Doctoral Class Sequence

Entering the final stretch of my doctoral candidacy at Liberty University’s Rawlings School of Divinity, I’ve really enjoyed connecting with fellow and potential students via my YouTube Channel. For those just joining us, I’ve been posting video blogs of my doctoral journey:

One viewer emailed me asking about my course sequence. For what it’s worth, here is the sequence of courses I took for my cognate of Church Planting & Evangelism:

August 2021

DMIN810: Foundations for the Doctor of Ministry

Fall 2021

DSMIN815: Personal Spiritual Formation

EVCP810: Biblical Foundations for Evangelistic Church Planting

EVCP820: Missional Considerations for Evangelistic Church Planting

Spring 2022

EVCP820: Missional Considerations for Evangelistic Church Planting (Retake)

Summer 2022

DMIN851: Micro-Project I: Biblical Precedence

DMIN852: Micro-Project II: Current & Historical Practices

Fall 2022

DMIN853: Micro-Project III: Personal Engagement

DMIN854: Micro-Project IV: Recommended Engagement

January 2023

DMIN855: Portfolio Presentation

As you can see, although I was considered a full-time doctoral student, there was only one semester where I took three classes simultaneously, which in hindsight I do not recommend.

I am looking forward to my final few weeks this January - March and will keep you updated on my Defense.

25 Years Ago, I Partied with Chris Farley, Two Nights Before He Died

EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is an excerpt from the opening of Jonathan Herron’s book, Holy Shift. Jonathan leads one of America’s fastest growing churches, LifeChurchMichigan.com. Part of his training was his time spent at Second City in Chicago. Holy Shift is about unleashing contagious enthusiasm on church leadership teams; equipping leaders to leverage laughter and passion; and creating sustainable momentum in reaching younger crowds for Christ.

My dad was a pastor, which means our family went to church every single Sunday. This was great for introducing me to the gospel and receiving Christ into my life at a young age but was horrible for my chosen vocation of comedy. You see, we were Presbyterians, a group of Christians not really known for producing high-quality, razor-wit comedians. Our pastors know how to dress up in dark robes like Obi-Wan Kenobi, but we tend to shy away from open-mic comedy nights. Presbyterians must think it’s funny to say that we are God’s “frozen chosen.” I don’t get it. I always found it curious that if you rearrange the letters in Presbyterians, it spells out Britney Spears. That I do get.

Anyhow, I loved our little country church in the fields of Iowa. Looking back now, I realize we didn’t have much to do in Iowa. When you’re surrounded by cows, chickens, and pigs, your options tend to be limited. In my spare time, I excelled at corn-on-the-cob speed eating. What can I say? We are Iowans. We like simple. We thought that the capital of Wisconsin was W.

The day after I graduated from high school, I begged and pleaded with my parents to drive me to Chicago to see a show at Second City. The birthplace of improvisational comedy, The Second City in Chicago has produced most of the major comedy stars over the past half century: Alan Arkin, Bill Murray, Gilda Radner, Mike Myers, Stephen Colbert, Steve Carrell, and the voice of Homer Simpson, Dan Castellaneta. Without Second City, there would have been no Saturday Night Live, no Ghostbusters, no Late Show with Stephen Colbert, and no Simpsons. If I wanted to move toward writing and performing comedy, Second City was my first stop.

As we parked the car a block away from the comedy theater, we looked over our shoulders and noticed another historic landmark: the Moody Church. Constructed in 1924, Moody Church was the result of the aggressive evangelism of Dwight L. Moody in the late 1800’s. Literally and figuratively, I believe that the intersection of church and comedy can be felt at the corner of North and Wells. Many Second City performers and students (including myself years later) would attend worship at Moody Church on Sundays at 5pm and then head over two blocks to the theater to create comedy. There’s a symbiotic relationship there; comedy and leadership are not as far apart as you would suspect.

Fresh out of high school, I found the comedy show that evening to be hypnotic and mesmerizing. I was hooked: Second City was where I wanted to go and learn the principles of comedy. As soon as I could afford a full tank of gas later that summer, my aim was to wave goodbye to Iowa and hello to Chicago.

Turns out I needed to arrive in the Windy City a few days ahead of Columbia College’s freshmen move-in so that I could interview at Second City for a hosting job. When I got the call a few days later that I was hired, I hit the roof! I was in! I didn’t care if there was grunt work involved and all my weekend hours would be spent cooking and cleaning; the idea of rubbing shoulders with established comedians was intoxicating.

One particularly busy night in the fall of 1997, I was handed the tickets for a couple who were eager for the evening’s performance. I quickly sized them up and was astonished at the sight. The young woman was HAWT (yes, H – A – W – T)! She was beautiful, blonde, in a gorgeous evening dress, and had sparkling blue eyes. Hawt.

Her date, on the other hand, was NAWT! He was overweight and sweaty, sported slicked-back-yet-frazzled hair, tie askew . . . definitely NAWT! Do you remember the old musical segment on Sesame Street: “One of these things is not like the other?” That was this guy! He did NOT go with HER! As I began leading them to their table, I silently wondered, What is this, a joke? Did she lose a bet somewhere? Is this guy her cousin?

Their tickets were for the best seats in the house—remarkable because only Second City alumni or relatives and close friends can secure the best seats. I glanced back at the couple to see if I recognized either of them. Nope. Must be friends of a cast member, I guessed.

As I politely pulled back their chairs to help seat them, I looked down at the tickets one last time to quickly use the last name listed and wish them a good evening. They were sitting down as I realized what I was saying mid-sentence: “Thank you for being our guests tonight at Second City, Mr. Faaaaaaaarrrrrrrrley.” My mouth went dry as cotton balls and my palms became clammy. This was Chris Farley!

As I stumbled back toward my manager to assist the next guests waiting in line, she grabbed my ear. “You see Mr. Farley over there with his date? We want to make sure he has a very good time tonight. At intermission, I don’t want anyone bugging him for photos or autographs. It’s going to be YOUR job to usher Farley out of the room and act as his bodyguard.”

Bodyguard? Me? Hadn’t my manager seen my body frame? If I were a superhero, my name would be Captain Toothpick. At intermission, I dutifully whisked Chris Farley out of the main theater and into a holding room. He was very kind, down-to-earth, and, well, sweaty. But I didn’t mind; I had a front-row seat to a rich and famous comedian! We exchanged some small talk, and at the end of the night I thought that was that. Turns out Mr. Farley would be making multiple visits to the theater over the coming weeks . . . and I was the Tommy Boy star’s designated body man for each visit. Over time I was able to closely observe the side effects of stardom.

I remember one night Farley came barreling into the theater with a group of friends. Once we had them seated at a large table near the front, Farley pulled out a wad of hundred dollar bills and began liberally handing them out to his party. They pocketed their cash and scattered. I thought it was odd.

Another time Chris came to a show under the influence of something. He looked like more of a mess than usual and smelled like he hadn’t showered in days. When he began loudly heckling the comedians on stage, I had the awkward duty of discreetly trying to remove Chris Farley from the audience.

Even though I was a front-row witness to some blaring warning signs, I had zero sway over Farley’s downward spiral. My role was being the young, impressionable college kid from Iowa who thought it was cool to hang out with one of my comedy idols. As I bragged about my adventures to friends back home, folks thought I was making this stuff up.

So I became determined to snap a picture with Farley.

My opportunity came that December at Second City’s annual Christmas party for employees and alumni. Closed to the public, this was a night of celebration and revelry . . . and Chris Farley was there! I found him in the back swapping cocaine with some of the kitchen staff. He looked like he had been partying for a few days straight at that point. I jumped in with friends for a group shot, and there in the back of our photo, posing alongside us college kids, was a drunk Chris Farley.

This was the late 1990s, a bygone era before Instagram and Facebook. We didn’t have digital cameras with instantly-uploadable photos. Nope. I had to head across the street to a 24-hour Walgreens to drop off my film for three-day development (three days—oh the horror!). I was excited because on that cold, wintry Monday night in Chicago’s Old Town district, I had partied with Chris Farley.

Thursday morning I was sitting down for a college class when a buddy came in the door. “Hey, Herron! Did you hear about Chris Farley?” he announced. “You bet,” I replied. “I just partied with him two nights ago, and I’ll pick up the pictures after class!

“No,” my friend pressed on, his voice lowering a bit. “I mean, did you hear the news about Farley? They just discovered his body in the John Hancock Building.”

Turns out that two nights after my photo was taken, Farley was continuing a four-day partying binge. After smoking crack and snorting heroin with a call girl, he took her back to his apartment in the John Hancock Building on Michigan Avenue. There was an argument about money that caused her to get up in a huff. Chris tried to follow but instead collapsed on the floor, struggling to breathe. His final words were, “Don’t leave me.” Instead of calling 9-1-1, the escort stole his watch and wrote a note saying she’d had a lot of fun, then left.

Chris Farley died alone.

 

You can discover the rest of Jonathan Herron’s story in Holy Shift.

Advice for the Weary Leader

‘Wisdom comes to the heart that is hungry for God.’ (A.W. Tozer)

Whenever I feel discouraged and want to quit something, I remember the words of my then 3-year-old after she puked carrots all over the living room floor: “I’m gonna need more carrots.”

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‘As a leader, you will have to make decisions that those whom you lead and even spectators won’t understand for years.’

(Dr. Eric Mason)

Leaders are targets for the Enemy. If you’re leading out front, then of course you’re going to be on the receiving end of fiery darts. Expect it.

Misunderstandings and miscommunications will happen.

You cannot control other people’s perceptions. You can only control your own actions and reactions.

Be careful with what you hear about someone. You might be hearing it from the problem.

As soon as we step into condemnation instead of conversation, we can no longer see that person clearly.

/ / /

‘A perverse man sows strife and a whisperer separates the best of friends.’ (Proverbs 16:28)

People don’t own you when they hurt you. They own you when your entire life is defined by that hurt.

If you’ve been burned, heal. If someone has an issue with you and they’re telling everyone except you, they don’t have a real issue with you. They just enjoy the attention they get from talking about you.

/ / /

‘Love God and He will enable you to love others even when they disappoint you.’ (Francine Rivers)

The only way to handle ‘prodigals’ is to let them go, give them to God, and pray for their return with tears. And when you see them on the horizon with their head hung low, wrap your arms around them and welcome them home.


We are all rough drafts of the person we are becoming.

Don’t be afraid to start over. It’s a chance to build something better this time!

Sure, the winds feel strong and your team is small.

Stand firm.

If you set your anchor, you won’t drift.


New Podcast Debuting This Week

A couple months ago I took down all my past podcast episodes in order to rethink and revamp my approach.


I want to be more effective in helping you reach people far from God!


As part of my doctoral work, I'm excited to share that I will now be launching a new version of my podcast, renamed 'LeaderShift.'


Trailer is up now, Episode 1 will be dropping later this week.


Some of the early episodes will feature content you've enjoyed in the past, but don't worry; plenty of fresh new content will be coming your way shortly!


Don't miss a single episode: SUBSCRIBE to LeaderShift on your fav podcasting platform now!

Ghosted Again? Pastors Respond to Disappearing Congregants

Church leaders are seeking fresh ways to prevent "backdoor exits" and adapt to shifting membership.

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by Maria Baer

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The membership packet for new congregants at Cross City Church in Columbus, Ohio, is pretty straightforward. There’s a section enumerating the church’s “essential doctrines,” including creedal beliefs like the Trinity and the saving work of Jesus on the cross. There’s a section about church leadership and discipline, explaining the church’s process when a member sins.

And there’s a curious section under membership, “How to Be Sent Out or Leave the Church”:

There are many ways in which God calls His children out of one spiritual family into another. Physical moving, leading to a new mission and disagreement are all ways in which He moves His children. All these may happen without sin and with a full and righteous leading of the Spirit. … We pray and ask the members of Cross City to be prayerful, honest and communicate concerns, offenses, hopes, ideas and convictions in an early fashion, rather than allowing them to fester in isolation and cause division, hurt, or other ungodly effects within God’s family.

Cross City is part of the Evangelical Free Church of America, but church leadership came up with the idea for this section themselves.

Despite having a written policy against ghosting, pastor Scott Burns said the majority of people who’ve left over the church’s 11-year history departed without notice. “They just get quiet,” he said. “And one week turns into four, which turns into six.”

Pandemic shifts, along with rising political and social divisions, have made ghosting a major problem for pastors across the country. Across demographics, US adults are less likely to attend church than they were two years ago, according to the American Family Survey. While some slowly came back from shutdowns and pandemic restrictions, Pew Research Center reported in March 2022 that the return to church had plateaued. Odds are, if they were coming back, they’d be back by now.

Even before the pandemic, church membership wasn’t stagnant, and pastors knew not to take it personally when congregants left. The natural bends and twists of life—relocations, college attendance, job changes, deaths—mean all church bodies turn over with time. Yet the quiet, unexpected departures leave a lingering sting. With all the recent upheaval, it’s a feeling that’s become harder to ignore.

At Concord Church in Dallas, pastor Bryan Carter said attendance at Sunday gatherings is only about 65 percent of what it used to be, while online gatherings have grown by 400 percent. It’s hard to know who left for good, who moved online, and who joined.

Two years into the pandemic, pastors like Burns and Carter are eager to create a church culture that discourages ghosting in the first place.

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A time to seek and a time to lose

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Ghosting is dating parlance. It means to go radio silent in the middle of a budding online romance. In that world, to reach out to a “ghost” is bad form—it’s desperate or creepy. So this isn’t the perfect analogy for those who leave a church body with no word.

When members or regular attendees leave a church without explanation, pastors have a few choices, but all come with sensitivities. If you ignore departures, you risk overlooking potential problems in the church that prompted people to leave.

If you reach out to follow up with leaving congregants, you risk exacerbating hurt feelings on both sides. Even asking questions could put pressure on the former members, implying leaders are angry or against them.

Many pastors are burdened to reach out to leavers, whether to make sure the church didn’t cause harm or to extend a shepherd’s crook to the wayward, just as the shepherd in Jesus’ parable of the lost sheep in Matthew 18 left his 99 to seek the one that “wandered off.”

Darryl DelHousaye is chancellor of Phoenix Seminary and was a longtime pastor at Scottsdale Bible Church, a 7,500-person congregation. He doesn’t remember learning about how to deal with “ghosters” in seminary; nor does Phoenix Seminary cover it in any official curriculum. He called that a potential blind spot.

DelHousaye said his protocol at Scottsdale Bible was to reach out to families who ghosted. “I would call them and say … ‘Where are you guys worshiping?’” Most people were shocked to hear from him “but grateful,” he said.

For pastors of megachurches, reaching out to ghosters might sometimes mean contacting people they’ve never really gotten to know. At Concord Church, Carter said he hasn’t fully implemented a good system to address what he calls the church’s “backdoor” exits. Part of his challenge as the pastor of a 2,500-attender church is recognizing when someone leaves.

“We have two indicators for Sunday attendance: giving and childcare,” he said. The church tracks both, which should make it easier to notice a sudden absence. But the huge popularity of their online services during COVID-19 has made it more difficult to know whether someone has stopped attending altogether or is just attending virtually.

It’s harder to leave unnoticed at smaller congregations, but people still exit without explanation.

Paul Risler is the pastor of Central Avenue United Methodist Church in Athens, Ohio. It’s a rural church with about 200 members. For Risler, reaching out to someone who has ghosted means touching base with someone he almost definitely knows and whose absence can’t go unnoticed among the congregation.

“I used to be more intimidated by those conversations,” Risler said. But he can’t avoid them. Leaving Central is baked into the church’s context: It’s located in the middle of Ohio University’s main campus, and around half his congregation is college students.

During the pandemic, Risler noticed the same thing Carter in Dallas did: The online-only services gave members the option to “tour” other churches online.

Risler said the option for college students in particular to virtually attend services elsewhere—including churches shepherded by nationally known pastors—proved too tempting to avoid. Many college students never returned to Central. “We lost our junior and senior class, basically,” Risler said.

When the church identifies departing congregants, Risler said he’s committed to reaching out for “exit interviews.”

“I just want to make sure that the reason they’re leaving isn’t because we harmed them or sinned against them or that there isn’t something we can fix,” he said.

Burns said part of what makes ghosting so deeply hurtful for pastors is that it means those who left secretly—even for understandable reasons like starting a new job or moving away—chose to do it without prayer and guidance from their church family.

“If the people are strong in Jesus and they find our church not a good home to be at … that’s a concern,” he said. “Is that our preaching? Is it the way we lead things? That’s hard.”

Carter said after the pandemic he’d like to implement a protocol of making “care calls” to people who’ve left without word. Instead of trying to stem the tide of ghosters, he’s going further upstream: He wants to create a church culture that discourages ghosting in the first place. “We’ve seen [ghosting] before,” he said. “We think part of it is we weren’t calling people to a higher mission.”

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A time to break down and a time to build up

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In an area as transient as Scottsdale, a rapidly growing city where families and young adults move in and away with unique frequency, DelHousaye used the phrase “come, grow, go” to describe the pattern of people inevitably leaving his church.

DelHousaye said when pastors don’t hold their congregants “loosely” enough—when they cling to church growth and demand loyalty from members—they unwittingly encourage ghosting.

“If people are going to be loyal, they tend to be more loyal if they realize they’re there by choice and not by manipulation,” DelHousaye said. “We made it so that you didn’t have to be afraid to tell people you were leaving,” he said of his “come, grow, go” philosophy. In fact, he said when he heard of a new church plant coming to town, as long as he believed it was “biblically solid,” he’d ask the planting pastor to share his vision from the pulpit and invite people to join him.

Burns in Columbus is trying to create a similar culture in his small Ohio congregation. “You should be able to trust that the church is not desperate to have you,” he said. “Otherwise, you shouldn’t be going to that church.”

The key for each pastor to create such a culture, DelHousaye said, is remembering whose church it is—not the pastor’s.

“If Jesus wrote a letter, it wouldn’t be to Scottsdale Bible Church,” he said. “It would be the letter to Arizona, to Utah, to Galatia, to Ephesus … It’s the church of Jesus Christ. It’s not my church.”

Carter in Dallas said his strategy to prevent ghosting is to encourage deep connection: “Here’s the deal. If somebody is worshiping, if they’re giving, if they’re serving, if they’re in a small group, the likelihood of their ghosting is low.”

Carter’s goal is to train 300 new small-group leaders this year. That includes leaders for online small groups, which meet virtually and are part of his strategy to prevent even digital ghosting. He wants to communicate that “going” to church online or even just sitting in the pews each Sunday isn’t enough. “We’re trying to say your commitment to Christ is not fulfilled until you’re helping other people grow in their journey with him,” he said.

Risler at Central has come to the same conclusion. He said pastoring a church body of mostly mobile college students has forced him to get creative about getting people connected and serving in the church quickly. Even official church membership is not a major focus at Central.

“We try to get people ‘onboarded’ pretty quickly,” he said. “So people are serving … and then kind of at the end is our membership commitment.” The idea is that connection breeds investment, which makes leaving without a trace harder.

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For everything a season

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Every year, Risler shares what he calls the Post-it story with his congregation. Early in his tenure, he and his team were doing a “SWOT analysis,” an organizational tactic that explores a team’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

Risler wrote “transience” on a Post-it, intending to stick it in the Weakness column. His children’s ministry pastor misunderstood and placed it under Strength. They had a back-and-forth, but she won him over.

“We’ve been given this opportunity to give people Christ, to have them experience biblical community,” he said. “We’re given this short period of time, and we don’t know how long that’s going to be. So we really have learned to try to maximize that opportunity as much as we can.”

Risler said that’s Central’s reality. It’s also, it turns out, the story of the church.

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Maria Baer is a CT contributing writer based in Columbus, Ohio.

Link: https://www.christianitytoday.com/.../ghosting-church...

Remembering Gallagher

Like many in my generation, I discovered Gallagher comedy specials rerunning back-to-back on Old School VH1 weekends back in 1990.

Between his ridiculous roller skates, the microphone that literally hung around his neck, and bits of watermelon flying through the air via his “patented” Sledge-O-Matic, Gallagher provided an entry into stand-up comedy for this impressionable Gen Xer.

In high school, I somehow convinced my Mom to take me to my first Gallagher show at the Adler Theater in Davenport, Iowa. Before his stand-up show, the crowd was lined up to meet Gallagher in the lobby as he signed autographs.

Wearing my freshly-purchased Gallagher t-shirt, when I got to the front of the line, I asked him to sign my t-shirt. Gallagher instructed me to lay down on the table, whereupon the famous comedian straddled me and signed my chest!

Another time Gallagher returned to the same theater — it was the comedy tour where he revealed his head had been shaved. I’ll never forget that particular comedy set because he was making Superman jokes on the literal date that Superman Died (it was the Fall of 1992).

Several years later when I saw him live again in 2007 (pictured above), I relayed the t-shirt story to an older Gallagher. He said he didn’t remember that moment, but admitted it was definitely something he would do.

I’m going to miss Gallagher.