EP185: Tom Pounder & Encouraging a Digital Missionary

Hey, we got a great conversation set up with you, but by the way, remember here with season five we're highlighting the crazies, the innovators, the people who are thinking outside of the box. And it's a pleasure for me in this conversation to connect you to, introduce you to, welcome back a good friend of mine, a great friend of mine who honestly I just met for the first time couple weeks ago. Tom Pounder is a digital pastor, student pastor, a pastor extraordinaire at New Life Church in the Washington DC area. And one of Exponential's regional conferences, the one in Washington DC obviously, was held at New Life Church. And even though I have known Tom Pounder and consider him among my friends for the past years, I think the first time I probably met him was 2017, maybe 2018.

I've known the guy for a while. We have developed a great relationship together, and it's all been digital. And so we even joke about and talk about it here in the show, but it's important to notice that there was a friendship that was developed in digital space that went for at least three years before we were actually able to connect together at the physical level. And it is awesome for me to bring in Tom Pounder into a conversation where we're highlighting people who are thinking outside the box, people who are innovators in this digital church space. If only to start to talk about what Tom is thinking in context of a digital missionary. Now, what does a digital missionary mean? What does that look like? How do we equip people and train people? Is the digital really a mission field? And what are some inherent challenges maybe that come up looking at digital as such?

Yeah, this is really what we start to scratch the surface on, and there is so much more conversation that needs to be had as we will continue in later episodes to explore this idea of a digital missionary. So here's what I'm doing for the conversation. I'm bringing in Tom Pounder, like I said, digital pastor at New Life Christian Church. And by the way, phenomenal resources through YM Sidekick, through Digital Boot Camp. My gosh, if you're not tracking with Tom Pounder, you really need to. We're also bringing into the conversation myself, hey, it's Jeff from the Church Digital and with Stadia Church Planting, in a conversation that I'm simply calling here, "Releasing Digital Missionaries."

Okay, everybody, here you go, man. I'm looking forward to talking about a digital missionary, and I've seen Tom, you know, you and I have had a conversation on this years ago talking about maybe what a digital missionary can be. And I've seen you in recent months really start to hone back in on that language of a digital missionary. And so I wanted to bring you back on the podcast here and just, you know, have a conversation. What is a digital missionary? What's it look like? How can we, the church, how can we start to explore in this space? So, man, thanks for coming back and jumping on the show.

Hey, again, as always, thanks for having me. I'm very appreciative, and you've been very kind. And so, um, and I value our friendship as well. So this, I'm really excited about this. I'm gonna get all teary-eyed. That was beautiful.

Hey, so let's talk. You know, we've used the phrase here a couple times, "digital missionary." Um, as I literally just get an email from Tom Pounder, and while I'm doing this, it just beeped. Your newsletter on Friday just hit my inbox. Well done. Talk to me. What is a digital missionary? What, when you use this phrase, like what does that mean? What are you envisioning?

Yeah, so I mean, again, I think it's very simple, but I think we don't ever look at digital as a missionary opportunity. I mean, you think back to Matthew 28:19 and 20. Jesus says, "Go and make disciples of all nations." And for the longest time, we were literally physically going to make disciples of all nations, going to different countries all over the world. We have to spend months of preparation, months of language understanding, and all that kind of stuff. But now with the development of the smartphone, we have that opportunity where at any moment in time I can be talking to someone right next to me, or I can be talking to someone clear across the world. And again, I think when we think about digital, when we think about social media, we often think about the fun stuff. And of course, there's controversies that happen on social media and everything like that as well. But I've really over the past few years, and in particular since COVID, just viewed it as a missionary opportunity. People are on their phone. You know, I used to work with Young Life, and Jim Rayburn, the founder of Young Life, had this phrase: "Go where they are." You know, you want to meet teenagers? Well, go where they are. And so my philosophy is I want to meet people, and I want to meet people online and tell them about Jesus. So I go on my phone and I go get on Twitter. I love Twitter. Um, and I'm on Twitter all the time. But you can go on Facebook, you can go on Instagram, you can go on TikTok, and become a digital missionary and share about Jesus in a lot of creative ways.

That's beautiful. Are you, you know, and you've had a mix in your career of digital pastor, of student pastor, and going back and forth in that. Have you, do you have examples? Have you seen where people, stories maybe, where people are buying into this digital missionary idea? Stories of people responding to what I'm doing or people who are being trained up to do it? Maybe both, either or?

Well, I know again, you know him very well, and I just know him a little bit, but Tyler Sansom is really honed in on this digital missionary stuff and really using it as opportunities to use his music ability, his singing ability to share about Jesus. But he's training people all the time and reaching people all over the world. For me, yeah, I've had different interactions where, so when I go on social media, in particular when I go on Twitter, I'm looking to do two things. One, I'm looking to encourage fellow ministers. And so I want to encourage them, and I create content to encourage them. But then I want to encourage other people, and I do that by sharing my life. You know, I firmly believe again the church can be great on social media, but my ability to reach people is far greater than my church's ability to reach people on social media. People respond to people more than they respond to brands or churches. They want to see it really happen in real life. And my story is different, you know. I, you know, I grew up in Northern Virginia, a great family, and pursued ministry my life. But I'm also divorced, and there's a lot of hurt that goes along with that. And I'm trying to raise my four kids, you know, I'm co-parenting, but there's a lot of aloneness that comes with that. And what I've discovered is the more I can share my life with people and encourage people in that way, people respond. And I get messages at different times on different platforms. Sometimes I'll get a message on TikTok, other times I'll get a message on Twitter, other times I'll get a message on Facebook about how what I've been able to share has encouraged them and challenged them in their relationship with the Lord. So yeah, I mean, it's not like I'm reaching millions of people, but I feel like God's using this for just that one. And every time I create content, I'm looking for who can I connect with on that, you know?

I've, it's that's beautiful, Tom. Just yesterday I was, I had a meeting with the social media director of the church that I'm serving at. We're down here in Miami. We just launched a Reality Church. It's literally called Reality Church. Carlos Lulette's the pastor. But I was meeting with their volunteer social media director, and I told her, I was like, "This may hurt. This may be hard to hear, but the organizational, the institutional voice has never meant less than it does right now, and it's actually decreasing. It's not increasing." And so as much as we're pouring this energy and effort into creating these perfect posts to go within the church social media channels, the real influence, the real reach of the church is not through the organizational channels, but what if we started equipping the people of our church to share within their social media channels? Like, to reach their individual ones as opposed to the church organizational one? Like, the ones of the individuals far outnumber the ones that the organization can reach. It's just, we need to not pivot, like stop the organizational voice, but what I challenged her was, "Let's start to pour some resources, maybe that we're not using for the organizational, and start to resource people to start talking about the church." It's better for us when we get people talking about the church than when we, the church, talk about ourselves. And it was funny, like just, it was eyes wide open in that conversation. And she's like, "I've never really thought of it that way before." And it's just, there's so much opportunity once we start realizing that people will listen to others where there's a relational equity, honestly, more than they'll listen to our organization in many ways.

Have you felt that? Do you see that from New Life?

One hundred percent. Again, the, I love how you just said, I think so many of us social media managers or online pastors think, "Oh, we got to be like Wendy's," you know? How Wendy's social media brand, they, everyone loves them, they love to follow them, and there's creativeness there, and that we can be like Wendy's and everyone's gonna follow us. But that's far and few between. Even the best churches, I firmly believe it's even the best churches doing it will never be able to be like a Wendy's. But what if we trained up people, as you just said, to be digital missionaries, to look at social media as a ministry opportunity rather than just something they do for fun? Yes, you got to have fun on social media. You got to do fun things. But that's TikTok, man. TikTok is all about fun, and you can use that to reach other people. If we train them to think about it like, one of the things because I do do a small little digital missionary class with some people from time to time at our church, and the first thing I say to them is, "Whenever you go on social media, spend some time just praying to God and asking Him to open your eyes to see the ministry opportunities that you can have." And again, maybe it's just simply sharing your live stream on that Sunday morning, or maybe it's commenting on someone who's hurting that day. If God's giving you the eyes and God's giving you the vision, gosh, you're going to be able to reach so many people. As you just said, the church has reached, especially on Facebook, that algorithm is so terrible, and the churches reach on Facebook is so terrible these days. But my reach is greater because Facebook values relationships, and you can use your relational equity, like you said, to reach people for Jesus in a really powerful way.

It's funny you said the word TikTok. For me, the number one question I get right now, okay, maybe the top three questions. In 2020, the number one question I got, I don't know about you, Tom, but the number one question was, "What do we do with the kids? How do we do kids ministry and student ministry?" Easily the top three questions that I'm getting in 2021 are, "How does my church take advantage of TikTok? What are we doing on TikTok?" Um, and you know what's funny is I don't, I personally don't have a solid answer for that. I mean, other than get your pastor dancing on TikTok, and nobody seems to...

To want to take advantage of that, but you know, it's within our churches we have people that understand TikTok far better than me, 44-year-old bald guy with a goatee, understands TikTok. And rather than the church owning the strategy of TikTok, maybe we should instead release the concept, release that responsibility to someone that we've discipled who understands the community of TikTok.

If you're wanting to, you know, here in Miami obviously there's a lot of multicultural around, and so as a church it's not our responsibility in the physical space to understand how to reach every nationality of person that lives in Miami. But if we're wanting to reach into Hispanic or wanting to reach a Haitian or a Central American or Cuban, it's hey, let's talk with people who really understand that nationality, who understand how these people think. And now maybe even ask them to be part of our church in reaching those people in that neighborhood. And even in a digital space, there are people that understand TikTok far better than bald goatee Jeff Reed is going to. And so how can we disciple them to a place where we trust them spiritually and then release them to go reach people, to be that digital missionary in TikTok or to champion the idea of us heading into TikTok to reach people for Christ?

Yes. See, I think the misconception about social media and the church is that everything you do has to be spiritual. And the reality is no, everything you post doesn't have to be spiritual. You have to embrace your church's culture. You have to embrace your church's identity and include that as part of TikTok or whatever strategy you're going to be doing.

There are, I mean, you know this, I mean, there are people who are making lots of money off of TikTok right now because they're posting stupid things, but they're building a follower. And here's the deal: if you use your TikTok and post some funny videos that may not lead them closer to Jesus, but I'll tell you what it will do. When that person's hurting and that person's looking for a church, they may remember your account and say, "You know what, that church seems pretty fun. I related to that person who shared that simple little story, or I related to that person who did that stupid little dance. I'm gonna check out their church." And they might check out your church online and that could lead them down the path again.

Just TikTok is fun. Embrace the funness of it. But I also know that TikTok can be inspirational. And so we post some encouraging stuff, like some clips that we talk that really challenges people's thinking. And again, we try to keep them short because I think TikTok is best as a short form. I know they've expanded to three minutes and whatnot, and there's actually even talk of them expanding even more. And I'm like, TikTok is best when it's a minute. And if you can keep it to that minute and really make them laugh, make them smile, or feel better about themselves, then I think that you're doing an effective thing.

What you're doing is you're highlighting that. That's actually one of the biggest differences between physical ministry and digital ministry. Physical ministry, you know, it's all about the, um, it's you want it quicker. It's let's get there, let's do the, let's present the salvation in every message, the plan of salvation. Um, it's more centered around the spiritual aspects within the week in service, you know, and things like that. Digital is far more of boil the frog slowly, crock pot than microwave. And really, it's more about what you're suggesting is building that relationship, maybe even more than getting to where the end game or the goal is. It's developing it slowly. And there are people within church that say, "Hey, you can't be reaching, you can't have that level of relationship digitally."

What's fascinating to me is the people who are having that level of relationship digitally. And rather than saying they can't do something, encouraging them in it. You know, like I would even, Tom, even being off topic here a little bit, I would even count our friendship in that and in the ability that we've had to connect, relationally connect digitally over social media, tweets and DMs and emails and Zoom calls and everything over the years. I mean, yeah, it was awesome when we met together physically and we were able to have conversations physically that, you know, I didn't necessarily want to take time to have digitally. But the development of both of those is phenomenal. And so understanding digitally how we can build these relationships with people and start to train and equip volunteers to do so, man, this is a beautiful idea in utilizing these channels to reach an oikos or the circle of influence for the cause of Christ.

Man, well, I can't think of a better reason to actually utilize social media other than to use it for the kingdom. Again, it's just like in person settings, you know, people want to feel accepted. They want to feel cared for. And if they feel accepted and cared for by you, they're going to stick around and stay longer. So when you're thinking about a digital missionary, it is a longer-term play. But again, we're in this for salvation. And any comment that I get, I respond to. Any person that is going through a hard time, like again, because I'm on TikTok and because my algorithm is interesting, I come across a lot of divorced people. I comment on every single one of those divorce TikToks and try to begin the relationship or try to begin a friendship and encourage them. And that's part of what a digital missionary does.

A digital missionary looks for opportunities to comment and share the positiveness of Jesus because again, we know this. There's so many misconceptions about who believers really are and people just make up things. It's my job as a digital missionary to share the love of Jesus, of who Jesus really is, to people. And I do it in what I post as content, but also how I interact with people as well.

Let me ask just a clarifying question here. On you, and I didn't see us focusing on TikTok, but hey, why not? Um, when you're interfacing on TikTok, are you interfacing on a New Life channel or are you interfacing on a Tom Pounder channel?

I'm interfacing as a Tom Pounder. So you're doing ministry in this as a digital pastor. You're utilizing your personal channels as opposed to an organizational church channel. Um, why drill into that for me.

Yeah, we do have an, uh, we do have a church channel and I post and interact with people as they share. But when I'm interacting with people, I'm highly looking to interact with people from a personal person because again, people respond better to people than they will respond to church. If I comment now, I can do a little of this and, uh, you know, um, but I've chosen to just interact as a person because I feel like I have a greater chance of meeting them where they are as Tom Pounder. And they can look at my bio and they can, you know, discover all that stuff about who I am. They can look at my videos and know that I'm posting highly encouraging stuff. But the reality is, um, I feel like I have a greater chance of impact if it's just Tom Pounder.

At what level, I mean, let's even, let's, I mean, obviously Tom, you trust yourself. Yeah. And so you're doing that outside on your personal channels. Uh, you know, I've had conversations with other digital pastors that are actually, I don't agree with this personally, but they're a little skeptical towards allowing individuals to utilize their own channels as opposed to utilizing the organizational. They don't trust people. They're afraid of, um, you know, inappropriate circumstances or things happening. Um, how do you, like, how would you get past that through from a New Life perspective, from your church? How do you trust the people? How do you train the people, equip them? What is that relationship? Because we want to get this beyond just digital pastor utilizing his own channels and starting to empower others. Maybe what are some of the steps, um, the checkpoints that you put in just to make sure or could make sure that things are legit?

Yeah, so when we talk about releasing digital missionaries, the first thing that they do is they go through an opportunity to go through a four-week training with me. And I kind of go through the basics of what is a digital missionary and what are we looking for. And then I walk them through, like, well, how can you be a digital missionary? Because I think a lot of people think that a digital missionary has to be a 20, 30-something-year-old person or 40-something-old person. The very first class that I did of digital missionaries, they were all over 40. You know, but they were looking to figure out how they could use their platform to encourage people with Jesus.

And again, part of the cool thing about going through this class that I had with them is I taught them all the basics of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube. Um, at that time I didn't talk about TikTok, but the next one I'm going to do, we're going to talk about TikTok. You know, um, and so we go through a process with them. Um, and then, you know, kind of weed out some of the people that may not be quite ready to do this. But the other thing I do is I do a lot of online Bible studies. And the people that really comment and are really engaged and active on those online Bible studies, I actually ask them personally to consider taking the steps of the path forward and being a digital missionary because I'm seeing their spiritual development, their growth a little bit. And so I'll ask them to run with me. And then I'll stick them actually in a group. And this is through WhatsApp. I'll stick them in a WhatsApp group and just try to test it out a little bit without ever officially being a digital missionary. I test it out with them. And then we go through the training as they make it through there. So it's a little bit of a few-step process. It's not refined by any way, stretching the imagination. I know there's probably other churches that are doing it better than I am, but that's the process I'd go through. And I've, you know, I've seen you doing this recently, those online Bible studies through, uh, Twitter Spaces. How's that going?

Okay, so the first one was great. It was very good. The second one, it was not good. And so we had, you know, and so, but that's one of the things that I've really enjoyed about this is I'm really experimenting to see what works. And, uh, again, I know this is being recorded and people are going to hear about it, but I posted because it did not go well yesterday. I actually posted a thing on my digital bootcamp Facebook group to say, "When's the best time to do an online Bible study?" because I'm trying to get an idea of when is the best time.

See, I took from now, you're going to get into the weeds a little bit, but I selected 6 p.m. on a Thursday because I saw some people doing Twitter Spaces at 5:00 and 6 p.m., and I'm like, okay, that's probably an ideal time. They're getting a good audience. But I'm gonna run with it. But what I discovered after yesterday, I said, "You know what, 6 o'clock is not a good time because the people I'm trying to reach are making dinners for their families right now or they're doing family time. I need to go, I need to go later. I need to do these later and try to attract an audience that way because that's my target audience. They're going to be on later when their kids are asleep and they've got a little bit of free time."

Yeah, all the studies that I've done, I tend to be like 8 or 9 at night. Um, and so I just lean more that way. Thanks for telling me, man. I mean, yeah, yeah, sorry, my thought. I didn't know.

The quicker you fail, the quicker you are to that time when you do actually succeed. So there you go, I was just helping you, helping you succeed quicker. But here's the deal, here's the deal Jeff. I mean, as a digital missionary, you're going to fail a lot. Um, as new technology comes out and as things develop, you're going to try things, you're going to fail, but that's the beauty of it. I mean, I failed yesterday and I'm like, okay, this just didn't work. I'm gonna make the adjustments and for next week we'll do something different. Yeah, and that's beautiful.

And within your churches that may be hard to get to that place. So I'll just speak from my own ministry life. A lot of times for me, failure was, you know, abandon ship and let's never go there again. Very rarely did I get the failure to iterate, failure to learn lessons and re-implement. And that's actually something that we've done several podcasters, Jay Cranda, talking about because Jay's culture out at Saddleback has been completely different where, you know, I think they're currently on their fifth implementation of a micro church strategy. Um, and it's not even that all of them have failed. The first couple were very successful. They just weren't scalable. And so they just, when they get to a point, they realize, hey, this isn't working, let's try it again. Hey, this worked but it has this weakness, let's try it again. Okay, this was a complete failure, let's try it again. And it's understanding, listen, in the year 2021, anybody who says they have a playbook for church ministry, I don't know what they're talking about. COVID trashed everything. Nobody knows what they're doing. I've done meetups with a dozen plus digital pastors and half of them are openly saying, hey, I don't actually know what I'm doing here. Like it's completely random and everybody's got their strengths and weaknesses. And what's fascinating is what one church is really good at, another church is horrible at, which is one of the reasons why we do this podcast, to be able to highlight successes, to be able to highlight new learnings in this area, to help churches understand how to take some next steps. And this idea of digital missionary, in empowering and releasing people, this is just golden. Tell, let's, I want to drill in a little more into the weeds here, Tom. Um, you were so, and I didn't realize this, and we talked about Tyler. Tyler we're gonna have on at some point here in a couple months. He's ramping up his trainings right now towards digital missionary and excited to kind of see what he's doing and thinking. I didn't realize you were actually doing like a four-week course on that. It sounds like, you know, a couple times here, talk to me like, do you know, I'm this is in the weeds and I apologize for putting you on the spot. What's like the syllabus of the four weeks? What are you covering over those four weeks? What is that development process for training somebody to be a digital missionary? What does it actually do?

Well, so like the first week is something where we just talk about the value of missionary work, why we should go, what's the point of us going and being there. And then I kind of tease a little bit. I try to keep these to like an hour long time because I know time is very valuable. But we dig into scripture a little bit about Jesus calling us to go and reach other people and how technology has changed and evolved over the years. Um, and how now we have this opportunity. And I kind of glance over some social media stuff. And then week two, I dig into social media and what is social media. Um, what's the pros and cons of all the major platforms. Uh, of course I spend the most time on Twitter because it's the best. Pro right there. I mean, just kidding. Um, but I spend time on all the major ones. I talk about Facebook, Instagram, Twitter. I talk about YouTube. And again, like I said, I'll incorporate TikTok in the next one that I do. Um, and then week three, um, we get into ministry opportunities and I talk about how, what are the different ways that you can be a digital missionary? And we work towards the different things that you can tell about stories and posting images, posting live streams. Again, as you know, Jeff, there's like some real basic stuff that you can do that everyone can do really easy starting today. And then you dig down a little bit deeper. And what ultimately we get to do is, um, I want them to be able to share their story, their testimony. And so I, the assignment on week three is what's your story? And when you come back to class, I want you the following week to tell us your three to five minute story so that you can share it. Um, and then week four is when we actually share our stories. And the homework assignment then is to go and share it in some form online. But then we also talk about tech gear that you can use, you know, how using your smartphone is maybe the only tool you'll need. And then we talk about some other tools and gadgets you can use that will help you make videos better or do or share your content better. So that's kind of the general thing without looking at it right now. That's kind of the general how I work it.

I know I love it. That's a great even just base model to kind of work towards. Um, you know, as for me, I think I was forty when, and with a fifteen-year ministry, like a ministry career professional Christian church staff, I think I was forty before somebody literally taught me how to share my faith. Um, and like the evangelism training, that piece. And at the time it was, um, you know, the three circles, four fields, three thirds. Like there's a whole system centered around that. And somebody sat down and actually started. I was, I'm not kidding, forty. And it was like, oh my gosh, am I sharing my faith? Am I doing this confession? How are you? No, I wasn't before that point. I was great at producing services, but even as a church staff, I was not great at having those personal level conversations. And I would suspect a lot of our church members, a lot of the consumers, a lot of the people in our seats or watching us online, I would suspect that they're probably the same way. I mean, sure, maybe they're comfortable having a conversation if somebody comes and talks to them about Jesus. But something proactive, something reaching out, even praying for these people in advance and walking in with intentionality and allowing the Holy Spirit to use them, I would suspect at least my circle of influence and my friends, they struggle with that. And so even Tom, what you're suggesting is a beautiful thing.

Well, let me ask this. Like, if some, if a church out there is like, hey, I want to do that. I want to, I'm interested in this digital missionary piece, um, evangelism training, helping people understand how to utilize their social media networks, their oikos, uh, for the cause of Christ, like how would a church even get started in this? How do you get from square one to where you are?

That's a good question, Jeff. And I wish I could have the answer before you never just get. I would contact someone like you, Jeff. I mean, or someone you know, someone that you know that's doing it. Again, the great thing that's come out of COVID is that there's more people thinking online now. There's more people thinking about online opportunities. And people like you, Jeff, who've been in online ministry well before COVID hit, um, have been thinking that way. And I think, you know, if you really see the value in online, and I can't see how you've been through COVID and not seen the value of online, then you have to just continue to scratch where it is itching and realize that while people may be zoomed out, they're still watching your services. They're still engaging with people online. And there's still plenty of opportunities. Um, and so I think it's like reaching out to the people who are really doing it. And you know, again, Jeff, your list of people who know is far greater than mine. But I think just reaching out to some of these people who've been doing it for a long time and just picking their brains. And that's one of the things. Again, when I started doing online ministry, the very first person I reached out to was Jay Cranda. And he didn't know me from anybody. And he was the nicest person to me and shared just the most amazing stuff with me and gave me time and answered all my questions. And then as I got to know you, you know, well before COVID, you were super nice to me as well and just sharing some. All these online guys are some of the coolest people that I've ever met in ministry. And I'm not kidding. I mean, they're not arrogant. They are humble people who are simply trying to do the Lord's work. And so, um, I don't know if you have a list, Jeff, of all the great people doing it. But I would say start talking to them and get ideas because there's lots of opportunities out there.

Yeah, I think one of the reasons why the community is so tight is because pre-COVID, you know, for a decade, Jay Cranda was told he was crazy. You were told you were crazy. I mean, I've been doing this for twenty years and I've been told I've been, you know, nuts. And I've been chewed up and down. Um, yeah, we can eat this podcast. I've told that story many times. Um, but it's understanding as a result of that, you know, even in this COVID season, uh, the continuity, the friendliness, the support, uh, within the digital, I talk with, uh, like student pastors, children's pastors, music pastors. I don't see, like, creative directors, communication people. I don't see the community aspect nearly as tight in those areas as I do among, uh, digital pastors and online people and churches that are doing online ministries. So yeah, definitely resources. We'll throw some links in the show notes. You can check that out. I mean, I would also, I would even start to kick the tires, explore some of these like disciple-making systems that are already out there that are already existing. Don't reinvent the wheel. Um, Timothy Initiative, Disciples Made, uh, Four Fields, some of the stuff out of No Place Left, um, discipleship tools, uh, is another one. Uh, Zuma Training, um, like there's a lot of stuff that already exists and it's not that hard. Hey, ask your church, this can I get ten people and do an experiment? I want to go through this ten-week discipleship system and see if we can't at the end of this get people excited about talking about Jesus on social media. And if you get success with the ten people, that's awesome. If you don't get success, maybe try another material, I mean, another system, another process. Make adjustments, try to figure out where the breakdown was. Ask where the breakdown was and try again. I mean, stuff like this doesn't cost anything and it doesn't hurt anything to try to experiment. Um, and the payoff can be incredible, can be like church-changing.

Well, I would agree. There's so many resources out there. And I think in large part too, um, when I told my church that I was going to do a digital missionary group, they were like ecstatic. They never even thought of that before. But if you have someone thinking that way, um, then they're gonna let you run with it. And um, like you said, there's so many different tools out there. You're not recreating the wheel. You're simply just tailoring it to the digital and online world.

I love it, love it, love it. Hey, this has been great, Tom. This has been a great time. It's always great hanging out with you. Um, as we're landing the plane here.

Man, any closing thoughts here? No, I think there's lots of—there's lots of opportunities out there. And the more digital missionaries we can get out there sharing hope and love of Jesus, not creating arguments or division, but just sharing the truth of Jesus out there, the better our social media interactions are going to be. And Lord knows we need to reclaim social media for the kingdom, maybe a little bit here or there as well.

So hey, Tom, thanks for jumping on the podcast. If it will include, um, links in the show notes for all of Tom's stuff, but Tom, great, thanks for jumping on. Glad to have you here. And for everybody else listening and thanks for joining in with the Church Digital podcast. Thanks for jumping on the show. We'll see you next time here at the pod. You have a good day.