Heart & Soul: An Interview with Pastors Rich & DawnCheré Wilkerson

uh right now we're gonna take a moment to actually dive in a little bit further you know every single heart and soul we hear a leadership talk this is a stakeholders meeting like we said you can't have a stakeholders meeting without hearing from the board without hearing from the ceo without hearing from the people in charge and i'm just really grateful that we have the pastors that we have you know dakota jam and i were talking about everything that took place in 2020 i promise you none of that would have happened without the leadership of our senior pastors pastor rich and don trey wilkerson come on put your hands together for them going to welcome them onto the stage and we're going to go ahead and start our interview come on put your hands together for our pastors [Applause] how are you doing good you look great thank you you look great i'm grateful to be here there's nothing like heart and soul i love it uh this is absolutely incredible we started our day very early adrian right here it is day 17 of 21 days of prayer and fasting and we actually kicked off 12 hours ago right here at 7 30 in the morning with a whole team hundreds of people on youtube and zoom praying seeking god shout out to kat rouse who i think right now is that design district who preached a powerful message this morning but i'm just grateful for a church that's full of energy that leans into the moment got a packed room over here of people that are leaning into what we call studio church uh but i also am so grateful that we got a room full of people in the design district and our brand new uh first ever purchased our own we it's our asset ladies and gentlemen our very own building so it's amazing we're pumped to be tonight i'm excited about it yeah and today is a big day uh not just here at vu but in our nation in general and uh you know i i believe that at the end of this day we'll take a moment to pray but it is a big day it's a massive day with obviously the inauguration of a brand new president and uh there has been a year really full of turmoil and division but i'm really believing as we step into 2021 uh that here we are today i know the church is supposed to the church is called to pray for our leaders the church is called to be peacemakers and i'm really believing as we step into this transition as a nation that as the church actually goes all right what's our part to play we'll keep saying the same thing to humble ourselves and to pray and we believe that god will heal our land and so congratulations to uh president joe biden and i know at vue church that we're committed like every president who's ever been inaugurated and been voted in in this nation that we're gonna play our part and pray so however you feel about that uh that's how we're playing it and so we're not a political church we're a church that has one message his name is jesus nobody voted jesus in he's king of kings and lord of lords and so we're gonna pray and play our part awesome i'm grateful for it so why don't we just get right into it tonight is like we said plenty times heart and soul internal meeting leaders meeting but for you guys as our senior pastors why are nights like tonight critical to the health of our church well i'll go first babe you look beautiful thank you i love you i'm 15 weeks pregnant i just thought i'd throw that out there it's so funny with the third one it's like people ask me and i'm like i should probably find out what week i am um but yes i made sure i i am actually 15 weeks you forget sometimes that you're pregnant with baby number one we like had the vegetable app yeah we knew it you knew everyone baby number three it's like yeah it's coming she'll be here soon i know you know do you think we're going to give her as much attention as well absolutely and you know sharing the love is healthy for them right like it's good big families are fun um why is heart and soul important i think that's the reason why i value it is because healthy families make healthy churches and it's very important for us to recalibrate our hearts with the heartbeat of god it's so easy to pick up society's measure of success it's so easy to think that the way that society thinks we should organize our time is the way that we should organize our time and what we should give our focus to um should be what other people give their focus to i think heart and soul draws our eyes to eternity i think it draws our eyes to the mission of this city i was driving over here tonight and as i pass downtown every time i see those high-rises lit up it lights my heart up because it reminds me that the mission of vu we're just getting started it should be humbling how many millions of people are in our city that still don't know that the community of vu exists i can't wait for the day that every level of every one of those high-rises every apartment room every home knows that if they want to be a part of a community there's a community and so sometimes we can get wrapped up in going yes god's done so much but what he's done before is not going to supersede what he wants to do in front of us and so we have to continue to challenge ourselves we can't settle and we can't get comfortable and we can't think that what we invested in the past is going to bring a harvest tomorrow and so i think i love heart and soul because it reminds us that we are not the spectators that we are on a mission and that god has entrusted miami to us amen god has entrusted this city to us i want to i want to be faithful i want to walk it out yeah that's beautiful i i think a lot of people are attending tonight for the sixth time the fifth time they've been here before but a lot of people are attending tonight for the first time when we did platform huddle over there there was at least 10 people that raise their hand that are here for the very first time and i think a lot of people are wondering what your perspective is on what it means to be heart and soul so if you had a criteria what would that criteria be i'll finish the growth track being a crew attend every sunday give faithfully no um i really feel like your message sunday laid out so beautifully what it means to be heart and soul that was one of the best messages i've ever heard if you haven't heard it you need to go back and listen to it because i think it's so instrumental to the mission of our church but i really think like heart and soul when you explain to us what jesus meant when he was saying you have to hate your mother or father the willingness of that it's not an act of hate it's a comparative hate that nothing compares to jesus that i'm placing him on the pedestal and the altar in my life like that i just love that so much can we put our hands together for that message that was amazing you're very kind i i think that i think part of even your question is exciting to me because i suppose maybe one of the challenges that we are facing is i sense such new interests and such new engagement i think our heart on these nights is that we want to bring everybody on the journey but going on the journey is always an individual decision you have to decide if you want to continue to step into the future and so when you say what does it look like to be kind of heart and soul what's our perspective we could give lots of different characteristics and we do a lot of teaching like that a lot of leadership teaching but i think more importantly than all those little qualities and criterias is simply a position of your heart with a with a lean in i remember when we first started the church we used to talk and it was so important because it was just you know a group of people in the studio no larger than this and you know getting a service done even tonight we're still learning how to do church in the studio and i hope the sound was okay over there in the design district we're still trying to figure out how to mix live sound and studio sound and all of these things that none of us ever signed up to do but it reminds me of the early days because just to put a church service on you couldn't afford not to have somebody there and so we would have such clear accountability about what time you got there how many services you were going to do all day that day if you left early why did you leave early and i remember teaching earlier now and going hey listen here's the reality the reality is you can't be at everything but we want to have a church that your heart is to be at everything we want to have a church that if you're on vacation man i'm on vacation but my heart's with you hey i couldn't make it i love my city because it's my daughter's birthday and family came in town but my heart is there with you and i think that's a lean in and i suppose the reason why i think import tonight's like this are important you and i were talking about it before this is not another program it's not another event the last time we gathered like this i think it was about 1100 of us at the watsco center in that little rec center in january i preached a message called about happy to be in the room and and i think that you followed up with a message a couple months later called happy to be in the zoo and that call is still taking place right now we thought it was going to be like a six week call right it turned into a you know 16 months we don't know how much longer but it's a position of our it's the same message over and over again and i think what's exciting is that there's a lot of people that are entering adrian into the vu story in the vu narrative in a pandemic in quarantine and with it it's like this is the only church they've ever known and they're loving it i think the people that are struggling are the people that go i entered into this story under a much different narrative context and picture and i'm having a hard time adjusting and pivoting and changing with where we're at today and i think there's this idea that hey i will re-engage once it gets back to normal but i don't know if there's any guarantee that the future is going to look anything like it did in the past i want to prophetically say tonight it's not going to look the way it used to look it's going to look much better than how it ever looked and the question is will you have leaned in and done the journey and so the criteria for me is lean in be available get back to that entrepreneurial i'm like i'm back to like grit and grind like what does it take i'll do whatever it takes i want to be a part of a move of god in miami i'm committed to seeing a harvest come in that's what i'm living my life for so good come on put your hands together that's beautiful part and soul is 5 45 in the morning at i-tech and then staying till 11 p.m at night okay taylor lakey never did that and he he's questionable no but when i think about the question is do you think you could do that again easy yeah right yeah yeah yeah i have two kids now i barely sleep there you go there you go it'll be easier yeah no but i think what you're saying is so powerful like we say here at vu that our methods come and go but the message always remains the same when i think about our leadership core and i think about heart and soul it's like our strategy may change what you experience may change but the heart and soul has to stay the same so the last five years were awesome but now you could re-up in the next five years with the same heart and soul you had previously but if you're new on the journey it's your opportunity to adopt this heart and soul and carry this heart and soul into the future so i'm pumped for it um last year we talked about it a little bit but it was very unconventional challenging in a lot of ways but also revealing in a lot of ways for you as church leaders as pastors of a large community here in south florida what's the biggest lesson that 2020 taught you you want to take that dc yeah i think i i think there have just been so many lessons that we've learned in 2020 i think that i think that the biggest lesson we all learned is that whatever our idea of what church is that that can change in a moment but we are still the church so however you saw the church you know uh it's it's not about what day we gather on it's not about the songs necessarily the newest song it's not about you know what the edgiest thing is all of those things are amazing tools that we value so don't get me wrong i'm not knocking it because we value it and it brings people to know jesus but i do think that 2020 taught the global church that god is building his church and that the church is not weaker for 2020 we are stronger and that we leaned in together and that we're unified and if we try to pull the pieces together ourselves we would have crumbled because it would have been our strength but that's not what the word says it says not by might nor by power but by my spirit and so it's the spirit of god that strengthens the church and it's not the world wide web it's not any of that it's the holy spirit who is quicker than the internet and who is more powerful and can communicate far more than even what the internet holds the holy spirit holds all the depth and beauty and character and the nature of god and he is speaking around the world all the time and so it didn't come as a surprise to him that that covet came and he was prepared to equip his church to help people in need and so i i think that it reminded all of us that when we see our world shaken that god is not shaken and that when everything in our lives fall apart that god still holds us and it's one thing to sing it in 2019 it's another thing to live it in 2020. and i think that that's what we experienced and i think my prayer going into 2021 is that we not forget the fervency in which we prayed in 2020 that we not forget the trust that we placed in the hands of god that we not get complacent or comfortable again and i think the best days are in front of us if we can stay close to the cross and fully relying on him i would just echo dc i mean like i think there's just so many revelations and lessons i think that when you go through storms when you go through pain c.s lewis he says it this way that god he whispers in our pleasures but he shouts in our pain and so i could talk to you honestly for days about lessons i learned in 2020 but i think the one that's important for all of us is i just recognized once again a new revelation of the importance of community and i love these nights they're talking about community commitment and you know making a challenge to all of us but we need to make sure that we also recognize as we talk about that challenge and that cost and that price that we balance that with this beautiful benefit called community that this was for me it's such a difficult year and i don't think we're out of it yet i love that we've closed the chapter on 2020 but we're still kind of like i think we're still in the game man um so i don't want to exactly magically win away but man you know prosperity will bring you friends but it's poverty that'll prove your friends and it's like these moments where it's like yo church is popping and everyone wants to be around it you put a pandemic on that thing and figure out all right who's really up in this and i'm just thankful for the men and women that have shown themselves to be so faithful i don't think i would be standing here today with hope for the future i love what we're seeing tonight start crying when phil bixby man i've been doing a lot of life with that guy i could throw a stay in party for that man uh when he starts singing that beautiful song that i'm dancing on a hopeful future the dreams to come that's what's in my heart tonight my soul is singing doesn't mean that my circumstance is good but a big reason why my soul is singing tonight even though my world can be shaking is because the faithfulness of proven people in the hardest and most difficult times that said i'm in this thing heart and soul and i don't know for me that gives me a lot of confidence that gives me a lot of courage uh i don't know about all the numbers i don't know about all the metrics i don't know if we could open up tomorrow if all the seats are filled like i don't know if all 6 000 people are back in seats tomorrow i don't know about that what i do know is there is a faithful church there is a community of men and women that are saying you know what i want to see god do something in miami and come hell or high water i'm a part of this place i'm not leaving i'm staying and that that's brought such encouragement to my mental health my emotional health and of course to my spiritual health and so that's been a huge lesson for me just the importance of incredible people you know yeah and if i could just honor you for a second both of you because i think the biggest lesson that i've learned is the significance and the voice of a leader you know i think we we undervalue the weight that is attached to the leaders in our lives and specifically the the voice that they have in our lives and so many examples this year so many organizations kind of plummeting downward and it's because at the very top they didn't have a leader that provided clarity provided vision provided direction provided confidence and i think you guys did that exceptionally well so come on put your hands together if you agree with that i want to go down a vein i want to go down a vein of something you just said so you said there were moments of 2020 though that were frightening that were a little bit uh scary if you will um for you guys what was the scariest revelation as leaders what was the scariest revelation as pastors in this city that you recognized in 2020 wow um i thought we're going to go through like the growth track um it would be if i can be honest uh if i'll just dive in don't say it no kidding my leg i don't it would be several different things because there were so many different battles going on in 2020 so i think when it comes to church the scariest realization for me is how quickly people can isolate when church doesn't look the way that it used to look that as many avenues as you extend to continue to serve continue to build right there from your home continue to watch continue to participate because it's not the way that you want it or the way that it used to be that it's put aside until it's back how you like it then there's another front with the racism of our nation and i think the scariest realization that i had in 2020 is that there really are people that are unaware or blind to the sins of our nation and then when you go to the political side the scariest thing for us is that people who both are a part of the kingdom of god would attack one another instead of having grace understanding that one side is not god's side and one side is not the devil's side that somewhere in the middle intertwined in so many different issues that god is in the middle of it all wanting to use his church so i think those are the three different areas that is a realization that is good for us as the church because we need to be honest with our weak spots and allows us to know that we need to have and continue to have important conversations around all three of those fronts because the enemy uses all three of those fronts to divide the church to weaken our legs to slow our feet and to keep our hands reached inward and as long as we stay in that position we really can't be the hands and feet of jesus and so i think one of the things that vu church decided in that scary realization as our church took sides as people stepped out as there was division as there was pain and brokenness is that we said we're not going to shrink back from it we want to put language to the things that our church is facing and so i think moving forward all of those conversations will continue to be had we're not going to back away from the tough conversations sometimes it's difficult because we're family but family fights for one another and family is honest with each other i don't want to have a surface level conversation i want to go the distance and i want to know why we're doing what we're doing and so those were the realizations for me i think you i think you nailed some things that are certainly um you know hot topics and pitfalls that uh are just wedges that create such division and i don't think that you can just avoid these things and you know have this sense of peace i think you have to confront and whatever we avoid the enemy invades but i think that don cheri uh speaks for both of us when it just a lot of just surprised and shocked how the body of christ has responded and i'm not once again even as i say this it's like there's this fear that somehow i'm being political and that's like the last i'm i'm a jesus guy i still remember i love that story of joshua where it's like hey he goes out and there's there's a type of jesus the angel of the lord and it's like who's siding on it and the angel lord says neither neither and and the idea is is that it's not about you know is god on my side it's like are we on the lord's side i see jesus in between two thieves on a cross you know he's the man in the middle he's he's seeking to bring people together and uh i don't know about you i'm not up for a civil war like i don't know like i just hear some of this rhetoric i'm not like yo that i'm i'm seeking peace i'm seeking to learn and so uh that's not because i'm weak i just think i've i've counted the cost and going i want to hear i want to bring jesus to a lost and dying world and i think it's been a bummer that um so on both sides people get so lost and i can't have anything to do with you it's like man um i wrote a whole book called friend of sinners that uh just because we disagree doesn't mean we can have to disrespect and it's been challenging for sure um i would also funniest i want to jump in really quick one of the funniest misconceptions about rich's book is that people thought he was talking about christians being friends of sinners and it's like no jesus is the friend of sinner we are the sinners and sometimes right like right like they're like that's kind of weird like calling yourself friend of sinners what are you trying to say there we're like okay this book is not about us okay it's all about jesus i had a friend who was a non-christian and i was writing that book he was like bro i don't know if you should write this i was like what do you mean he's like kind of arrogant don't you think i'm like no bro i'm not it's not jesus is the friend we are we are all but i think that that is the dangerous part is that christians can take on that mentality we can look at each other and act like oh you're the sinner and it's like no man we're all in the same bucket by the grace of god we are here we're saved we're set free like that's it end of story i think on the other side of just church cycles i think this is fun stuff just to voice because i think we can hear things and hopefully as we're hearing stuff and processing out loud there's little moments going oh wow like i think the other side of all this is just this concept that like i didn't sign up and i just want to clarify i don't ever want to be debbie downer or mr negative i am all for like the new ways that god is working but like when you cut me open you say what are you passionate about i think i've said this from day one but i think it's these kind of moments that proves it like i am what you call a local church guy and what that means is is that i god has given both of us opportunities throughout the years i don't know how it all played out that we found ourselves at conferences and events and we've gotten to write books and we've gotten to have um a voice into the global church and i love that and i'm so thankful for that but that has never been my priority that has never been my pursuit in life i have always been called to be what i believe is a local church pastor which is we're doing life in community we're forming a community it's not about just a talking head it's not about just being a really great teacher it's about raising up and empowering and releasing leaders it's about seeing the five-fold ministry grow forth underneath your leadership it's about seeing new apostles and new evangelists and teachers and pastors and it's about planting churches about sending out missionaries that's what really to this day still gets me fired up i suppose a little bit of what has been interesting once again it's just like you i think the question you kind of say is like what's been like the hard lesson or the shocking lesson or like the how did you voice it i don't i want to make sure i'm answering scariest scariest it's just how many people that i thought was on board with that that's like scattered to like i'm just gonna be a part of the christian consumer thing and just go to the brand new whatever the new tv ministry is aka the internet preacher and just go to that it's just like not a that's a great supplement but what we're doing here is much more than a word that we bring on sunday what we're trying to do here is give you an opportunity to raise up and become all that god has called you to come and yeah those are the parts i'm still kind of working out as we in the 2021 i'm like i like some of this stuff i'm seeing but i don't want to fall into just the metrics of how did youtube do and how's the instagram account going not a hater that stuff we are doing that and having meetings and learning those things but i want to figure out how to how to do the both and that we're going we're still carving out a local community uh in the heart of miami where there's real people that you know i'm not just watching the fire on tv i'm getting near the fire and feeling the warmth of it so right does that make sense yeah absolutely i think i think systemic change comes from systemized community you know and i think that that's what the power of the local church is we can have a global footprint and that's awesome and we're going to figure out how to do that the best way that we can but miami's our city and then after miami another city and then another city because we want to create local change so i think that's beautiful let's shift now we've been talking about 2020 let's go to 2020 come on now it's the night about vision and yeah we're gonna get there let's talk about the growth track the whole eulogy of 2020. i thought we already did these moments right my back step one no okay sorry exactly no i mean the dakota jam and i were kind of trying to hit on it but the season for vu is is a a different season you know for for you how would you classify this season what's different about this season right now that we're in january 20th 2021 from any other season we've been in in the past well i think that what so many different mediums that we're learning and growing once again we're in a studio right now like people that are here if you're never in the studio like this is kind of different like there's people back cameras shouting right now there's doors like all these things that we've like fought for five years to be the opposite of now we're like learning and so i think there's this massive massive learning curve but like what i like i love the dakota the language dakota was using just about i don't want i don't want to fixate on the obstacles i want to see the opportunity and what is the opportunity the opportunity is is that we're able to reach so many more people there's like it used to be kind of like confined to this one-time experience that you had to get in the room for and it kind of felt like really cool that like either you were there and you missed it and i like all that but i also like the idea that like seven days a week uh every day every minute we can be providing all sorts of different niche content to meet people right where they are i think there's just endless endless opportunities to reach people but there's a huge learning curve and so when you say like what are these things that are different that we're focused on it's like we have to grow we like we need new leaders to step up and the ways that we used to do things are not going to be the ways that we're going to do things in this new space i have to learn i have to grow uh what i did in the past don't you just said it's not going to cut it in the future i don't want to expect a new harvest and i'm not planting any new seed and so i just think all of us we have to have this idea of this mindset in this this heart of going i want to stay open to learning and to growing and i don't know at all i think i saw a quote the other day any person who steps into your life knows something that you don't know what a powerful concept that like there's new people around that know something that i don't know we have a strong culture that i want to maintain but i want us to have this this learning idea of going let's try some stuff let's experiment let's be okay with making a mistake and failing let's not let's not get locked into this idea that you know what worked in the past is going to work again in the future yeah and i think a lot of people are there they want to grow they want to know how to be helpful in this season so i think right now is the perfect time to just provide practical handles yes how can you be most uh how can you be the biggest asset to vue church in this season what would you say what are practical handles you want people to walk away with tonight okay so there are a lot of different ways that we have the opportunity to build the church it's so cool the way that god designed it we didn't design this framework this is actually god's building that he's building we all get to be a part of it it's going to be standing long after we're all gone he's still going to be building it there's there's ways that you can build god's church you can build by serving you can get on a team that starts with growth track like we were just talking about um you can build by being a part of a crew if you just serve and then you're not a part of community you're not going to reap everything that god wants in your life out of this church you need community and small groups really are the way that our church is pastored and led and supported and people go through seasons together one way that we don't talk about enough and that as soon as you give your life to jesus you can literally like obviously we're on a path of sanctification being shaped in the image of jesus that takes a lifetime but you know one way that you can immediately start to build the church from the moment you decide to give your life to jesus is through your finances we don't talk about it enough because it's as simple as one decision to go i'm gonna tithe i'm gonna look to the word of god for an example of putting god first my first fruits rich and i we're freakish about this when we have income it immediately is tithed on we want god to get the first part of that you don't have to wait until you're married to get serious about your tithe you can be on a minimum wage job you can be a college student and god can bless your finances because you choose the tithe and i i wouldn't be honest with you if as your pastor i didn't tell you that if you are not tithing right now you're missing out on all that god has for you if you are choosing to trust in yourself more than you're choosing to trust in god you're missing out on a huge part of the faith journey so whether you're 19 years old whether you are 40 years old whether you are single whether you are married you may have been serving at this church for five years and you've never decided and trust your finances to god this should be the year that you do that this should be the year that you experience what it means if the bible says talks about our treasure being where our heart is if it talks about that the love of money is the root of all evil man i want to trust god especially in my lap hear me especially in my lap especially in my lap so our church has so many young amazing people if we would start to walk in that way i think that i think that you would be amazed both in your individual life and in your buy-in doesn't matter how much you serve there's only so much buy-in you can have until you put your money where your treasure is and that will change your life one of the one of the best things we did as we started our church is we we really have operated from a value system and there's seven values and i think what's healthy in every season is to look at those seven values we've always talked about the idea these aren't the churches values you're the church these have become the values of your home these become the values of your marriage jesus is our message people are heart excellence is our spirit generosity is our privilege servant leadership is our identity passion is our pursuit honors our calling what i think is important is that you can have a value the point of a value is that in a changing world you have a changeless core and i think you should take your value and to the right of it in the season that you're in going how am i practically living out that value yeah so you're going like what can people do right now i think there are people that are engaged it's like i would just go through what what the season church looks like it's going to require real flexibility this week we're gathering in person i don't i don't believe in guilty people that's like the dumbest way to lead if you don't want to be there you don't want to be there but i do want to challenge people if you're going to dinner if you're going to your gym you should be going to church so we're at jungle island this weekend in fact we just signed up again for the following weekend i'm just gonna be real frank it's a lot of money like i don't want to tell you because some people will be like i'll just tell you it's like 20 000 for a gathering there so just okay like i'm telling you that because i just i want you to go oh we so value the coming together not because we just like it practically it's scriptural that we're trying to walk that out in fact tomorrow i'm going to record get a whole team in here to create a great experience for church online then we're gonna also show up and put even more energy into putting on a live experience because we value both these things what i would say is like if you're heart and soul if you're not out of town be here and maybe consider not going to disney this weekend because you went to disney 28 times already this year i don't maybe don't go to key west again like go i'm actually going to prioritize this thing called the church i i think i just want to help people it's like servant leadership is my identity cool to say what does that look like for you bro have you gone to a i love my city are you on any freaking team at all i've kind of graduated from holden science really why right what happened what like i don't really need to like be on the team anymore but but it's my value i don't if you don't have a practical handle then i don't know if it's really a value dontre is talking about generosity i think honor honors our calling tonight before the service uh zach freeman who's leading worship at design district luke who's leading over here man who's leading over there i shot them individual texts like let's bring it tonight you got this god's hands on you that's a form of honor like i think we got to get back into shooting texts out to people on your team you're going to crush today as you serve what about people our heart yo like have you evangelized at all in 2020 or 2021 well how would i do that man uh it's never been easier but you actually have to attach a system how about take the youtube video and share it through a text message my trainer manning sumner is relentless with being the text evangelist he's got a list of 20 people that he is reaching for jesus he's like hey bro here's a message for you it's like i think this message is about like making peace with your spouse are you trying to tell me something right now he's like maybe he's he's always reaching people i just think like get done with church and text somebody like create a list of 10 people that you're going to be relentless with with reaching heart and souls tonight you're a crew leader uh did you text anybody in your crew to tune into heart and soul like i could just go on and on and on i i think rsvp's like all this stuff which is new we say it this way at heart and soul if everybody behaved like you would our church be better or would our church be worse and i don't know if i don't think we ever graduate from that i got to ask myself that it's like if everyone's behaving like me thinking like me praying like me worshiping like me leading like me are we better or are we worse and and that's always the call of these nights always the qualities last question i'm sorry did you want to say something no you're great i was just going to add on to that i think one of the most when it comes to how can we build in this season one of the most detrimental mindsets that we can have when it comes to church is to think that it's a hobby or it's something um that just is you know this is this is my me time sometimes people will come to church and they'll be an expert at something but they'll want to serve in a really low capacity at church and i get it i really do but friends like we're called to bring god our best so if we're a great artist then we want to bring our art to god first and foremost if we're great at i.t then man i want to elevate the church through i.t if i'm if i'm great at social then i'm not just having me time this is a hobby at church and then i'm going and crushing it somewhere else five days a week we see even from the first book of the bible how important it is that in in our line of work that we bring god our best you look at cain you look at abel you look at the offerings of god and you look at great churches and movements built around the world that the greatest artists brought their greatest art that the greatest builders brought their best plans in engineering that the greatest writers wrote their greatest hymns and their greatest songs and it wasn't a time to just let off steam or relax it wasn't a hobby it wasn't a it was god i'm bringing you my very best it's a detrimental mindset when we go this is just a hobby it's a detrimental mindset when we think that church fits into our cookie-cutter box man my heart for the church is that we as families would grow and embrace the church sometimes we think oh we're always at church friends every gift that is in my life was drawn out by always being at the church i was at church sunday morning i was at church sunday night i was at church wednesday night for a wednesday night service i was at worship rehearsal on thursdays i was at youth on friday nights and you know what it developed every part of my life and it surrounded me with a community that spoke life over me and here we are and we think that serve one sit one just on a morning never one evening seven days a week is too much for us we are shortcutting the plan of god for our family's lives if we are willing to drive across town for soccer practice and for dance practice and for violin practice but we are unwilling to put our kids in the house of god and for things to be messy for a little while and for them to be around they're missing catching the spirit of what the global church is it is not a program it is not a program we will push back on that forever but we got to fight for this and so my heart is let's lean in this year let's embrace the messiness the last picture i have of our last service before we went into quarantine is i have a picture on sunday morning with wyatt vu kids and i have a picture sunday night of him on my lap in big service sunday night and it's not easy and it's messy and even tonight why i had a meltdown as he's in service but that's life that's life that's what it looks like so let's do it you're single you're in college you're working a job god still wants to use you here you're a grandparent you have the wisdom we need you have the expertise that we need you have the discernment that we need you have that mentorship that people are so desperate for and hungry for they're starving for your voice in their lives we really need you so let's embrace it let's do it i think this is our year i'm more expecting than ever adrian like i'm more expecting than ever one more i think it's important that we hear this as our pastors what dreams are on your heart for this year well god has been extremely faithful i mean the idea that we ended the year with our largest single offering um stepping into almost 20 21 now it's close to i think it's right at 2.4 million dollars that's come in in our bricklayers fun which is just it's insane um in the most difficult year god has brought about the greatest blessings um there's so many things that i'm excited about um right now uh there's a property there's a couple properties that we're looking at one that we're really even close to potentially putting under contract i i'm not at liberty to share all of it due to confidentiality things but um i think it's an opportunity for us to actually have a worship center we'll see hopefully i'll be able to share more about that but just crazy how god is lining things up and all that it takes like i i just sensed coming in here tonight like oh like you can sense the passion and the energy inside of us i was talking to some pastors i have a friend who pastors a church in san fran they can't gather more than 10 people since march and as he literally said to me today said said uh i said how are you doing he said you want the cookie cut answer or do you want the heels you want the the pastor cookie could answer with the real answer so give me the real answer he said well either we're gonna grind it out here and figure this out or we're gonna have to go replant a church somewhere else uh or we're gonna have to go do another thing with our life because we are just completely confused with all that's happening around us and i just got to encourage him you know for a minute just going life is challenging if someone was to ask me if you had to make two observations about life in general what would those two observations be i would say that life is always this it is separated with these two observations those that live disappointed and those that live grateful and i am grateful for what god has brought us through but when you say what are the dreams in my heart for 2021 i'm telling you we haven't scratched the surface and god wants to do something bigger and better than we could ever imagine i believe that we're going to close this year out with having a property i believe that we're going to find land i believe that we're going to build buildings i believe that we're going to release i'm excited about these worship songs i'm excited for the friends and family network of helping resource other people not about look at us but let us come alongside you and do the journey i'm excited about seeing leaders raised up i'm excited about seeing locations started back up and rooms full of people worshiping jesus i'm excited about seeing my friends in this city that don't know jesus we just moved down to the coconut grove area and like just god's already opened up doors to meet people i'm like i can't wait to see the people in my neighborhood come to know jesus and these are the things that get me excited these are the things i want to live for and um i want to help raise up a community that lives for those exact same things and so i i've been saying that you've been hearing me say a whole lot in staff that's probably why you asked me 2021 is going to be our greatest year yet all we got to do is endure through this stick together fight together lean in and watch what god does on the other side let's stay grateful hey man come on i don't know about you but that uh encourages me a whole lot where it is that we're heading and what it is that's before us and i know that this night is not about you this is about the heart and soul of our church but i think it's very important for you to know that the heart and soul of this church is behind you we believe in you we're grateful for you and we recognize that god has ordained your lives and that god has purpose on your lives and it's it's funny to talk about submission and all that kind of stuff but this is a house that has a heart and soul for the vision that god has placed on your heart and we're submitting i believe this year this church is going to submit over to that vision in a grander way than it's ever done before and i believe because of that god has the best days ahead for blue church ahead of us do you believe that come on put your hands together awesome

Channel: VOUS Church

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Id: ULE-qsi5zbE

Length: 44min 42sec (2682 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 20 2021