Setting the Table for Community in Stream/Game and Discord - Dalton Ruzicka & Andy Mage

Yes, I am Andy. I'm the creative pastor for Lux Digital Church. Um, and uh I am just I'm I'm good with tech. I'm good with creative and graphics and all those other things, but the guy next to me, Dalton, um he is a monster when it comes to community.

He is uh he's got that gifting and I I don't say that to blow smoke um in places. I actually truly believe that. Like it's it's a humbling thing.

When I first met Dalton um goodness almost two years ago now, right, at NCMS. Totally. Yeah. When I first met Dalton about two years ago, he um he was just a fun, happy, awesome dude.

And um he I was I was joining the team at Lux Digital Church. I had I had been in ministry for 13 or 14 years.

Up to that point, I was a worship pastor and then a digital pastor for in-person churches. And then God had moved it in me and really put it on Pastor Mark's heart to like extend a job.

And so I was going to come on staff and I had made that decision and we were praying through that and all that. And then Dalton actually had it put on his heart too.

And one of the things that God was saying to him, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, but it was, "Hey, go and do community. Go and do discipleship. Go and really help build out um the community of Lux behind the scenes and then get in front of the camera and really help people." And so, uh, we kind of wanted to talk about that.

Thank you for posting that level up. Uh, that is our that's Pastor Mark doing the hype train. Um, yeah, with the glasses and the really ugly Christmas sweater and his wife just like shaking her head at him.

Uh, it is like the best gift in the world. Um, but hey, so Dalton, first things first, like I I want to kind of back up like give me a little bit of your history and kind of introduce yourself to a waiting watching world right now.

For sure. So, what's up everybody on Twitch, everybody in Discord, everybody in YouTube, all the people that will see this down the road.

Man, I'm so pumped you joined us for such an awesome conference. Can we get some fives in chat for everybody that's helped put this on because this has been awesome.

It's been amazing and I've been blessed to be a part of it. But today I want to introduce myself. I am Pastor Dalton Drewzy, whatever you want to call me.

You could call me your favorite goob. Whatever it is, I'm so glad to be hanging out with you. Uh I am a husband of 13 years, a dad of four kids, 12 to three.

Three is my sour patch kid. She's the one that we weren't necessarily planning but was crazy. But all those things. What'd you say?

I said the oopsie.

Yeah. Yeah, that's right. Uh I grew up all over the country. I grew up in so many that would take all all the things.

Uh but I grew up in seven states, 13 schools all over the states. Uh just out of that came a love for people and a love for a lot of different passions which helps me a lot in my job.

Uh but I yeah I've been in ministry for 14 15 16 something years somewhere in there. Uh youth ministry, camp ministry, sports ministry, children's ministry, nextgen ministry, and now digital ministry for the last two years.

So, been a ton of fun. Do a lot of graphic design stuff on the side. Uh but yeah, really, really, really enjoy community and discipleship.

So, walk us through a little bit what you actually do at Lux right now. Um because we've we've we've uh What is it you actually do around here?

Uh no. Um you know, we've talked we've talked about finding our one. We've talked about kind of how to how to measure if we're actually finding our one.

But but what we're gonna kind of get into today in this talk right here is how to actually take the one and guide them into a space with other ones with other people that are your one with other people that are actually promoting and providing community.

But let's back up a little bit. What do you do at Lux right now?

Um my job at Lux is the community and discipleship pastor at Lux.

So, I was was going through the process of stepping out of youth ministry cuz I felt like that time was ending. And I started walking with Pastor Mark Lux, our lead pastor, um with the potential of planting my own church.

Long story short, I found a spot actually at Lux doing what I'm doing now as a intern volunteer loving the community side and the discipleship side of Lux.

Not that they weren't doing any of that before because they 100% were. It's actually why I fell in love with it because of how stripped down and simple it was and I just like loved that.

I just I don't know if you've ever been in a ministry where you really feel like that sandbox was just designed for you. Oh man, Lux was that for me.

So my role is I oversee everything that's discipleship focused. Obviously both Andy and Mark uh all have a say in that too because we work very closely as a team, but small groups is a big area of our church.

It falls under my leadership at Lux, but also anything dealing with community. So, a lot of the hosting stuff uh and the uh table setting obviously we're going to talk a lot about here, but all of the things that not only bring people into our server and into Twitch, uh like community events,

things like that. Um, but also the connecting points of throughout the week like our co-working and you name it. Like I'm kind of over a slew of things help with graphic design stuff here and there too to help out Andy.

But yeah, it's it's a ton of fun over our kids ministry which we just launched. I could talk about that later too, but yeah, a ton of stuff.

Yeah, Dalton has become quickly Dalton and I have been thick kind of thick as thieves over the last year or so. Uh, really as we've started to kind of find a good cool groove.

Um, now you mentioned table setters and I want to back up to that. Um, I think a lot of people think setting a table is just like cool, I'm having people over for dinner, but when you actually distill down who your one is, you need to set the table for them.

Can you kind of walk us through like your thought process behind that, the history behind that, and like what what you're trying to do in Lux with setting tables.

Yeah, I love that, man. So the idea of table setter kind of came out of and it's a term that anybody that's been in the church, you know, you've heard a bajillion ser, we're actually preaching through a sermon right now, a place at the table, right?

Um and and the the idea of tables is totally common to everybody in the church world for the most part. If you haven't heard that, I want you to hear it cuz I think it is one of the most efficient ways to think about what we're going to be talking about today.

Maybe efficient isn't the right word, but effective, right? So table setting for us in Lux is the context of relationships, right? It's this idea that discipleship starts with relationship.

It's belonging before belief, right? And a big part of that is finding out my job is to help find out what people are passionate about.

Help them not only walk in that as a Christian, which is super important. This applies to all of us. Whether you like board games, art, motorcycles, whatever it is, God has placed you in a place with passions and exciting things that you get you pumped in the middle of the night, in the

morning that help you start your day. And then it's taking that a step further and saying, "What about, you know, how does Jesus fit into this?" Like, how does Jesus not just fit, but how does Jesus drive and put this passion on your heart?

and how can you use this when it comes to the great commission and walking with people in their faith. So for me, a lot of that table setting mindset is finding people in what they're passionate about, helping them realize that God wants to use that in his kingdom, and then finding a place

or helping them create a place within our context, us being a digital church, and saying, "Hey, you know what? I think you could use that gift to not only love, serve, and care for people, but also point them to Jesus." And it's amazing how many of those people are like, "Man, I don't

know how to talk to people about the gospel. Like, I know what the gospel means to me." But like over time, as you walk with them as a leader, you start to help them realize where Halo and getting kills and hearing, you know, all the different things can transition into gospel conversations and

that's been a really awesome part of my job.

Yeah. Um the the interesting thing that when you start to talk about tables in community, I think a lot of people think that man, it's going to be a lot of work to start a community.

It's going to be a lot of work to um to really get something like that off the ground like oh it's easy for Lux because you've got a server full of people and all that.

You know, Drewzy just kind of dropped in. Yeah. You know, you've got all this other stuff. So um if I am a solo streamer or I'm just creating content on TikTok right now and I am looking at trying to in institute this like what's my first step man like how how do

I even take that first step?

I love that. So my my career in the digital space did not start at Lux. So back in COVID back in the great blip as we call it right like the the snap moment so to say.

Uh yeah, I I love League of Legends. If you know anything about me, League of Legends is my jam. I have a embarrassingly amount of time in that game.

Uh it's the greatest game to me ever. I'm a competitive person. But during COVID, I was a youth pastor and I took some time off of youth ministry because our church had slowed down it.

Not time off, but rather I I the the normal schedule I had drastically changed. So, I still was reaching my students, still loving them, serving them, but I also just found myself with so much time.

And I was like, man, I love gaming. What if I did something with this? We've all asked ourselves this, right? Like, it's why you're here.

Like, what if I did something? God put it on our heart. Why Why don't I do something with this passion that I have for gaming?

There's so many people that need Jesus. What if I use this? Right? So, long story short, I I ended up starting a server for League of Legends that wasn't a Christian server.

It was called LOL Midwest. It's still a thing. It's totally different than we ran it and we've handed off leadership since then. But man, it was such a blessing because me and another guy, Zeke, who who I kind of came alongside and helped him build this thing, it became this place where we

all came together around something common, a game, and we talked about this idea of belonging. And in that conversation, as we started to invite people in with us and find people that were passionate about this thing with us, we started tapping them on the shoulder and saying, "Hey, uh, what if you helped

us do this, right? Cuz I I can't do this all by myself." That's where it first starts, right? Is that like you're a streamer by yourself.

You're like, "I don't know how to build something like this." Well, you have viewers that watch you consistently. Get to know them, care about them, love them, see what's going on in their life, and have a conversation with them that says, "Hey, you know what?

I got this table that I've been wanting to do. I need help. Would you join me in that?" So, that's kind of where it started for me was like asking somebody that had already been very involved in our server and I tapped them on the shoulder and said, "Hey, you know what?

I need your help. Would you help me in that?" And then, yeah, we we walked alongside them, trained them how to do things. And the same thing happens at Lux.

I can't be all things to all people, but Jesus has called me to do something really specific. And God has asked you to do something specific.

You just may not know it yet. So, I want to tap you on the shoulder and just encourage you, man. What are you doing for the kingdom?

How can you use your gifts? Yeah, I love that. Um, so I'm sharing the link to our kind of workbook spreadsheet doc in there. And um we're going to take just a minute, a minute. We're not going to take five minutes in between each question, but I want while everything is fresh right now, um by the way, the music button, just use the m, just use the unmute music, man. I'm telling you, like it makes everything better. It's just down there. If you're on mobile, I think it's still down there as well. And you get that blaring like um but take a second and answer that first question. Where is your community gathering right now? You know, for Jersey it was it was League of Legends, which, you know, might be a blight on humanity, but, you know, he was trying to redeem it for the kingdom. Um, where is your community gathering? Where what what are they doing right now? We're going to move into the relationships piece in a second, but right now, just take a minute. Just take one minute right now and answer. Where's your community gathering? I'm going to hit the music button. Drewzy, you can hit the music button if you want to. There we go.

Yeah.

I pretended that I pressed it.

I know. I saw that. That was that was quite clever. You're you're you're really good at this whole stream. Maybe you're an entertainer from North Hill. Maybe. Yeah, maybe that's what it is.

I was trying to figure out what I was. That was good.

I don't think entertainer. I watched you play Mega Bonk last night and uh it was fine. You did good. Uh but you know, you weren't like I'm too serious to be a Yeah. You weren't like you weren't Susie like putting on a penguin suit when you got co Some of us are Discord people. Some of us are Twitch people.

I know. That's fine. That's Hey, there's nothing wrong with it. That's That's why we do drop in because you get to you get to stretch those legs just a little bit. By the way, hello to Jade live. Jade's going to be coming up uh in a little bit as well.

Uh Jade got 85K on on a run.

That's awesome, man. Jade's crack, though. Jade Jade is a Jade is the consummate entertainer. That's the thing.

Jade's the gamer.

Yeah. All right. Uh come on back. We just uh we just riff for a minute or two while I had music in the background. Um but where's your community gathering right now is the thing. Um, yeah. What's kind of the next step then? You identify where your community is. Um, you identify kind of a place that you might want to gather them, be it on Discord or be it like, and this is from me to everybody here, like don't tell anybody this, but like I've been trying to crack the code of how to asynchronously uh gather people that from other platforms that are not, you know, Twitch and Discord. I've been trying to figure crack the code on how to gather people from YouTube and Instagram and Tik Tok and there's no good way yet. If you know of anything like DM me because I would love to like maybe start a conversation here because there's a there's enormous potential for all of that. But in the meantime, you know, trying to shift people where the community actually is right now. What's the next step? Uh we talk about kind of relationships being the basis for everything. What is the next step in establishing that community? Yeah, I think you have to ask yourself a question, right? Like before you go live, you know, what what's your purpose? And we've talked a lot about that today already, right? Like why are you streaming? And I think the question is like what if your Discord or your Twitch stream could be someone's first experience with Jesus? And as you're walking in that, you start to build relationships with people because you're here for whatever reason God's put on your heart. And a lot of us are here talking about this idea of discipleship which comes through relationships. So as we're building relationships then we have to start asking us and and I've already seen it in chat to what makes sense for the platform I'm on right like Lux Digital Church is on Twitch. Discord is such a natural place for us to do community. Twitch is not community necessarily. We throw that term out because we're gathered around things. You could have great conversations on Twitch. You could have a lot of things. You could check in on people. But man, the relationships that I find Jesus wants us to have are so much more than just that Sunday morning relationship. The the three times you stream a week relationships, right? So, you may not be a Discord person. You may not be a community person, but there are people that God is going to bring to you that will be and for Lux, I guess that was me in a lot of cases, but like there will be somebody in your group that will be connectors and community builders. So, you have to have a place for them to do that, right? Like, and and your Twitch chat is not that really like there's a lot of great relational stuff that happens. I love when we do services and you see everybody checking back in with each other that maybe don't catch up with each other. It's one of my favorite parts of our service. However, those relationships carry over into Discord and go deeper than Twitch could ever offer. So for you, no matter what platform you're on, you have to find what is the co- co- uh place for it. Your third place that's connected to that method of of going live, so to say, of reaching the stage is very much the outward like light in the dark place. So now like you're drawing them in. So now where are you drawing them into? And you have to answer that really for you and the platform you're on, right? So for us, Twitch, Discord, man, that is a beautiful marriage and I'm grateful for that. May not be around forever, but right now God is really using that space for many of us, right? But if you're on YouTube, what is that? If you're on Tik Tok, what is that? Facebook even. I saw that as something, you know, I've watched maybe a handful of Facebook gaming things throughout my life. One of them led me to the LOL Midwest server, so that was clearly a God thing, dude, cuz I never watch Facebook live. Wow. Uh, but you know, God could use a lot of different things. WhatsApp is a great example of of a place. You know, I think there are certain things that are more billboards. We talk about this a lot. Chino's really good about talking about this. And there's certain places that are the communal spaces. So, you really have to weigh out what's a billboard for talking about community and tables and what's a place where we actually can set tables. So, for us, this Discord just makes so much sense, but it fits with our platform. So that's kind of where we're at. Where is your community gathering at? That's the question for us.

So did you ask that next question going further? I I wanted to I wanted to lean into the relationship piece. So just sh before we get to recruitment, you like I said at the very beginning of this, you're a relationship monster. Uh, and I think a lot of times people that are very process-oriented like me, u, people also that are kind of introverted like me, and I think a lot of us online are um, totally we're in we're introverted extroverts. Like that's what I am. I'm an introverted extrovert. I think you're you're a straightup extrovert. So you have no introvert qualities to you whatsoever. Maybe occasionally like you need to go sleep in a corner, but by and large like I've been on trips with you. I've been with you online. Like you could just talk to people all day. Like that fills you up.

Can't shut me up. Yeah.

Uh, yeah. Jade, same thing. Like I I'm an extroverted introvert though. Like I love being around people, but they're at a certain point it's like listen, I got to go pump my brakes.

For people for people in that vein, having relationships is tough. Uh and I'm not talking like marriage relationships. Forming relationships and forming bonds is tough. And then letting those bonds kind of uh work into the mission field and work into table setting. Um how do how do you form those relationships, especially when you're looking at community building, especially when you're looking at your one? Like what do you have any tips or any go-tos for for everyone?

No, that's good. Let's start talking about so say I meet somebody new at Lux and um I'm sitting with them and maybe in a group or maybe it's one-on-one. It really doesn't matter to me. Um my job is to not make it about me. Um I think that is one of the hardest things for all of us is that we want to talk about ourselves, but I think the important thing is every single day we have to fight the flesh that we have, right? We that man in the mirror moment where that's all we want to focus on. But God has called us to something so much different when we walk with Christ, right? He asks us to look up to what God has for us, that vertical moment, and to look to the sides, not so much that guy in the mirror. So when when I'm sitting at a table with somebody, I really want to get to know them. And the beauty of this is they want to talk about themselves most of the time, right? Even the most introverted introvert man I just start prodding and asking questions in a healthy way of not I'm not like hey man tell me about yourself right but like I'm I'm asking questions that that I know can draw out things in their life you know what are your hobbies in our space man it is so we have it easy in so many way guys guys like all we have to do is hey what's your favorite game that tells you so much about someone right and even then like in Discord we we get to people even in our gaming space of a church where they don't like games. That's okay. Like, what are you into? And use that as a launching pad for something. However, I want you to be intentional. I'm super ADHD and I could no matter how much Chino says I'm obese at this, I could care a lot about myself and I could wait to try to say something for what's coming next, right? I could be listening, but it just go from one ear to the next. So, what I've really started doing online especially is try to be on camera myself, even if they aren't. And I try to listen and take notes as they're speaking. Discord has an amazing feature, rightclick, edit note. I take notes on people all the time. If you if you are on my account, if I showed you your profile, you probably have a note. Some people may say that's weird. But what I say is it's intentional because Jesus loves this person so much and I want to care for them just as much. So, I'm meeting so many people daily and I know you are too in your space. You need to remember things about people to be intentional with them. So, I want to know like, hey, are they in a relationship? What job do they have? Like, what are they passionate about? What are their favorite games? How do we connect? I I start taking notes on those things so I could call them back next time I see them in a chat and they're sitting by themselves like, "Oh yeah, this guy really likes Halo and man, he really I've been saying Halo a lot. Our community is really big on Halo right now, but like this guy really likes this thing, this person, this uh really likes this thing and and they're in this stage of life and they're looking for this. And then I could call back to it and I could ask them about it. And even further, I could ask them, "Hey, how can I be praying for you?" And then I take that down and then ask them how that went, right? Like it's just simple tiny intentional things that you could do that could help you set tables. You start to build relationships. So, you start to train other people to do those same things and it'll change your space in ways that you can never imagine.

It's it's a simple intentional thing, but it shows so much care and love for that person and they feel it as long as you're being intentional with it. You're not just doing it for statistics or whatever.

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Uh we want to take a second. We want to answer that question in your spreadsheet as well. Take a second. Um what do your current relationships look like? Are you just kind of scattering them to the wind? Are you just kind of hoping that God is going to drop a a positive relationship that you can then build a community around?

Are you actually investing in the mission field? Like what is your level? You can give yourself a 1 to 10 grade. This is not to be scathing. Nobody else is going to um nobody else is going to see this. But answer that question. What do your current relationships look like? Are they healthy?

Are they unhealthy? Are they non-existent? I mean, I I know in my life like they're fairly healthy most of the time, only if I invest the time. But if I if I don't let them invest or if I don't invest them over the span of weeks and months, they start to crumble.

So, take a second, turn the music on, and uh uh go answer that question. Also, I while you're doing that, I will show off my iPhone 17 Pro Max. You've got yours.

No, bro. I tried the small one. And yeah, you've got yours, too. Um but I've got mine in the halo case.

Yeah, it's beautiful. I love it. Master Chief has aition. It has a

Yeah, it's not Master Chief. It's Mr. Chief. This is my Mr. Chief. Yeah. I just don't feel like

Yeah. You just don't feel like calling your phone master. Though sometimes that'll preach as a youth pastor does master you.

This is master right here. I am a M fan. Not orange and green. Get out of here. I'm a Michigan fan.

Yeah. Yeah. I flat cap. I think the 31272 is really important, right? Like when when you're thinking about your teams, when you're thinking about who you are, all of those things. I think that's important. You know, one of the things, sorry to keep talking as people are are working through things, but one of the things I think that is great feedback that's encouraging to me a lot is that our staff is very just ground level with our people.

And you as a streamer, it could be very easy as you're building teams to step out of the relationship side of things to let your teams handle it. Don't ever lose that. Don't ever lose being on ground level with your people in the internet and online and in the digital spaces. We have to be better at relationships than any other place.

I really believe that with all my heart. Like to connect with people, be on the ground. Get your knees and hands digitally dirty, right? Like you have to be there with your team doing it with your team. So don't forget that.

Yeah, that's good. Uh Tope, never been in a Discord conference before. Loving this. Yeah. Flat cap saying, "We've never done it either." Yeah, this is all first time. We're all just trying stuff. It's been great.

We're all new to this.

Yeah, we're this is this is all all all a brand new thing. Um, I want to move on. So, uh, the the interesting thing that then starts to happen, uh, and you can, if you can see the spreadsheet, you know where I'm going with this, that big ugly rword, recruitment.

Mhm.

So, you've figured out where your community is gathering. You've now identified where you possibly want to move them. Hopefully, maybe probably want to try to gather your community. You've got a couple of key relationships that you're forming. you're seeing, you know, first- time chatters, first- time guests coming in uh to your streams.

You're seeing your view count go up. You're, you know, hopefully everything is up and to the right.

Yeah.

But then you hit that wall because you're trying to do everything yourself. You're trying to connect to everybody yourself. You're running out of time. You're running out of hours. You're running out of patience. Um I know when I have connected too much and not withdrawn enough into myself. Um and uh Dalton and Mark have heard this, but I have a I have a give a crap meter. my give a crap meter goes to zero and I get real cynical real quick.

Uh and you know for me that is I've just been operating on empty. You're operating and you're you're trying to do things and it's not really working and that's where recruitment comes in. Um Dalton, talk to me about recruitment is in in Lux right now. How how what's your process? How how do you go about doing things in Lux?

Yeah, I'm you're just going to keep hearing it from me. Relationships, right? So, I've built I mean, it's

stream over.

Yeah, it just streams done. Um, yeah, you could ask Level Up. Level Up says he just asked them to do it. This is true. No, no, no. This is absolutely true. But what LevelUp also knows is it's because we built a relationship, right? Like, it's because I've sat with people.

I mean, the digital space is so about time.

If if you want to do ministry well here in the digital space, it's about time. And I'm not always saying time as in like you have to be here 80 hours a week, but it has to be intentional, right?

So I I've spent time with our people. Actually, I was just telling somebody the other day that for the first time in my ministry ever, finding volunteers isn't a drudging experience online. There are people that are screaming to be a part of what God is doing.

Screaming. And you're either not listening or you're not seeking it out, right? You're not sitting with people. And my experience is, man, when I sit with somebody and I start to talk to them and I start to be see what's their passionate about.

I start to see who they are and where they're at with their walk with Jesus, you know, I start to see like, man, this person would be great fit for here. And I believe it's my part as a shepherd. Now, yes, we're in a church setting, but even for you, right? Like there's a part of shephering that God has called you to, right?

Second Corinthians says that you are an ambassador for Christ, right? So you you are an ambassador for Christ in the space you're in. And that means that that sometimes you get to speak awesome amazing things into people's lives and you get to ask them to do things that stretch themselves and and step out of their comfort zone. So for you as you're talking and building relationships with people, it's about tapping shoulders and saying, you know what, hey, I I have this thing like I would I would love for you to be a part of it.

I I I am doing it right now, but to to be honest, if I want to do this other thing really well, I need somebody to help me in this. Would you be willing to do that? And my experience is man so much. Dr. Level Up posted, he just asks earlier. And that's true because at our church, we've we've got a lot of people right now in the current situation here in the United States that are struggling financially.

And in that, I've heard a lot of feedback from our community of like, man, I just don't know what to do. Now, Level Up, I know, is somebody that's really good with his finances. So, I I messaged him the other day and I just said, "Hey, bro, like you're you're really good with this concept of biblical finances and you're really good at this area. Would you and your wife consider praying and joining me in leading a small group?" Now, he's said yes to that. Or at least it's a 90%.

I don't want to put him on the spot here right now.

No, he said yes. It's 100% right now.

100% right now. It's on the internet. It's recorded. Done. Right. We're doing it. He says, "Awesome. peer pressure, but it's it's the relationship that Level Up and his wife, Lady Level Up, I we've built, right?

That we know each other's heart. He knows that I care for him, but he also knows that like when I ask him something, there's this accountability of like stretching each other and that we need each other to to do this. And you have to open yourself up to being stretched by the people you're talking to to, right? You're not you're not the the commander dictator in this situation.

When you ask people to join you in this, you give up part of that and it may change a little bit of what the dream was for you. Doesn't mean that it changes the mission and vision, but it may do things a little bit differently. And there's some of that humbling yourself and realizing, man, the body is better when when it's not just me running everything.

Um, I want to Yeah, it helps me. Um, you know, and this is not just for table setters and communities. This is not just for, you know, small group leaders. This is for mods. This is for people that you want to come bring onto your content team. This is like an all that that that relationship piece is an all-encompassing thing to ministry.

And one of the things I have struggled with uh a lot and born again, I want to I want to get to your your statement there in a second because you just spurred this on. One of the things I have struggled with is because I am an extrovert and introvert and a lot of the times I see the energy outlay of trying to form a relationship and talk to somebody.

It's like, man, I just rather do this myself. Like, I can get this done. And that's when I'm stretched. That's when my energy depletes. That's when my give a crap meter goes to zero. That's when I get very cynical and very angry and I want to quit and give up.

And Born Again said, "I need to see how to gauge people's skills. I put out a few requests to my most dedicated viewers and participants and like all of them said no thanks. Uh some of them thought now I could never do that. Insert some negative selft talk here. I think I think that's a common thing in ministry too, right?

Like if we're if we're and this is not calling you out born again cuz like I'm right there with you, but a lot of the times I'll ask somebody to do something. Not a lot. Sometimes I'll ask people to do something and it's like I didn't really have the best relationship with them or it was just kind of like a a handshake agreement that you do your thing and I'll do my thing and then they say no.

the negative selft talk thing that is that's that's a that's a disciplehip thing that you can definitely invest in but Dton how how would you kind of get around that part the the the people saying no thanks

so we have a lady right now in our church I won't use her name she wouldn't care anyways just yeah I'm not going to use her name but I actually talked to her we we've been needing more small group leaders because our small group ministry has been growing and that's exciting right we talked about stats in the last session and our our stats are are going really well because God is growing things and that's exciting. Like, praise God for that. But with that, we need more table setters that are small group leaders, right?

So, I actually uh asked one of the ladies at our church that I have a really good relationship with her and her husband and I said, "Hey, would you think about this?" And at that time, she was like, "I'm not ready for that yet." And that's that's great. That's one of the things like you have to be okay with asking and people saying, "Not yet or never." and you have to pray about it and you have to maybe give it time to ask them again later, but you have to be okay with that.

Now, this person, I said, "Hey, that's great. Can I still ask you to pray about it for maybe a different season?" A month later, they came back and they're like, "You know what? I think I want to do the volunteer training, but I'm not sure if I still want to do this yet." I said, "Hey, you know what?

Can I ask you something? Can I put you with another leader rather than lead it by yourself? Can I put you with another leader like a baby step in this process and see what you think about it?

And now like they've already led groups several times on their own like God is doing really awesome things through them and they're so pivotal at our church.

But it does take time throughout all this process. Some people are going to be ready to jump in right there, right then and do all the things and do them far better than you would ever do them.

But some people are going to need you or someone else to walk with them in the process. And you have to be okay with that.

And you have to realize that sometimes when you hand things off to people, it's going to be messier than the way you would have done it.

But overall, if we're walking with them in relationship, they will grow in their role and they will get better. And man, my prayer is that they get better than I ever would have been in that, because that's what's best for the kingdom, right? Like when we're all using our gifts, we're all in together, man. It creates something really beautiful.

So it takes time and it just takes you walking with people at the different stages. Just like you and me are at different stages in our faith.

There are people at different stages in their willingness to serve and readiness to serve.

Um, another question. That's a good question. How about the people who are asking to help out and I get the sense they aren't mature enough? What do you do in that situation?

Love that. So we actually have a lot of that too right at Lux. And I think a big part of that really clears up for what it means to be on a team in your context.

I think a lot of times upfront we use a form that has a lot of spiritual questions, maturity questions and expectations of our team.

We also have some videos that go into training. Super easy for y'all. Um, to some extent, so many of you are great at content, man.

What would it be like for you to take an afternoon, sit down and make a five minute video with you and maybe one of your awesome mods or something and just say, "Hey, this is what it means to be a mod for Jade Live," right?

I'll throw Jade's name out there, right? Like what if you created some quick content that helps train your mods, your Discord community, leaders, your insert, whatever platform you're on.

What if you added some things, some processes up front that show people really clearly what it means to be on your team and then follow up with some conversations?

For us, we actually have some high-level volunteers that actually once you go through the initial form process, they meet with them for several weeks and we pretty much find right away if they're the people that want to be on our team.

Like we make it not hard but we make it a process where you really kind of shave off if they really want to be a part of this because man this matters.

This is intentional. These are people's lives and this is the kingdom, right? Like there are positions at our church in our ministry that are easier to get into and there are positions that are harder for you.

You're going to have team members. Maybe an admin role is not somebody you just need to give to somebody, right? Like they have control of things you don't want them to have control of.

If they're just some Joe Schmo, right, that comes in and wants to serve. But maybe you have a different thing. Maybe it's somebody that just does clips for you for your Twitch stream.

They sit in chat. They're there all the time. And you're like, "Hey, you know what? Could you start here?" And then watch them in that process.

Give pointers to them. If they don't take feedback, well, maybe there's a discipleship conversation, a leadership conversation that needs to happen that either can help them grow or help them figure out and self-select to be off your team.

Very, very little amount of times at Lux do one of us pastors or leaders at our church have to really turn somebody away, but it's more of like giving them space to see whatever God is doing in that role and seeing if they want to self-select in or out.

Yeah, that's great. Um, we got a lot of great questions coming in. We've only got a few minutes left. Um, I do want to ask you, I want to ask no, no, no.

This has been awesome. Um, we, uh, if you have more questions, stuff, you can always DM uh, Drewzy. Uh, but you can also jump into the Lux server, but you can also hang out here.

We have a room that uh, Drewzie can go hang out in in a little bit. Um, there's two other questions. What do you do with people that want to join the team uh, who are only focused on positions like preaching is one.

And then the second one from Blessed Tim. What if your regulars are not believers? And that's the one I want to hit on right now.

What if your regulars are not believers? What if your community right now is a non-believing community and yet you want to train people how to speak about Jesus in a good way?

What do you do then?

Yeah, I think that takes if we're going to talk about that second question that takes a lot of intentionality on your part.

We do experience that a little bit at Lux. We are very upfront that we are a digital church. So we get a lot less of that than you may.

So let's specifically talk about your situation rather than ours because even in our situation we have available options for them to join certain things.

However, there are just roles that you have to be a believer in and we're very clear about that because like small group leaders especially we have a tier of like maturity in your faith kind of volunteer roles for you in your context.

I think it really matters if somebody comes to you and they talk to you and they want to serve and they're really dedicated and they know who you are and they know where you're at with your faith and they're been open.

They you've gotten to know them. You've built a relationship with them. They're open about where they're at. I think it really matters of what they're wanting to do with your teams and I think you really need to pray and discern about that, right?

Like there is not always a perfect position for everyone. And sometimes you create a position because you're like, man, didn't even know I needed this, but this person fits it.

However, I think for a non-believer to come onto your team, I also think you as a leader need to really think about putting them with somebody that's going to walk with them and disciple them if you can't or you need to step into that role to walk with them and do life with them regularly and talk a lot about faith with them and be open from the very front that here's our goals and our missions, right?

Like don't water down what you're doing to try to change something in order to make them feel comfortable on the team. Be open and honest about what God has called you to and talk to them in that process.

Now, also once again, think about where they're at, right? Think about the influence they have. Think about the roles they have and where that meshes with the mission and vision of what you're doing.

Yeah. Yeah. That's great. Um, we're going to obviously you have this uh spreadsheet with you. Um, and uh that last question is not something that we want you to answer right now.

Maybe invite three Christians to join you in your ministry. Recruit your friends to join you. Absolutely. Like that's perfect for Joy. By the way, Joy coming all the way from India.

Has no clue about Discord. We're going to scare Georgia by putting fives in chat for Joy right now. Uh, everybody throw a five in chat for Joy.

Yep. That just means we're clapping. We're giving you high fives. We're doing the whole thing. Thanks for joining us all the way from India trying to reach into different cultures and different uh literally ninety-nine percent is what they said uh are unbelievers and into different religions, faith practices, all the things.

That last question on that spreadsheet is what could be your first table? And this is not something that I personally want you to answer right now.

Maybe something has sparked from this conversation. You go, okay, cool. I know where they're gathering. I've got a couple of relationships. I think I know how I can plug them in.

And you know, tables could be your greeters, it could be your mods, it could be your small group leaders, it could be, you know, people that are gaming and helping with, you know, Bible study and sending texts and sending DM.

You know, get creative in all that. God's a creative God and he made us to be creative people as well. But I think more than that, you need to spend some time praying and thinking about your mission field and really mulling over what is your what could be your first table.

What could be your first. Dream dream big and then, you know, you can start to take some steps into it, but dream. Like for example, if like Drewzy was dreaming, his first table was really a League of Legends thing.

And I'm sure Drewzy didn't set out playing League of watching that stupid video on Facebook. Uh maybe it wasn't stupid, but it most videos on Facebook are stupid.

Watching a video on Facebook and saying like, "I'm going to set my table there." But instead, he was dreaming big. He kind of backed up into that and went, "Okay, no, no.

I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this." We have uh if I mean clapping, absolutely. Um, we have an enormous potential with everything.

All the content that we're creating, all of the people that we're reaching, non-believers and believers alike, we have an enormous potential and it's going to take you and your kind of God-given mission to go out and set a table for people so that they can actually join you at the seat with your Lord and Savior Jesus.

Um, Drewzy, anything else before we uh before we close up shop here?

No, I think I think that other question I just want to speak to this real quick.

A question about uh somebody that's seeking a lot of power.

Um man, Lux, we have this thing called yes, ban them. No, not at all.

Uh we've had this conversation a lot with a lot of people. We have a standard of guides verse heroes. It's something Pastor Mark put in as a culture thing at Lux very early on that just as Jesus came to serve, we also have served.

So like we also are here to serve, right? So I think having a culture of servanthood is important and when people want to come in and be a leader right away rather than a servant, they don't get your culture if you've built it right.

So encourage servanthood over stage time and you'll see God really bless that. We'll keep it super simple, but in our experience when we have conversations and they're seeking power over servanthood, they're probably not a person that needs to be in a leadership role anytime soon.

Doesn't mean we won't add them to a team, but we want them to understand the culture and more importantly, not our culture. We want them to understand kingdom culture.

So, that's kind of where I would go with that.

Yeah, Drewzy, thank you, man. Uh, five chat for Dalton for absolutely crushing it.

Um, if you do have questions, he's a DM away. Um, he'll be hanging out a little bit as well. Um, but man, I I'm so honored that we get to serve with you.

Um, I'm going to throw you back into the audience here. Uh, but thanks so much, man. Thanks for your wisdom.

Stage dive.

Love you guys. Okay.