Transcript
Danny Price: everybody, welcome to episode 12 of the Table Talk Recap Podcast with me and Shane Finley. um We're going talk a little bit at the beginning of this. So this was Anniversary Sunday, um very exciting just for Mountain View Fellowship, just 17 years celebrating.
Danny Price: um But in the midst of the celebration, ah there's just been some rough news that has come through this last week. And I'm sure you know if you're On social media, um you're very aware of this already, but just the whole Charlie Kirk um being assassinated in passing.
Danny Price: um I didn't want to dominate this whole you know podcast by talking about that, but I feel like it would be, um especially though given this as a podcast, it would be um disingenuous not to at least mention that and just talk about that just briefly a little bit.
Danny Price: um Shane, is there anything you wanted to share? I know you already shared on Sunday a little bit, but is there anything you want to share about that specifically um and kind of how that's affected you or has hit you?
Shane: um You know, outside of what I did share, which I think people can listen to, I ah i was actually a little surprised at how much it did hit me because, you know, i don't I really don't pay attention to a lot of the commentators and stuff.
Shane: um And it made me realize how much I had started following him.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: And i think. What I noticed about him is it felt like the last two to three years in listening to him, he became much more about evangelism and the gospel and, and centering his answers in scripture and that kind of thing. And, um, which I really appreciated. And, um, and I, and I really hope that people that have that Christians who have the same,
Shane: um desire to be that involved in more political discussions. I hope that they'll base, i think we, we would, we do ourselves a misjustice and injustice and we, we fail when we only debate it and not go back to scripture in it.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: um Because it, You know, who really cares what your opinion is? Honestly, oftentimes, you know, I mean, if if we can't kind of go, hey, here's a here's a biblical reason why I believe this, then then I think we're um then we're just debating opinions, you know.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Danny Price: Right, right.
Shane: So anyway, just a different thought.
Danny Price: Yeah, no, it was it was terribly sad. um And I think my my heart, I think some people that I've talked to got really angry right away. ah You know, self-admittedly, not...
Shane: Yeah, for sure.
Danny Price: And I think for me, there was a little bit of that, but I think more than anything else, I was just incredibly sad to hear that because I knew... I know where, how both sides of the aisle in terms of politics are going to spin this.
Danny Price: It's just, I mean, you could, you could set out like, you know, a game plan of exactly like what they're going to do. The talking points I can do right away. Oh my gosh, this is going to be such a big deal for the longest time.
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: And, I'm just thinking to myself, man, this is the end. I think this is going to be the end of anyone doing anything outdoor because of what happened with Trump, what happened here. And there's just going to be, this is the end of outdoor discussions on a campus or anything like that for a while, at least until they can really tighten things up, which is sad because I think that was his, his whole the deal. And I don't, I didn't agree with him on everything.
Danny Price: There was a lot of stuff I did, especially his faith stuff, but there was some political things I wasn't like on the same page with, but The fact that he could discuss it with college students in the open and talk to them, i mean, that was really cool.
Danny Price: And he was one of the only people doing that as consistent as he was.
Shane: Oh,
Danny Price: There's other people that kind of do that from time to time, like as a special thing, but that was like his whole his whole deal. And I'm like thinking about it, that's kind of over. I don't think they're going to do that anymore.
Danny Price: they They might do it indoors and it might be you know very heavily guarded, but just because of the security issues, um that would that was really sad to think about. Like, man, that's going really end a lot of discourse.
Danny Price: And then also just his family and his wife. And oh my gosh, a death like that.
Shane: ah yeah
Danny Price: It's just, it's not something that you would ever wish on your your worst enemy. um
Shane: Nope. Yeah, it was definitely your sad.
Danny Price: It's just ah really terrible.
Shane: I guess real quick, as you were talking, two things I would say. my The one thing I've seen out of it, too, is a lot of people on the other side, on the the left, the people that are Democrats, I think they're realizing how unhinged the extreme Democrats are because they, they're hearing these people literally be okay with, with someone being killed.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: And I've heard many kind of what would be more left-wing commentators saying that's nuts.
Danny Price: you know
Shane: Like something's wrong with, if you feel that way.
Danny Price: Yeah. Yeah.
Shane: So, I mean, I'm hoping that is one good out of it. Is it maybe more moderate Democrats kind of see what, what it is that, we say is, is like a real big issue, you know?
Danny Price: Yeah, no.
Shane: ah And then the thing that was just so cool is I haven't seen one riot over any of this. I haven't seen one looting.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: I, I've seen people responding in prayer and, and I'm hoping that that is a testimony to people.
Danny Price: We hope not to. Yeah.
Shane: So anyway, yeah.
Danny Price: Yeah. And I think he would want that. He would have wanted that to be, um, I know that that for example, just anecdotally, um, mountain life church and center point church had some of their biggest Sundays ever. um after the Sunday, the Sunday after I know we had, a i mean, and that was partly due to anniversary Sunday, but we had a big, we had a huge Sunday and I know that nationwide it's causing people to go back to church, which man, if that's um the silver lining to someone dying in such a terrible way of people just coming back to faith, I know he would have wanted his, if, you know, with when he died, I know he wouldn't have wanted it to count for something.
Shane: We had our biggest Sunday ever.
Danny Price: And that's, that's kind of cool, but that's what's happening and not people getting, i know there's,
Shane: Yeah. Yep.
Danny Price: Stories here and there, people getting angry and stuff, but like you said, there's no mass rioting. There's no crazy outbursts of violence, and you hope to to not see that.
Shane: Yeah, yeah, there's people acting out in anger, but yeah.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: So anyways, we're not a political podcast, but I had to i had to say something about that. um
Shane: Mm-hmm.
Danny Price: Just terribly sad, but continuing on. um So really awesome Sunday, really celebratory. I thought that was really cool. just all that stuff that we were doing, um like the video and just kind of all the look back on the last 17 years.
Danny Price: So the video that Patrick put together that kind of introduced the sermon, um just of you know all the old footage of the church and all that, did you get emotional watching that? Was that pretty was that a pretty special moment just to see all that? And just, is there anything you want to highlight from that video from the church history that you were like, this that was really cool to see?
Shane: You know, honestly, I got emotional in my office when he previewed it for me. He always, you know I always have a preview of anything.
Danny Price: Mm-hmm.
Shane: um
Danny Price: Oh, gosh.
Shane: But um yeah, no, it was really neat to see. Yeah. I don't know as far as what to talk about it. ah You know, it just reminds you of all that and we've gone through and, you know, and it's neat to see, you know, see a few people in the video that literally have been with us for the 17 years, you know, and, um,
Shane: and how much older we've all gotten. um You know, but then just, you know, I mean, there was some of the things highlighted just our building phases and stuff like that.
Danny Price: oh gosh
Shane: And, you know, um so that's kind of it. Those are the reminders of like heart, really hard to getting the buildings done.
Danny Price: Right, yeah.
Shane: But now this really neat to look back on it and, and see people and, even miss people that aren't here anymore. um Even a couple people that were in the video that have at least one that I know has passed, you know, and so.
Danny Price: Oh, yeah.
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: Yeah, i i I've only been part of the church, I want to say it's been nine or ten years since I've been going. And it really wasn't the last to last seven years that it's been worked like really consistent. But really, it was really cool for me to see just how long this has been going on.
Danny Price: And so I was never there some of the older buildings, like the Clock Tower building way back when.
Shane: you ever.
Danny Price: So seeing all that stuff was really cool. um So the sermon was mainly focused on... I mean, and from my perspective, at least, you were talking mostly about like the mission, ah like you said, the why behind everything, the drive the driving force. um
Danny Price: The question that I'm trying to i'm trying to like figure out the best way to say this without making this drag on super long, do you think that other churches have different missions, and is that valid for them to have other missions? For example, like we have like our what what Is it our mission statement or vision statement, the meet Jesus and live free?
Danny Price: What what would that be called?
Shane: Yeah, meet me Jesus, grow in Christ, and live, meet Jesus, grow in faith, and free.
Danny Price: Is that mission statement or what you what would you call that? Mission state mission statement, you would call that?
Shane: Yeah, i um I always get so – I'm so bad about mission and vision statements. um you know i So, yeah, I would say it's our mission statement because it's basically the great commission, the mission um in in three phases phrases.
Danny Price: I know. Got it. Okay.
Danny Price: Got it.
Shane: And then the vision, I would say, is is usually more focused on things like like what are we going to do, how are you know how we're doing that, how we're living out the mission.
Danny Price: Got it. Okay. Okay. So that being said, with other churches, and I'm trying to say this in like a very... um diplomatic way.
Danny Price: Are other churches, and and again, I'm talking about, you know, capital C, like, you know, classic, you know, non-denominational or like within like the mainline Christianity churches. Is it okay for them to have different missions? Is that a good thing? Is that complimentary to us to, you know, the community, so to speak of, you know larger, you know, churches in a big network?
Danny Price: Are they wrong? Are we right? Vice versa? um How does, how does that work? Because I think, In my mind, I'm just thinking about that's awesome that that's our mission. Are we missing things that another church could possibly pick up or vice versa? Like, are they missing things that we're actually excelling in? And is that compliment, comp complimenting each other? Does that make sense?
Shane: Yeah. Yeah. I think a lot of it just comes down to nuances um of the same mission. Like I honestly have never come in line with in communication with.
Shane: OK, let me just take like John MacArthur. You know that I have very different views than John MacArthur. Right.
Danny Price: Sure.
Shane: But I would still say he and I would say our church's mission is the same. Right.
Danny Price: Hmm.
Shane: um
Danny Price: Interesting.
Shane: That, you know, his goal was to see people come to Christ, to grow in a relationship with Christ and live for Christ.
Danny Price: Okay.
Shane: You know, now now he and and Grace Church would would say it in a different way.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: And then they would have a different emphasis as to how they live out that mission. um And so I think it's it's more the nuances of what that mission looks like and what our strengths are and what our weaknesses are.
Shane: but um But yeah, I mean, i I don't know any pastor or church of that I know of that wouldn't kind of agree that, yeah, no, our goal is to win people, you know, or or bring people to Jesus and and and and help them become fully developed disciples of Christ.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Danny Price: Cool. Yeah. And I would say to, you know, so for some, for some people, like i think the nuances of, you the difference of how a Sunday service works, um, can draw or sometimes repel certain people. For example, if you're really wanting to listen to more traditional music and hymns, there's churches that do that.
Danny Price: And they also, again, are living out the mission. Like you just talked about exceptionally well, but their Sunday service looks way different than ours and that's okay. And I don't think you, I mean, you might not, and I might not have like a preference towards that, but that's, there's nothing wrong with that.
Danny Price: And the way that they operate would be a little bit different.
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: Um,
Shane: Yeah. And, and they're going you know, and they're good. They're just going to have different strengths. I think a lot of that is based on who the leaders are of that church. You know, God black blesses different, you know, we all have different gifts in different ways. And, you know, ideally ah church is, know,
Shane: you know, just completely well-rounded with people of different different gifts that balance each other out and and are doing all of it really well. I just have never experienced that church.
Danny Price: Right.
Shane: And I think a lot of it is because we're broken n you know, so...
Danny Price: Yeah.
Danny Price: Yeah. No, you try to do the best you can. um And I think it is hard too when you have a really small church, and I wouldn't consider this necessarily a really small church, but... um, we're, we are on the smaller side, like even in terms of staff and like a teaching team and so forth. So it's hard when you're like trying to exhibit all these different gifts and all these different ways. And it's like, and you're not even that, I mean, we're getting a lot bigger by today's standard of churches, but still, um, I'm thinking of the churches that are like, like, like, ah the gateway campus, for example, like a hundred people, like it's going to be really hard to have all those gifts represented. Well, um,
Danny Price: you know because you only have like one person or two people on staff, it's going to be difficult, which is a cool opportunity.
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: Not to say it can't happen, but it is difficult. youre not going to have like the perfect ecosystem.
Shane: Well, you have different, ah based on your area too, you have different people who kind of gravitate towards different gifts, you know? um ah You know, like for instance, here in Heber,
Shane: we don't have a a plethora of people who are waiting to teach Old Testament history classes and Romans classes.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: And um because we're not, you know, we don't have any Christian colleges around us.
Danny Price: Mm-hmm.
Shane: You know, like when I was doing ministry in Southern California, I could call one of six different ah Christian colleges within 30 miles, about 40 miles of my church and had when and have a worship leader like that um and come and lead worship and do do a great job.
Danny Price: Oh, that's a cool resource. That's cool.
Shane: So if i my worship leader was out, no problem. call Call this. I got there's college students chomping at the bit to get a chance to lead worship in places.
Danny Price: But not here in Utah, not as much.
Shane: Yeah. Yeah, but also teaching, right, at ah the level of mature Christians and and not just mature in how they're living their faith out, like really knowledgeable Christians who could teach Bible classes and things like that was a completely different level than what we experienced here.
Danny Price: Oh.
Danny Price: Hmm.
Shane: I would say our first 10 years here, i we maybe had two other people who I would say, yeah, i would that's a person I would say, yeah, let's have them teach a Bible class.
Danny Price: Hmm. Interesting.
Shane: So,
Danny Price: Difference.
Shane: yeah
Danny Price: Differences. Which is cool. Which is so cool because then it, there's room to grow.
Shane: yeah, just different areas, you know, but you but we were also able to build our last building like we'd not do the whole, but we were able to renovate our last building based on completely volunteer work.
Danny Price: And there's, yeah. Okay.
Shane: We're in Southern California. I doubt I i didn't know 10 guys who even knew how to use a skill saw.
Danny Price: The blue-collar workforce.
Shane: That's not true. any Any of my friends who are from California might be listening.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: ah That's not true. There's probably like 10 of them.
Danny Price: That's not true.
Shane: There's about maybe 10. Yeah.
Danny Price: That's funny. No, that that's definitely a strength that we have is people that are willing to go-getters, willing to do stuff, and also good with their hands. That's cool.
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: Let's see here. So as a pastor, you you know this is your baby, and you know the church incredibly well. Where do you think... we are, and I want to be careful here and not to like, I don't want you highlighting all these weaknesses.
Shane: yeah
Danny Price: Where do you think we're weakest? Where do you think we're weakest though, as a church that we need to realign with to get more back onto the mission? um Is there, is there an area where you're like, man, I i wish we were a a little better here. And I know we've kind of talked but about the stuff in the past, but is there something that really stands out to you that you're like, yeah, that, that would be cool if we could be a little bit more um on mission with this?
Shane: Yeah, absolutely. um So, you know, we have the three that the pathway where we say meet is where we want people to meet Jesus and then grow, grow in relationship and then live.
Shane: Our weakness is grow. we We need more people taking an active role in discipleship.
Shane: um ah leaders, discipling, you know, disciples, discipling, basically, right? I mean, people that have, are walking with Christ, taking an active role in bringing people up underneath them and, and having them grow in a personal way.
Danny Price: yeah
Shane: I, as you maybe know, I'm not a big believer in that Sunday morning is the place for people to be discipled. I think if people are really going to grow in their faith, you it need, they, they need to be doing it.
Shane: First of all, you need to be doing it more than an hour a week, you know?
Danny Price: Right.
Shane: Um, and, um, so I'm a big believer in that we, we need to see people taking that active role throughout the week, um, to, to help people develop a relationship with Christ.
Danny Price: Do you think that is an informal... Like, ah so-and-so so knows so-and-so and says, hey, I'd love to disciple you. Or so-and-so comes to so-and-so so and says, hey, I'd love to be discipled. Or is that like a church-sponsored thing?
Danny Price: Like, is it like more programmatic? Like, hey, we have a list of these mentors, and if you can sign up?
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: Or is it like kind of an informal thing? how How would it be ideal? and i And how do you actually see it happening, I guess?
Shane: Well, ideally it's organic. That, that i would say that's ideal.
Danny Price: Right.
Shane: It just happens. I, um, I heard something a long time ago and I, well, churches program for things that they, that they're not doing. Um, so we, we, we program discipleship because unfortunately people are just not understanding they need to do it.
Danny Price: so
Shane: Um, and they're not living it out. So, okay, well now we'll have a program for it. Um, you know, uh, So hit a ideally it would be organic.
Shane: I don't think that's gonna happen at the level, like especially when we look at the growth we've had. You know, we we're we can't keep up with that organically. So I do think we need to have some sort of, you know, what do you call it? Mentoring or discipling or coaching program the that helps people do that.
Shane: um ah It's really hard though, because then people get this idea. It's like, okay, hey we want you to meet for 12 weeks to go through this material together. Okay, I did this material. I'm a disciple.
Shane: Um, you know, and yes, you are, but you are not fully discipled.
Danny Price: Oh, no.
Shane: Um, you know, you, that's hopefully just to get you to, to take more steps, you know?
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: And, and yet at the same time, like we live in a community. I mean, i would say even our most, our strongest Christians for me to say, Hey, I, I need you to commit to meet with these two people for the next three years.
Shane: It's like, like,
Danny Price: That's tough.
Shane: I don't even, I really don't know how to do that. I wish I did. And, you know, so someone listening that they have a good plan for that, come come talk to me because that's what we need, really.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Danny Price: Right, right.
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: Well, and you think about, I know this has been used many times before, but like um you want to have a, what what what is it, like a Barnabas? remind Remind me how that goes.
Shane: A Barnabas, a Paul, and a Timothy.
Danny Price: Like like you have you have a Timothy. Okay, Paula Barnes.
Shane: Yeah, Barnabas, Paul, and Timothy.
Danny Price: Yeah, Paula. There you go.
Shane: Somebody that's next you.
Danny Price: Someone that's a peer. Yeah, peer over you and then someone that you're discipling in the ideal world.
Shane: Yeah. Yeah.
Danny Price: um But yeah, you're right. That is tough. And people move and people change life phases and it's hard to stay in.
Shane: yeah
Danny Price: Like, I don't think we see that as much as it's been in like our US history where you stay in the same area for a long time. It's not as common anymore. So you're going in and out of people's lives and that's difficult. And then i think it's awkward.
Danny Price: ah
Danny Price: How do i say this? I think if someone came to me and said, hey, you need discipling, I'm going disciple you. It would be off-putting right away unless I knew them very well because I'd be like, well what do you have to teach?
Shane: yeah yeah yeah
Danny Price: Why are you so excited to teach me something? that's um And I'm not saying that's a good posture of my heart. I'm just saying that's the reality of how I would respond to that. So it almost needs to be starting a little bit.
Danny Price: with someone like, kind of like how you see Elisha just like following Elijah around. It's like, I'm not leaving. Like, I'm just going to hang with you and I'm just going to do life with you.
Shane: yep
Danny Price: and you see that awesome relationship. And then the other thing I would say too about that, that's difficult is I think it's all fun and nice. And it sounds very rosy to be like, well, yeah, there's my, they're discipling me. It's so great until the rubber meets the road and you're actually doing something stupid.
Danny Price: And they go, Hey dude, what are you doing? Stop that. And you get someone that crosses you and then,
Shane: Mm-hmm.
Danny Price: it all niceties go out the door because nobody wants, and it's very hard to humble yourself to be able to be checked by somebody else, even if it was in a kind way, but nobody wants to be held accountable. And once you're an adult, it's beside your boss, there's not that many people that have authority over you.
Danny Price: even in the church, I would say we don't do that as much as has been done in the past. Like imagine if you and like three elders showed up to someone's house to like confront them. I mean, that'd be a huge deal. That doesn't happen very often.
Danny Price: So imagine someone just in a personal relationship calling somebody out. I mean, I could see that that being a hindrance unless you're open to it and you set ground rules at the beginning of like, Hey, I'm open to you.
Danny Price: Letting me, you know, letting me know if you see that I have a blind spot or I'm living in error in some way. um My dad's always been big on that, but you know We've talked long and hard about making sure you have someone in your life that it could be your parent too, but just it's important to have someone that can call you out and it's not common anymore.
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: And I don't even, I wouldn't even say that I do that necessarily super well, let alone someone else that just signing up for a program or doing doing and something like that.
Shane: Yeah, and that's the thing. You sign up for a program and people are like, well, in our culture, if you sign up for a program, you're just like, well, I'll let you teach me this in a formal setting. But what that doesn't like they're wrapping their mind around like you're going to call me out in my life.
Shane: Yeah, that's such a rare thing now and hard to do. um I will say, and, you know, that's one thing I appreciate about our family and I feel like your family as well is – I don't feel like I have any kind of formal discipling relationship with you and David, but I do feel like in a, in many ways we disciple each other, even like, you like we have the kind of relationship that I actually, I'm like, that's what people should have. You know, we, we debate and talk about a deeper issues of faith. um We, we,
Shane: we pray together, we break bread together. we um well, we have fun together, but we have fun knowing that, look, hey, we're also going to call each other out if someone's like totally inappropriate or, you know, um ah we talk to each other about things that we maybe need to ask forgiveness about from people and, you know, that kind of thing.
Danny Price: Yeah, yeah.
Shane: And, you know I mean, we could even step that up a little bit. you know i we have We've gone through times where we take communion together. I know your family does that. you know
Danny Price: Mm-hmm.
Shane: but But anyway, it it really comes out of that kind of time together, right? and we And we do that because we're pretty committed as a family. Like, hey, we spend you know at least four or five hours together every week as a family.
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: Yeah. I'm curious what you think. And again, I'm just spitballing here. This is not in the question list, but what do you think there's a an element of not having as many grandparents around and calling our culture?
Shane: Mm-hmm.
Danny Price: Like if you think about like the Latino culture and certain like European cultures where the grandparents live at the house and they're old and wise and they kind of, they're kind of like secondary parents. Yeah. that's not as natural in the United States because people move away and don't live with their, and there's also like family tension. You don't live with your parents anymore.
Danny Price: um Do you think that that has an element to do with like discipleship of like not having more adults pouring into the young people?
Shane: Yeah, absolutely. i think that's I think that's a huge element in our culture. is um and you know And a lot of parents, unfortunately, I don't think they take that role on with their kids.
Danny Price: what What role? Like the disciple, the disciple role?
Shane: The cycling role. like
Danny Price: Huh.
Shane: They're kind of like, well, we're going to stay out of their business. you know And you know i mean you know us, we don't stay out of the guys' business.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: We're...
Danny Price: No.
Shane: we
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: you know um So it and that's a hard line to, you know, you don't want to get in their business to a point where you're like telling them every little thing they need to do or as far as how they're raising their kids and all that.
Shane: You know, you got to give them room.
Danny Price: Right. Yeah.
Shane: But no, I do think that that gen generation's not being together is a bad thing.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: um And, you know, even churches, right? There's a lot of churches. It's like, well, that's a church of 25, 20 to 30 year olds. That's a church of 50 and 60 year olds, you know, and that's kind of like the main congregation.
Danny Price: Right.
Shane: One thing I love about MBF is we we have kind of everybody, you know, and um so, yeah.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Danny Price: No, that's cool. um We're well represented of the community. We talked about that last week too. Just it's cool that we're having, we have all kinds of people.
Shane: Yeah. So older people start taking on some of these younger people and discipling them.
Danny Price: And I would say too, if I could talk, i don't know if anyone here is listening that's older, but if I could talk to you, if you're a if you're an older Christian, um
Danny Price: i would I could see myself, because I know I would feel this way of not feeling as qualified to be able to talk to somebody else because I've made mistakes in my life or I'm not, I don't know everything about the Bible, so to speak.
Danny Price: um I don't think that, I think there is some sort of qualification to be able to, you know, disciple. And I think you have to be, you know, a believing Christian and walking with the Lord, you know, you know faithfully and being sanctified, but there's, there's no one that's perfect. And I think if you're waiting for you to be perfect for yourself to be perfect to then take on somebody else, I think that's a mistake.
Danny Price: And I've always found whenever I'm teaching a topic or teaching something, I always grow in it more myself because I have to then relate it to somebody else. So not saying that there's like, if your, if your life is complete, utter disaster and you're struggling in all these ways and your life is falling apart and you're trying to get things back together, I'm not saying now is the time to take on somebody else, but you're never going to be at a spot where you're,
Danny Price: you got You got it all together and everything's gelling and everything's perfect because it just isn't, it's never going to be there.
Shane: Yep.
Danny Price: and then you're never going to disciple anybody. So just an encouragement to anyone that's older, please, please come and talk to people and please reach out and be a support.
Shane: That's a great, that's a great word.
Danny Price: Don't feel bad if you're not all put together and you don't and you don't know everything.
Shane: Yeah, that's ah that's a really good word, Danny.
Danny Price: Um, So I want to hit some of these more questions. We're already starting to get lower lower on time. Classic. um
Shane: but
Danny Price: So talking about campusing, um you know, gateways, our campus. um I know you've talked about potentially having other campuses. And I'm just curious what your thought is about campusing.
Danny Price: I have mixed feelings about it and I love it in some ideas and I love what can happen with it, but I can also see some downsides. Talk about like the pros and cons of campusing and why you like it as a, as an option.
Shane: Um, I like our form of camp. I'm going just because of time, I'll just talk about what we're doing with campusing because there there's different, there's different philosophies behind it.
Danny Price: Yeah, that's fine. Hmm.
Shane: But our philosophy is literally, I look at these campuses that we're looking at as mission areas. Um, these are never going to be campuses that we, I would say are like, oh, well they're self-sufficient or they actually contribute to us.
Shane: You know, they're, they're more going to be campuses where that we look at as like, hey, if they never are overall contributing to us, that's fine. um we're We're just going to make investments because there's these little areas, there's little towns of 2,000 to like 8,000 people throughout the Intermountain area that I have observed churches, even once they start, even if a church gets started, when they're trying to do everything by themselves and they never grow past that 60, 80, maybe 100,
Danny Price: They can't.
Danny Price: Hmm.
Shane: it's statistically you see once the first generation of a church moves on the second generation is very rarely as invested as the first generation um and you know unless there's an act of god a movement of god that really just changes it um and and what happens is that first pastor moves on and i've seen over and over and over again in these small towns first pastor moves on and then that searcher slowly starts to die
Danny Price: Hmm.
Danny Price: and
Shane: Because they don't have an umbrella that they work under. And yet what we're doing with the Gateway Campus is we provide an umbrella.
Danny Price: and
Shane: And so we we take care of like they don't have to do like the children's people, the people who volunteer to do children's ministry, they get to do the part that they love, that children's ministry people love. they They serve and work with the kids and teach the kids.
Shane: Right. your wife cuts out all their dumb little things that they need for the Sunday school lesson.
Danny Price: ah
Shane: Right.
Danny Price: The crafts, yep.
Shane: um We, we, we, we prepare all the curriculum for them. We, we go through all that. We get all the VBS stuff ready, you know, um ah high school, we youth youth ministry, we, we put on the camps and then all they got to do is invite the kids to come and have a leader.
Shane: um So we make where they're able to do the, the focus part of ministry that, that, isn't such a burden and and be able to thrive. So we're helping them go from surviving to thriving.
Shane: And that's, that's the way I see campusing for us.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Danny Price: I like that.
Shane: Now there is a bunch of other campus models out there and that's a whole nother conversation.
Danny Price: Yes, there are.
Shane: i don't know if we want to get into that.
Danny Price: no I don't know if we have time.
Shane: oh Yeah.
Danny Price: I'm not trying to pick on people, but I do appreciate our version of campus scene a lot more than other versions specifically
Shane: So yeah, ah
Danny Price: ah just to really do a small little rapid trail. I struggle personally when you have a campus where there's no leadership at the actual campus.
Danny Price: It just operates like a like a cry room, essentially, of the main campus church where people gather in a room, there's no one that like leads anything, and they just watch a video screen.
Danny Price: And there when they tie that just goes the main campus, it's not like anything that's specific for... There's nothing... their church specific i'm not saying that that's completely wrong model i just personally i'm like i don't it'd be hard for for me to go to a church like that because i would want i want people i want someone that's like like a pastor and shepherding and you know carl does an insanely good job with that up at you know the gateway campus because he's very passionate about that stuff so even though and he preaches exactly exactly
Shane: Yeah.
Shane: Yeah. Well, he preaches. they don We don't even show video. He preaches. Yeah.
Danny Price: And I like that.
Shane: pardon
Danny Price: I'm not saying videos are ever wrong. I'm just saying, I personally, I'm like, oh, I don't know.
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: i don't know how i feel about that. And I'm i'm not trying to pick, i don't know.
Shane: I couldn't do it either.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: I'm not against it. i couldn't do it either. um There again, because of time, I'll leave it up to you what you want to do. But I personally don't know of any churches that have no campus pastor, regardless if they're the ones teaching or not.
Danny Price: and I don't think I, yeah.
Shane: um You know, but, and i so the video sermon, that is a whole nother thing, you know, but, but even outside of that, the ones I know outside of the video sermon, they do have a campus pastor who gets up, does everything else.
Danny Price: I guess, I guess that's true.
Shane: And then he meets with people.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: He runs programs, discipleship, you know, make sure if they even have a staff, he runs the staff, all that kind of stuff.
Danny Price: Hmm.
Shane: So, so, and you might know of some that are different. I, that's just my knowledge.
Danny Price: I don't think I do. I think I'm just, i'm I'm just saying I've heard about that. I know other like bigger kind of mega type churches do that. Um, I guess the campus pastor thing that does cross that or check that box rather of having someone that's there, um,
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: Again, i I don't know. I have that like internal like a little bit of twisting. like I don't know if I love the whole video thing. But again, that's a little bit of preference.
Shane: No. Yeah, I don't. It's definitely not a preference for me. I think there's weaknesses to it, um but there are also strengths. Maybe that's a side podcast.
Danny Price: Got it.
Shane: We could have a whole conversation on that.
Danny Price: Yeah, no, we'll have a side podcast on that. um Moving forward, I was really excited to hear about that whole seminary idea with the high school. um You want to talk about that a little bit and what you want that to look like? Yeah.
Danny Price: and potential any hiccups or roadblocks with that with the community and you know school and all that
Shane: Yeah.
Shane: Yeah, I mean, we're in communication with the school district. i had a meeting with them two weeks ago or three weeks ago. So I don't see any hiccups with it um as far as it happens.
Danny Price: well they were okay with they were okay with it they didn't know objections
Shane: Yeah, they kind of know they can't um object because they they either have to not let the LDS church do it or or they – so so you know it's hard to know when people are like – when they know they don't have they they're going to hit a wall, are they just they just being nice about it because it's like, well, we're just going to – yeah, we can't fight this.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: Or do they are they excited about it?
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: So I don't know. um I like to think the best of people. Right. So um anyway. ah Yeah. So my vision right now is that we would kind of break it up into three sections for their first year. The cool thing is I don't even really we haven't even really thought out. Like, what about second year students?
Shane: Like, what if a kid starts this as freshman year?
Danny Price: Hmm.
Shane: And goes four years with us. Like that's, that's awesome. But first year, my thought is, a foundations that we break it up into trimesters of foundations and old Testament and a new Testament.
Shane: And, you know, we give them just a really good, you know, cause if you're coming, I think it's twice a week. Yeah. Twice a week for an hour and a half, you know, we can give them, I mean, we can get, get deep into some of this stuff, um,
Danny Price: That's a lot of time. That's a lot of time.
Danny Price: Yeah, wow.
Shane: You know, but then, shoot, maybe then maybe second year, you know, like maybe by fourth year, it's an ah it's a year of apologetics, you know?
Danny Price: We're going to do Greek. You're going to do Greek and Hebrew.
Shane: Yeah. No, but, you know, i mean, like, can you imagine these kids going to college campuses and they've had those kind of foundations? They've had a year of apologetics.
Danny Price: That's insane.
Shane: They've had, you know, and shoot, maybe we have them, the maybe the third or fourth year, they're actually discipling a freshman student. You know, so so right now, all we really, ah really have laid out is here's what we want for the first year.
Danny Price: There's a lot of possibility. That's cool.
Shane: um You know, but i but now I'm super excited about the possibilities. If we get kids like four year students, I think they're going to be they're going to be able to graduate in a completely different level than the average kid who Christian kid who goes to high school.
Danny Price: Yeah, that's that's really cool. that's That's excellent. Do you know, I mean, I'm guessing you'd teach a little bit of that. you Would you have rotating teaching team for that? I mean, that's a big commitment. um
Shane: Yeah, I mean, we definitely have our hopefully future youth pastor kind of oversee um a lot of it. But then, yeah, I mean, yeah. You know, we got myself, Bruce, I know Ashley Chauderidis would love to do a little bit of ah teaching with it.
Danny Price: Yep, yep.
Shane: um I've had a couple other people that have come to me and say, oh, that would be really cool, you know. So we'd we'd probably have to give them, you know, small slots to see how they do, you know, and that kind of thing.
Danny Price: Good.
Danny Price: Yeah. But that's, that's, that's awesome that you'd get involvement from the congregation and from people, you know, leadership doing that. That's cool.
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: I'm excited. um I was really excited to hear about that. Cause for me, I'm like, that's really cool. I wish I had that in high school.
Shane: Yeah, we're we're excited.
Danny Price: That's really exciting. Cool. um Last question. um And again, this is a broad, you can take it wherever you want. When it comes to just the growing MVF body and congregation, what have you been most passionate and excited about recently?
Danny Price: um Take it, take ah take that however you want. What are you excited? what are you passionate about?
Shane: I think the biggest thing for me is seeing people come to Christ. I mean, you know me, I have an evangelistic heart and, you know, I could go through stories of in the last two, three years, some people who I've seen come to Christ in a way that is, is and they're they're even already starting to show some fruit, you know, that, so um that's what I get.
Danny Price: Hmm.
Shane: most excited about. I mean, another thing is obviously one thing that numbers do bring, even though there's also problems that bigger, the bigger you grow, the more problems you have in some ways.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: One thing it brings it opportunity for, for expansion of passions and ministries. You know, um you get people with some real strong gifts that can really contribute in different ways, you know, and, and the church kind of,
Danny Price: yeah
Shane: make more, more ground for the kingdom in some ways, you know?
Danny Price: It's
Shane: So, but, but definitely, you know, watching people grow and walk a relationship with Christ.
Danny Price: so exciting.
Shane: That's, that's what is most exciting to me.
Danny Price: Yeah. Something that I noticed that I thought was cool, I wanted to highlight from last week that I didn't mention and I thought about it afterwards was I was looking back at that sermon from not this not this last week, but from two weeks ago, the first vision or celebration um Sunday.
Shane: Yeah.
Danny Price: But the... um the baptisms really lined up with the church growth. Like the amount of people that were getting baptized kind of coincided with the amount of people that were the church was growing by, which is really cool to think about.
Danny Price: there were intentt not you know Not that it's all about, you know, numbers, but the retention of people, it's cool that the people that are getting baptized are aren continuing to go. And that's how the church is growing. And it's not just like, it would be weird if we had 2000 baptisms or 15, know, thousand baptisms over the course of a couple years, but then the church is not growing by that amount. And you're like, well, what's going on? Like we're getting all these people to come to the Lord, but then where are they going? So it's cool that I just wanted to point that out. That's cool thing that the people that are getting baptized are also sticking around and continuing to go to church and be invested.
Danny Price: yeah.
Shane: Yeah, no, it is really exciting to see that. And, you know, i mean, like said, I could share like, I think when you say that, I'm thinking of three stories of people who have been baptized in last year and a half that like, they're like some of ah the most exciting people in the church for me right now, because yeah I'm just watching them like,
Shane: come to me with things that they're like, oh, this is happening and they're excited about it.
Danny Price: So cool.
Shane: I love being around new faith because I think we get tainted sometimes as Christians and that, you know, and we don't, we don't see God in these little things.
Danny Price: Yep.
Shane: We're, we're so used to being surrounded by God that we're, we don't see them sometimes. And that's sad to me.
Danny Price: Yeah.
Shane: And so I love being around those people that like, Like they actually give God credit that, hey, my marriage is doing better, you know, and they really like fully give God full credit for it. Or, you know, um this little financial thing worked out and I was so stressed about it, you know, and you're like, OK, yeah, that's that's so exciting to be.
Danny Price: yeah
Shane: And then even steps of faith, you know, um like like stepping into serving. And yeah, I mean, it's it's really cool. It's really cool.
Danny Price: I love that. I love that. That's exciting. Cool. Awesome. Well, we're at 40 minutes. We're going to end the episode. don't have any more questions. um Really exciting. Anniversary Sunday, 17 years.
Danny Price: Ephesians is next, right, Shane?
Shane: Yep. Yeah, so we'll get into some more deeper Bible next starting next week.
Danny Price: Awesome.
Danny Price: It'll be exciting. Cool. Awesome. So Feature's coming up. We'll talk to you guys next week. See ya.
