Ryan Sweat (Student Pastor at Beach Church)

The episode you're about to listen to was released back when the Mere Christians podcast was called the Call to Mastery. Now, if you love Mere Christians, you're still going to love these older episodes because the majority of each conversation focuses on how the gospel influences the work of our guests. With that disclaimer out of the way, please enjoy the episode. Hey everybody. Welcome to the Call to Mastery. I'm Jordan Raynor. This is a podcast for Christians who want to do their most exceptional work for the glory of God and the good of others. Every week, I host a conversation with a Christ follower who's pursuing world class mastery of their craft. We talk about their path to mastery, their daily habits, and how the gospel of Jesus Christ influences their work. Today's guest is one of my best friends, one of the best student pastors and preachers and disciple makers I know. His name is Ryan Sweatt. He's been on staff at Beach Church in Jacksonville Beach, Florida for eight years and he is truly exceptional at what he does. Guys, this is a super fun episode. If you've ever been curious about what your host was like when he was in the sixth grade, you're about to find out. And I can't believe we did not cut this out of the episode. We talked about a lot of different things. We talked about why Ryan is encouraging middle schoolers and high schoolers to scatter into the world of work and not simply gather at church. We talked about how practically Ryan's church is seeking the prosperity of their city, the entire city, and not just their church. And then finally, at the top of this episode, we ran down our top three things that we love to make fun of on Christian podcasts. Hopefully nobody's offended by this. I know I've said all of these things on the Call to Mastery to my shame. Please enjoy this great episode with my friend Ryan Sweatt. Ryan Sweatt, longtime listener, first time caller. Welcome to the call to master.

Hey Jordan, longtime listener, first time caller. Just so excited to talk to you.

All right, so you and I catch up by phone, I don't know, every couple of weeks. And we have a habit of spending the first few minutes of our conversations speaking in what I like to call Christian podcast voice, which is like one of the reasons why I didn't want to do a podcast. It's is I did not want to fall into Christian podcast ease. So now publicly, I'm going to ask you for some of the all time most annoying things that people say ad nauseam on Christian podcasts.

Let me make some Disclaimers first. I am a pastor. I love Jesus. I love the church. I love being a Christian. And so when I make fun of Christians, just keep that in mind, because I know some of you people are going to be all like, oh, my gosh, I can't believe we might have.

To edit this out.

I don't know if these are all podcast things, and I'm not even really sure where, like, Christianese and then just podcast ease, like where they intersect.

Yeah.

But I just feel like only Christians talk certain ways, and it's just ridiculous. So I gotta. I got a top eight list.

A top eight. Oh, my gosh. Top eight. Wow. Top eight.

We'll go through them. You just interrupt me where you want to. First of all, really, any talk about a platform. I never heard the word platform in church until, like, three years, 10 years ago. Yeah, People just used to say stage, and now it's like, wow. Like, it's really an honor to get on the platform. You know, like, we only let certain people on the platform. And I'm trying to build my platform and just. Platform. That's a tough one. Content. I know that's not really Christianese, but I can't tell you how many podcasters are just like, that's some great content. I'm just really trying to create some new content. You know, it's good. We went to a conference one time, a Christian conference, and we were in this breakout, and the person was like, here's my advice to y'.

All.

Just consume as much content as you can. And I had this guy that works for me, and he was like, that's probably the most annoying advice I've ever gotten at a conference. This one's really important. Seasons. Seasons.

This is one of my favorites. Yeah, just in a. Just a crazy season.

I'm just in a season of pruning right now. I'm just in a season of being patient. I'm waiting. I'm just waiting. I'm in a season.

Real things. But do we really have to use the word season? I think that's the question.

Seasons is great song by Hillsong, but an annoying word to use.

What I love is that I'm sure I've said all of these things before.

Oh, you definitely have. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Probably not to me, but probably on your podcast.

Yeah. I'll wrap this up. We probably don't have time for eight. Here's the one I found. I was at an event recently with mostly pastors, and they were like, oh, yeah, you marketplace guys. I'm Like Marketplace?

Yes.

Nobody in the business world says marketplace. You're just working like.

I think Marketplace is the new secular. Marketplace.

Marketplace is the new secular. You heard it here first. All right, so hey, you and I actually haven't talked about this in a long time, but I'm assuming you remember. Do you remember how we met?

100%. I was hoping you'd ask.

All right, go ahead and share this. I promise we'll get to the good stuff in a minute.

First week at Seminole Presbyterian School sps Tampa, Florida. I'm in sixth grade. I transferred to this private school halfway through sixth grade year, which is just the worst thing my parents could ever do to me. I had never been in a private school. I'd never been to this school. Everybody there had been there since pre K. And I walk into this school, I don't know anybody, it was like the most nervous I've ever been. And there's this little nerdy, spectacled little boy running around in a collar shirt tucked in and just screaming about Orlando Magic basketball scores from the regular season and Syracuse Orange basketball scores. And he had printed out scores and put them. I don't, I don't even know why this little boy was so excited. But it turns out that little boy turned into your podcast host, Jordan Rayner. And then we met.

Here's the irony. This is back when sports was my life. And today, as my listeners know, I couldn't tell you. Speaking of seasons, I couldn't tell you what sports are in season right now. That's funny. I'm glad you remember that because that's a very vivid memory for me. And we lost touch for a while. Right? Your dad was a pastor. You guys moved from Tampa back to Jacksonville Beach. And I remember very, very distinctly. You probably don't remember this. You were at my house, I think. When did you move away? 8th grade, something like that.

10Th grade. But we stopped seeing each other. We saw each other like once in ninth grade. But basically after middle school, we didn't see each other.

That's right, because you left for middle school. So I remember very distinctly you and a bunch of people are at my house at the end of eighth grade and we're all hanging out on the dock of my lake where my parents house was. And I remember Vitamin C's song Friends Forever secular version of Michael W. Smith playing. And it was a lie. We were 12 years old and we didn't have cell phones or social media. There was zero percent chance we were gonna stay friends forever. And sure enough, we lost Touch. We lost touch. And then somehow God miraculously reconnected us at Florida State.

Chick fil a brought us together.

That's right. I forgot about this.

You're having lunch with some friend. I'm having lunch with some friend. We both lean over to get something out of our bags. We both look up. It's like a romantic comedy. We both look up. We haven't seen each other. I mean, this pre Facebook, and, like, we look up and we haven't seen each other in, I don't know, five years. So now we look a little bit different. And we look up and we just kind of stared at each other. And then, like, you were like, Ryan. That was it, Jordan.

And that was it.

You know, Next thing you know, we're living together.

I was going to say, well, yeah.

That'S again, we lived together for a.

Couple of years at Florida State. And by the way, don't make us sound too old. Facebook did come out the year we were at college.

Literally three months later, it would be introduced at fsu. So I was almost about to say that Mark Zuckerberg was getting ready to launch at fsu.

So we lived together for a couple of years. I was thinking about this. I think you know me better than any guest who's ever been on this podcast, save for maybe my dad. And that's debatable.

It is debatable.

So I can't believe I'm asking this, but I will. Before we get to the meat of the conversation, what's something our listeners don't know about me that they need to know? This is very dangerous.

This is easy.

Okay?

I mean, I assume they don't know Jordan, from middle school had a dream to be the president of the United States.

I don't think my listeners know this.

Okay? And here's what I'll say. This was. And this dream kind of continued, I would say, through to college, until you realize, like, in college, I don't really want to do politics. But everybody that was close to you was 100% confident that it was gonna happen. Like, everybody, you know, I'm gonna be this. When I grow up, I'm gonna be this. And like, it's like, yeah, whatever, slugger. But, like, everybody was like, oh, yeah, if he wants to be president of the United States, he's going. I mean, you ran, like, a political campaign in 11th grade or something for, like, a real political county seat or something, so. And then obviously you changed your mind, so you're not going to be the president. But I think everybody. Everybody knew from a very young age that whatever you wanted to do, you would do. And so you've done it.

Wow. I was not expecting a kind answer to that question.

Oh, I mean, I could have been mean, but probably would have gotten edited out anyway. And so let's just stick with. That's right.

We edit out anything anytime somebody disagrees with me on this podcast.

Nice.

Yeah, that's not true. All right, well, that was fun. Now we got some context to this friendship. Let's get some context to your work. All people know from the episode title here is that you're the student pastor at Beach Church. Tell us a little bit about your work.

Well, I'm a student pastor, 6th through 12th grade students. I've been working here at beach for nine years in the student ministry. Also early on did some stuff with missions, but mostly students. And really this is the student ministry I've been a part of since I was a student myself. And after college came back and served as a life group leader and served just on trips and all that kind of stuff, and then had an opportunity to come on part time and then really felt the call to ministry. Once I was already working and I was not one of those people. My dad's a pastor. Everybody asked me from a young age, are you going to be a pastor? I was like, heck, no, I'm not going to be a pastor. And whenever people would ask, do you feel called to vocational ministry? I would never stand up, never raise my hand, because I didn't. I really didn't feel called to vocational ministry until I was actually working at a church for probably about a year and a half. I've always loved students. Even before I worked in student ministry, I was always kind of like, hey, I'm gonna serve. I'm a life group leader for the rest of my life. Whatever job I'm doing, I'm serve as a life group leader at whatever church I'm at. And so I always love students and love impacting young people for Jesus. And they're just so full of life and full of fun and growing and learning. And students are, you know, there's plenty of negatives to being a teenager, but one of the main positives is like, students, like, buy in and when they, like, turn to follow Jesus, it's not like halfway, it's everything. And, like, they're so passionate, and I just love that. And so, yeah, I'm student pastor. Been here for a while, working with, with middle schoolers and high schoolers.

When we were living together at Florida State you really did not want to go into, quote unquote, full time ministry. My most hated term, what I would call a religious professional. But you did. And I think it's interesting that it took you going on staff at the church for a little bit to be like, oh yeah, this is the thing. And I think it jives with something I wrote about, Master of one, right? That passion grows with competency, that as we get good at the thing, whatever that job is, we grow to love it more and more. Was that your case? Like, what was it in that first year and a half on the job that you're like, yeah, this is the thing I really want to sink my teeth into.

I think that one of my big passions growing up was sports, like you. And so I majored in sport management and I did internships in sports marketing and in the athletic department and coach some and all that kind of stuff. And yes, that was a passion of mine. And sometimes we end up working in our passions. But I think on a more basic foundational level, impacting young people was a bigger passion of mine. And even towards the end of college I started realizing that, oh, I still want to do sports, but now I want to coach because I really wanted to have that impact on young people. And then looking back, I can see like that passion for young people and investing and discipling and pastoring was really in that, in that initial desire to be a coach. And so I think for me it was realizing that there were other passions that were even more foundational to who I was, that I was passionate about, that I was good at. I had always been good at it. I never had to try, I never really thought about it. It was kind of second nature. And I think that sometimes the most obvious things aren't, aren't very obvious to us. And it wasn't until I worked in IT where I was like, oh, like, like I'm actually good at this and I like it. Why can't this, like, maybe this is what God's calling me to. And there were some gifting things that, that God gave me in that first year and a half. I would say supernaturally that kind of completed the puzzle that made me realize, like, oh, okay, like this is where he's calling me. That kind of confirmed things. But I think that was the big thing is just recognizing maybe for the first time, like, oh, like I've always been passionate about this. I've always cared about this. This has always been an important thing in my life. That's what God's calling Me to.

During those first couple years before you came to that realization, did you have people speaking into your life who are calling out these things back, hey, Ryan, that sermon was dynamite, or, you're really good at discipling these kids. Like, did you have those moments?

I feel like I had those moments before I worked at the church, but I always just saw them as, yeah, like, okay, like, that's where I serve. And, you know, students are great, and, you know, I'll be a volunteer leader for the years to come. And so, like, I had, obviously my parents, but also a life group leader, a youth volunteer, and a youth pastor, all in Jacksonville, that all would speak those things into my life that would just talk about my leadership and my influence. My dad and my mom were always talking about my leadership and my influence. And so I really strongly believed I had those things because people had told me, and again, I didn't see those things as, oh, that's the job I'm going to work in. But they encouraged me to the point that when I got into that place, I was like, yeah, I can do this. Like, this is what I'm gifted at. And then kind of as I started to do it more in those first few years, in a professional sense, I continued to get some of that affirmation. As I started to preach, I started getting that affirmation, and. And then it kind of all went from there.

By the way, if we're playing Christian podcast bingo, I think influence has got to be on the map.

Got to have influence.

It's a good square. You'd have influence. No, but, you know, your story reminds me of Acts, chapter 13. It talks about how Barnabas and Saul and everybody are working together. And basically the lesson of Acts 13, I think it's verses one through five, roughly, is the calling of Christians is discerned in Christian community. Right. It is allowing. If we believe our work is service to others, service to the capital C church, service to God and his mission, then we need to be open to what other people are saying about what we're gifted at, what we can do. All right, shifting gears for a second. So as a student pastor, crystal clear how the Gospel shapes what you do. It's not as obvious to your students, many of our listeners, how their work outside the four walls of the church matters to God. So I'm curious, in the context of your students, what are you telling them about the significance of their future careers?

We don't talk about it all the time. I'm actually somewhat touching on it this Sunday when I preach. But in the past when we've talked about identity, we've just kind of started with the idea that your identity doesn't come from any part of who you are, except for the fact that you were created by God. Kind of the old adage, you're created on purpose, for a purpose. And we talk about, like, you know, there's a general purpose to glorify God in all we do as Jesus followers. There's the great commission purpose of showing the love of Christ and making disciples wherever we go. And then there's like that specific calling, that specific purpose that partially has to do with your job. But I think something that I try to encourage them is like, no matter what you do, you can have an impact and you can glorify God in what you do. And like, you know, even when we talk about, like, vocational ministry, I'm like, look, not all of y' all are called to this, and you don't need to be. That's not. The objective is all of us are going to be pastors. The objective is that we will go into all different places and show the love of Christ and glorify God. And so I think that's the biggest thing I kind of teach them on that is like, I believe that there's something God's given you passion for giving you talent for gonna give you, as you also say in one of your books, like, opportunity for that. Those places are gonna intersect and you're going to have a job or career in that area. But no matter where you're at, whether it's high school, college, or in professional sense, in the marketplace. In the marketplace. In the marketplace. Because I even tell them, like, you guys have a better opportunity to impact people in high school than probably any other time. Because every day you go to school with a few hundred or a few thousand people that are from all different places, all different races, all different backgrounds. And when you get older, as I know you found, and basically all of us find is like, our friend groups get smaller, our friend groups get more homogenous, and it is more and more difficult to be surrounded by people that are from all walks of life. And so, like, they have great opportunity right now where they're at. And so I think that's the big thing is just helping them see, like, your purpose to glorify God, your purpose to make disciples, all that kind of stuff, like, that's going to follow you wherever you go. And, you know, you may spend 20 years of your life as some high level executive, and then you May spend the next 20 years of your life as an international missionary. Does that mean, like, I had to wait to be a missionary before God worked with me? Well, no, of course not. Like, there are people in our church that had a full career and then launched a mission organization in Costa Rica when they were like 55, 60, 65 years old. God didn't just start working with them late in their lives. He worked with them all the way through up to that point and prepared them for that. And they influenced people in that time. And then we're able to influence people in a different way in Costa Rica through a mission organization in their retired years. And so, like, it's really throughout life and not really looking to a destination as a place that I'm going to glorify God. I'm going to start being the person God made me to be when I'm 25, when I'm 35, when I'm 45.

I just published a devotional in my weekly devotional, the Word Before Work a couple of weeks ago about how the Greek word that we translate to mean go in Jesus's command to go and make disciples is what's called an aorist tense passive participle. Very dirty. But the implications are massive. If you look at any biblical concordance, a much more accurate translation of the Great Commission is not go and make disciples. It's as you are going make disciples. Right. And that means that the high schooler or the executive or the marketer, the carpenter or the artist, whatever you're doing right now, you can fulfill the Great Commission today without changing your vocation or your location. Right. Sounds like that's what you're telling your kids.

Yeah. Church history shows us that I know we all glorify the disciples and Paul and all that kind of stuff. And obviously they planted many of the early churches, led the early churches. But church history shows us that the massive growth of the church was not because of the apostles. It was because merchants, traders, travelers, workers went into cities where there were churches, were led to Christ, and then as they went, they shared it in these other locations. And that's how it spread around the world. Because the apostles didn't get to every single place where churches ended up being within the first few hundred years. That happened because they poured into people who then went. And just as they went, they'd go into another marketplace and talk about Jesus and they'd go into another city and talk about Jesus or another nation. And then it started to spread all around the Roman Empire because of that.

That'S how the gospel goes to all nations. Right. Us being faithful to where we've been planted and knowing that God's going to take some of those people and put them elsewhere. We're recording this in early December and I was just meditating the other day on the Christmas account. And the fact that the shepherds were the first people to go herald the good news of the gospel, that the Messiah was here, that's startling to me. Right. Like, this is religious news. You would expect the angels to appear to Pharisees, to Sadducees, but instead they appeared to shepherds with this very lowly vocation. And then 30 something years later, Jesus is doing the same thing when he kicks off his preaching of the Gospel of the kingdom. He did not call religious professionals first to help him spread that gospel. He called tax collectors of fishermen. Right. Like, I don't know how much more clear, don't hear me wrong. If the Lord is calling you to pastoral ministry or missions overseas, by all means, we need, desperately need people to do that work. And we should celebrate those people for the sacrifices that, that they make. But that's not a requirement to fulfill. And I think there's also a sense. You and I talked about this a couple of weeks ago. There's also a sense that in this increasingly post Christian moment, it's just less and less likely that people are coming inside the four walls of a church to hear the gospel. I mean, are you guys seeing that? I mean, you're in the south, right? So maybe you haven't seen this trend yet, but what are you seeing there in Jacksonville Beach? Is this trend a real thing that people are more likely to hear about Jesus outside the church than inside?

I think probably that's always been the way it is. Yeah.

And now we're just more cognizant of it.

Yeah. And the whole idea of like post Christendom, where the church isn't the center of the world, that happened in Europe a while ago, that's happening in America now. And so we're just kind of starting to experience it. But, but I think more and more we're having to realize that while some people will come to us and hundreds of thousands of people will come to know Jesus in a worship service, in a worship environment, at a church, that kind of thing. And it's very important, at the same time we have to be able to go, or as we go and make disciples and go into different places. Because even like there's this, there's this idea, especially in Western Christianity, of like well, you know, like, missions are to, like, poor people, which is the dumbest thing ever. I mean, like, that's one of the groups of people. But if missions are only to people that lack physical resources, then what happens to the people with lots of physical resources? And, like, there have to be multimillionaire Christians living in gated communities that no one else can get into, that can reach their neighbors for Jesus, because their neighbors aren't necessarily going to listen to some traveling preacher, but they, they might listen to their neighbor who, you know, is also high level in their. In their company or in their career, who has a relationship with them and understands where they're coming from and all that kind of stuff. And so I think one of the biggest things for the church is, like, we have to equip people of all different influences and all different backgrounds and all different socioeconomic backgrounds to go into their spheres of influence and at least, at the very least, maybe not preach, but at the very least have an impact for Jesus. Sharing the love of Jesus, showing the love of Jesus, serving their neighbor, glorifying God in the way they talk and the way they walk, and inviting other people in, whether that's inviting them in to dinner, inviting them to a serve opportunity, inviting them to church, to a life group, to a conversation that's good.

It's what my friend Jack Alexander, former podcast guest here, calls a scattered church.

Right.

For so long, we have taken this gathered church approach, and it's not working as well as it used to, Right? And we are called to scatter. My pastor, I love his strategy on Sunday mornings. He's like, jordan, I preach to equip the saints we gather so that we can scatter out into our communities and show the love of Christ and share it explicitly. Right from time to time. Hey, I wanted to ask you about this. All of Beach Church's messaging is centered around this idea that you guys are, quote, for the beaches. What do you mean by that?

Yeah, that's a. Obviously, if you're in Christian world, that's a popular phrase or a popular idea that was popularized by a guy named Jeff Henderson, wrote a book, what you're for, I think, or know what you're for. And so a lot of churches in the Atlanta area that Jeff Henderson was involved with kind of popularized it. And so a lot of churches are doing it, but it's just, hey, we're going to really be for our community. It's almost a way of saying we're going to serve our community. But it's not just we're going to serve projects, but we're just going to support, whether it's supporting local businesses, being for the schools and going in and serving at the schools. We do a lot of stuff with our local middle school and high school and our teachers and. And that kind of thing. Serving. A thing that we like to talk about is serving the servants. And so a lot of times we're like, well, we got to serve the people that need help, but sometimes you got to serve the people who are serving the people that need help because they need encouragement. Obviously, we've seen this a lot with medical workers over the past year, and that's important. And, like, going and serving them who are serving our community, our nation, our world at large. And so. And so that's what for the Beaches is about. Like, we want to be for our community. And I think we see in Jesus there were some times where he talked about what he was against, but there are a lot of times he talked about what he was for. And we've got to make sure that we are showing people that are outside the church that we're for them, that God loves them, that God has a plan for them, that God wants a relationship with them, that they're not the scum of the earth that God's trying to get rid of, but that they are loved and created and purposed and all of that. And they need to know that, because who gets drawn in by a message of, you suck, get better? Like, nobody. Like, people get drawn in by love and relationship. And once they're in that relationship, then kind of that iron sharpens iron. That sharpening and sanctification stuff can happen.

Yeah. One of the practical expressions of this idea that I love from you guys is every week, you guys pick a specific restaurant in Jacksonville beach to promote. I saw this Instagram post recently. You said, we want to overwhelm this restaurant with business over the next seven days. I love it. It's just such a beautiful, modern expression of what God commanded his people to do when they were in exile. Right. Jeremiah 29:7, Seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I've carried you in exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper. We are not called to isolate in Christian subcultures. We are called to insulate ourselves and then go out and engage the world. Right. And I think. I'm curious if you agree, but I think this call to insulate and engage versus isolate and retreat has ramifications for how we all think about Work, right? Like, are you with me here? Do you know what I'm trying to say here?

I think this is another thing we see in early church history is that there was a time where it was like, okay, well, what if we got away from the world and we isolated ourselves? What if we went out into the desert and kind of the whole monk movement started and everything? And there was a realization. One was, yeah, like, when we're alone and we have more time, like, we're gonna spend more time with God and there's gonna be some things that happen in that. But the other realization was like, oh, I still have my heart with me, and my heart's sinful. I'm still messed up. I still desire things. And it's not my culture that's making me bad, it's my heart that's corrupt. And, like, that isn't fixed by getting away. And so I think often we've tried to do that thing where it's like, let's get away. Let's have this Christian subculture of like, oh, we gotta have the Christian movies and the Christian music and the Christian art and the Christian restaurants, the Christian coffee shops. And it's like, okay, like, that's great, but why can't we kind of go into what your books talk about? Why can't we have excellent glorifying God work and businesses and restaurants and coffee shops where we, you know, we influence our staff and we have certain values and we maybe give up a portion of the profits or whatever. And we are glorifying God in what we do and how we do it, but we're doing it with everyone instead of just in a certain group of Christians and just reaching. I mean, yeah, if you make a Christ centered thing, but only Christians watch it, like, that's good. But what would be best is, hey, let's have something that impacts a wider audience, but it's really done well and it's done with all of the gifts God gave us and all that kind of stuff. So I think that's important that we can't just isolate, because when we isolate, like, we don't influence anybody.

Yeah, it's the difference between seeking the peace and prosperity of the city versus seeking the peace and prosperity of the church. Right? Like, that's the distinction. I've even been thinking about this in the context of the Great Resignation. Right. As Christ followers, we got to think really critically about this response to the economic climate. Work is not just there to serve us and our needs. What if Christians stood up and say, we're going to end this great resignation. We're going to be a part of fixing what's broken in our cities and in our economy, and we're going to rush back into the workforce at unprecedented levels because we care about these businesses and these businesses thriving. Man, that would preach, right?

Yeah. Like, something that actually that reminds me of is I was having a conversation with a local business owner about a month ago. He just said something, and I thought Jordan would really like this. He just talked about. He said. He mentioned our church and another church close by, and he said, my best workers come from those two churches. Like, I know if I hire a high school or college student, young adult from one of those two churches, they're going to work hard, they're going to be trustworthy, all that kind of stuff. And when he said that, I was like, man, I got to tell Jordan this. He's going to love this. Because that's really. Shouldn't people say, like, man, I just want to hire Christians, not because they're Christians, but because I know I'm getting certain batch of goods when I get a Christian, I know I'm getting a hard worker, someone who's trustworthy, someone who's faithful, someone who. Who does the best of their ability, someone who loves the customers and all that kind of stuff. And so I think that's a really important thing for us to focus on when it comes to our work, whatever that work is.

Totally. No question. I was reading in Philippians this morning.

Oh, you. You did a quiet time today.

That was good. See, we need more guests. Like, you could call me out on my shameless self righteousness. Yeah. So we're definitely not editing this out for the record. No. I was reading in Philippians where Paul talks about grumbling and arguing. He says, do not grumble and argue. I'm going to butcher the exact verse. You guys can go look it up. But. And he says, in doing so, we will be light to those around us. Man, just going to work and doing your work with excellence and love, without grumbling and arguing with justice and mercy. We will be light, we will stand out. People will want to be around us. And that's good in and of itself, but I also think it leads to opportunities to share the gospel. Right. I invited you on the podcast not just because you're one of my best friends, but also because I really believe you're an exceptional communicator and specifically in the lane of preaching to students. So I'm curious, what are some of the keys you found to mastering that craft that you think are common, to mastering a bunch of different crafts. Like, what are the commonalities there?

So I'd say, like, biggest thing that I always tell anybody when I'm raising up some of our younger preachers and interns and that kind of thing. My number one, number one thing is always practice. And I didn't do this for the first three or four years that I preached. I would spend a lot of time thinking and spend a lot of time writing and looking at the outline, but I wouldn't just go into a room and practice. And now I will never preach a sermon unless I've preached it all the way through with a mic in hand, with my notes on the, like on a stage at least twice. And actually that's my fast forward button. Like the hack for preparing faster. Like there are times where if my outline is completely not coming together, I will just get up on a stage and in a room by myself and just kind of just struggle my way through it for an hour. And I'm like, oh, this. Sometimes I'll even say out loud, this is terrible. But when I do that, I start figuring out, okay, this is where I need to keep this. I need to get rid of this. I need to, I need to change the. It's like it like turns into like A Beautiful Mind all of a sudden. I'm seeing like where the outline should go and like what should be slotted into the end and what should be in the opening and what should. And it just like all comes together when I actually get up there and just preach it. And I actually told someone that the other day who's heard me preach a lot, and they were like, you practice. Like, I would never think that you practice just because of the way that you preach, but I was like, the way that you can, like when you go hiking, the way that you can make sure you don't get lost is you know the path. And if you know the path, you can go off the path and then be able to get back on the path and get to your final destination. But if you don't know where you're going, it's very hard to ad lib and it's very hard to like go off the path because then you're just going to go off. And we've all heard speakers do that where they just go off into another land. And it's like, is there anything that we're going to get out of this? Like, are they actually ever going to get to a destination? Or is this Just like rambling and that kind of thing. And so if you know your path, you can go off of it and stray from it, and then you can get right back to it and know where you're going. And so I think practicing allows speakers to do that.

Or heard my friend John Acuff say once, I'm going to butcher the quote, but if you want to really know your talk, don't memorize your talk. Know the content. I like. Just know it deeply. I actually think there's really broad application for that. Brilliant advice. It's like, know your discipline, whether you're an entrepreneur, whether you're a speaker, whether you're a marketer. Don't memorize the rules, know the principles, know the craft really well. And that takes study and it does take practice. But no, that's. That's really good. You at least told me you read Redeeming youg Time. I. I don't know if this is true.

I did 100% and I even went kind of slow, slower than I wanted to go so that I could actually apply some of it.

You kind of need to read it slow. I've been telling people there might not be a worse beach read than redeeming your time. It's a terrible beach read. I am curious how the book has changed or changing how you master your craft as a student pastor.

I don't know about mastering my craft. I mean, it does. I'll just tell you how it's impacting me daily. So I've gotten one of the apps that was recommended for. I forgot what the acronym is for.

Your Commitment Tracking System. Yeah, yeah.

Cts. Yeah. So I'm doing that. Everything I have goes into that. Even little things, even like depositing certain amounts of money in certain accounts at a later date and writing letters to work projects and to preachings like everything is in one place. I've always been a list person, but I've consistently had separate lists for different parts of my life. And that whole open loop thing was like one of the most impactful things in the book for me of like, we get stressed mentally when we have something we know we need to do and we haven't actually put it down on paper and come up with a plan to do it. And once we come up with a plan to do it, it releases stress and allows us to focus on what we're doing in the moment and then we're able to get to that when we have the time. And there are times even that when I have a little free time, I can Go and look and say, hey, what's on my list? Oh, yeah, I had to do that. I had to pick that up. I have to send out that email. I need to text that person. I need to set that meeting, whatever it is. And like, that has been the most impactful thing for me on the whole, both in my job and my day to day life, and just personally and being a husband and a dad and all that kind of stuff. So I think that's. That's been. Been super, super helpful for me and.

It helps ensure that our yes is yes like Jesus commanded. You know, when I was writing the book, I was really worried about this is chapter two of the book Let your yes be yes. Talking about this commitment tracking system idea, heavily influenced by David Allen's great book Getting Things Done. And I was really hesitant to put it in there because it's a lot of work. But it's so funny. I'm reading the reviews of Redeeming youg Time, and people like, yeah, this is a lot. But this radically changed my life. I keep hearing it's made me far more present mentally with my work and my family. It's made me less stressed, less anxious, and people trust me to do what I say I'm gonna do. Right. Which, whether you're mastering your craft at work or at home is pretty critical. All right. Anything else from the book that you loved? Just tell me how awesome I am is basically what I'm asking. Yeah.

Can I just say, like, just an immaculate writing performance by Jordan Raynor in his third officially published book. He really has taken it to the next level. You don't want to miss.

Okay, stop. Cut it off. Cut it off. I can't handle it. All right, all right. Okay.

Really is good. Love it.

I think everyone listens. Read it so we won't bore him too much. No, but seriously, I am curious now that the book's been out for a while, how it's changing the way people work. All right. Because that's the whole purpose, that we would redeem our time because the days are evil, as Paul says in Ephesians 5. All right, you know the three questions we're going to wrap up with? I'm assuming you've come prepared.

All right, I've come prepared.

You've come prepared. Which books do you recommend or gift most frequently to others?

Well, I'm a student pastor, so I rarely gift them, but I recommend them.

That's good.

I recommend them if you're in the marketplace. If I was in the marketplace, I would Definitely gift them.

You gift a lot more.

Yeah, most of the time it's more of a recommendation. The three that are like, they were three of the original books that I read that were like Christ centered books back in my early 20s. And one of them is the Life youe've Always Wanted by John Ortberg. It's a spiritual discipline book. I read it at a time where I thought I was a really good Christian because I was not struggling with any obvious habitual sin. You know, I was serving, I was tithing all this stuff and I was like, oh, I'm doing well. But I was looking more at the surface y things. And this, this spiritual discipline book, it didn't make me feel bad about myself and just condemned me. It helped me realize, oh, there's some other places deeper in my soul, deeper in my heart where, like, I really need to address with Jesus. And it's an incredible, incredible book. It'll have you, like, really like thinking about like, oh, I do that. Like, you'll read the book and so many times you'll be like, I do that too. Oh my gosh, that's so true.

Before you go on to the second book, I've never read Life you've Always Wanted by Ortberg, but you shared with me a quote from it. I don't know if you even remember this about four or five months ago. I think about it frequently. It was basically the gist of it was, if a spiritual discipline isn't making you more like Christ.

Yeah.

It's probably time to question the spiritual discipline. Right.

Or it's just not a spiritual discipline. Yeah. At least for you.

Yeah.

That book really helps me understand there's more than just like, when we hear spiritual disciplines, we're like prayer worship by like the Sunday school answers. Prayer worship, Bible, Jesus. Great things, great things. But there's other stuff too. And there's other things that even will relate more with certain people's personalities and hearts and the way God made them. And so a spirit discipline can be taking a walk. A spiritual discipline can be listening to music. It can be journaling. A spiritual discipline can be, I mean, working out or playing sports, like, whatever. If there's things that you intentionally use and help you become more like Jesus and draw closer to Jesus. You know, in that book, he would, he would kind of argue like, that is a spiritual discipline.

All right, I'm all for this. But these are not replacements for being in the Word and they are not replacements for prayer. I don't want people hearing us. I Do find it to be a worshipful experience when I take a super long walk in nature. But that doesn't replace knowing God's word.

Yes. And I would say that's the intentionality of it. Like, if you're doing it with some type of those core precepts of worship, the word prayer, involved in them. That's where. Yeah.

All right, next book.

It's really two books, but they're related, and they're both by the same author. Super, super practical books. You don't have to be a Christian to read them. Principle of the Path and Ask it, which used to be called the best question ever, but I think currently it's called Ask It Both by Andy Stanley. And I love these books. They've been so impactful in my life. I think about them consistently throughout my days and months, even 10, 15 years later. I recommend them to young people. I recommend them to older people. One is basically just about the whole idea of principle of the path is your direction, not your intention determines your destination. And it's all about what direction are you headed in. What you do now affects tomorrow. And the best question ever is a book about wisdom and what is the wise thing to do? And it is something that literally all the time I'm asking myself, well, what's the wise thing to do? What's the wise thing? What is the right thing to do? Not, what do people think I should do? Not what does common sense tell me I should do? What is the wise thing to do? So both of those books are huge, huge building blocks in my faith and in my life.

All right, you guys can find those books right now@jordanraynor.com bookshelf all right, who do you most want to hear in this podcast?

Okay, I want to tell you, I prepared, but I couldn't come up with anybody.

Wow.

I literally tried so hard. Here's the closest I can get to an answer I would love to hear just because I'm into sports and everything. I'd love to hear athletes talk about how their influence and their work ethic and all that kind of stuff coincide with their faith. I hesitate to say any, because whenever it comes to famous people, it's like, I mean, lots of people say they're Christians or whatever, and then we say people are Christians. And I don't. I don't know anybody's faith journey, so I'm not going to say anybody in particular. But I love hearing athletes talk about their faith and how it impacts what they do.

Yeah, we need to have some more athletes we're lacking in the athletes department.

Got to make some connections with those athletes.

Yeah, okay, we got them. We just haven't pulled that trigger yet. We'll get some more on here. All right, last thing. What's one thing from our conversation today you want to reiterate to our listeners before we sign off?

I don't know if it's a reiteration, but I think it's important to mastering wherever. Whatever your vocation is, wherever you're working right now, and I think it is. Do your best where you are right now, and don't worry about the results. Do your best where you are right now. Don't worry about the results. I think when I look back at what got me into ministry, there were things I was doing, and I was doing them with all my heart to the best of my abilities, and I was not thinking at all about the results. I was not thinking at all about where it was going to get me the raise. It was going to get me my future with it. I literally didn't think about it at all. And I look back, and those are the years that got me to being called into ministry, to being a pastor and all that kind of stuff. And I think if in that time I was like, well, I'm going to do this if it gets me to the next place. I'm going to do this if I can get a job or if I can get a raise or if I can get this connection. I don't think any of it would have worked. And it wasn't on purpose. It was really by God's grace that it happened and by accident. But, like, I look back and I'm like, that was one of the most impactful things for my career was when I just did my best where I was, and I didn't worry about the results. That was what really changed my trajectory.

Well, this is hitting on something I.

Talk a lot about.

Trust, hustle, rest. We cannot worry about the results because Scripture tells us the results aren't up to us. God produces results. God alone produces results through our work, but he often uses our hustle to do it. So hustle and trust the results to the Lord. Hey, buddy, I just want to commend you for the exceptional work you do making disciples of the next generation. Thank you for reminding us that, you know, it's not just pastors and who are called to make disciples, but every entrepreneur, every makeup artist, every mechanic is presently called to make disciples where they are. And obviously, on a personal note, just can't. Thank you Enough for our friendship. It is truly one of the great treasures of my life. Hey, if you guys want to connect with Ryan, you can find him at Ryan W. Sweat dot com. Is that right?

Yes, Ryan sweat dot com was already taken, so I had to add my middle initial in there. Like George W. Kind of.

Not really.

Kind of.

I can't remember, did you get to see George's Oval Office when we were in college?

No. I think you attempted to. And we got there that morning for the tour. And I think every once in a while, things change at the White House. I don't know. It's crazy. Like, I can't believe, like, that things change, and there are things to deal with that they didn't expect. But anyway, that happened that day. And so we were making our way to the Oval Office, and our intern leader, Jordan Rayner, said, hey, guys, Oval.

Office isn't happening today. What's funny? Because I know Kara got to see it. I mean, that's how I convinced Kara to date me.

Classic. Yeah, classic. So that's what really happened.

Classic movie.

You sent us all to, like, holding cell, and you took her to the. The Oval Office one on one. Yeah.

You guys go to the White House mess, and I'm going to take care of the Rose Garden and the Oval. Yeah. Hey, Ryan, thanks for hanging out with me.

Sure thing. Love you.

Hey, are you guys enjoying this podcast? We've been making this thing for two years now. It's totally for free for you. Here's what you can do to help us keep this thing going strong. Go rate the podcast on Apple Podcasts. If you want to leave a review, great. But at a minimum, just click one to five stars. You would be shocked at how important those ratings are to help new people find this content. There, I used one of Ryan's favorite words. No, but seriously, I hope you guys are loving it. Thanks for tuning in this week. I'll see you next time.