way that draws people nearer. They're curious about Jesus.
Speaker 2:It's very obvious he can do things and say things from a position of profound authority, and that's where the Pharisees are kind of looking at who gives you that authority? Well, it kind of came down on me. We're pretty close, me and the Father are pretty close right. But the way it drew not just the disciples, the kind of came down on me, we're pretty close, me and the father are pretty close right. But the way it drew not just the disciples, the power of invitation, come and follow me, but it absolutely changed the whole world, as the apostles went out as eyewitnesses of the crucified and risen one, with the appropriate level of confidence in their message. Don't worry, it's not going to be you speaking, it's going to be the Holy Spirit speaking.
Speaker 2:But it was a winsome invitational. Come, come, learn with me. Come, come meet. I love this. Come meet the one this is a woman at the well who told me everything I've done on the people in the town and Samaria, like everything, everything. Could this be the promised Messiah, you know, and so I think that's the that keeps us from hubris, that keeps us from arrogance, you know, and so I think that's the that keeps us from hubris, that keeps us from arrogance. There's a spirit of invitation. We're courageous, we know our identity.
Speaker 2:To be sure, there's no way we're falling off in the LCMS on the passive side we could become is is our brand and I had a conversation about brand to the name LCMS. What that means is that an invitational group of people who are gathering together, yes, with profound intellect et cetera, but in a profound history and tradition, Are we inviting more people who are outside of that tradition? Lcms means very little in terms of their identity marker and obviously there's way more people that are there in our communities than identify with who we are. Are our congregations and our leaders and our intellectuals offering what we have with an open, invitational hand that will keep us from hubris, keep us from arrogance. Any response to that, Brian?
Speaker 3:No, that was beautifully put. I think that's. Yeah, I mean you made the better point than I did, because you went right to. Jesus says that the perfect example. So I think that's spot on, thank you.
Speaker 2:Hey, so good. All right, let's close with this question here. As you look, as I bring up the LCMS, as you look at us, what is our unfair advantage? Because I think there are many Our unfair advantage as you compare us with kindness and charity to other denominations Catholic to charismatic, everywhere in between as you compare us, though, to other mainline denominations and the rise of non-denominational churches and I say all that in the context of only about 15% of people being in a Catholic or Lutheran or non-denom in my community. This blows my mind, brian. The growth in our community, right With 1,000 people moving into Maricopa County every single week, and not even that's a great point.
Speaker 3:I heard you mentioned that before, and that's yeah.
Speaker 2:I mean it's mind blowing. It's the size of our Sunday worshiping community every single week moving into the East Valley and and more of them. Here's one of my struggles is in our struggles here as a congregation. It's like how, how do we create awareness about we're a Christian church, we're in a traditional, what may look to some of you like Catholic. But let me tell you the other story of grounding why we do the things we do.
Speaker 2:And sometimes I feel on this market where you've got non-denom churches, who will start another multi-site Brian this blows my mind and launch one of their multi-sites with a community of worshiping a thousand people first Sunday and 500 end up sticking because they have strategies to buy lots of land, you know, and not to mention our Mormon neighbors here. Right, buy lots of land. Very strategic, long range thinkers, and sometimes I don't know that our strategy is following as much of our theology. Do we have that sort of a vision in all of our especially urban, suburban communities and other communities in between to say, wow, we need, we need more churches right now? I think that could be an opportunity for growth for us, but there there is a strategic unfair advantage and I think it's our theology, which is so, so great. What do you think about our unfair advantage right now in the wider Christian landscape?
Speaker 3:Brian, yeah, no, that was. You know, I've heard you speak on that before and I've it's been. It's been one of those, like you know, it gets planted here and I just keep trying to wrestle with like your situation here and ours is a little bit different. We're a very we're growing community but you know it's a Lutheran, more saturated area. So, yeah, kind of the fair, kind of maybe playing both sides there, let's go Right. So you know what's the fair? There's the obvious ones and you articulated it and I'll kind of skip past it not to minimize it, but because you know the theology. You know, I think one thing that we can leverage more is we're watching, particularly like in the younger groups, we're watching like a swing towards traditionalism, and it's not just in the church, it's kind of, it's kind of throughout. You can even watch it. You know. I mean Mormons very fast growing, they're a good example.
Speaker 3:It kind of the interest in like spirit, like ancient spiritual practices. You know, if you go on YouTube like you get a lot of these like ancient Buddha meditation techniques and stuff like that. A little bit of that's new age, but a lot of it too, is just this. There's this intrigue, there's this recognition by people that we've got a fractured society that's lost its kind of groundwork. So people start to search backwards and they say, where's that firm ground? And that that moves them back traditionally, right. So sometimes they go back to like the real ancient, or they go to the Eastern and they, they're, they're looking for that. So if you look at the landscape of churches, that that moving desire means that you know, despite, despite the very valid data point that you're talking about with some of these mega churches, which is, you know, sometimes when you just get large, there's a multiplication effect. So that's kind of it's that's you know one thing to table, but the movement isn't traditional, which means Catholics, orthodox and LCMS, lutherans have an advantage there, right? Other ones that have that have gone more modern, and by modern I mean, like they've adopted modernist type philosophies, women's ordination, things like that, like that. That is going to hurt them in the long run and it's, I think, numerically hurting them already. We have demographic issues. I think they have theological issues on top of probably already demographic issues. So that's, that's something to leverage.
Speaker 3:Now what's the challenge to that? Well, how do you get people to know that? Right, and that's certainly, I think, part of your mission and my mission is like okay, so people get interested in that and they go watch Father what's his name? From the Orthodox Church who articulates it wonderfully, and young men are like there. It is Like there's like the restoration of masculinity and like the proper ordering of the household and all of this kind of stuff, and they get excited about that and so they're going Orthodox or they see Bishop Barron or Pints with Aquinas and they, you know, they get drawn to the Catholic and it's so that's. I mean, that's kind of it's my shtick, but I truly believe it.
Speaker 3:Right, like we need to be in that space to show to the public like, well, like what's Lutheranism? This is Lutheranism, right, and it's and it's and it's serious because people want to take something seriously. It's not stuffy, you know. Like you know, it doesn't serious, doesn't have to be stuffy, traditional, doesn't have to be boring or anything like that. Right, it's the exact opposite. There's this, there's this vibrancy. So that's, that's the gem that we have.
Speaker 3:And the challenge is how do we articulate it.
Speaker 3:And that leads to the challenges, and the one that I would probably highlight the most is articulating this externally, putting it out there in front of people, so that there's access points where people can say never really heard about Lutheranism, but like that's, that's a compelling case, oh, they're interested in the early church and you know, you can just kind of play into that.
Speaker 3:And then the other one, which is not an area of expertise in my area I think this is probably more in your lane, but I think there's there's very valid questions that you're asking.
Speaker 3:As far as we've got a thousand people coming in Like what do we do about? Right, like they don't call Brian Stecker up, the associate pastor of Minnesota, and say, like you know, just so you know, here's what's going on in California, right, so I'm not privy to those, those conversations. Oh, they don't call me up either, they don't call you up, but like those, those are serious, those are serious things that we should be and trying to like taking that seriously and say we gotta, we gotta jump at those things. So I think that's a valid thing as well. I don't have a ton of answers to that outside of kind of my realm that I'm, that I'm leaning into, cause you know I've studied this now enough, but there's there's a lot of other ones, and that's where where you need those kind of those voices that are skilled in that area to say you know, here's opportunities, and let's capitalize on those opportunities and jump at those opportunities, and I've said publicly now that I'm not talking about pastoral formation, and so I'm not.
Speaker 2:This podcast has, though, talked about some cultural and long range strategic concerns for us, multiplying the message of Christ crucified in the Lutheran Church, missouri Synod, message of Christ crucified in the Lutheran Church, missouri Synod, which is what I'm praying for. I'm praying for diverse perspectives and some of those conversations I pray. I pray there's an invitational spirit for more and more of those conversations about some of our pain points had to be taking place privately and, if it makes sense, for the help of the church for some folks with diverse perspectives. I've been told that podcasts is not the appropriate place for some diverse perspective conversations in the LCMS, and so we're not. We're going to do the best we can to talk about what the church wants to talk about, and sometimes they're a little more on the edge, I guess you may say, but but I'm not afraid.
Speaker 2:Like all of my conversations in my local church, there's lots of edgy conversations that pastors talk about like all the time, you know. So it doesn't feel for me like a different thing when I'm talking about something that's going on in the life of the wider church. But I know for some it feels like a different and maybe even a divisive thing, and if you know my heart, brian, this is why I love being with you. That's the last thing I would want to do. We are an entrepreneurial community here that like to test new things. Not that everybody else should be doing what we're doing, but yeah, we'll see how it all kind of plays out, and I know you and I both share this. We would love to see more unity in the LCMS toward toward our one another, obviously, and then united in our mission to make Jesus known and united, obviously, around scripture and confessions. Any any more comments there, brian?
Speaker 3:Yeah, maybe maybe two, just a plug to say, like you know, I appreciate having a line with you and vice versa, and we've we've talked about some things over the phone, right, and whatnot. I mean, when you were on, you threw your cell phone number out there, right. Say like, hey, if you've got things, you can call me up and talk about it, like if you've got challenging thoughts or whatever. But no, I appreciate that and more of that, I think, is good, right. So if there's something like that, tim says I'm like I don't know about that, or vice versa, we like prime, like what were you getting at there, like you know, just taking the time to talk there, one that's. I just want to endorse that and to endorse that you're very willing to do that. You do it with me and you've shared stories of doing it with others, so I want to endorse that publicly. And then, one of the thoughts you were, you were talking about in the ELCA, right, how they're having, like they're having conversations on the divinity of Christ, right.
Speaker 3:Like that's like that's significant, so like there's groups within, like their synod, that are arguing about that. Like that's mad, like I can't imagine that. So there's one like we don't know how good we have discussions and you know, sometimes, you know Brian has to be like you know what I was saying, this and you know I might be wrong. So there's all these examples. But at the same point, like we're not arguing over the divinity of Christ or the you know the article justification, so in many ways we have it really good and I think that's because of the theological ac. Like like people do disagree on things and that we should debate these things. But at the same point, like we're very healthy in that as like an LCMS and like I just don't see any reasonable reasons for like a split or anything like that to where it's. Like when I look at the ELC I'm like you guys might split over the divinity of Christ. Right, that we should recognize that concordance. That, I think, is there. Amen.
Speaker 2:Hey Brian, this has been great dude. I'm grateful for your friendship, partnership in the gospel, for the way God made you and for your desire to put it on the line. People you should follow on the line. It's wonderful, and all the range of guests you're having praying for you and your ministry, your family, your new little one coming. If people want to connect with you, what's your? Just like church email. If people wanted to cause I get this from time to time. Hey, have you talked to so-and-so? No, okay, yeah, if someone wants to recommend or just connect with you, how can they do so?
Speaker 3:Yeah, if on the linenet is the best way because the contact information's on there. So that's a good place to just mean, unless if anyone's got a pen and they're going to write it on brianstecker at trinitywaconiaorg. Yeah, so just check out the website and you'll find my contact information on there.
Speaker 2:Hey, this is good man, this is lead time like subscribe, comment wherever it is you take in these podcasts, and it was an upward, moving conversation. We're growing together. I learned more about CS Lewis today. That was super, super fun and I'm again just grateful for our partnership in the gospel, praying for you and for more churches like Trinity that want to raise up leaders, newer, younger pastors and say hey, if you got a vision, let's see about accomplishing that vision. Our congregation is the same way with the Unite Leadership Collective. Let's see about releasing young leaders into a creative adventure and to see how it all shakes out. It's shaking out really, really well for you, brian, and praise, praise be to God. It's a good day. Go make it a great day. Thanks, brian, thanks Tim.
Speaker 1:You've been listening to Lead Time, a podcast of the Unite Leadership Collective. The ULC's mission is to collaborate with the local church to discover, develop and deploy leaders through biblical Lutheran doctrine and innovative methods To partner with us in this gospel message. Subscribe to our channel, then go to theuniteleadershiporg to create your free login for exclusive material and resources and then to explore ways in which you can sponsor an episode. Thanks for listening and stay tuned for next week's episode.