292: James and Holland are back with Pastor Plek to share their different Easter Sunday church experiences. Holland and James offer their personal insights on how even a no-show baptism and an unexpected car accident couldn't overshadow the celebration of Jesus's resurrection and the impactful outreach at Elm Ridge apartments. As they navigate the complex journey of shepherding culturally Christian individuals towards authentic faith, they grapple with the delicate balance of addressing sin with love and grace. Listen in for a conversation that's as real and raw as ministry itself, anchored in the hope and challenges that define our calling.
Got questions? Text us at 737-231-0605!
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292: James and Holland are back with Pastor Plek to share their different Easter Sunday church experiences. Holland and James offer their personal insights on how even a no-show baptism and an unexpected car accident couldn't overshadow the celebration of Jesus's resurrection and the impactful outreach at Elm Ridge apartments. As they navigate the complex journey of shepherding culturally Christian individuals towards authentic faith, they grapple with the delicate balance of addressing sin with love and grace. Listen in for a conversation that's as real and raw as ministry itself, anchored in the hope and challenges that define our calling.
Got questions? Text us at 737-231-0605!
Like, share, and subscribe! We love seeing and responding to your reviews and comments.
Support the show: https://wbcc.churchcenter.com/giving
Welcome Holland. Thank you so much.
Speaker 2:And straight out of Huddo to Taylor, is James Foster, how you doing.
Speaker 3:I'm doing great.
Speaker 2:Man, great, having both you guys back. It's super fun. We are now a couple days we're recording this, a couple days post-Easter, and I wanted to hear about how your Easter Sundays went at your uh each of your churches, and uh what you're looking forward to in the future. So, holando, what did, what did you think about, uh Easter, how did that go?
Speaker 1:It was okay. Here's what's great about it Jesus rose from the dead, that's right, and we got to preach that. Uh, there was a lot. We had a lot of struggles in our Easter service. What was the primary struggle in the service? The pri? Some of the primary struggles were my youngest children, who, uh are, my kids are awesome and but, uh, but on Sundays, especially Sundays where Jenny and I are both doing a lot, they exploit that, the reality that we, you know that they can be more mischievous and run around, and they know that we're focused on other things and they exploit that.
Speaker 2:So were they screaming during the service? Was that the?
Speaker 1:A little bit during the service, a lot before, a lot after the easter egg hunt after church that my wife spent a ton of time setting up for and everything and made you know this great easter egg hunt. All the kids including mine probably started by mine ended up crying and was it sympathetic crying. I don't know, I wasn't out there, I didn't see it, so you got. But uh, there was lots of crying, is what I heard Lots of crying.
Speaker 1:Oh man, there were certain eggs that had like a dollar in it and the kid, even if they got one, they wanted two dollars, or they didn't get the candy they wanted, or I don't know. The kids were losing their minds at the Easter egg hunt and so, yeah, hey, your.
Speaker 2:Easter egg hunt was way better than our Easter egg hunt. Anytime there's money involved.
Speaker 1:I would have been on your Easter egg hunt.
Speaker 2:Well, it leads to children crying. Lesson learned, lesson learned. How long is the actual egg hunt part of your Easter egg hunt?
Speaker 1:I think it was like 45 seconds to a minute long, okay.
Speaker 2:So that resulted in a lot of crying. Okay, did you guys do anything else other than Easter egg hunt? Or did you do like a I don't know a?
Speaker 1:coffee. We had a baptism set up on. Sunday, which we were really excited about, and um, the person did not make it to church.
Speaker 2:You know, if there's one thing I understand, it's that reality right there that has happened to me more times than I can recall.
Speaker 1:Still haven't heard from them and praying for them.
Speaker 2:Hopefully, hopefully nothing awful happened.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so then then praying for them, uh, another member on our team that was supposed to help set up ended up not being able to make it. Another member on the team that was going to help set up their car broke down and they didn't make it to church, and so it's just like all these kind of things. Yeah, you know, you, of course.
Speaker 1:Of course I also got in a car accident on the Monday of that week. I got hit by a car, just smashed. Was it totaled? Totaled the car? That was. How did you get here?
Speaker 2:uh well, we have. Praise the lord, we have a van as well. Oh man the lord, my lovely wife took me here.
Speaker 1:Oh, she's so great yeah so it was a crazy week, a lot of crazy stuff happening then. Sunday morning was just like a lot of chaos, but all of that said, at the end of the day we got to preach jesus, uh. We got to love and bless our community. The day before Easter, we had a big outreach in the community, uh, which was a huge win.
Speaker 2:So uh, at Eastside, is it at Eastside community church? We're at mission, possible currently.
Speaker 1:No, at one of the apartment complexes in the community they, uh, we asked if we could do an outreach.
Speaker 2:Can you tell me what community it was?
Speaker 1:Elm Ridge apartments and uh, they, we asked if we could do something there. They were what community? It was elm rage apartments and uh, they, we asked if we could do something there. They were like, oh, we'd love that. And not only did they allow us to do it there, but their management came to the event as well as provided like tacos, donuts, waters, capri, suns, bubbles for the kids, like they came and they stayed like the whole time. So we really got to connect with the apartment management wow a ton of people came out to the event.
Speaker 2:Got to connect with a lot of families so was it multiple apartment managers or all the apartment managers from that one apartment, from that one and from?
Speaker 1:another one. Oh wow, so it was multiple apartments involved.
Speaker 2:Did they share a courtyard or something?
Speaker 1:uh, no, just some of the other. One of the other apartment managers heard about the event, just wanted to come, and so that's so great, and so that breeds huge opportunity. Yeah, they loved it. We got to. We did bounce houses, face painting for kids, food, music and got to invite people to church, pray for people, share the gospel and you know conversations with people, and they wanted us to come back and do more events like that.
Speaker 2:That's exciting.
Speaker 1:That was a huge, huge win.
Speaker 2:That's a win, all right. So, james, that's what went down on the east side of Austin, texas. How was it on the northeast side of the city, in Taylor?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it was great, probably our best service yet.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 3:I mean biggest service yet.
Speaker 2:How many came out?
Speaker 3:We had 110 unique worshipers.
Speaker 2:Nice.
Speaker 3:And then we had, with our totals, 138 people, 93 adults and 43 kids.
Speaker 2:That's great. Yeah, that's really great. You should be really excited about that it's amazing, yeah. So tell me about how, like because your service started at 4 o'clock, yep. So was anybody already Eastered out by the time they got to you, or they had enough in the tank? Was this like someone's second or third Easter service? There were a couple of double dippers in there.
Speaker 3:That said they were coming out but did not make it out.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 3:Which could have been that they were Eastered out or maybe their Easter celebrations just expanded. Yeah yeah, which I? They were eastered out, or maybe their easter celebrations just expanded. Yeah, yeah, uh, which I don't know that you'd compete with as much if you did a morning service, but, uh, afternoon evening service uh works out pretty well most.
Speaker 2:Most of those folks, especially uh are sleepy folks that want a little extra rest you know we have a church that meets here at four o'clock on uh sundays as well. It's uh or no. They actually meet at no, sorry, they meet at one o'clock, their service ends at four and we're gonna have a another ethiopian church is gonna start meeting here at wow four, nice yeah, I think that's awesome it's kind of fun.
Speaker 2:So you know it is happening, um so all right, so tell me about your easter egg hunt. How did we saw pictures looked great. Looks like it was a lot of fun yeah, it was great, was great.
Speaker 3:We had um. That was probably one of the highlights too. Is uh just getting to keep our people there and enjoy them, kind of bring out some other snacks and refreshments and spend some more time with them. We were wanting to do like a full on meal, but that's for a future year, yeah it is so hard to coordinate so it is so hard to coordinate.
Speaker 2:So I my and this might just be me we went for the Wednesday sorry Wednesday, I don't know. So it was for Saturday. We did the Wells branch elementary, which is right around the corner here, and that's where we did the Easter egg hunt, but it was more of like an Easter extravaganza. We had none other than our deacon of compassion. Aaron Swanland was the easter bunny.
Speaker 3:Uh which was pretty awesome.
Speaker 2:Cody got fired from uh cody got fired, uh, I think when.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he's from easter bunny just from easter bunny, yeah, yeah, he's still, he's still. Yeah, yeah, he, he won a trip to hawaii. After, uh, he didn't actually win it, they're going to a wedding out in Hawaii, uh, which is pretty great. So, but, yeah, he, he went to he I don't think he made it out to the Easter egg hunt this year, but, uh, our deacon of compassion was very compassionate uh on the children and did a great job, staying in character the entire time. Um, it was it, cause that's's it's a lot of not, uh, it's a lot of stuffy head that you have to wear. Um, but we did have, uh, bunny tail dodgeball. We also had the face painting, uh, balloon animals, and we had starbucks and somehow adrian got some really cool snacks anyway, so it worked out. It was a fun dodgeball. That'd be like the snowball the snowball, so it works for during, uh, we.
Speaker 2:So what's really great about they work for christmas? Uh, for our dodgeball during christmas. It works for the uh, the camp out that we do every year with the kids at the camp out. Where we do, I guess it's snowball dodgeball, and then it became bunny tail dodgeball and I thought for sure a couple guys were going to tear a rotator cuff because they were like really slinging it and we got really competitive. When it became adult bunny tail dodgeball Did not think it, courtney Blick wrecked shop once again. As you would expect, she does not mess around, you know she's there to win, so, uh, we really gotta appreciate that ended up being a two-hour event, that's amazing uh, which I was sort of surprised by, and my kids were ready to go about a good solid hour.
Speaker 2:15 in they were. They were pleading to go and I I had to say, hey, our job is to be the last ones to leave. And that did not go over very well. We did have a couple meltdowns, um, but that's okay. Overall it was a big win.
Speaker 1:But we had about 200, 200 people came to that outreach in that wild right. Yeah, it was huge.
Speaker 2:Adrian brought, like our entire neighborhood. I don't know how she did it she brought. They didn't come to sunday morning, but they did come to the easter egg hunt, so maybe that's just like a you know baby steps.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, no, we had one kid from our outreach, from the outreach that we did uh came to our Easter service. No one else did, and so it was. Uh, it was one of those, uh, you know, build relationships and uh, like everyone, everyone in the community that we had done outreach with, and we invited them to church, they were like, oh, we'll just, we'll be cooking all day. Like all of them were just cooking for Easter parties at their house all day, and so they all had a Sunday plans cooking at their house.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's interesting. That is the thing, though. Yep, um yeah.
Speaker 1:Fascinating 4.00 PM service. I don't know if that would have changed anything, but yeah maybe do 4.00 PM service on that day.
Speaker 2:That might solve a lot of issues.
Speaker 1:But the one kid that came, she walked, just walked straight there. She was like I have to go to church and she walked there. Hey, listen, yeah, made it home safe.
Speaker 2:She's fine, that's good, that's good, okay. So what did you preach on, james? What did you preach on, for the Lord is Risen day? What did you pray, john, for the Lord is risen day?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so we looked at the end of Mark.
Speaker 2:So our first sermon series was walking through Mark Did you start like in the fall in October or something in Mark and just like aha All the way through and we did a couple of skipper-oos but we got there. What did you skip?
Speaker 3:Like end time stuff. Yeah, we'll get there, we'll come back to it, we'll come back to you, know.
Speaker 2:Jesus comes back. All right, everyone get over it Moving on Mark 13, mark 14.
Speaker 3:We're a little bit tight. Yeah, we did some.
Speaker 2:Surfing Bible, surfing there, yeah. We summarized yeah, it's a little summarization.
Speaker 3:We're going to go back to it, though, at some point soon.
Speaker 2:You know, listen, finish mark on Easter. Was that the goal? Absolutely yeah, yeah, and there's a lot of first year as well.
Speaker 3:I think, yeah, that's amazing. Yeah, great place to start.
Speaker 2:Okay, so what was your? What was your big takeaway from Mark 15, 16?
Speaker 3:So come back to courageously honor Jesus, and the reason for that is that you see, the disciples are awkwardly absent. And then you have the women who are sticking around, but they're watching from afar where Jesus dies. And then they see where he's buried and they go to visit the tomb. And then we have Joseph of Arimathea, who comes back to courageously honor Jesus Even though he was part of the council.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, nice.
Speaker 3:And he says he takes courage to go ask for the body. Nice, right, but basically talking about our identity as being restored representatives that we get from Jesus coming back from the dead, nice that allows us to overcome our fear and our failure to then come back to him and serve him as a restored representative.
Speaker 2:Nice. So had you preached on anything like this before? Was this the kind of the comeback I feel like I've heard that from you somewhere. Was that in the mark somewhere?
Speaker 3:uh, when we did mark. I pitched this for you to do, but you took a different take oh, that's right, I do remember that, I do.
Speaker 2:I was like this is how this sounds so familiar.
Speaker 1:I was like, like that's what I remember it from yeah, it was not doing it when you suggested it. Terrible.
Speaker 3:No, it's good. I also used it in my preaching class at Dallas, so this is my second sermon in my preaching two class.
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm glad that you got some use. I thought I heard you preach it somewhere. No, we actually talked about preaching planning. Okay, that's good. All right, holland, you did not choose to go to a resurrection story, that's right.
Speaker 1:Well, I did. I would say it is a resurrection story. We've been in Daniel, so we've been going through the book of Daniel since I can't remember a few months ago and we were in Daniel six for Easter Sunday, which is Daniel and the lion's den. So we talked about uh, I explained up front, you know, knew everyone would be like why are we in the old Testament it's Easter supposed to be talking about Jesus and the resurrection?
Speaker 2:Oh, so you went planning they would have some objections.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, and just addressing it right away, saying that we are going to get to Jesus. What'd you say? Stop crying, stop crying, stop your crying. That, ultimately, the book of Daniel is a book about Jesus, because all the scripture is about Jesus, it all points to him. The Old Testament reaches its fulfillment in Christ, the prophecies look forward to Christ, the types and shadows and all these things are pointing to him. So down in the lines, then, especially being something pointing forward to the death and resurrection of Jesus.
Speaker 1:So I love that Talked about Daniel himself, and we hit on the theme of courage as well, his courageous faith in refusing to back down from his religious beliefs and practices, continuing to pray even though the King said you'll be thrown to the lions.
Speaker 1:So he demonstrated great courage and faith there, and we've talked a lot about that theme, of the example of Daniel and his friends in that book, of what it looks like to live out your faith in a hostile culture, how that applies to us today, but also looked at Daniel as a type of Christ and so his being, uh, uh, will it willingly accepting death, um, going into the lion's den and then, uh, being miraculously delivered from death, uh, that, the you know, the King goes down the next morning and, uh, and Daniel's alive, right, god sent the angel to shut the mouths of the lions, and there's even this idea he goes into the lion's den and it's a stone is rolled in front and sealed, you know, and so there's this same kind of idea. And then the stones rolled away and Daniel comes out the next day, and so, talking about how this points forward to Jesus's death, he actually died, though Daniel was spared from death. Jesus actually died.
Speaker 2:And he only had to do one night in a tomb. Jesus had to do three.
Speaker 1:So Jesus is the greater Daniel, essentially.
Speaker 2:I like that. Oh, that's really good yeah, so talked about. I like the christocentric viewpoint on that, because sometimes it's hard to see how it becomes like because you know, my tendency is I'm daniel and then like, when you read it with like a christ centered view, it's oh, jesus is the hero, he's down, and then I am the guy plotting his death yeah, I, and I think there's value in both, though.
Speaker 1:I think, I think Daniel has met, you know, like passages, like the Hebrews, like, you know, hall of faith and stuff. We have these. We have these great examples that ought to instruct us in how here's what it looks like to live faithfully. But we also, you know, need to recognize we can learn from that, but we also need to recognize how it points us to Christ and salvation him.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, I have a. Yeah, that's good, I think that's where I'm always looking for that. And sometimes I have a hard time and I'm like, well, I guess I'm too me centered, I'm ready to get whatever. Um, uh, I went from the standpoint of uh, the three responses to the gospel message which you know whenever the women come back from the tomb. And then Luke 24, verse 13, I think, says and they sounded like, what they said to them sounded like an idle tale. And so Peter's response says but Peter. The next verse is but Peter rose and ran to the tomb, so his response to the gospel was to verify gospel truth, whereas the rest of the disciples like, all right, well, that's interesting.
Speaker 2:And then Cleopas and his buddy, they head off, uh to uh to Emmaus. They got things to do, like they don't have time to check out an empty tomb or look up scripture. And, granted, they didn't have a Bible, probably a handy, you know, carrying one in your pocket or anything, and they they'd have to go to the, to the synagogue or somewhere. But they just like, well, I guess there's nothing we can do. Let's go back to our old lives. And it had the, the gospel it was interesting to talk about. It'd be make for a great Bible study, uh, up until the point where Jesus meets them and then they run back to Jerusalem to go connect with other disciples. And then I had Thomas who demanded proof. He was like a guy that was like I'm not going to believe unless I see. And so those are the three responses, the kind of the, the. The point was, each one of them ended up running to Jesus.
Speaker 1:Uh, and each one of them ended up running to Jesus and Jesus reached them in unique ways, but Peter gets the award for best running to Jesus guy, even though, yeah, john beat him there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, john beat him there. That's really you know. But John only went because he saw Peter running and he had to outdo him. But the thing I thought was interesting, I relate to that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, peter got a, a special revelation on the way home. So because it says he he marveled and then went home and you don't find out until like verse 23 of luke 24 that he actually met with jesus and first corinthians 15 uh, I'm sorry, 51 verse 15 says that, or 51, 15 verse I think might be 15 actually is where it said Paul says that he got Jesus revealed himself first to Peter. So anyway, I thought that was fascinating that he got the initial invite and connection before all the rest of the disciples. Anything tell me about some of your sermon illustrations that really just crushed it or maybe didn't land either one.
Speaker 3:So come back to courageously honor Jesus. I talked about how, uh, I preached here at a youth service and I got told not to do the second service because it was so bad. And then I talked about how I lost my job, uh, at Fiat of Austin, which is a terrible job.
Speaker 2:Oh, that was funny.
Speaker 3:Good for uh. And so I felt like a failure and I felt afraid, yeah, uh, and confused, of like, okay, lord, you brought me here. What are you doing? Uh, I thought I was here to do ministry. Obviously that's not going well. What, what do you want me to do? Um? And so that was like the bookend story of like you can come back after failure. You can come back and overcome your fears. That's good Through recognizing that you're a restored representative. And what's cool is like similar to what you were just saying. Jesus, when he's through the angel, talking to the Marys that are there at the tomb, he says go and tell the disciples and Peter, right, right. And so he's sending them to remind Peter that, hey, even though you failed, even though you've yeah three times.
Speaker 3:I want you you're still part of this Come back.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh, that's good, okay, so when did?
Speaker 3:when did you not get asked?
Speaker 2:back to uh, it was like preaching at youth back in the james meyer days. Oh yeah, oh early, early, early days, okay, yeah.
Speaker 3:Oh, there's like a middle school and a high school service. Maybe I did the first one, but it was, it was. It was a little bit rough yeah, that happens.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, all right. Um, okay, holland, any great illustrations that, uh, all of the merging pastors are going to listen to? Because they're, like, I'm going to learn from Holland Gregg on what sermon illustration is going to land? I don't think so.
Speaker 1:If we had two services at my church, I might've not got asked back for the second service. I don't know. I just I felt like I mean, I don't know, sometimes you have great sermons and maybe I'm the I'm very critical of myself too, and so you know I just afterward I was just like was that good? Was that even a?
Speaker 2:what even happened?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know, maybe, maybe, maybe it was fine, but it was just one. It just felt like things weren't, it wasn't landing.
Speaker 1:Nobody was crying, taking yeah, no, well, the kids were crying, the kids were still crying. So I don't know, I mean, I preached the scripture, I taught right doctrine I, I. I preached Christ crucified and risen. And so you know, I think I was faithful to my task as a preacher and I invited people to repent and receive Christ. But in terms of yeah, did I have these amazing illustrations? I don't think so.
Speaker 2:Did um can't can't win them all. Yeah, when I got off the stage, adrian goes. How do you feel it went? And you know you're like um, I was like, eh, it was a sermon, you know if Jenny ever asks me that question, I assume that it didn't go well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like how do you think it went? It like oh so it was bad.
Speaker 2:That's what you're saying, yeah, and you're you want to know if I know it was bad, yeah, and so, and then I think I got some um charity texts from adrian's friends, which was nice, which I did appreciate, and they go. It was a totally new angle on the gospel. That was good yeah.
Speaker 1:New angle. I don't know if that's.
Speaker 2:I'm sure it was great. That's what you tell your kids whenever it's like a drawing, that you don't want to lie to them and you're like those are some great angles, what a creative. Yeah, so you know it was good. Yeah, so you know it was good. We, I had the probably the highlight for me Um, I had this young man, uh, named Tyler, the guy that came from Kyle and he had just gotten saved, uh, the two weeks before, by reading the Bible, Like he didn't go to church had.
Speaker 2:No, he just was miserable and alone, suicidal, and he just kind of did a last ditch prayer before he was going to end his life and he's like, hey, if you're out there, god, I just want to die without a conscience or, like you know, just make it end me so I don't have to go to non-existence. And he was into um, a new age, new ageism, like crystals and a lot of psychedelic drugs and um, kind of like esoteric readings and that kind of stuff anyway. So he, he, he. For eight years he was into that and just felt he got so numb to everything that he just wanted to end it. And so then all of a sudden, a voice pops up in his head. Uh, you know, at this point you know which voice, who knows? But no, but this one actually told him that life was worth living and somehow that instruction to get a Bible.
Speaker 2:He started reading a Bible and then God's word just hit him and then he started going to random churches. He, I think he went the week before he went to to a Presbyterian church and a I don't know. He just said he knew one was Presbyterian, he didn't know what the other one was and he said they were great, they were fine. And then he's like you know, maybe I should go look up in North Austin because I want to move there and maybe it's because of his work. I haven't really gotten the full story, but he Googled the churches in North Austin, showed up here, came to our sunrise service and his plan was to hit our sunrise service and another church, and another church. And then he just ended up staying here and Robert Sass got a hold of him, took him out door knocking last night.
Speaker 1:Wow, or Monday.
Speaker 2:Took him out door knocking Monday night.
Speaker 1:Oh, Robert.
Speaker 2:Yeah, robert's so great. So he went out and door knocked and shared Christ and then he came to my men's group and was super open about all sorts of stuff and now we're going to get him baptized. So it's like, hey man, that's amazing. I wish we could have said we were the ones that led him to Christ. But we definitely get to a water and God gets the increase and it's just, it's exciting. So, um, that was a highlight for me. Um, my one illustration I loved was and I don't know if this resonates with you guys you one illustration I loved was and I don't know if this resonates with you guys you guys remember ice cream trucks. Do they still have ice?
Speaker 3:cream trucks. Yes, they drive around in our neighborhood like eight o'clock, it's the worst. Really scare my kids. Yep, oh, that's eight o'clock.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's the worst when I was a kid, they seemed really like magical and awesome it was like the greatest. Thing ever as an adult now, like I don't know if they've changed, but they just, they're all seem sketchy yeah, oh, absolutely.
Speaker 2:I mean white van with some dude driving hey, kids want some ice cream. You know like you're just thinking yourself that kid's getting abducted. So I talked about that reality.
Speaker 2:But the the ice cream, right, I mean yeah, ice cream sound all right, which maybe, as when you have childlike faith, it's an exciting sound that that causes you to go and run to the truck. But now you're just like nah, that guy's probably out. Just you know swindling kids and you know abducting them and take him to you know child trafficking somewhere, like that's kind of where people go now, and you're like I'll believe it when I see a genuine ice cream truck. So that's kind of the general direction. I don't know. Thumbs down on ice cream trucks. I haven't seen what. What's the analogy?
Speaker 2:the analogy is the gospel message is like the ice cream music the music that you hear, is you ever and like you hear it and so that knew you ran to it. Or if you've been disappointed, you're like whatever I'm never gonna find it because it was every time.
Speaker 2:That makes sense when I went, when I went looking for the ice cream trucks, I heard the music. I could hear the music but I could never find the truck. And then eventually I go back to my mom, I make my mom drive me all over the neighborhood and then we couldn't find it and I get so mad so the next time I heard it's like screw that, I'm not gonna listen to any more ice cream truck sounds. I'm gonna. I'm done. I'm done with you. I've been ice cream truck hurt.
Speaker 2:I have six bad ice cream truck hurt and you deconstructed your deconstructed my ice cream truck and now I understand the true, just negative impact the institution of ice cream trucks has had on our country. There you go. Wow, that's good, all right, so, all right. So, um, back to what went, uh, right. So let's talk about some things that went right. Uh, for you, james, what went right during the Sunday morning or Sunday, sorry, Sunday afternoon. What do you do Sunday morning? Do you just prep?
Speaker 3:That's like an extra free day. I am so prepared that I never have to study on Sunday morning.
Speaker 1:Very good, that's good, amazing that's how it should be.
Speaker 3:There's usually a good two to three hour chunk of getting ready on Sunday morning.
Speaker 2:That's good. What time do you get up on Sunday?
Speaker 3:Eight or so Depends on it's later than usual.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's good. You should sleep on in yeah.
Speaker 3:Get a little extra rest and then get started. Nice, get a little extra rest and then get started.
Speaker 2:Nice. Do you do your sermon for your wife, or anything? No, yeah Me either, I share.
Speaker 3:I share, like an outline with a signal group which is like just a, it's like Slack, but it's a. I share an outline and ask them to pray over the text and share thoughts as they read it. Oh nice, that's cool.
Speaker 2:It's not a it not a, it's not a full run through like preaching practice. Yeah, yeah, I now do two preaching practices. I know that sounds insane. I do a preaching practice on tuesday which is really saying improv. Yeah, that's exactly what it is, but it's extemporaneous. But you know, it's really funny when you force yourself to do it. It's amazing all the the amount of speed you'll you'll make up on on at least going faster, to knowing that that idea is not going to work.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's good Like failing faster is kind of what I call Tuesday and then Thursday. I do the typical run through same message both times, same message both times, and then, um Sunday, I did the 7am, 9am and then 1045. Wow, holland, what about for you?
Speaker 1:What went right Sunday, you know we gathered, we worshiped Jesus. Okay, those of us, yeah, that were there.
Speaker 3:You filled a baptismal.
Speaker 1:You filled a baptismal we filled it and emptied it, and it was there if anyone wanted to get baptized, which is great, we were ready. Yeah, that is exciting. Uh, yeah, we preached the word, we sang songs to jesus and we had, we fellowshiped with each other wife say after your sermon, did she go?
Speaker 2:how'd you feel, what did she say?
Speaker 1:She said did church go good? I think church go good. Is that what you said? Yeah, oh, yeah. Um, yeah, we had no nursery on Sunday either, so that makes it way better.
Speaker 3:Sure More hearers of the gospel, more hearers yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, works for the numbers. Yeah, um, it was great. What was the question?
Speaker 2:Did she say anything like like what is what's your wife's typical response to when you come off the stage? She said do you like sit next to your wife? Uh, in church and the Sundays that she's not serving? Does she say like good job, or does she?
Speaker 1:Very encouraging.
Speaker 2:That's good. What does your wife do? What does Katie do?
Speaker 3:Yeah, she gives some good feedback most of the time.
Speaker 2:No, but I mean like on Sunday morning, like what's her feedback? Like right after, like immediately after?
Speaker 3:I understand, like when you get home, but does she say anything like right when you sit down? It's usually just a little pat on the back or something, but not much talking there. Yeah, that's good Like a hug and a pat, okay, that's good.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you need something.
Speaker 1:though If it didn't go like, if something in the sermon, like if Jenny feels like we off about it or something like that, she will, I'll sit down or I'll come next to her and she'll usually she'll just like pray for me, and so. So if she starts praying for me and I'm like okay, something that's where you like, you're like well, that's where you wish you had two services. You're like okay, maybe I can correct something for the second service, but uh, wait, wait.
Speaker 2:I would love to know like how that position? You know she's praying for her, she's just holding you, god, I just pray that you would do your will. Your word does not return void.
Speaker 3:You promised that was a great text. Lord help my husband.
Speaker 2:Yeah, andrian says something relatively encouraging, which is really good, uh, but usually I think sometimes she's worried that I don't think it's encouraging, and then she goes how do you think it went? Yeah, and that's where I want to go. Yeah, we'll talk about it later, cause I don't want to ask how do you think it went?
Speaker 1:Yeah, how did church go is like okay, obviously. Yeah, you didn't think it went well, and so yeah, all right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean that's, that's, yeah, I mean that's kind of some cues, like if you're a person that's in the audience like I don't want to say lie to your pastor about how well they're preaching. But man, find the good angle, that's a good one. Good angle is a good direction to go with.
Speaker 1:Or, you know, find something positive to kind of yeah, I will say like overall, Jenny, encouraging and we'll find. We'll find things to praise or share what God has taught her. And I think, just like I don't know if you're listening for pastors, wives listening, yeah, that encouragement is very valuable. Very valuable Goes a long way to know Cause. Honestly, like if five, 10, 15 people from church came up to me and were like that sermon was trash, I would be like okay, Um, but if my wife is like that sermon was trash, that would like be a dagger in my heart.
Speaker 2:Maybe I should retire.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but uh, and so that encouragement is really valuable. And then also, like I would say, the times when you have like okay, you said this and I don't know if it came across the way that you meant it to like, that's really valuable. Obviously, she knows me better than anyone and I think it's probably helped me grow more than anyone else.
Speaker 2:Yeah, she's done a good job of that with me. It's like I know that you probably meant this to come off like this. Here's how it actually came out it actually came off, and I'm always like, at first I was like no, you know, and then eventually you go back and listen to it. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, okay, that comes with some some years of experience there. Has Katie ever come back to you, james, and said like, okay, don't ever do that again, not yet, no, thank God, that's good.
Speaker 2:I think that's happened a couple times. I don't you know. Like, don't, please, don't do that. Although I think her dad, um, uh, adrian had brought, bought coffee for the entire staff because everyone had worked so hard with a good friday service, uh, the saturday extravaganza, and then so she brought everyone, uh, coffee, and I've been off caffeine now for about three weeks and um and not and it's not like a caffeine's evil or anything, I just I don't know, I think it started by. I just didn't drink it. Now I'm like, hey, I'm gonna try drinking water, uh, anyway, so, uh. So she had some caffeine, yeah, cheers, uh, and so, uh, she had like a white chocolate mocha for me, which I would have loved that, but she didn't give it to me because her dad was like, don't give it to him because apparently I talk, I talk fast, naturally, right, but me on like caffeine, where I haven't been like like a what's it called.
Speaker 2:We know these things about you, chris apparently I talk a lot faster and way more animated and like, do cartwheels and stuff on the stage? And I think he was like do not give that to him, he does not need that. So I did not do any cartwheels on the stage, which I'm sure a lot of people are disappointed. Yeah, yeah, um, we did baptize three people, which is exciting, uh, uh, hector, uh, and then vanessa, who robert sass led to faith on a door knocking nice, uh, one of the apartments nearby. And then kingsley, one of our kids. So that was, that was a cool experience, amazing, um, okay, uh. Other illustrations I thought you had one illustration. You were going to tell us the illustration.
Speaker 1:No, I said that I didn't really think they landed well. No, no.
Speaker 2:Well, I want to hear the illustration that didn't land and we can give you like, oh, that was awesome, it really James, what was another one of yours?
Speaker 3:I can't think of one right now.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:I don't like just. Oh, these were just the best ones for me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, uh, I don't like just, oh, these were just the best ones for me. Yeah, usually my easter sermons I feel like I kill them and I didn't feel like they're. They were good, I went the. So I don't say they were not awesome, because I use people's stories. Um, our one guy, have you guys met? Machine gun nick? I think you guys. Yeah, yeah, so machine gun nick is kind of like he's like the, the church mascot at this point. Uh, and all stories revolve around machine gun nick and and he had had a run-in. Well, he took in a, a homeless guy and then homeless guy had drugs that made machine gun nick mad. Machine gun nick, when he gets mad, pulls out guns you know that happens.
Speaker 2:And so he's at the church, guns pulled out and you know he wasn't waving it around and he didn't point at him, but he did have it out and then cody's like put the gun away and then the guy has his posse there. You know it was like.
Speaker 2:It was like a showdown standoff yeah, it was a big church standoff and so that was a little nerve-wracking and machine gun nick did a good job of repenting and apologizing for his uh. So we talked about how that was similar to how, even though Peter denied Jesus, he ran to Jesus. He wasn't. As soon as there was an opportunity for him to repent, he took it because there was, there was. Jesus was alive. He's running to him, which was awesome. And then the other guy is Maddie, is a. You know Maddie?
Speaker 3:you guys both know, maddie.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you were sharing the gospel with Maddie for just a million times, a million times. And so Maddie is. He now does our setup and runs a camera on Sunday. He is the most faithful, one of the most faithful non-members of our church. That's awesome, and he is. He never misses of setting up at like 7, 30 or whatever time he sets up. All the that's huge.
Speaker 2:You know the parking lot stuff he loves the community, he loves, he loves the community. And I, because I asked, I was like after going to lunch with him, kind of what I do now when I want to train people how to share the gospel, we go to lunch with maddie and all right, here's your lost person and now share the gospel. And they share the gospel. And then he asked a million questions about the Gilgamesh uh Epic and how all the other, uh, the census yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yep, so it's so great he goes to all of those and they go. You know I'm not going to argue into the gospel. Jesus has to reveal himself to you. It's great. And then he goes, okay, and then he shows up again to serve again and he is happy about it and I love Maddie for that. In fact, I need to have Maddie on the podcast cause he's just great.
Speaker 2:Um, but one of the most faithful guys honestly, like has not. If he misses it's, he's tells you in writing, uh, by email, that he will not make it and uh, never just doesn't show up. So we're pretty grateful for that. It's pretty, pretty awesome having. Anyway, I told him the thing that was cool about doubting Thomas is he goes there's eight days where he was hanging out with the disciples and after they said we have seen the Lord, he tells them I, I won't believe unless I see it. And they don't kick him out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I just sort of made the point like that had to have been weird for thomas. Like you're seeing these people probably every day, you're going through life with them and they're believing and you're not, and you're like the doubting thomas of the group and and I think I was like, is it possible that and I'm trying to get into maddie's head a little bit with that it's like you're it to be true but you don't want to risk it for yourself and you love the excitement of these other people who believe in this thing and you love the fact of being around people who really believe something, and I think that's why churches are really attractive to lost people. There's about 20 or 30 non-Christians at our church on any given Sunday, so that's about over 10% of our of our people, yeah, are not saved on a sunday and it's exciting kind of be able to preach the gospel with urgency. Um, and I wonder if that's true of every church. I don't know, but, um, it's fun to know who the the people who don't believe in jesus are.
Speaker 3:And they're still there anyway yeah, for them to know it, and for them to know it, and for them to know it which I think a lot of time.
Speaker 2:I spend some time trying to deconvert people not deconstruct, but deconvert Cause like to say, like you really don't believe this, do you? You kind of like, let's just not steal the label, cause that now that we want to hold you to something that you really aren't why not just be a non-Christian?
Speaker 3:Yeah, have you ever experienced that with people? There's a man that we're ministering to and caring for that has come to church the past three Sundays, that he really wants his marriage to be better and that's why he's there. And at first, when I talked to him, he said I want to believe, but I just can't. And then when he came up for prayer this past Sunday, he said I want help being a better Christian. And so did something happen in between these two? Right?
Speaker 2:How do?
Speaker 3:we talk about this and let's get on the same page.
Speaker 2:How do you navigate that conversation?
Speaker 3:Well, I need to navigate that conversation. Just getting together with him, yeah, when it's not sunday afternoon, crazy, busy oh, was that this sunday where he said I want to?
Speaker 2:oh, that's exciting yeah, absolutely exciting.
Speaker 3:Um, so the way that the conversation goes is hey, you said a few weeks ago, when we talked to him, you were asking for prayer. This is what you said I want to believe, but I can't. And then this past sund, you said you want help being a better Christian and you want prayer for your marriage to be better. That part's staying consistent, but did something else happen in between?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:What does it mean to be a Christian? Have you trusted Jesus for the forgiveness of your sins? What does that look like?
Speaker 2:Oh, that's so good. Look like oh, that's so good. So walking with him through that, that is awesome. Um, I feel like that's our our.
Speaker 2:My part two, or point two of my sermon was Cleopas walked away, and the reason why I walked away is he thought Jesus was going to redeem Israel. And so he's like I thought my life was going to get better. I might have a cabinet position, something would be better, I would no longer get bad taxes. And now here I am. It's not that great, um, and so I I think a lot of people are like that. They like the Christian vibe, they like the Christian people, but it doesn't impact their life until Jesus comes and actually meets with him. And that's when they believe, and then their hearts burn when the scriptures are open to them. Um, what? What do you think Holland for? Uh, you've dealt with a lot of people who don't believe and then you walk them through. If you're a walk through someone like hey, don't stop calling yourself a Christian. And then I want to say unconvert them or whatever, but, um, just help them to understand the reality. They were never saved in the first place.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah exactly, Um, a lot of did that a lot in young adult ministry here, and I think I've done that, continue to do that in ministry through church planting, and a lot of it is young adults, especially in my experience, who, yeah, maybe were raised in a Christian home or at least nominally Christian home.
Speaker 1:Of you know, we, we go to church, even if it's once or twice a year or something like that, but it's more of a cultural Christian type thing, Right. And then you know they do something that they feel is okay but isn't, and when you address that, I think it starts to unravel and gets exposed. And so for a lot of young adults it's moving in together, you know, while they're dating or something like that, and then we, you know, start having that conversation and deeper things get uncovered about, um, yeah, about where their heart is, what their understanding of scripture is and really their willingness to submit or their unwillingness to submit to scripture and going, okay, what does that reveal? Um, if this is God's word and uh, you know, here's the standard of um. If this is God's word and uh, you know, here's the standard of uh that God has called us to in this way, you know, flee sexual immorality, Right, and, uh, your unwillingness to do that. Okay, that's, that's revealing, that's exposing something, and so that's how a lot of the conversations have gone for me, yeah.
Speaker 2:And how do you um, especially when people are living in sin but saying they have a relationship with Jesus? I feel like that's the challenging part to confront. How does one lovingly confront a person at that spot? James, what do you think?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's good. It's most challenging if they don't have, if their conscience is seared, yeah, like they don't have. If their conscience is seared, yeah, like they don't have conviction, they don't have a desire to repent and turn away from that Right, that's when you might really start to question if they've believed in the first place.
Speaker 2:Right, right right.
Speaker 3:Because you don't want to lay on the grace and say, okay, hey, there's grace for you. It's not about your performance. So, just keep on doing what you're doing.
Speaker 2:And then you want and I think it's, I almost feel like it's, is it 1 Timothy 3 or 2 Timothy 3 where, like you, have a knowledge of God but you don't understand it's power, Like there's no power, and I feel like that's where a lot of people sort of struggle. Holl, I have the confrontation part for you. You've had to do that many, many times at least in the ministry here. Like what's your, I don't know, is there like a do you have to pump yourself up? Like I can do this? Or you know what I mean. Like I mean, how do you get, like, how do you get prepared for those kinds of conversations are just that challenging.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I, I pray and I trust the Lord with how it goes and I think I have realistic expectations that people are going to. Uh, there's going to be some who get angry and walk away and there's going to be some who feel the conviction of the Holy spirit and convert to Christ through it. And I've seen both of those and, um, it's I'm not going to say like I don't care at all. Uh like, if someone walks away, it's not like I don't care at all, I care about that person. But when you understand, there's a very real possibility they're going to hear this, get mad at you, call you legalistic, call you judgmental, you know. And then they're going to walk away and possibly slander you. And when you just kind of understand that, going in, you're not shocked when it happens.
Speaker 1:It's not that you don't care, it's just you're like yep, I knew that could happen.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and that's a healthy place where you're not responsible for the result, but your part is having the conversation, confronting them in love, and then what God does there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, faithfulness belongs to us, results belong to God, and so, uh, yeah, there's been some good ones, though, where we've had conversations like that, and people have been even some. Later. Man, I got a text message this is like a few months ago, um, at this point, but it was from someone that, um, I had confronted about that exact issue, like two years ago or something, maybe, and they got upset, Um, they left the church. That didn't say a word to me, you know. After that, and I just, you know it was a real like I cared about these people, you know, and I knew that was a possibility you have.
Speaker 1:You count the cost. You say, ok, it's worth addressing this, even if they leave. It's better to address this, to shepherd their heart, you know. And so, anyway, they, they, the couple, did leave, um, but two years later, um, the girl sent me a text message and said hey, I just want to let you know I'm sorry for the way that I responded to that. You were right, I was wrong. Thank you for loving me enough to tell me the truth. And I live in, you know, in this city now and I'm going to this church now.
Speaker 2:And I just wanted to say thank you.
Speaker 1:And I was like man that message.
Speaker 2:That means the world after.
Speaker 1:It's just so encouraging to know, like, yeah, it may be two years later that, um, you know that, that, that a decision is finally made to go. Okay, I need to repent, and but man, that's that's so worth it. It was worth having that conversation and then leaving our church for her to one day experience the conviction of the Holy spirit and turn. You know, you know what I mean. So that was beautiful.
Speaker 2:All right, let's wrap this up with, uh, something you're excited about and something that's challenging for you, that you're looking to navigate, uh, at Taylor Bible church.
Speaker 3:So we had a. We had a lot of folks that came for the first time this past Sunday, excited about seeing how those relationships progress, those, those folks come back. Something challenging we're doing a memorial service for a family and their daughter, adult daughter but still their daughter, 37 years old who passed away?
Speaker 2:Oh no, man so praying through that? Where is the daughter living? Was she in the area?
Speaker 3:She's in your neck of the woods. Actually she's in Schofield, oh wow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh man. Was yeah, yeah that's hard, golly, that's tough. Oh man, we'll be praying for that. That's huge. Okay, well, man, thanks for sharing that. That's rough. What about you, han? Something that you're excited about and then something you are challenged by there at Eastside Community Church?
Speaker 1:I'm excited I shared about the outreach earlier and that the apartments wanted to do more events with us and I think this is a big open door for us to be able to get a wider kind of reach in the community in terms of our outreach stuff, be able to do more events like that, our outreach stuff be able to do more events like that. So excited about the possibility of doing a summer kickoff outreach event or something like that there and just continuing to build relationships on the east side. That's good. Yeah, really looking forward to that. We have many struggles.
Speaker 2:How about one that our audience, which you know, reaches globally?
Speaker 1:we'll be able to be praying for you about Amazing Global listeners if you could pray, for I think the biggest need, the biggest need that our church has right now is in the area of leadership. Okay, that we I'm praying for some godly men to step up as elders who are committed not just to a year or a couple of years to be in the church and serve until they move on somewhere, but who have like a lifelong vision to serve the East side. And who? Who would you know that God would raise up some godly men to serve as elders for the long haul? And, ultimately, we'd love to be permanently established on the east side and be able to have a space of our own Right. And, yeah, praying that the Lord would provide that for us, that we could just so, 50 years, 100, 150 years from now, our church is still thriving, shining the light of Jesus, blessing the people of East Austin and honoring God. So that would be the big prayer request, okay love it.
Speaker 2:Hey, thanks so much for watching. Make sure that you, if you want to get involved, and make sure you text us and tell us when you are praying for Holland and James. We'll let them know. You can text us at 737-231-0605 or just go to PastorPleckcom. Leave your prayer or just leave a message or question. Anything you guys got to talk about faith, culture or anything in between. We would love to hear from you. Thanks so much for watching and listening from our house to yours. Have an awesome week of worship.