Rob Wood Reveals What Keeps Pastors & Missionaries Going

: Sorry everybody, I muted everybody but myself. This is why I check this way. Sorry everybody, I muted everybody but myself. This is why I check this way.

: Oh, it's so much fun uh to be a streamer and to mess everything up every time. Okay, let me welcome in uh my friend Rob Wood.

: Well, thanks for having me, Leon. It's good to be with you today. Okay, volume sounds good enough for mine. Stream can come in and let us know if you need higher, if I need lower.

: We can we can adjust all those things as we go forward. So cool. So you and I have known each other for a few years, and this is a little bit of a departure from what I've been doing on the podcast, and I want to explain a little bit of why that is.

: So, uh, you and I have known each other, but the reason that we know each other really is because I'm on Twitch. So, I had been in John 17:23 group in my local community for a few years, been leading one of them.

: And then as I was in Twitch space, I began to see a number of pastors who are in the space or people who are serving in the pastoral role.

: And we can talk about that a little bit later. How do we identify and uh talk about being a pastor? But I started seeing a bunch of pastors with a real need for others that understood what it meant to be in ministry, what it meant to to have needs and to have someone come alongside them and support them. And they're in a digital space on top of that that they try to talk to pastors they know and their eyes glaze over and they have no idea what conversation uh that they're even talking about.

: It's like a foreign language entirely. And I I just decided that I needed to bring John 17:23 groups online and to these pastors who who had a need.

: And so I I talked to the to the the guide that I have, Bill, and he said, "Well, you need to talk to Rob because because Rob's over the global.

: He's he's over a larger region than just local. So if you're talking not local, we we need to get someone else." So, I don't know if you remember this, but I remember the conversation was I thought really fun.

: I said, "So, Rob, this is what I feel God's calling me to do. Can I use your name because I'm doing it whether you say yes or no?" I remember that.

: That's exactly what you said. I know. I know. I was like, "So whether I get permission or not, I'm doing it." Yes. It was great.

: Yeah. Um I don't often approach things that way. Um, but I was just so convinced that pastors, digital missionaries, Christians who are online are isolated, lonely, facing all of those things that pastors face uh in a regular setting that in digital they don't even have support of, hey, you should be in digital spaces. And so it was like I I just felt so led by the spirit that it needed to happen that I wasn't waiting for permission.

: It was just like, "Can I use your name? I'm going to use your stuff. You can try and stop me." Um you know where I live, but uh and and it's just been great um moving into that, learning more and more about John 17:23 and all of that.

: So So that's just the intro to everybody. Let's let's back up now and talk about how did John 17:23 get started and why is it something that's valuable and why would it be something that those who might be watching this or joining us live who are digital missionaries or pastors in digital spaces might need. Okay. Well, uh, it got started by a man named, uh, Dick Germaine. He was a pastor in the Metro West area of Massachusetts.

: And it was totally led by the spirit of God. Um, I think like most areas, uh, outside of your denomination, Dick didn't connect with anyone.

: And uh they had their own preconceived notions of that church down the street, that pastor across the way. And he was invited to a pastor's gathering and he tells the story.

: He he got the paper, the sheet, and there was the invitation. And he he was available to go, but he said, "I just crumbled it up and threw it in the garbage." And the the waste paper basket was right next to his desk.

: And as he was doing work, he sensed the Holy Spirit saying, "Pick that up." And he must have done this three or four times.

: He says, he picked it up, looked at it, said, "Nope, threw it back down. Nope, threw it back down." And finally, he said, "All right, I'm going to go." And so he says, and this is on our, you could see him sharing the story on our website.

: He says, uh, all the way driving there, it's about a twenty-minute drive. He's in the car saying, "Why am I going to this thing?" you know, he's uh what is this going to really do for me?

: I shouldn't be going. And all the time he senses the Holy Spirit saying, "Just be obedient. Be obedient." He gets there at this pastor's gathering.

: And they were supposed to really talk about connecting at a deep level, but it was all superficial. It was all event-driven. It it had nothing really to do about having authentic relationships.

: And so he felt impressed in the Holy Spirit to bring that up. And so he brought that up and he says, "You could have heard a pin drop." And and then they just went on talking about these events and then there was another opportunity.

: He brought it up again. And this time at the end of him bringing it up, uh, one of the organizers, one of the pastors says, "Well, hey, there's donuts and coffee in the fellowship hall and he's he's tells a story.

: Everybody walked out except one. And this one who stayed behind, uh, his name was Ernie Fry. And Ernie was at a charismatic church. Dick was at a mainline church.

: And they started talking. Ernie said, "You know, I really like what you had to say. Uh, I'm interested in that." And Dick, um, you know, had a conversation with him and they they both told the story.

: Ernie passed away about a year and a half ago. Uh, Dick is now eighty-eight years old. So, this was back in the early nineteen nineties.

: And Dick will say, "When I thought of Ernie Fry, I knew of him. I knew about him, but I didn't know him. I thought, how can that crazy charismatic even know Jesus?

: And Ernie would say of Dick uh when he he said, you know, I'd drive by his church and think, how can anybody go into that mainline church know Jesus?

: How can he even be saved? So that was their perception of one another. And here they are, the Holy Spirit, God spirit brought them into this room together and they were all in agreement.

: We need authentic relationship. And so as they talked um they talked about three other pastors that they knew of but didn't really know. They invited these pastors together and Dick shared his heart.

: At the time John 17:23 groups were called he they came together and said how about we call this John 17:23 fellowship and let's meet.

: And they were so afraid early nineties, nineteen nineties that their churches would find out about this and would actually fire them that all five of them kept it a secret for nine months.

: And within those nine months, the Holy Spirit led these five to really develop what we do today in a John 17:23 group. They learn they began to they said, "Well, we're going to start by telling our story.

: We need to get to know each other." So, at every meeting, it was a two-hour meeting. They met at six o'clock, I believe, in the morning because of their schedules.

: And they decided, we're going to meet from six o'clock to eight twice a month, and every time we meet, everyone um one person gets to tell their story for, you know, it was like forty-five minutes or so.

: So, that's how they got to know each other. And then they said, you know, we're going to share scripture together, but and they all agreed, it's not talking about Sunday sermon.

: It's not a a Bible study that you have to prepare for. Let's have the Holy Spirit speak to us. He's brought us together. Let's just share a scripture together and say, "How's God speaking to us right now?" And then they would pray for one another.

: And they'd also then begin to just talk about life. This is what's going on in my family. This is what's going on in in my my ministry.

: So, they did this for eight to nine months. And then they gathered their congregations together. They invited him together to explain what they'd been doing for these eight to nine months in building relationship.

: And our current executive director um Shawn Bowen, he was actually at this service, which was wicked cool because he tells a story and Shawn Shawn just begins to tear up and cry.

: He said, "Rob, I'd never seen anything like it." All five of them are up there and they're telling um how they've experienced growing in this relationship with these these guys outside of their denomination really just knew of them and about them but didn't know them.

: And he said then at the end of the service they all they all washed each other's feet and he said I just began to weep and we worshiped God together.

: And so Dick started this with these other four in I think nineteen ninety-two to ninety-three. And then you jump ahead. He's sixty-six or sixty-seven in it's ten years later, two thousand one, two thousand two.

: God tells him I want you to retire. And at this time he's told people about it. You know people have come together and they they meet in large group meetings and then they go off and have their little own meetings.

: uh in his church because his church facility could hold that. And then God told him, he said, "I want you to retire from the church and I want you to start this ministry called Barnabas Ministries and I want you to establish these groups for pastoral leaders throughout uh your area in New England."

: And so that's how it started in two thousand two. And Dick did that. He started he he was you know he was everything who he did everything and he started developing these groups and um started to grow and he started having to have have someone come in and help him and then in two thousand fourteen, two thousand fifteen

: uh God said okay it's time for you to retire and around that time they started looking for someone to replace Dick or I should say take his role and they realized in taking his role.

: At this point, they had around two hundred pastors in groups and they were in all New England states, all six, and they were in Michigan uh with your friend Bill and my friend Bill.

: Y and they were down in Georgia and they were in Florida. At least that's what they they thought. So, this starts and they realize we need to hire two people to do what Dick's been doing.

: Really honestly, they could have hired three or four people because Dick was doing an amazing amount of stuff for one person. So I came in, Sean came in as the executive director overseeing the whole ministry.

: I came in to focus on groups and we were just in the United States and when I started making calls, they said, "Rob, we got two hundred fifty, two hundred sixty pastors and groups.

: Here's the list. Here are the leaders." Well, we know we no longer had groups in Florida. that was gone when I came in because the group the ministry had grown so much Dick couldn't keep up with it.

: And so where we thought we had groups we didn't and even in New England there were places groups that had just dissolved. And uh so that's how it started with me coming on in two thousand sixteen and Sean came on in January of two thousand sixteen.

: and I came on in May of two thousand sixteen and within two years God opened the door for us to reach out outside the United States and we started um connecting with leaders in Kenya.

: I went on a a trip there and my good friend George Moling um he he invited me to come to Kenya and uh he took me all around Kenya.

: I thought I'd never come home. I was there for almost a month and uh that was the longest trip ever. But I got back and we still had around, you know, we had about two hundred fifty pastors and groups at this point.

: And within six weeks, he had over two hundred pastors because I went with them everywhere. Two hundred over two hundred pastors who had joined groups and we had established groups and developed group facilitators.

: And God since then, God has just continued to open doors and it's been amazing where we where we've gone to. Yeah, it's we man.

: Yeah, we can get into where it's gone and some of that stuff in a little bit later. For you, what was your first encounter with the John 17:23 group and how or why did you decide to get involved beyond that?

: Okay. I've been pastoring for 17 years. And like most people who pastor, if you're in a denomination or a fellowship and association, a lot of times that's all you know. And you may know people in your community, other pastors, but you really normally you just don't really know them. So I'm pastoring for 17 years. I'm in Massachusetts where I'm currently residing and we had been pastoring in a church since 1999. And I was invited to, at the time, something called the John 17:23 group. And actually at the time we called it John 17:23 pastoral support groups. And so just the name itself, it just made it sound, and this is going to sound awful and anybody watching probably is going to say boo, but I thought when his name was Jim, he was a pastor in the city. Came over and said, "Hey, Rob, we have this support group for pastors. Would you like to join?" And my initial response was, "Oh, no." Because it just sounded like they were a bunch of needy guys. And I'm like, "I'm not a needy guy. I don't need support." Well, you know, little did I know I actually did need support, but it was my pushback. My objection was, "I'm healthy. You guys must be sick. No, thank you." And Jim, he, there's this movie where I can't, um, John Cusack is in it and this paperboy, he's never paid him. So everywhere he goes, you know, the paperboy's there. Jim Morrison was my paperboy everywhere I went in the city. I'd turn and he'd be walking up the street and I'd try to run away. I'd try to just find another place. And God had that guy for six months. I just felt like he was hounding me. And it was good that he was hounding me because I didn't know what I didn't know. I didn't know what I really needed, but God did and Jim did. And he didn't give up on me. And he wasn't badgering me. He wasn't nasty about it. He'd just smile at me and he'd say, "Hey, Rob, we still have an opening." And so I'd had a rough time at the church that we were pastoring. It had grown quite quickly when we got there. It was in my denomination, we called it a reboot. There was like 11 people left. It had a church split 10 years ago and had never done anything since then, nine different pastors before I got there. And I stepped in, had no idea about the history of the church, and the Lord just blessed. We started seeing the church grow. And it grew to the point where from 11, you know, we're about 80, 90 people at this point in seven years. Um, and we just had a leadership team that I realized at the now and back then wasn't healthy. We had a leader who was somewhat of a bully and he bullied everybody on the board. And so what happened was I'm just at a low point. Things were going great and now I just hit a brick wall. And so I remember Jim, we were in the post office in the city and I didn't see him. I'm getting some postage. I turn around, there he is. And he says, "Hey Rob." And I'm like, "Yes, just tell me when. Tell me where. I'm there." And yeah, so I went in and met these guys. I knew of them. I didn't really know them. Most of them were 15 to 20 years older than I was. I was at this time about 35. And so Jim didn't really tell me, just like you said, "Hey Rob, do you have like some time this week? You want to come on and we can chat about stuff?" I'm like, "Okay, I'll be available. What do you need?" And then I realized it's a podcast. So with Jim, it was the same thing. Just come on in. Well, you'll get to know these guys. And so I get there and he's like, "So, first thing we do is get to know each other is tell your story." Like, "Okay." I'm looking around like, "Who starts?" "Oh, Rob, it's you." I'm like, "What?" No idea who the, you know, I barely know these guys. So, but what I didn't know was how cathartic it would be. I start sharing. I said, "Well, I don't understand what am I, what do you mean my story?" You can talk about your childhood. You can talk about, you know, growing up and what it was like to be in your home or when you came to Christ, how you met your wife, talk about your parents, talk about your calling to ministry, whatever. Okay. And so they prayed over me, which I hadn't had people pray over me since I was ordained. Okay. So that was a long time and I mean literally they put hands on me and just prayed that God would speak through me. The Holy Spirit would give me words what I needed to share. And they said you had 45 minutes. I thought I'm going to be done in like 10. And I realized I just started talking and in 20 minutes I was bawling like a baby. And it was such a relief to share. And these men were leaning in. Yes. They weren't interrupting. They were asking clarifying questions when I would say something and they just wanted to know more about that. But they were really listening to receive. They wanted to know me. And I realized after 17 years of ministry, first no one in 17 years had asked me what my story was. No one asked me what life was about for me, what I was going through. And that's where I just started crying. And it was such a safe place that I was comfortable with that. There was no shame. There was no embarrassment. It was just me weeping and them looking on and I could see in their eyes they cared. They weren't in any way like, you know, uncomfortable, like, "Oh my goodness, the guy's crying. The dude, what's wrong with him? He's nuts. What's going on with him?" No, they. And what I didn't realize was they got it because they'd been there. They'd all experienced this relief and release of just sharing. And so, then over the next six meetings together, three months, I got to know them. They did the same thing, opened up and within that time I just was able to share about what was going on. And the important part of this is I stepped into there because I had a bad situation with a leader in the church on the board. And those guys for those first six months talked me through it, prayed with me and encouraged me. And you know, we all have our smartphones now, but I had a, this was the time where you had flip phones, right? Right. And so I remember sitting in the church parking lot and on my flip phone reading their texts, "We're praying for you. We're with you. You're not alone. We're on your side. Trust God. He has this." And then me, you know, tapping that number three to get to the right letter, going through all the texts, thanking them. And I could not have done what I did without their support. I mean, even though I'm in my denomination, I have a presbyter, I have a superintendent, we have leadership, I did not feel safe sharing what I was going through with my denominational leaders because I was afraid if I shared this with them, they would look at me and say, "Well, you've done something wrong, right? It's your fault. You know, you shouldn't have put him in this role." And your leadership is lacking. But with these leaders that had nothing to do with my denomination, they shared, they'd been through similar situations. They understood. And I realized, okay, I'm not alone in this. This is not, I'm not an oddball. This happens. And you know, even that night, we got into that night in that board meeting and things transpired. No one was yelling. No one was screaming until the person who said he wasn't going to stay on the board said, "Okay, I will stay on the board." And I said, "You know, and I calmly just said as the head of the nomination committee, I can't accept that nomination and allow this to happen." Well, at that point, I don't know if you've ever been in a meeting like this, Leighton, we're around a round table. This fella flipped the table. The mic, flipped the table up. I mean, literally end over end, came at me and luckily I had a board, we had another board member who was about six foot one, six foot two and a big, stocky fellow. He grabbed a hold of that fella as he came to attack me and he held him up and I remember his feet dangling as he was holding him and I was just like, holy cow. But what was, you know, I, what transpired there was they saw what I would see in private and then they realized, you know, and we prayed for them. We weren't trying to be nasty or mean with them, but it was a turning point in our church and a turning point for me as a leader because I had the backing of these guys. And so since 2007, I've been in a group, a John 17:23 group. Um, I was with them until 2014. Um, when I resigned that church and took an assignment at another church and then I got into a different group because it was in a different location.

: That is quite a powerful story there of having someone. Sorry, I'm feeling like I got an echo here. I'm not sure why. I must have hit some button. Let me see if I can figure that out a second here. Okay, so I'm coming back through it seems like. No, it's not doing it. Okay, it just solved itself. I have no idea. Awesome. Okay. Um, anyway, I was just thinking, I don't know everybody's had someone that would come across a table and attack them or had a physical confrontation. However, I imagine a lot of people listening to this are going to totally relate if they're in ministry to a couple of things you said there. One, I don't know if I can share the burden I'm carrying with other people because they will think I'm not doing what I'm supposed to. I'm the one that caused the problem. I'm the one to blame. I am the problem. If I share all of that, that's how I'll be judged and perceived and I won't actually get any help in this circumstance and situation. And those can be compounded depending upon your denomination or someone in your congregation. If I share my struggle with my board, now my board doesn't know if I'm fit to actually lead the church. If I share my struggle with my denomination, now they wonder whether I'm fit spiritually to lead. I mean, there's all of those kinds of things. But what's fascinating is you sharing with complete strangers your life story built more trust with them to be able to have them journey with you in the trenches because you began to see the commonality that you had with them of, hey, I'm not the only one that struggles with. I heard you say that. I'm not the only one. I'm not this weird person that is different than everyone else. You've faced that too. You've struggled with that too. So I love that image of sitting there in the parking lot getting the encouragement from your friends. Yeah. Who are on mission together with you. Friends on mission in the kingdom in a group together. And now let's go and face what's difficult in front of me right now. And there's also the interesting thing that you said too of what you faced individually one-on-one with him got exposed and then people began to see what you'd been dealing with. And I think that's a hard thing because people don't want to see it. And those people that are bullies and are manipulative, they know where and when and how to do that to maintain their power, authority, and all of those things. So, oh yeah. Yeah. It's so true. Yeah. Well, that's, I don't think that's necessarily the experience with everybody, but I do think that experience of finding a safe place is the thing that for me becomes the binding thing with people that I've been grouped with that I'm going to carry.

: That on with them. I had that before I was in John 17:23 groups, but there was still since I was in the same denomination, the well, I don't know if I want to share this.

: I don't know if I can share this with being in a John 17:23 group with others is like, who are you going to go tell? Uh, you're if you're something really important that you need to correct me up, we've got this group right here. If it's something you need to go to my board with if I'm being threatened or whatever you there are other ways but I don't feel the same kind of threat of somebody's gonna take my job away from me in some level it's going to be taken away so I don't know if that resonates with you. Yeah oh definitely the older I've gotten uh I've come to realize that when leadership changes within a denomination. Um, it's really the leaders. So, but e but there's there's just this perception that I had that if I share this, I'm going to get in trouble.

: Yeah. Even though I'm reaching out for help, they're going to attack me in some way. And you know, that's how the enemy works. The the devil wants us to stay divided and and and have some paranoia because uh you know when I think back I think of those leaders I they loved me they they I don't think they would have come down and hammered me um I think they would have came alongside of me and supported me but there's always that fear because I know others who've gone gone to their their church leadership and it hasn't gone well. They weren't listened to. It wasn't a safe place. And so that unfortunately that fear and it's it's not a fear from God. It's an irrational fear. It's a fear the enemy puts before you that stops you from being open and honest in that setting. So I thank God that I had this setting.

: Uh because like you said it there's something about one you use the term on mission. Yeah. I'm and I know in the digital space it's different because you connect with people all over the world. Uh most John 17:23 groups they connect with someone within their community. And so, but it's similar in that in the in the digital church, you're all doing the same uh you're all called to the same assignment. So, that's where there's the similarity and you're going to connect. So, that's your mission. That's your assignment. When you're called to a community and you're in the brick and mortar building, um you are all called and you have the heart for that community. For me, you know, it was a city in Massachusetts. Um, and all the these other guys, that's where they were from. That's that's what they were called to. So, when we talked about doing life together, we we would talk about what was going on in our city, in our community, and we would pray for our our leaders together. We knew our leaders. We see them in the coffee shop at Jake. And you know, we could talk about what was going on in the school system and pray and we could show up together united as spiritual leaders and we were invited to pray over things and and to be present. And so that commonality really brought a greater unity not just in our relationship but but brought our congregations together so that we could do more for our community. So that as we came together to pray for our community then that led to us actually serving our community and um we were on mission together.

: So that whereas in my denomination, the closest person to me was like 35 to 40 minutes away, right? So we were never how are we and and so that's multiple towns or cities separating us. But here and and it doesn't mean I'm not friends with them. Doesn't mean I'm not hanging out with them at times or having coffee with them. But I could meet with my John 17:23 group guys anytime because they were right there in the community. Yeah. Yeah. I say I had a very similar experience with being in a denomination where often the closest person down the road is a half an hour in the in the church in my denomination because we're not, you know, I'm not in a large enough city to have five, six, seven churches of the same denomination in the same town. Uh but one of the things with digital is there are spaces where we're called to the same people. And so, so here on Twitch, when I'm gathering with Twitch pastors and Twitch missionaries who are in the space reaching out and connecting and bringing the gospel to to people and then shepherding and caring for them, we do have a similar community because we're in a gaming platform and the platform is our place. So for us, it's the gaming community that we are reaching and we're all striving together to reach the gaming community. And our platform for most of us is on Twitch. There's some in other places. So So maybe there'll be a pastor group at some point, uh missionary group some point that'll be over on Kick or YouTube Gaming or Facebook Gaming. They're all trying to get in on what Twitch has. Twitch isn't making money yet, but nobody's making money. They're they're just trying to do things. And those of us who are in the space feel called to this community. The same way that wherever God places you physically, you're called to that community. Those people that are there, those people are going to be just the same variety of differences of people in the space as all the people that are on Twitch. Uh there's different age groups of everybody that's on here. They come with their own background and baggage just like anybody in your community in a physical space does.

: The the other the other thing though that you would think that oh we're all close together we could all get together easily and it should be easy to find a group time. Well, we can all just at the drop of a hat meet if we need to. But we all have busy schedules and we all have time zone conflicts that we might be uh across the US and now I'm I'm doing globally. It becomes well we might need to have some geographic connection here time zone bound on some level to make it easier for for groups to happen but I think I think we're all just driving back to the the the unity as the focus of it because we are unified in the in the desire to see Jesus proclaimed in digital spaces and gamers reached with the love of Jesus and so uh I'd love to see any any of my friends I don't care what your label is. We'll get into this a little bit, but let's just focus on unity because we mentioned that a few times. John 17:23 is part of Jesus high priestly prayer where he's praying for unity. So, why don't you unpack why that is the center point for uh this ministry? Okay. Well, for us in John 17, that's Jesus's prayer from he he's just had the Passover meal. He's instituted, you know, uh the new covenant in the Passover meal and they're on their way to the garden. And John's the only one who depicts this. And as they're on their way, Jesus just starts praying. And I don't know how your imagination goes, but I was a children's pastor for years, so I was always thinking imaginatively to to help the kids see something. So Jesus wasn't standing up in in the upper room praying this prayer. It's very clear he was on the way. And he's praying this prayer as the dudes behind them, his disciples are comp, you know, arguing who's going to be the greatest in the kingdom, right? They still don't get it. He's just told him this is what's going to happen and they're still like, "Yeah, I'm going to be better. I'm going to be I'm going to have the best seat in the house." And I I just imagine as they're going on this way, Jesus just begins to pray this prayer and he's talking to the father about um how wonderful he is and eternal life comes through him and he here is the son and he's about the business of the father and he's beginning to pray and so that I think that catches their attention. Oh, he's praying for us. And as he's praying, he gets in, it's verses 20 to 23. And Jesus begins to pray a prayer about how he and the father are one. This relationship they have is so tight, so amazing that they're just in sync. Now, we know, you know, I'm a trinitarian, so I believe in God the Father, God the Son, God the Spirit. And so, one God representing himself in three persons. And here Jesus is praying and he's saying, "Now, Father, I'm inviting my disciples into this relationship with us." Whoa, wait a minute now. Huh? What? He's inviting Jesus invited us to be in this oneness, this unity, this this tight relationship with he and the father. I believe the only reason he didn't pray about the Holy Spirit is because the Holy Spirit had not yet been given and the disciples really wouldn't understand that. Yeah. But since we now have the Holy Spirit because of the day of Pentecost, we understand he's in that prayer as well in my opinion.

: So Jesus says in John 17:23 to the father about us, his disciples, and he he and he says in verse 20, I think it's 21, you know, he or 20, he's not just praying for these disciples, he's praying for the disciples all to that will come. Yeah. He says, "I in them and you in me that they may become perfectly one so that the world may know you sent me and love them even as you love me." So we look at that scripture and Jesus prays that prayer over us and he's ending in that prayer because it the the the priestly prayer ends um shortly after that. He's inviting us to be as we're one with him. He wants us to be one with the father and he wants us to be one as he and the father are one. So that's that's that's really we call it unity but it's beyond unity. It's it's in sync with one another, even though we're different, you know, even though we're different that I mean, the church is so diverse ethnically, um, languages that are spoken in it, uh, the just personalities totally diverse. And we can go to a a local assembly, a local gathering of of believers and their mode of worship will be total will be completely different than what we're used to different in our you know so I mean across the board we're different. We're diverse and yet Jesus says even with your diversity you're still one. You you you still come together in me and you can relate to one another because of me and you can have this relationship in love and and I I want to say respect because people are different and because sometimes personalities they sometimes we don't always get along with everyone because personalities are different but I may look and say that fella rubs me the wrong way. But just because he or she rubs me the wrong way, doesn't mean I'm not going to love them in Christ. As a fellow believer, especially if if you're not a believer, I'm going to love you anyway in Christ. But you know, as a fellow believer, we want to love them as Jesus loves them. And a lot of times people are the way they are. It's a nature nurture thing. We don't know their history. You don't know their background. So the whole idea when we come together in the John 17:23 group is to say we want to get to know you. The only way we're going to get to know you is to again talk about sharing your story. And so when you begin to hear where people come from, how God has brought them through life and you hear their story, they they open themselves up to you. And because Jesus has accepted them and I'm one with Jesus, that means I accept them because they're one with Jesus. And so we're one in Christ. And so I'm not I'm not there to judge them. I'm not there to, you know, think I'm better than them. I'm not there to say, "Well, you know, if you'd have done this or this or that, life would have been different for you." No, I'm there to hear their story and say thank you for sharing that story and I want to thank God for how he used your past to shape you into who you are today.

: And so that's all part of the John 17:23 understanding when we look at that. Jesus said when you come together and you are able to look past—and Paul talks about this in a lot of his letters—look past those idiosyncrasies that would annoy most people and say, "Huh, you know what? I'm supposed to find you more significant than myself. Philippians 2, and I'm supposed to think less of me and more about you. So, uh, yeah, I'm going to in all humility just surrender that to Jesus and say, 'Wow, I thank Jesus for you.' That bonds us together because that's who Jesus is and that's what he does for us. So we begin to look at people, fellow ministers, fellow pastors through the eyes of Christ. You're one with Christ. That means I'm one with Christ. That means we're one. We can come together and that's where we can respect people's differences, you know, doctrinally.

: Hey, as long as we focus on the majors, the minors really don't matter. Um, I got a friend who's an Anglican priest and he and I have a different understanding of the scriptures when it comes to the end times, you know, tribulation. He'll let me know, "Rob, the word rapture isn't even in the Bible, right?" And we can joke with one another about it. We can laugh about it, but when it all comes down to it, we respect where each other's stance on it. And we don't try to change our understanding of the scriptures. In fact, as we talk about it and we have really deep conversations, we grow in our understanding of that doctrinal statement, you know, and it's not like, "Okay, I'm going to die on this, I'm going to die on this mound." No, it's "Hey, tell me more about why you believe what you believe there." And it's okay to talk in that way because we respect where we stand, you know, but the key is, "Hey, we believe who Jesus said he was. He's the way, the truth, and the life. He is the one and only son of God. You know, you can't come to the father except through him. That's the whole unity aspect. When we believe in that part, everything else is not going to keep us separated." Yeah, I does that answer that question?

: Oh, yeah. That was beautiful. I mean, if you want me to read the whole passage, I can pull it up and read it too. But there's a—like you were talking earlier about the Pentecostal—I had a perception of him. Now you're talking about an Anglican. I have a perception of him. There is this um level at which we neglect, I think, to understand seriously the diversity of the disciples. We downplay the diversity of the disciples because, "Oh well, they're in Jesus, they're following Jesus. They're there together with Jesus. So they're all unified. They're all in unity already." And no, they're not.

: Um, I love going through and I can't prove all of this, but as I look at the evidence, some you can. Simon called the Zealot. Oh, you know what that means? He wants to take up arms against the government. Okay. You know who else is in there? There is Levi the tax collector. I throw him in the group. I call him a Herodian. Maybe he's not technically a Herodian, but that's a classification of those people that want to collaborate with Rome for their own benefit. He's collaborating with Rome. I always love using the example of how did that conversation go. I picture them at the first dinner together with Jesus that Jesus sat them next to each other and they turned to each other to have small talk and uh Simon the Zealot turns to Levi and says, "So, how much money did you swindle today?" And Levi turns and says, "How many people have you killed lately?" you know, they just like, no, that's not what's like they're sitting there following Jesus. They put aside all of their political nature of their belief system to follow Jesus. And then you throw in the uh the Galilee boys who some of them may have been followers of John, which John may have been in a scene, which is the world is corrupt, the system is corrupt, let's go and do our own thing elsewhere and let's avoid everything. And the others would have been influenced by the Pharisees who are, "If we do everything exactly the right way, then our nation will be restored."

: And we have a lot of all of those in the church still today. Those people that, "Let's go along and collaborate with the political power because it gives us power. And let's overthrow the government at any cost because they're fully corrupt. And let's just get away from everything because everything is corrupt and we got to do it our own way, create our own system, our own thing over here." And then those are that like, "No, we just have to do everything perfectly. So you have to make sure that you attend services and you don't miss one, and if you're sick, you show up anyway, and you got to give exactly ten percent. It's a tithe, and it's all biblical and all of this, and we're going to find all"—and Jesus brought twelve of those kind of people together around a table that could put aside all of that. And this is who he's praying for. I wanted to premise before I read it. That's who he's praying for. Yeah. These four political parties. Now, the fifth political party would be the Sadducees. And they're not represented that I can find anywhere in scripture of being one of the disciples. Uh I just can't find it. So I'll read I'll read twenty through twenty-three. Okay. "My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message." That's everybody listening today. I love that part. "That all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you sent me." I love that passage. This is his why does he want unity? So the world will believe that the father sent the son. What is the thing that's going to get the world to believe that is unity among diverse people with diverse backgrounds, diverse cultures, diverse political opinions to sit down and eat a meal together.

: "I have given them the glory that you gave me that they may be one as we are one. I in them and you in me so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then so once complete unity happens then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as I have loved you."

: Yeah. This just that whole focus that whole thing. So it's just fascinating that why hasn't the church had this focus? Why haven't we thought about the need for unity uh more often instead of my denomination over here, my congregation over here, my whatever it is, my in the front of anything seems like it goes counter to the uh the whole unity aspect of things. I think it's because it's comfortable. We as human beings like to be comfortable. Uh I know I because of what I do today, I'm in many different churches. And what's interesting is whatever congregation I go into, they assume that all the other congregations out there do it just the way they do it. Oh yes. And you know, so because I I'll I'll be asked to speak at certain places. I'll fill in for pastors who are away or you know um taking some time off and I'll be asking all these questions and the people I'm speaking to say well they they think well this is common this is how everyone does it isn't it and time and time again I have to say no it is not because some people will call they'll call the people helping serve in the service they'll call them ushers. Others say, "Oh, no. Those are the deacons serving today." Others will say, "Well, this is our worship leader um or this is the assistant worship leader or this is this is the uh you know, whatever that person is." And so, wherever I go, I have to say, "What do you call one another? What are what's your titles here? Cuz if I'm doing communion, I got to know, I'd like the ushers to come up and help us today or I'd like the deacons to come and help serve communion this morning."

: And they they just think, well, this is how it is everywhere. So you get comfortable where you're at and you because you don't really travel and you're not going to be visiting other churches, you just think, well, this is how it's always this is how everybody does it. So when you do have that experience when you go somewhere else, I think that's where you realize one, well, I'm not comfortable with this. If if you're used to, you know, a charismatic style of worship, hands are raised, people get excited, hands are clapping, people are shouting, "Woohoo," and then you go to an a high church setting, an my, you know, an Anglican setting or even high church. I've been in American Baptist churches where I've done the services and congregational where I wear the robes, I have the stole, I come out. Yes. Yes. And there's liturgy, you know, and I'm just as comfortable there now as I am in a Pentecostal service. But if I were to take that that um e, you know, that that American Baptist congregation and say, "Hey, come over here to this Pentecostal service where I'm going to be at an African Pentecostal service." Yep. You know, um from Tanzania, they're all from, you know, and they're hooting and hollering. They sit there and say, "This is not comfortable, right? This is strange to me." And so I think that's that's the issue is because of our perception, because of what we get used to, it becomes comfortable. And then when we see something that's out of sorts to us, instead of saying, "Oh, well, it's just because the church is diverse," they'll say, "Well, they're doing it wrong." Yep. "Oh, they don't because they don't do it our way, they're not doing it the right way." And that's where we focus on pastoral leaders. So people who oversee ministries, oversee churches. So you, you know, we say pastoral leader because if you preach the word, preach and teach the word of God, if you're doing spiritual, giving spiritual direction, and you're giving pastoral care, then this group is for you. So you may have the moniker of, "Hey, I'm a missionary," but you're doing pastoral work. Um, people call you an apostle, but you're doing pastoral work. "I'm an evangelist," but in you're doing pastoral work. Well, then you come together and you focus on we focus God has us focusing on these spiritual leaders when they realize the differences are to be celebrated. The diversity is to be celebrated because we can be one in Christ and still be diverse. And so you can go to a service where there's no instrument whatsoever and they're just singing. Okay. "Hey, praise God that that works for you. You're worshiping the Lord. All right." And you go to another service and they have a whole orchestra and they're just, you know, worshiping God that way. "Hey, that's okay, too." Um, when you get the leaders on board, it's the leaders, those over the congregations, those over the ministries, when they begin to say, "Hey, I was with my I was with my friend the other day. You know, he's he's the Anglican priest in town, or I was with my friend, and he's he's the Methodist minister over there. I was with my friend and he's the charis he pastors the charismatic the ark church we hear they're part part of ark down the way when you begin to say that and people hear oh you actually swim in a larger pool yeah because the pool of Jesus Christ is huge right and you know we just have all these labels but the labels really they just signify what we're comfortable with Okay. At le Baptist. I don't have to agree with all their their doctrine. They hang out with me and they don't agree with all my doctrine. But we do agree again on the major. "Hey, we all love Jesus. So we can hang out and have fun and we can joke with one another and we can pray with one another and we can learn from one another."

: And by doing that, we're going to be a witness to the world around us. One quick story on that. If you allow me.

: Go ahead. There's a group of pastors up in Holton, Maine. They were meeting together and because one of them had to go right into ministering at the hospital, when they met for their John 17:23 group, they'd meet together about 6:30 in the morning in the cafeteria of the hospital.

: And so they're all from different churches and people know they're from different churches. And some of the staff there attend some of their churches and they'd stop by and they'd see these pastors together and um those who knew they were pastors and they attended the church they'd come by and what began to happen, you know, God would lead someone over there and they'd say, "Would you mind? Would it be, you know, as they're introducing, 'Hey, these are my friends. This is, you know, John, he pastors so and so. This is Travis, he's over at such and such.' They'd, you know, with all of you here, would it be okay? Would you pray for me? I'm having this situation with work today." And they would pray for them.

: Well, what happened is that got around to the whole hospital. And people who weren't even, you know, they're not Christians. They're not attending anywhere. They knew that that table were five pastors from the town.

: And so people who didn't even know Jesus would go over there and say, "You know, I'm not a Christian. I don't even know if I believe in God, but um I know that you pray for people. Um, can you pray for me in this situation?" And they began to witness. They saw the unity and it attracted them like moth to a flame and they were able to share God's love by saying, "Yeah, we'll pray with you."

: And they weren't like overtly trying to convert these people to Christianity. They were just loving them where they were at, sharing Jesus with them as they were asking them to have that prayer.

: And people started becoming more and more um open to hearing about God and Jesus because of these five ministers being that witness. "Hey, if they can come together and they're all from these different churches who pray differently, who worship differently, who have different doctrine, well, then maybe there's something to this Jesus thing." That's that's pretty powerful to think about. It's not only impacting the pastors, but others who witness pastors meeting together. And I know that's not always that you don't always meet open in a meeting. We usually do it privately so that nobody is overhearing or we're worried about sharing things. So you don't just meet in a restaurant, but here they were taking it and just praying with one another.

: Um, which I don't I don't see necessarily any problems with praying publicly uh in a space. I have a I have a prayer booth. So I I invite people to come in who need prayer. So that's that's just really cool to to hear those stories. Do you have any other stories of uh unity? Maybe maybe some uh example of the churches coming together because of the pastors coming together for something in the community that happened.

: Sure. Um, we have a there was a city that the pastor wanted to connect with the pastors of the city to do a to just love on the city and give them one day where they provided medical care, um, food, um, entertainment, they had music and, uh, they'd get lunch, they'd get groceries when they left. They had community agencies there. And this pastor realized, "This is too big for our congregation. We can't do this by ourselves." And he was part of a John 17:23 group.

: So he talked to his fellow John 17:23 groups and said, "Hey, I know this organization. Um, they do these neighborhood outreaches. We can work with them and they'll provide a format. They'll give us a model to follow and and they'll even provide us with the food and we'll work with the city." And uh I know the story. One of the John 17:23 members looked and said, uh, said, "You know, I've never heard of this ministry." It was the Convoy of Hope.

: Oh, okay. But I know I know you. I don't know anything about the Convoy of Hope, but I know you. So, we're in. I know you. I trust you. Let's do this. And so these five churches, these five pastors got their five churches together and because these pastors knew other pastors in town that they weren't in groups but they knew them. Um 11 churches finally came together and you know they went to the mayor they said this is what we'd like to do. Um and the mayor was like where do you want to do it?

: And they they said, "Will you tell us what what what is the what is the area the neighborhood that needs it the most?" And the mayor said, "This is the neighborhood and this is the favor of God. Here they come. This is what we're going to do. These are the pastors and and so the uh the pastor who was leading this up and and working with the other pastors came to the mayor. Mayor said yes." The mayor brought all the city agents, all the city leaders together, all the one you the fire chief, the police chief, the person over the DPW, the person over parks and rec, and the pastor shows up to uh meet with the mayor and these these uh leaders of the city and sees the mayor's administrator uh administrative assistant says, you know, I'm here for the meeting. Okay, go right in there.

: And guy goes in and looks, tells me the story, comes back. He says, "Uh, the mayor's not in there." Oh, yes, the mayor's not going to come. Well, then who's meeting? Who's leading the meeting? Well, the mayor wants you to lead the meeting. So, the pastor goes in, leads this meeting, and here's the favor of God.

: The Bible says in Psalm 133, Psalm 133, 1-3, the whole the those three verses are about the blessing that comes from unity. The first verse says, "How good and pleasant it is when men and women come together in unity." And then it says, "It's like the oil coming down Aaron's beard, down his robes, down the fringes." And that's representative of being anointed by God. And it's like the the dew falling from Mount Hermon onto Mount Zion. And that's how the water came to to one fill the cistern so they could drink, but also provide them with crops. So that's the blessing of unity.

: And then and the last verse says where there's unity there's life forevermore. God brings blessings and life forevermore. So because of the unity of these yes the the money came in through the churches to provide for this and then God gave favor with this whole group to where the city didn't charge him for a permit. The city went throughout the whole neighborhood where they were having this around the baseball field uh around all the up and down the streets with the street sweepers and cleaned the whole area for the day.

: They provided the police to make sure that nothing was stolen in that area because it was a pretty rough area. They did round the clock um you know um the cops came around and checked everything. The city parks and rec turned on the lights of the field the whole night because they had to set up the day before. All this was given free to them.

: I mean it cost the city so that the this this group of ga this gathering of churches because the pastors knew each other and trusted each other could bless the community.

: So that day in the neighborhood of 10,000 people, they had over a thousand people come to the park and it was a cold day. It was in October. It was and so a thousand people came and 989 people stopped in the tent to have prayer out of the thousand plus people who came and everyone was given food.

: The city health commission, the the health department was there giving um flu shots to every child and every person who needed a flu shot for free. They didn't have to show any insurance card. They just said, "We're here and we're giving it away." They had local barbers cutting hair for everyone.

: And and then out of that, there were there was 78 people who accepted Jesus Christ. They wanted to know about Jesus. So out of those 11 churches, I only have 10 fingers, so 10 and one. Wherever those people lived, because they took their name and number because all these churches came together, they were working in the prayer tent and everywhere else.

: And it wasn't just the church they're working, they invited the community to serve with them. Um, wherever if whatever church they were closest to, that's where they that's that's who they were connected with. That's because no one was like, "I want them all to come to my church." No. If if you live right if you live a block away from this this, you know, First Baptist Church, well, they're going to be calling you.

: And they knew, you know, so that's one story of the church coming together and the favor of God because of unity. Where there's unity, God brings blessing, life forevermore.

: And then one outside the country. Um, we have a group of pastors in Nakuru, Kenya. Uh, led by Edward Waka. He's the group leader. He works with me over there. Um, outside of being the group leader, does a whole bunch of stuff uh, uh, presenting this to pastors.

: So his group, they felt he and four other the pastors, they felt God's calling us to this remote area in Kenya that doesn't they they don't hear the gospel and we're going to work with the the the one or two churches that are in this area.

: And so they had to combine from their five churches, 46 people go with them for a week long crusade out in the bush they called it. Okay. 847 people came to know Jesus that week. Wow. And connected with the the the churches that were there so they could be disciples.

: 847 people came to know Christ. They went out there with food. They went out there singing. They went out there sharing the gospel. They went out there meeting needs. They went out there with clothes to give them. They went out there not just to meet their spiritual need, but their physical needs and emotional needs.

: They listened to him, prayed with him. I was blown away. I'm like, "How I, Edward, did I hear you right?" Said, "847, Rob." 847.

: Right now, Edward is with the with the same group of guys at their churches. They're doing after post-resurrection, they call it, crusades. They are they have three two set up three day two two in different locations and they're working together cuz you can do more together than you can do on your own, right? And that's that's what's so cool because yes, again these churches are diverse. These churches are are from different denominations. They they worship differently.

: They have different modes of worship. They preach different style and yet they're coming together saying, "Well, the only thing that matters is Jesus." And uh so these churches now see we can come together. We're we we we don't lose our identity in who we are. I think um Edward's church is called Jesus Christ Church, JCC. He's with these other denominations and and that, you know, they're from different denominations and that it works.

: So to me that's the answer where Jesus said um you know as they come together as one they'll they'll know about Jesus. Um I and them and you and me that they may become perfectly one so that the world will know you sent me and love them even as you love me. It's it's all about that our unity leads to Yes. people come people knowing Christ. Yeah. It's it's out of the unity. Yeah. Totally. And even when we have some pastor, some of some in our groups that they share with us that Sunday mornings they all each of them say, "Well, this Sunday uh we're going to be praying for First Congregational. Next Sunday we're going to be praying for New Hope Community Church. The Sunday after that we're praying for First Presbyterian."

: And the next Sunday we're praying for, you know, whatever the church name is, you can fill it in. And so their congregations are praying for God to bless and care for a congregation that's in their community that could be just three or four blocks from them or maybe across the street from them.

: And what the pastor is teaching them is it's not just about us. We're not building our own little kingdom here. No, it's about God's kingdom.

: And God's kingdom is big and diverse. And so we're praying for Pastor Smith down the way and that congregation to be blessed of God and for the Lord to provide for their needs and to use them to be a witness.

: And the thing is, Pastor Smith is doing the same for pastor, you know, pastor John who's praying or pastor Susie who's praying, whoever. Right.

: Right. And it's again when you focus on the leaders, the leaders set the tone and the example for the congregation. Yeah. You're talking about prayer and praying with praying for exampling that prayer or demonstrating that living it out.

: Uh, there's also a component that John 17 has a prayer team. We haven't touched on that. You want to share about the prayer team?

: Okay. Sure. Uh, we have right now 15 prayer teams, intercessory prayer groups globally and in a in the US we have one in one for New England, one in Pennsylvania, one in Michigan, one in Georgia.

: Um, we actually have two in New England. We have one about to start in Tennessee. I think we have one that started in New Hampshire.

: The whole point of this is God calls people to pray. God's gifted people to be intercessors. And they love to pray. They love to present people's needs before the Lord.

: And so this is a safe place where a pastor can send his or her request in. They'll never be followed up with. They'll never get an email back saying or a phone call saying, you know, you sent this. We want to know how it's going. They present it and it's prayed for. If they want it prayed for again, they have to present it again the next week.

: And so these pastors will be given a sent an email and invited to send in their request. And even if they don't send in that request, the intercessors have a name have the names of all the pastors.

: And at the end of when they pray for the needs of the requests and it's not always just praying for the requests, it's also giving praise for answers to prayer because as they pray, there's answers and then the pastors will send in those answers.

: Um, at the end, every pastor's name is called off before the Lord. The whoever the intercessors are that are there, they'll be given a list of names and in unison all together because God can hear us all at once.

: They just speak out the names and say, "Lord, bless John Smith, Jackson Robert, Leighton, Size, and Bill Filillmore, Doug Bitework, and just go down the list.

: Um, you know, Donna Sloum, uh Debbie Moland, all these names. And on a regular basis, weekly, whether you send in a request or not, your name is lifted up before God, you're prayed for.

: But when you have a specific request, the intercessors will pray. And it's all confidential. And that's what I mean about no one ever reaching out to you.

: The intercessors know that when you get this in front of you, you don't talk about it. If you see, if you know the pastor, you happen to know her or him, you're not going to go to that pastor and, "Hey, I prayed with you that I prayed for you this week." No, that doesn't happen. They're trained and they're taught. What you see in here stays in here. What you pray for in here is prayed for in here.

: Now, God may have you pray for that pastor throughout the week, but it's in your private prayer time. You don't share what you've heard or read about or or receive as a request outside of that time.

: And so for me, I have a, you know, in my role because I know of all the stations, um, the prayer group in Georgia prays on Monday.

: So on Friday, I'll get a, hey, what do what would you like us to pray with you about? And I send them requests. And then the the group in Pennsylvania prays on Wednesday and so I get this request from them on Monday or Tuesday and I send them my request.

: And then the Michigan group prays on Thursday and so I send out my request to them on Wednesday so they can pray for me on on Thursday.

: And then the ones the one in New England uh I got to give it to them by Thursday so they can pray for me on Friday.

: So I have and then I also know that the central in central Massachusetts we have another prayer team that gets the requests that I also send out on Friday on Wednesday.

: So I got these intercessors praying for me on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. I'm waiting for God to develop one on Tuesday because in every every day of the of the the weekday, I'm going to have a group of people praying for my requests.

: And it's open to any pastor. You don't even have to be in a John 17:23 group. If you go to our website, john1723.net, and you go to the drop down on prayer, you can leave a prayer request and know that it's confidential.

: It's safe. They're it's gonna that prayer request is going to be prayed for. And uh it's just a ministry we offer to any pastoral leader out there who's seeking prayer.

: It's like I said when the the pastors prayed for me my first time in the group in 2007. No one. I couldn't remember anyone praying for me.

: And now I have I have a lot of people throughout the week praying for me. It just it's it's on me. I had to take the time to write out a prayer request.

: I had to take the time to say, "Holy Spirit, what do what do Phil and the intercessors in Georgia, what do they need to pray for me about?

: What what And it's not always about me. I mean, I'm asking prayer for God to provide uh finances for a well to be dug for in Koma, Tanzania.

: I'm asking prayer for God to provide for a pastor friend who who his church in South Africa was robbed of all their sound equipment.

: Lord, provide them with what they need. And so these intercessors, not only am I praying for them, but these intercessors are. And then I also have my own personal prayer requests, you know, that I'm I'm praying for.

: If I'm sick, if I'm not feeling well, if I'm a little an anxious about going on someone's podcast, God have me, you know, have them pray for me because I'm going on this podcast and I don't know what is going to happen.

: What's going to happen is I'm going to have text screwed up and uh, you know, not able to get the banner behind you. You just got the green screen and we couldn't get that because, you know, that's what's going to happen is chaos.

: Chaos and and grace and uh oh yeah, like this is the least place you need to be worried about coming on my podcast. Like it's I I don't have I don't have hundreds and thousands of people that are going to come on and listen.

: So it's just going to touch the lives of two or three people and maybe more. Who knows? Who knows? Um who knows? Yeah. Who knows what God's going to do with it.

: Uh, but I do think this is valuable and and this really is evergreen content from the standpoint of anybody listening to this at any point.

: I mean, recording it uh in April of 2025, it'll be out on YouTube in May of 2025 and someone may listen to it five years from now, stumble across it, and God can use it to be able to connect them in a group when they when they need it.

: Uh just thinking as you were talking about prayer and and it being confidential, we didn't talk about that too with groups that whatever is in group is is confidential.

: And when you share uh of the four elements of of being in groups which you've talked about I don't think we labeled them so much though of uh sharing your story uh sharing in the word uh checking in what's going on in your life and prayer that you don't share outside of group with anyone without permission to share those things. And I think that's one of the valuable things too is that confidentiality breeds trust. I don't walk into and run into that other pastor down the road.

: Um, I know for myself, what really was surprising to me was the person who was going to be in my group that I rolled my eyes not because I knew them, but because of my perception of their denomination and who they would be.

: I rolled my eyes back in my head and I went, "Okay, well, I'll hold my nose and be in a group with this guy and I'll love him, but I won't just I won't agree with him on anything." He was the most um outreaching person to me personally of all the pastors in my group when I was struggling, when I was going through family struggles with things, and uh is is the one that uh we'll get together and we'll have a beverage together and we'll just go hang out.

: And I'm like, this is not the person in the group I would have picked that the two of us would just hang out together, would just talk about life together cuz what do we have in common?

: I can't find it. What we have in common is called by God and we love the community. We we love our brothers and sisters in Christ.

: And that is the only thing I need to have in common with this person. Yeah. Is is that and uh Yeah. So, it's like the strangest thing is the str, you know, like I didn't expect to hang out with you ever and now you're the one I would want to spend the most time with. Yeah. And I I think you bring up a good point about the group that you meet outside the group meetings. So, some of our groups they they meet once a month, some may meet twice a month, but uh even in the digit digital space, I have the hardest time saying that word. Even in that space, you can meet one-on-one. It It's not like you're uh, you know, breaking some pact you made with the rest of the group.

: It's okay to connect outside the group because you're building authentic relationships. You're building friendships. And um, I mean, I meet I I have my own personal group that I meet with.

: Um, and so outside the group, you know, I've had wings with one and one guy just loves wings and I'm a I love chicken wings.

: So he eats me under the table and he's just a stick. You know, you know those guys who you look and say, "Yeah, you can eat 24 wings and I can eat six and I'll put on six pounds and you won't put on anything but 24." But we go out, we have a good time. I go out with another one and we just sit around and have coffee together and we chat. But the relationships that we build within the group, they they spill over into our everyday life because that's what they're supposed to do.

: And we relate with them and we just have fun. We love having our group meeting, but I also like hanging out with them outside the group meeting uh because they they really do become true friends and they are.

: Yeah. In in the digital space, especially for for me in Twitch, I can go hang out when any one of my pastor friends are streaming.

: I can go hang out when they have their worship service online. Uh and I and I have my own eb and flow to that.

: Right now, I'm not in the season where I'm doing that as much, but there's been seasons where there'll be two and three of us pastors in another pastor's stream.

: And it's kind of, I think, a little intimidating if if you're someone in the chat for the first time and you're like, there's a pastor and four pastors are here chatting besides the pastor I'm watching.

: How weird is this? Uh, yeah, but we care about each other. But isn't that a wonderful sign of unity? I mean, for you guys to show up like that, that says something.

: Um, because right now I'm not my assignment isn't leading a church. I haven't done that in 10 years now. I mean, sorry, nine years.

: Uh, my whole focus I'm full-time with Barnabas Ministries. And so, I do have when I don't have obligation of ministry where my wife and I um call our home church, I can go and visit my friends.

: I can just show up in the back to and they're like, "Why are you, you know, what are you doing here? I'm here to support you, man.

: "I want to hear you preach." And um you know it it's fun because you're just I'm your friend. I'm here. I can be here.

: So to hear that you do that um through you know supporting your your buddies like that it's pretty cool. And again it's a a sign it's a it's a sign of unity to those who are watching.

: Hey there's something. What's going on? Why do you guys do this? How can you be friends? That's what I usually get. The question is when they see me, my Anglican friend, um, he's since moved to North Carolina, so I don't see him that much, but we'd go out and he was in he was he was high church. Not all Anglicans are, but he was in full black, had the collar, had the collar, you know, I'd be out with my shirt, just I'd just be I'd look like a regular guy.

: And I'd be sitting there and I I asked him once, I'm like, "Michael, how come you always got that thing on? Everywhere we go, you got that thing on. We can go to the beach and you got that thing on." And he said, "Rob, when I was ordained as a bishop, my bishop said to me, that collar for many, especially outside of the church, for many, that collar signifies that you're a safe person that they can come to and be and and and just receive Christ's love." He said, "So for me, it's evangelism. That's why I wear this all the time." And no sooner than he said that, we're sitting there having coffee. Some person who didn't know him from Adam came up and said, "Uh, are you a pastor? Are you a priest?" He's like, "I'm Father Michael of Anglican Church, you know. Oh, oh, oh. Do you mind um I have this need. Would you mind praying for this right there in front of me?" Yeah. So, I'm telling you after that, my denomination, we don't wear collars. I got me a collar and I started wearing that sucker. I go to the hospitals. I go to prisons. I'd put that on. I'd be out in the community.

: But the point behind that was just that we could hang out together and my own congregation would come by and see and say, "How come you're with him?" I'm like, "He's not the enemy. He's a fellow." Right. Right. They're a fellow congregation in town. We're not in competition with them. In fact, I want God to bless them. I want to see their church. I want to see their facility full to the brim. You know, that's my desire. I said, I hope that's your desire, too, because that's how we should be praying for our brothers and sisters in Christ. Lord, fill that hall or let their stream just just be overloaded with people watching to the point that, you know, oh, we're going to it's it's going to shut down if more people come on, you know.

: Yeah, that's that's very true. That that that camaraderie is different than a lot of people expect or maybe they're they're used to. Uh but it's not just a friendliness of, oh, you're a fellow pastor. Hi, hello. It's it's there's a depth to it from getting to know each other's stories and getting the updates of what's going on in your life and hey, you shared that a couple of months back. How's it going? Or hey, last time we got together and the the ongoing continuation of those things. Uh just looking at we we call it doing life together.

: Yeah. Doing life together. Exactly. Yeah. Uh I haven't done this much, but there is also because we're in Discord uh abilities to do gaming together. I'm trying to with this podcast invite those friends on and I've had several of those pastors that have been in groups with me on and then playing a game with them or I'm gonna go play a game later. We're still I'm still trying to figure out the gaming piece of this. I'm like I play a game one-on-one solo. I beat the game. I'm not really let let everybody watch me play. I feel embarrassed because of I'm so poor at it and then I can't keep up with chat because I'm distracted by playing games. But hey, it's my problem. I'll figure it out. But but hanging out with friends and playing is something I want to start to develop more of uh in this space so that I'm not just, hey, I hang out in chat streams all the time. I like the art. I like the weird nature places of Twitch where I did a sewing stream last week. I've done cooking streams before.

: Um, were you Brian? Brian, did you s you sewed something? I saw I saw one of your little um Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Yes. U It's It was awesome. It's Tim the Enchanter. Tim the Enchanter. Tim the Enchanter. Yeah. Not Brian. Yeah. I I was really impressed. Thanks. I mean, you really looked the part, man. I've got a beard that I haven't put on. So, so the first event will be on Friday. I'm hosting an event on Friday at my local brewery. And so, we're doing a cosplay event there. And then I'm going to we're my family is planning on going to Renaissance Festival, so I can use it. I probably won't pull the beard for that. I'll leave that off. Okay. Okay. And then uh so I've got a lot of options with it. And it's I mean you had the horns and everything. Yes. Yes. It's it's going to be fun. It's going to be fun. Um so I just thinking two last things. I mean we've got some time so if we if we go over that's that's not a big deal but just thinking about what are some obstacles that John 17:23 group faces. You know you as a ministry or just groups as they're they're trying to form. What are some of the obstacles that need to be overcome? And then just talk about what has happened for the the last year uh with John 17:23. If you can just kind of touch on those couple of things. If we have more time, I got a couple more questions we can do, too. Sure. Okay. Well, some of the obstacles to forming a group uh really are is the fact that sometimes pastors are afraid because they've been hurt in the past because they've they have their own hang-ups and they've they've been burned. So, the very idea of coming together and building relationships with someone that you don't know, there's a fear factor to it. So the fear of putting yourself out there and being rejected stops people.

: There's when you say an objection when we're trying to form a group, pastors can have all many many objections of why I don't want to be in a group. I don't have the time. That's a big one. And we have a, you know, we once a pastor gets in the group, what they find is we have this testimony from a pastor in Georgia of a of a well-sized church and he says, "I thought I don't have the time for this. I oversee a very large congregation. I just don't have the time." And he made the time. And he says, "Now I look and say, I don't know. I I'll get other things out of my schedule because I'm always going to make time for this group because I realize it it makes me a a better pastor. Yeah. Better person and I'm closer to God because of it. So what we don't what we don't know we don't know what we don't know. Yeah. So we don't realize how relationships transform our lives. We know that the relationship we have with Christ totally made us a new creature. 2 Corinthians 5:17. We're we've been born again spiritually new birth. We're not what we used to be. We're not to conform to the things of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of our minds.

: Well, when you're with other people who've been transformed by Christ, the Holy Spirit's working in them. As iron sharpens iron, we sharpen one another. We become better. We just do when we're Ecclesiastes 4, Solomon said, you know, a cord, one cord is easily broken, but two, that'll hold it. But three, wow, you're good, you know, and what happens if a person falls down and they're by themselves? Well, they're on the ground, but if you have a friend, they can pick you up. And if you're cold, that friend can keep you warm. So the objections are usually I don't have the time. I'm afraid to put myself out there. I I don't well believe this or not, there are some denominations who won't allow you to connect with other denominations. So So that's a real objection. And unfortunately if if they you know we we're not going to make anybody have to lie or you know you have to be true and respect where you're at. So that's a true objection and they unfortunately they can't be in a group because the denomination says you can't. Um so the objections are there the time factor I'm afraid to put myself out there. I'm not allowed to be there and um we have to work around those objections. When you find someone who we would call uh we either call a connector or just a champion of unity, when they're passionate about connecting with other people and they're the Holy Spirit just uses them and they just have this favor. It's it's probably like you have that friend that you can go to the you go to the same restaurant, same person serves you, you try to talk to him about Christ and nothing happened and your friend goes and he's just that that guy or that gal. They just start talking and you sit there and you look at them and you think, "How in the world are they telling them about Jesus? And I've been trying for six months." And boom. Well, thank you, God, that you're using using this situation. It's the same thing. You have those people who are connectors and once you once you get on fire for what we do and you say, "Yeah, I can do this. I want to do this. I want to see more people in this." they they're able to just speak to the people and say well just try it try it really what we tell everyone is we call it the pilot phase try it for six meetings that's all you got to do and after six meetings that gives time if you have five people in your group it gives time for everyone to tell their story for all of you to experience you commit to those first six meetings and you to all experience the four elements of group life and then afterwards you talk about it and you can commit or not commit. You can say, "Okay, we've tried this for six times. Who wants to stay? Who wants to commit and have an agreement that we're going to do this say for the next six months? We're going to commit to meet this time every month or this time every other every other week and we're going to do this for 6 months and then we'll re-evaluate and see if we want to do it again for another six months or another nine months.

: Pastor schedules are so full that we realize that they have to have an out. And so I don't know about you, but I've been invited to things and I get there and all of a sudden I didn't say yes, but just because I showed up they think I say yes. And I'm like, how am I going to get out of this? I'm stuck in this for the rest the rest of my days until Jesus comes. How do I get out of this thing? Well, we don't want pastors to feel that way. So, we say, you got a trial period. Try it on. See how it fits. See if you like it. Honestly, 98% of the pastors who try it like the fit, like the way it wears, and they stick with it.

: Um, so those that's the whole objection part. Did I answer that question right? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, is that what you were asking? Yeah, that's what I was asking. Yeah. Yeah. And then, uh, I was just thinking too of, uh, how has John 17:23 grown and expanded in the last year? Well, um, I mentioned going to Kenya in 2018, and since then, God opened the door to other countries. And so I've visited a lot of nations in Africa and we've had others champions of unity go and and they've connected with other leaders in um Scotland, Ireland. Um we're having somebody connect with someone in Greece. The point I'm saying with that is I used to go and last year God said no. And it really freaked me out because uh unfortunately I had kind of found my part of my identity in going because people say, "Where are you going this year? Where are you going next month? What are you going to be doing?" And um it was hard to let that go. But God said, "No, you're not going." In fact, um you were going to be going with us on one of the trips.

: We were planning to go to Rwanda and that just shut down. God said, "No." Yep. But what we learned from that was God was having a shift how we present and reach pastors.

: And for most people outside the US, they've heard of the app called WhatsApp. And outside the US, almost everybody uses it. So we were able to take our material and write it for WhatsApp.

: And so we'll put together a WhatsApp group. And in that WhatsApp group, we do training once a week, we send out material with questions. They have poll questions, fill-in-the-blank questions. And then once a seven days after that, we meet for an hour for a discussion. Because of people's data, we don't do a call. We don't do a video call or audio call. We do texts and we do recordings. So they text us, we ask them questions, they ask us questions, we answer their questions, they'll answer our questions, and we learn. They're kind of self-taught, but we fill in the blanks for them.

: So by doing that, the first time we did it, we had, I think it was 23 countries represented with 71 pastors in that first group.

: After we did the first group, we realized it was great to have all the pastors present, but we had to redo some things because it was too long. And so the Lord helped us to trim it down. And I just finished with our team taking a Pakistan ministry team through the training.

: Now, we weren't going to be going to Pakistan, but they found us through the web, you know, online and they reached out to us. And so it's a six-person ministry team and they all went through the training and they were awesome. They asked great questions. They answered the questions. They knew the material. We could tell they knew the material by the questions they asked. And right now, they're in that process.

: When you're forming a group, there's five things you do. You pray for the Holy Spirit to identify who you're supposed to reach out to, the pastoral leader, and then you contact them and tell them what you're doing. And you meet with them either in a whole group or just one-on-one to kind of say when it would work to meet and then you set up a time when you're all going to come together to start your first meeting.

: Well, talking with them in the area they're at, you know, they're in a place where they can't openly kind of do this. So they had to do some of what they do, you know, covertly. And so they're in that discernment process right now. Holy Spirit, who do I ask? Who do I reach out to? Who do I connect with?

: So we're praying with him and trusting God that we're going to have groups within the next six months because of them going through the training, but they're doing it developing these groups with pastors who in that area are looking to have relationship with other pastors or just looking to have relationships.

: The bonus is it's going to be another pastor who gets them, who understands what they're going through because they go through the same stuff.

: Yeah. So we're now in 29 countries and because of WhatsApp and how we've been able to use that, God referrals—a pastor knows a pastor in a different country and that different country that pastor then reaches out to us. Or I, you know, I'll be somewhere. I'm stateside. I haven't gone anywhere in a year and a half now and I go to a coffee shop and all of a sudden I meet someone and he just, you know, you just know when there's another believer and you're just talking and, oh, we talk and this person connects me with a pastor in Sierra Leone and boom, you know, I'm talking to a pastor in Sierra Leone right now about having him and his ministry team, his other pastors and his group, so that they can reach out to pastors outside their denomination and start groups.

: Will I ever go to Sierra Leone? I don't know. But I know right now I know pastors there and they're doing it for us.

: So it's been really cool. We've seen God. We increased last year in the number of pastors and groups by 23%. And we didn't go anywhere. And that was like eye-opening to us, astonishing that God—I gotta be honest with you, Leon—at one point I thought, did I do something wrong? God, is this a punishment? Am I being disciplined? Is there something wrong in my life? Because I was comfortable. I'd gotten comfortable and used to what I'd been doing and kind of said it's time to change things up, Rob. And I'm just so glad he did.

: We just started a group. We just started a new WhatsApp training course for pastors in Nigeria. We had a pastor who went through our training last year and she's reached out to these pastors and they're like, "Well, we want to know more. We've heard it from you." Kind of like the woman at the well. We've heard it from you and then we heard it from the source. So now we believe Jesus. These pastors have said, "We heard it from you. We like what you're saying, but we want to hear it from the source." So we've had these pastors, she put, you know, and they'd gone together in a pilot group and they're like, "Uh, I'm not sure about this. I want to know more." So now we have nine of the pastors who have signed up for this course. We just started it this week with them.

: And I mean within an hour of us posting the material, within an hour, two of them had already answered all five of the questions relating to the lesson. So they read through it and they got the answers right. So they're looking at the material, answering the questions. That's how quickly. And we've never had that. We put it out there and it may take a day or two. Within an hour. So God's doing some really cool things. He's given us innovative and creative ways to reach into areas that we normally—I had a guy reach out to me from Taiwan, a pastor, and he's like, "I've heard what you do. I want to see this happen. How can we make this happen?" Sent him the material. I was dying to go to Taiwan because they were having a conference and they were like, "Oh, we want you to come." And I'm like, "All right, God is breaking it. I'm getting out of this. I'm getting out of the US." And it just so happened that they invited someone else and they said, "You can come this year or next year." And they're like, "Rob, we want Barnabas to come. We want you to come." And this other guy and the other guy said, "Well, I can't come in 2026. I only can come in 2025." So that door closed, but this pastor still said, "You sent me all the stuff. Do you mind if I do my own workshop with your material?" I'm like, "Absolutely not. I'll send you more material. I'll send you some training stuff."

: So that's what God does and it's happening right now in Taiwan. There was a question which is totally related to this, wondering about language barriers since there's like, you know, 90 different nationalities at Sis Pineapple's church. She's in England. Is how would they and if they have family in other countries and pastors they know in other countries, how would they be able to get it into their language and be able to connect with what they're doing?

: What is so wonderful is with AI today, we had a trouble trying to translate. We'd have to try to find translators. And so we use different AIs online. Right now we're using ChatGPT and we just did Greece. We did Greek. A missionary reached out and said, you know, we want to do this. Some of them understand English, but the majority they're going to learn it better in Greek. Okay. So we took our material and we had ChatGPT translate it to Greek. Sent it over to him and he has the pastor he's working with is Greek. So he reads it. He's like, "Yep, change this, change this, everything else is good." So we were able to get that done within two weeks. And then we format it on our end so when it's sent to them, it's formatted in a way that it mirrors what our English version looks like or our Spanish version or French.

: As long as you have someone in that country that can review the material, we can get it to them in their language. I have a leader who just reached out today and said, "I'm going to Uganda. Um, what do you got?" And they speak English and it's Luganda in Uganda. Well, we don't have that language yet, but because my team member is on vacation, as soon as she gets back, I'm letting her know we need to do this. So do your magic because I got pastors in Uganda who speak the language who will read it for us. And it can be as long as we have someone there.

: The turnaround is really quick. We again Spanish—the first time we did Spanish because there was no AI and even when you, it took with translators to do it and it cost us a lot of money. It took months and now we do it in weeks. So technology is there. So to let that person know in England, what? Go ahead. What'd you say?

: I was just gonna say she's commenting now. I got an image of pastor groups all speaking Greek or Hebrew. Now I understand why they teach that at seminary.

: It's a different Greek. It's a different Greek. The Greek of the Bible is a different Greek than they speak in modern Greece. The same would be Italian and Latin aren't the same language. You may be able to understand things, but you're probably not going to carry on conversations.

: Well, here's something outside of Greek and Hebrew. We have—we did a conference, we did a workshop in South Africa and it was great. We had done one in Botswana and so some of those came, some of the pastors came who were there. And so the pastor who hosted us in South Africa was going to Mozambique. Now in Mozambique they speak Portuguese and so he doesn't speak Portuguese and the pastors going with him who know about John 17:23 groups, they're from Zimbabwe. So they said, "Do you have this in Mozambique Portuguese?" We're like, "No, but we can." So we put it together through ChatGPT and I have a friend, um, Joel, who he and his wife Adrian are missionaries to Mozambique. I said, "Hey, we just put this together." Now Joel's not in a group. He knows about us, but you know, I said, "Would you look at this for us?" And so he read it. He said, "You need to change this. You need to change this. And culturally, if you say it this way, it's going to fall flat." So he gave us the cultural perspective. So that was updated. And so this was, oh, just, oh, 10 days ago. It was well, beginning April 9th through the 14th. They went there. They presented this and there were also leaders from Malawi there because one of the Isaac from South Africa was a missionary for a while in Malawi. So they came over right after that. So Mozambique is done Portuguese. It's presented. These leaders in Mozambique received it. There was a translator who translated all this. And then the pastors who went back to Malawi with this material, they contacted us and said, you know, we were told by the guys who went, Marco and Linesman, "Hey, just reach out to them and say hello." We did. And they're like, "Hey, do you have this in Chichewa or Tatawei? It's their language in Malawi." Well, because we've been working with a guy Matiki there, we did. All of this was all already done. So if someone reaches out to us and says, "Hey, I want to have this happen in Russia," well, we haven't done it in Russian yet, but we can as long as you have somebody over there who can read it. We can make it happen because God is doing that for us. I just get excited because I don't speak any of these languages. All I unfortunately just speak English and I don't do that very well at times. So I misspelled it. I was trying to put it in the chat so that everybody could get us. John 17:23.net will get you connected.

: And then I mistype because I can't spell or type. Well, I don't even know how to open the chat window. I don't know if I have the same chat you have.

: I'm just looking at you. That's all I got here right now on Twitch. It's okay. You're good. I get to see you. All right.

: I know I could keep going with questions for you, but I told you two hours, so we'll just kind of bring this to a conclusion.

: If is there anything else that I haven't asked you that you think people need to know? You are pretty thorough, Leon. You are pretty thorough.

: Yeah. I think the reason why we do this is one, God's called us to this ministry. I mean, he's called you. You're involved with us with this ministry. And this ministry doesn't happen in a vacuum. We have leaders around the world like yourself, like me, who are passionate about seeing unity in the body of Christ.

: Our focus is on pastoral leaders because that's the focus God's given us. And it's a lot of it is because unless you're a pastor, you don't know how another pastor feels, what they go through, what they've been through.

: And so when you come alongside another pastor this way, it brings health into their life. And if we stop right there, hey, it'd be great. Wonderful ministry. But that's that we don't stop there because our vision is to see authentic spiritual and relational unity develop between pastoral leaders based on Jesus's prayer from John 17:23 so that the world will more easily find Jesus.

: It's kind of the testimonies and things we've been talking about. When they see the unity, it's like a moth to a flame. People are attracted to it.

: And so the fruit of unity is healthy pastor can lead healthy ministry, healthy church or lead a church to health. Lead a church in ministry, lead a ministry in health.

: That in turn then brings unity within that circle. As the pastors come together, whatever their circle of influence is, they become united.

: And it's not just those five. It's them and their ministry. It's those five and their community. Right. Right. And that unity then leads to Jesus being proclaimed.

: It leads to people finding Christ because as we get in health, it leads us to think better, to have better schedules, to take the Sabbath rest when a friend is saying, "Hey, you can't work 14 days in a row and think that's okay. That's not what Jesus wants us to do. Take a break." So that then we can really get out there and be the witness Christ has called us to be.

: So our ministry leads to kingdom pursuing kingdom ministry together. Our mission is having pastoral leaders connect in John 17:23 groups so they're encouraged, enabled, and inspired to pursue kingdom ministry together.

: It doesn't necessarily mean that you'll do an outreach together, but if you support me with your prayers and encouragement, it's going to help me to do that outreach to do that evangelistic work.

: When you're because I'm thinking of the digital space, right? You can't always, you know, but even in digital space, you guys can work together in the digital space to do something that reaches thousands.

: Yeah, on the in the digital sphere just like you would if you're in a community together physically reaching that city or town. Yeah. So I think that that's another focus I just want I want to lay out there. That's why we do what we do. Yeah.

: Sis Pineapple was just asking, do you know is there a group in the UK that she could connect?

: No. Okay. Sis Pineapple, connect with me. I'll get you connected with Rob and we can get more info or go to john1723.net.

: Your pastor can connect with me or Rob. We can we can follow up there and try to help that be able to happen.

: The other thing I guess just following up on what you were saying there is do you have any measurable statistics of outcomes that is the fruit of what John 17:23 does for pastors, churches, congregations when pastors are involved?

: Well, I can tell you how it affects pastors because we take a survey of those in groups. So I got to look at my numbers here because I'm not a numbers guy, but 96% of pastors feel safe enough to share anything in their John 17:23 group.

: So we have almost 2,000 pastors in groups representing multiple sized congregations representing hundreds or thousands now of communities around the world. 92% say that the theological differences are not obstacles to their relationship.

: 82% of pastoral leaders say their spiritual well-being is good to excellent. And what percent was that? 82%. 82%. That's significant. Yeah.

: Yeah. That's pretty high. Good to excellent. And then 92% of pastors actively engaged in the John 17:23 group say they no longer feel alone or isolated.

: We just began this year asking questions in reference to the outcome in communities. One thing and I again I'm not a number guy so I tried to read the graph before I got on here with you and understand the percentages and then I couldn't get in touch with our ministry administrator. So I know that one thing that they're focused on that we saw as we asked the question they're focused on pastors are focused on more than anything reaching their community.

: How do we do this evangelistically? How together can we reach our community? Because I thought like discipleship would be way up there, right?

: And that was in the top ten, but it wasn't in the top three. So they're focused on the Great Commission going and making disciples.

: And hopefully the next time you have me on here, if it's next year or whenever when we do our survey again, I'll have those numbers because we like this was the first year asking that question.

: So we like to have a couple years behind our belt so we can actually say, "Yeah, this we see the trend. This is real." Yeah.

: Yeah. And I know we were we were talking you've got some some new data, some some images. Those are all in the works.

: They're not yet available. So I was just trying to get a little bit of a glimpse, but by the time this podcast is on YouTube, it should be.

: And if not, I will be posting it or you can ask in the chat when these things get posted. And when they're available, I'll go back and post links to any of that stuff.

: But otherwise, if you go to john1723.net, then you they will get posted there at some point. Yes, they'll be coming up. Again, I'm not the guy who does that.

: We have a great team that's working on that and it should be up. I'm told that they're working on it and by the time this is up, it'll be on our website.

: Awesome. Our new infographic. Their new infographic. Yes. Which yeah, I'm learning. Which Subdue the Day was working on. Correct. Yes. Yes. So there's there's a few people.

: He helped us. He got us started. He got us started in that direction. Yeah. Yeah. He was he was helping along with that. There's a few people in the chat that'll know Subdue the Day.

: So he's he's been involved. He has taken a step back from helping with John 17:23 currently. So if you want to keep him in your prayers if anybody knows him, not sharing anything, just confidential, but he does need being lifted up in prayers right now.

: Is there anything that we can be praying for John 17:23 groups or for you, Rob? For us we have this evening a ministry update.

: Our first one for the year. We've collected our data and putting that all together just to share with those who are supporters volunteer their time. Pray for us give financially and so you can pray for that this evening to go well.

: It's not a fundraising thing or anything like that. It's just, hey, we just want to share with you what God's been doing and give God glory for the great things he's been doing and we want to make you aware of them.

: Pray for that tonight, but also pray that we can make that reproducible. We want to be able to share that so that not just, you know, the team here can do it, but my team that I work with, like you you oversee virtual groups for us.

: We can share that with you and you can share that. That's what I mean by reproducible. So that's what we're working on so that our team members, our team leaders throughout the world can be able to take that in their country, in their region of the world and present it because these numbers it's we're an international ministry. It's the whole that we're sharing. So if you could pray for that, that would be great.

: And yeah, on a personal level that I just stay focused. There's you know Oh, I know. Sometimes I can be like that dog in my back, my little dog in the backyard, squirrel, and loose. So just stay focused on what God has in front of me and get done what he wants me to get done.

: All right. Well, let me pray and then we will do what we call raiding out. It looks like Christian Ninja is up. He is in one of the John 17:23 groups.

: So it'd be fun to go over and raid him. Awesome. All right. Yeah. God, I just thank you for John 17:23 and Barnabas Ministries and what you are doing in and through them and how you are multiplying it.

: 23% increase last year. What a expansive growth and what it took was a shift in ministry focus but the focus was on groups where it always had been just a method to do it differently and digital has helped them be able to do that and make that expansion and so I thank you for that. I thank you for the lives that are being impacted the pastor's lives the congregations the communities and that you continue to expand that.

: May you be with them this evening as they present all of this information that they've collected. May it be a great time of celebration and praise and may they figure out how to duplicate this to the other places globally and digitally where there are pastors gathered together.

: And for Rob, I just pray your blessing upon him. You continue to multiply him and his ability to do what you've called him to do, to continue to refine that and to give away the things that he's not supposed to do.

: To have him not be distracted by other things. I'm always appreciative when I say, "Hey, I think I need to introduce you to someone else." And he's like, "Great. I'll love to meet them, but you know what I'm doing." I go, "I know, but they need to know you, too." As well as you knowing what they're up to and doing.

: So God, just pour out your blessing upon him and watch over him. I just pray this in Jesus name. Amen. Yes, Lord. Amen.

: Well, thank you, friend, for being here. Oops, I'm clicking on the wrong person. Let me go back. Trying to talk and click on stuff with my computer all at the same time.

: It's kind of like walking and chewing gum. So yeah, just that's why you don't game and talk at the same time.

: No, it's why I don't game and talk at the same time. I get totally distracted. I lose focus. I forget what I was doing because I'm trying to talk. But I can read the Bible and read chat and talk about both with no issues whatsoever.

: That I can do. It's a skill. I've watched you do it on Twitch and I'm impressed because I that's not the skill I have.

: So, okay. We're going to raid out to Christian Ninja. He is going it looks like he's got um just reading what he has.

: Anything specific? Looks like he's doing Minecraft right now is what he's playing. So we'll go in and we'll raid him. And I just want to say appreciate you.

: Appreciate your friendship. Appreciate what you're doing in ministry. And I thank you for being on the podcast with me. Thank you everyone for hanging out with us today.

: I actually did get those who who've been here. I actually did get some raid commands if you like those. Are they working? Maybe not.

: Nightbot doesn't have it. So let's try this one. You, so when we go over, you usually and I have to spell raid correct. I can't spell raid twice and get it correct.

: I told you I can't spell. There we go. So anybody coming with us, we usually put a raid command in there and then you highlight it and you copy it and then you share it when we all end up over there.

: So thank you, thank you, thank you everyone. I appreciate you and uh have a blessed, blessed day. And let's show some credits. I've got those too.

: It says just a slideshow. Nothing fancy.