WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.800 Welcome to the Church Digital Podcast, powered by Stadia Church Planting. 00:00:04.420 --> 00:00:08.540 Through this podcast, learn about how God is using technology and innovation 00:00:08.540 --> 00:00:11.580 in digital and digital environments around the world. 00:00:12.080 --> 00:00:16.000 Our goal? To help churches like yours learn to be the church digitally. 00:00:16.600 --> 00:00:21.600 Our heart? That churches like yours will discover a newfound focus on disciple-making 00:00:21.600 --> 00:00:23.620 that will revolutionize your church. 00:00:24.060 --> 00:00:26.660 And now, your host, here's Jeff Reed. 00:00:27.280 --> 00:00:31.100 We are kicking off Season 2 right here, right now. 00:00:31.160 --> 00:00:35.340 That's right, we did over 180 episodes of Season 1 00:00:35.340 --> 00:00:39.900 and then just arbitrarily decided to start Season 2 right now. 00:00:40.120 --> 00:00:42.000 So, no, there's a little more logic behind that. 00:00:42.040 --> 00:00:43.480 We'll get into it here in a little bit. 00:00:43.540 --> 00:00:46.960 But before we get started, hey, listen, I'm going to be traveling the country 00:00:46.960 --> 00:00:48.900 talking to churches. 00:00:49.200 --> 00:00:55.000 I'm partnering up with the Exponential Network with some of their regional conferences. 00:00:55.000 --> 00:00:59.340 They're doing four or five regional conferences here in 21 in the fall. 00:00:59.960 --> 00:01:02.560 Northern California, Southern California, Chicago, Houston. 00:01:03.060 --> 00:01:05.200 And I am going to be at all of them. 00:01:05.280 --> 00:01:09.420 I'm doing a pre-conference track on Fidgetal Church, and I want to invite you to be a part of it. 00:01:09.720 --> 00:01:11.020 Go to Exponential.org. 00:01:11.060 --> 00:01:16.500 If you are anywhere near those areas, Northern California, Southern California, Chicago, or Houston, 00:01:16.840 --> 00:01:20.640 go to that Exponential.org website, register for the conference. 00:01:20.860 --> 00:01:24.680 And while you're registering, go ahead and sign up for that pre-conference track. 00:01:25.180 --> 00:01:27.260 Stadia, Fidgetal, led by me. 00:01:27.380 --> 00:01:28.580 We'd love to have a conversation with you. 00:01:28.620 --> 00:01:32.540 We'd love to meet you, hang out with you, talk about all the crazy stuff that churches are doing, 00:01:32.880 --> 00:01:36.120 and help your church learn to thrive, grow, and multiply. 00:01:37.180 --> 00:01:42.060 Physically and digitally, which in itself is a crazy concept. 00:01:42.220 --> 00:01:46.520 Pre-COVID, mid-post-COVID, wherever you think you are, we are. 00:01:46.900 --> 00:01:49.080 That's still a little crazy, maybe. 00:01:49.220 --> 00:01:52.840 And really, this idea of crazy is really what we wanted to focus on here, 00:01:52.960 --> 00:01:57.660 which is the reason why we're pivoting and starting fresh with Season 2. 00:01:57.660 --> 00:02:03.280 You see, in Season 1, really the three years from where we were now, 00:02:03.420 --> 00:02:06.900 with Stadia, with this Church Digital Podcast, 00:02:07.020 --> 00:02:10.720 we've been doing this podcast for almost three years now. 00:02:10.780 --> 00:02:11.420 That's crazy. 00:02:11.920 --> 00:02:14.620 And over that season, man, we've talked about crazy stuff. 00:02:15.080 --> 00:02:21.720 We've talked a lot about practical things, too, about helping churches be more effective in small groups, 00:02:21.720 --> 00:02:25.840 learn how to discover who people are that are watching the services, 00:02:26.320 --> 00:02:28.700 what analytics to look at, how to manage shadows. 00:02:28.900 --> 00:02:34.740 There's been so much practical application because of the mass amount of churches 00:02:34.740 --> 00:02:38.580 that were trying to understand how to do digital ministry. 00:02:38.940 --> 00:02:41.060 And yeah, Stadia, we're still doing that. 00:02:41.160 --> 00:02:45.900 By the way, the Church Digital, man, there is some awesome stuff coming out here really soon 00:02:45.900 --> 00:02:47.120 that I'm excited about. 00:02:47.120 --> 00:02:52.740 So stay tuned about how we are going to help churches like yours be more practical 00:02:52.740 --> 00:02:54.760 in understanding this digital ministry. 00:02:55.240 --> 00:03:02.380 But that being said, we really wanted to take a turn with this podcast, specifically with Season 2. 00:03:02.920 --> 00:03:04.480 Honestly, we just want to talk crazy. 00:03:05.040 --> 00:03:10.680 We want to start getting more on that bleeding edge, on that cutting edge, on innovation, 00:03:10.920 --> 00:03:15.880 on thinking outside of the box, and highlighting churches that are doing these things. 00:03:16.080 --> 00:03:23.520 Not to brag about what they're doing, but to show you, churches out there, opportunities to think differently, 00:03:23.760 --> 00:03:30.300 to hear the stories, to see how God is moving in and amongst these churches that are being innovative 00:03:30.300 --> 00:03:32.820 by thinking outside of the box. 00:03:32.820 --> 00:03:41.880 And really asking you, church out there, questions like, now that you see how God is moving, pray about joining Him in His work. 00:03:42.500 --> 00:03:50.400 Let's highlight some opportunities to do radical concepts, to do experimental things, and to see where God's moving. 00:03:50.880 --> 00:03:53.840 And maybe you would join Him in doing that. 00:03:54.300 --> 00:03:55.720 So that's where we're going with Season 2. 00:03:55.800 --> 00:04:01.700 We are embracing the crazy because, honestly, I don't know anybody else who is. 00:04:01.900 --> 00:04:06.140 So we're going to be doing that here with the Church Digital Podcast. 00:04:06.520 --> 00:04:09.360 Right off the bat here, Episode 181. 00:04:09.740 --> 00:04:10.860 I love this conversation. 00:04:11.280 --> 00:04:14.540 Theo Davis from Restore Church in Kansas City. 00:04:14.660 --> 00:04:16.980 Now, Theo is a former student pastor. 00:04:17.480 --> 00:04:20.580 He gets into digital ministries. 00:04:20.740 --> 00:04:23.440 He's the digital pastor now with Restore Church. 00:04:23.500 --> 00:04:24.600 He's one of the teaching pastors. 00:04:24.780 --> 00:04:25.520 Great guy. 00:04:26.020 --> 00:04:26.700 Cool guy. 00:04:26.840 --> 00:04:29.640 Kind of relaxed attitude. 00:04:30.320 --> 00:04:32.460 Kind of loved this conversation. 00:04:33.060 --> 00:04:37.880 Man, he is doing some ridiculous online Bible studies right now. 00:04:38.040 --> 00:04:40.080 Now, online Bible studies is nothing new. 00:04:40.080 --> 00:04:44.380 So many churches in this COVID season have pivoted towards doing online Bible studies. 00:04:44.480 --> 00:04:47.780 But specifically with Theo, he's doing these in Minecraft. 00:04:48.040 --> 00:04:48.260 That's right. 00:04:48.320 --> 00:04:53.040 The video game kind of looks like Roblox, kind of looks like Lego minifigs. 00:04:53.520 --> 00:04:55.800 It's a software that's owned by Microsoft. 00:04:56.040 --> 00:04:59.880 And I want you to know, that's pretty much all I know about Minecraft. 00:05:00.280 --> 00:05:07.080 Like, my kids, specifically my middle school-aged children are not into Roblox, early elementary, 00:05:07.320 --> 00:05:08.120 not as much. 00:05:08.760 --> 00:05:16.180 But up beyond that, high school and beyond, it's become a powerful platform, a powerful community. 00:05:16.320 --> 00:05:28.960 And Theo is starting to scratch the itch of doing Bible studies in Minecraft, not just aimed at high school kids or college kids, aimed at adults too. 00:05:29.320 --> 00:05:30.900 Seemed crazy, seemed radical. 00:05:31.240 --> 00:05:32.180 He's running an experiment. 00:05:32.560 --> 00:05:36.320 I wanted to talk to him to learn what he's learning. 00:05:36.780 --> 00:05:42.680 So here for the conversation, we're bringing in Theo Davis, digital pastor, Restore Church. 00:05:42.760 --> 00:05:45.760 Myself, Jeff with the church, digital and Stadia Church planting. 00:05:46.220 --> 00:05:49.600 In a conversation that I'm simply calling Minecraft Bible studies. 00:05:49.980 --> 00:05:51.300 All right, everybody, here you go. 00:05:51.980 --> 00:05:54.900 So explain to me, what exactly is Minecraft? 00:05:55.200 --> 00:05:56.360 I'm new to this world. 00:05:56.980 --> 00:05:58.440 Admittedly, I don't understand it. 00:05:59.020 --> 00:05:59.840 What is Minecraft? 00:06:00.540 --> 00:06:07.580 Minecraft, it's this super unique game that came out back in like the mid-2000s, was in beta mode, 00:06:07.580 --> 00:06:13.260 and then just really blew up and took over the internet, took over YouTube, so many Let's Play videos. 00:06:13.380 --> 00:06:20.580 The basics of Minecraft is that it is this massive world of like pixelated blocks. 00:06:21.160 --> 00:06:26.520 And the whole thing that you're trying to do inside of Minecraft is you're literally mining down into the earth, 00:06:26.680 --> 00:06:28.740 getting resources, going back to the top. 00:06:29.040 --> 00:06:30.420 And then you can craft stuff. 00:06:30.540 --> 00:06:31.880 You can build houses. 00:06:32.160 --> 00:06:33.060 You can build boats. 00:06:33.160 --> 00:06:34.640 You can build actual functioning. 00:06:34.640 --> 00:06:42.200 Like someone in Minecraft was able to build a functioning computer because all of those resources are in the game. 00:06:42.560 --> 00:06:44.380 But most people, they just build little houses. 00:06:44.600 --> 00:06:45.640 They just explore the world. 00:06:45.740 --> 00:06:46.500 They fight monsters. 00:06:47.500 --> 00:06:50.080 And there's a couple of different modes with Minecraft. 00:06:50.340 --> 00:06:51.400 There's survival mode. 00:06:51.820 --> 00:06:55.200 So like there's monsters and you're trying to just survive, essentially. 00:06:55.460 --> 00:07:01.540 Then there's creative mode where it gives you all the resources and you can just build whatever you want to your heart's content. 00:07:01.540 --> 00:07:04.540 And so that's kind of the two big camps of Minecraft. 00:07:04.900 --> 00:07:07.680 It's a computer game, but it's on every platform. 00:07:07.820 --> 00:07:11.900 PlayStation, Xbox, mobile devices, computers, et cetera, et cetera. 00:07:12.060 --> 00:07:21.500 So it's just a really creative little world that everyone, I won't say everyone, but just about everyone can jump into and have a good time. 00:07:21.880 --> 00:07:23.100 I mean, I've got two kids. 00:07:23.220 --> 00:07:25.540 We've talked about it a lot on the show, 10 and 12. 00:07:25.620 --> 00:07:28.480 Actually, when this is broadcasting, it'll be 11 and 13. 00:07:28.880 --> 00:07:30.180 They both have birthdays coming up. 00:07:30.240 --> 00:07:31.580 So my daughter's a teenager. 00:07:32.040 --> 00:07:33.200 I don't know how to handle that. 00:07:33.600 --> 00:07:34.740 And you can pray for me. 00:07:34.920 --> 00:07:37.520 We'll talk about that on Facebook or Instagram or something. 00:07:37.700 --> 00:07:43.320 But, you know, they're more in the Roblox crowd than the Minecraft necessarily. 00:07:43.920 --> 00:07:46.260 And so, and I don't want to put like platform to platform. 00:07:46.500 --> 00:07:49.020 And we've had Daniel Heron on here as well talking about. 00:07:49.120 --> 00:07:51.360 But like, what are the key differences maybe? 00:07:51.820 --> 00:07:53.800 So I know one world, but not necessarily the other. 00:07:54.040 --> 00:07:55.500 Like, what's your audience? 00:07:55.660 --> 00:07:56.760 Who are you seeing in Minecraft? 00:07:57.020 --> 00:07:57.840 What does this look like? 00:07:58.060 --> 00:07:59.260 Yeah, that's a great question. 00:07:59.440 --> 00:08:04.620 So like for Minecraft, I really see it as like middle school and up. 00:08:05.740 --> 00:08:07.480 I was surprised, actually. 00:08:07.620 --> 00:08:13.300 So through this process, I discovered that some of my, the incoming ninth graders of our church 00:08:13.300 --> 00:08:17.480 knew about Minecraft and I was asking them some questions because, again, it's been around 00:08:17.480 --> 00:08:19.920 for a long time and they've done a bunch of updates. 00:08:20.140 --> 00:08:22.060 And I knew it back when it first came out. 00:08:22.460 --> 00:08:24.720 And so they were like, hey, we can help you build. 00:08:24.820 --> 00:08:26.860 We can help you, you know, go into the world and build a little bit. 00:08:26.920 --> 00:08:27.600 I was like, yeah, sure. 00:08:27.920 --> 00:08:32.160 And they're doing all this stuff I had no idea you could do in the game because they're 00:08:32.160 --> 00:08:33.160 that entrenched in it. 00:08:33.160 --> 00:08:39.400 I had no idea that ninth graders, 10th graders, 11th graders were still that into the game. 00:08:39.920 --> 00:08:45.180 And so, yeah, the audience, I would say, for the purposes of what I'm trying to do, it's 00:08:45.180 --> 00:08:46.420 two primary audiences. 00:08:46.880 --> 00:08:48.140 Number one, it's teenagers. 00:08:48.420 --> 00:08:52.320 It's young people because young people really know this platform. 00:08:52.460 --> 00:08:53.120 They know Minecraft. 00:08:53.360 --> 00:08:54.200 They love Minecraft. 00:08:54.820 --> 00:08:57.620 Some of them out there love Roblox and love Roblox. 00:08:57.660 --> 00:08:59.280 And I think that's also a great platform. 00:08:59.540 --> 00:09:04.500 The second group of people is a little more, it's a little harder to find them. 00:09:04.820 --> 00:09:07.020 But once I find them, oh man, it's magic. 00:09:07.180 --> 00:09:14.480 It's adults who are in their 20s, their 30s, their 40s, who have tried small groups before. 00:09:15.080 --> 00:09:19.100 They, you know, they've heard the announcements when they're sitting in a physical church. 00:09:19.480 --> 00:09:21.380 And it just kind of rubs them the wrong way. 00:09:21.480 --> 00:09:23.980 They're like, oh, I don't want to go to someone's home. 00:09:24.160 --> 00:09:27.200 That seems so, like, you know, trapping. 00:09:27.520 --> 00:09:32.340 Like, I'm one of those people who I've never really found an adult small group that I love, 00:09:32.420 --> 00:09:33.680 that I love everything about it. 00:09:33.720 --> 00:09:41.780 And so I wanted to do something where people who were hesitant about small group felt a little more comfortable trying it out. 00:09:41.840 --> 00:09:44.860 Because, hey, if they don't like it, they, oh, my power died. 00:09:44.940 --> 00:09:45.240 Sorry. 00:09:45.460 --> 00:09:46.980 They could just disconnect at any point. 00:09:47.460 --> 00:09:51.860 But also, I just love the fun that you can have within the game. 00:09:52.000 --> 00:09:53.380 So, yeah, that's the audience. 00:09:54.000 --> 00:09:58.380 So, I mean, but there's a lot of communities online that do this, right? 00:09:58.380 --> 00:09:59.920 Or do something similar to that. 00:10:00.440 --> 00:10:04.260 Like, and I don't want to start rattling off, but there's tons of games that have communities. 00:10:04.620 --> 00:10:07.940 There's, I mean, shoot, I used to be big in, like, Disney Infinity. 00:10:08.620 --> 00:10:09.960 And building some of those. 00:10:10.080 --> 00:10:10.540 Oh, yeah. 00:10:10.820 --> 00:10:13.820 So that was, for some reason, I, like, had that. 00:10:14.140 --> 00:10:15.160 And then I would, like, stop. 00:10:15.260 --> 00:10:18.600 I didn't continue on when Disney Infinity, when they cut the plug on that. 00:10:18.600 --> 00:10:22.840 And if you're watching on YouTube, I mean, all the Disney stuff that's on this wall behind me, 00:10:22.860 --> 00:10:28.860 you can see Disney, and if you know me, at any given point, I'm wearing some Disney article of clothing. 00:10:29.620 --> 00:10:35.420 But what I really wanted to get to is this heart of, why did you choose Minecraft? 00:10:36.040 --> 00:10:38.960 So, what did you see to really focus on? 00:10:39.180 --> 00:10:43.780 Because you're not, unless they're looking at tools, you're looking more at, where's community at? 00:10:43.900 --> 00:10:46.940 And of all the different options out there, you chose Minecraft. 00:10:47.180 --> 00:10:47.540 What's up? 00:10:47.540 --> 00:10:51.920 Yeah, you know, it's, it was an accident, really. 00:10:52.060 --> 00:10:58.340 So here's, when I became the digital pastor at Restore, that community was the first thing I was starting to think about. 00:10:58.440 --> 00:11:02.520 How can I start to create community and find who our niche is? 00:11:02.880 --> 00:11:07.920 And my initial thought was like, oh, I know, like, in Minecraft, you can create servers. 00:11:08.500 --> 00:11:10.960 You know, you can have, like, 100 people on a server at a time. 00:11:11.280 --> 00:11:15.040 Maybe that is something where we could start to find some community and develop it. 00:11:15.040 --> 00:11:24.740 But as I was learning about the servers that I could create, which had a limit of 10 people through Minecraft realms, I can tell you more about that if necessary. 00:11:25.000 --> 00:11:29.100 But there was a, there was a limit of how many people could be on the server at a time. 00:11:29.100 --> 00:11:39.300 So I figured, oh, man, that's really not going to do what I wanted it to do, where it could be this hub where people could jump on and discover one another, build whatever it is. 00:11:39.800 --> 00:11:47.640 So then, because of that limitation, and Jeff, you know this, like, sometimes it's limitations which pull out our best creativity. 00:11:48.160 --> 00:11:52.940 It was because of that limitation that I thought, well, maybe, maybe I could reuse this for another purpose. 00:11:53.080 --> 00:12:02.660 Maybe it could just be, like, a fun little game that we play in between small group, or maybe it's, like, you know, one activity as part of a Zoom small group or something like that. 00:12:03.960 --> 00:12:15.480 And so then, as I was, like, exploring it and figuring it out, it just sort of dawned on me in the process, why should we just settle for doing the fun activity inside of Minecraft? 00:12:15.480 --> 00:12:21.860 What if, what if we tried to do the whole small group inside of Minecraft? 00:12:22.480 --> 00:12:26.400 Oh, man, I think, like, so many people would be down for something like that. 00:12:26.460 --> 00:12:28.680 So that's, that's kind of where it came from. 00:12:29.000 --> 00:12:33.800 Just, just it not working out the way I wanted it to, and then it morphed into something else. 00:12:34.220 --> 00:12:37.920 Well, let's talk a little bit here about the journey of that small group. 00:12:38.080 --> 00:12:40.660 So when, how, when did you start it? 00:12:40.700 --> 00:12:41.600 How many are you doing? 00:12:41.700 --> 00:12:45.100 How many people who, like, what can you tell me about those people? 00:12:45.260 --> 00:12:46.360 How's the process going? 00:12:46.760 --> 00:12:49.920 Tell us the story of a Minecraft small group. 00:12:49.920 --> 00:12:53.400 Yeah, so, so we did a beta group. 00:12:53.560 --> 00:12:55.420 It was just a couple weeks long. 00:12:55.980 --> 00:13:03.780 And really for this one, I was just reaching out to people I knew, people that, some of them were familiar with Minecraft. 00:13:04.060 --> 00:13:05.660 Some of them had never played it before. 00:13:05.840 --> 00:13:09.920 So we ended up with six people total, and they were all couples. 00:13:10.040 --> 00:13:11.340 So it was me and my wife. 00:13:11.700 --> 00:13:19.000 It was this guy, Chris, and his girlfriend, Alexis, along with a married couple, Ryan and Becky. 00:13:19.420 --> 00:13:24.420 And so we just kind of put it out there, and we were like, hey, we're trying to do this beta Minecraft small group. 00:13:24.540 --> 00:13:25.720 It's a total experiment. 00:13:26.080 --> 00:13:28.340 I don't know of anyone else doing something like this. 00:13:28.380 --> 00:13:31.860 So I'm just trying to see, like, does this actually work? 00:13:31.900 --> 00:13:37.620 And if this feels good with some people that I know, I know I could make this work with people I don't know. 00:13:37.620 --> 00:13:41.200 So, yeah, we signed them all up. 00:13:41.380 --> 00:13:48.160 I made sure they had copies of the game because they need a Java edition, not the Bedrock edition, for reasons I won't go into. 00:13:48.900 --> 00:13:54.880 And so then I just started, like, brainstorming, and I started thinking, how can I run a small group in this? 00:13:54.940 --> 00:13:58.020 And so at first, Jeff, I was thinking really traditionally. 00:13:58.320 --> 00:14:08.100 I was like, okay, you know, we'll have, like, couches, and we'll just, you know, sit in the chairs in the virtual world, and then maybe we'll do some trivia or something. 00:14:08.900 --> 00:14:14.260 But the more I thought about it and the more I explored the world, I realized that the possibilities are endless. 00:14:14.560 --> 00:14:17.600 And so, really, I broke it up into, like, three sections. 00:14:18.460 --> 00:14:21.460 Each of our small groups kind of had just kind of three movements to it. 00:14:21.640 --> 00:14:23.000 The first was an activity. 00:14:23.000 --> 00:14:29.460 So I created these platforms in this world, and each person had a different platform. 00:14:29.600 --> 00:14:30.660 It was, like, 12 by 12. 00:14:31.020 --> 00:14:39.720 And the opening activity was to create something that represented you, to create something to share with the rest of us a little bit about you. 00:14:40.060 --> 00:14:42.000 And, you know, I created the Eiffel Tower. 00:14:42.260 --> 00:14:44.160 Someone created, like, a mushroom farm. 00:14:44.400 --> 00:14:45.620 Some Pokemon stuff. 00:14:45.760 --> 00:14:47.740 Like, their creativity really came out. 00:14:48.040 --> 00:14:51.220 Some of it was, like, really good, and some of it was, like, laughable. 00:14:51.720 --> 00:14:56.000 But regardless, it wasn't about your skill of building in the game. 00:14:56.220 --> 00:14:59.040 We were just having fun, having conversations as we built. 00:14:59.120 --> 00:15:01.020 That lasted for about 15, 20 minutes. 00:15:01.220 --> 00:15:08.840 And then we all went around to each other's builds, and we had, like, a quick little two-minute, like, show-and-tell, essentially, right? 00:15:09.220 --> 00:15:11.020 So that's, like, the first section. 00:15:11.020 --> 00:15:17.720 We always had some sort of build challenge or something to do within Minecraft, like hide-and-seek or whatever. 00:15:18.180 --> 00:15:23.040 The second movement of our Minecraft small group was something called Discovery Bible Studies. 00:15:23.040 --> 00:15:31.240 This is something I learned from Rob Wagner's Casey Underground group because they do these Discovery Bible Studies. 00:15:31.420 --> 00:15:32.160 Really cool. 00:15:32.480 --> 00:15:34.740 Anyone listening, check out Casey Underground. 00:15:34.940 --> 00:15:37.580 They have this really cool church-planting movement going on. 00:15:38.580 --> 00:15:42.620 But so we just went through a couple of passages of the Gospel of Matthew. 00:15:42.900 --> 00:15:48.600 We just read a short passage, maybe five or six verses, and then I just asked them five questions. 00:15:48.820 --> 00:15:50.980 You know, what did you notice people say? 00:15:51.320 --> 00:15:52.940 What did you notice people do? 00:15:53.240 --> 00:15:54.660 What did you notice Jesus said? 00:15:54.980 --> 00:15:56.640 What did you notice that Jesus did? 00:15:57.000 --> 00:16:04.560 And then what is God asking you to do, change, believe as a result of what we've talked about today? 00:16:04.740 --> 00:16:06.920 And, Jeff, it was a great conversation. 00:16:07.320 --> 00:16:09.960 Like, none of these people knew each other previously. 00:16:10.100 --> 00:16:11.420 Like, the connection was me. 00:16:12.000 --> 00:16:15.920 But we had a great small group discussion, and we prayed for one another at the end. 00:16:16.060 --> 00:16:17.340 And it didn't work out perfectly. 00:16:17.460 --> 00:16:19.800 Someone got disconnected, and then they jumped right back on. 00:16:20.140 --> 00:16:21.720 We were sitting around a fire. 00:16:21.900 --> 00:16:23.980 We built, like, this little canopy thing. 00:16:24.340 --> 00:16:27.900 And then the last movement of the small group, so we did an activity. 00:16:28.240 --> 00:16:30.280 We did Discovery Bible Study along with prayer. 00:16:30.380 --> 00:16:34.700 And then the last thing was just some build time. 00:16:34.960 --> 00:16:38.780 So they could leave at that point if they wanted to, or they could stick around and do some build time. 00:16:39.020 --> 00:16:46.360 We actually sectioned off 50 by 50 plots of land and created a neighborhood for the people part of the small group. 00:16:46.780 --> 00:16:56.240 And I told them, hey, so by the end of the small group, between now and our end date, you have the ability just to create your home. 00:16:56.520 --> 00:16:58.100 Your little 50 by 50 plot of land. 00:16:58.100 --> 00:17:01.460 You can do anything you want, and we're going to do a contest at the end. 00:17:01.540 --> 00:17:06.180 And whoever has the best, you know, homestead will win a prize or something like that. 00:17:06.540 --> 00:17:11.540 And so they were logging on throughout the week, building things out, and they actually created some really cool stuff. 00:17:12.000 --> 00:17:13.940 But that's kind of the movement, three movements. 00:17:14.100 --> 00:17:17.920 So we had the activity, Discovery Bible Study, and then just some build time together. 00:17:18.460 --> 00:17:22.000 And I was just really encouraged with how it went. 00:17:22.440 --> 00:17:22.840 So, yeah. 00:17:23.240 --> 00:17:23.860 That's awesome. 00:17:24.340 --> 00:17:25.000 You know, it's funny. 00:17:25.080 --> 00:17:26.000 You mentioned Rob Wagner. 00:17:26.100 --> 00:17:27.080 I just flashed back. 00:17:27.620 --> 00:17:31.880 You and I met, I think, at a restaurant in Austin, right? 00:17:31.940 --> 00:17:32.400 With Rob? 00:17:32.440 --> 00:17:32.900 That's right. 00:17:33.020 --> 00:17:33.920 Sitting at a table? 00:17:34.060 --> 00:17:34.280 Yep. 00:17:34.300 --> 00:17:37.360 Like, that may not have been the first time we talked, but it was the first time we really talked. 00:17:37.540 --> 00:17:37.780 Yeah. 00:17:37.820 --> 00:17:40.020 It was the first time we saw each other in person, for sure. 00:17:40.200 --> 00:17:40.500 Yeah. 00:17:40.700 --> 00:17:41.000 Totally. 00:17:41.480 --> 00:17:41.860 Tell me. 00:17:42.100 --> 00:17:44.580 Because, and listen, and I know, I'm actually curious. 00:17:45.220 --> 00:17:48.040 Did you tell Rob, like, hey, yeah, I'm doing a church in Minecraft? 00:17:48.220 --> 00:17:49.640 And I'm curious what his response was. 00:17:49.880 --> 00:17:51.260 You know, I haven't yet. 00:17:51.780 --> 00:17:54.240 You know, I'm friends with him on Facebook now. 00:17:54.320 --> 00:17:55.100 We found each other. 00:17:55.160 --> 00:17:59.360 In fact, I was like, Rob Wagner, you know, a friend requested me. 00:17:59.480 --> 00:18:01.000 I made it, you know. 00:18:01.000 --> 00:18:02.580 But he's an awesome guy. 00:18:02.660 --> 00:18:03.600 I got to let him know this. 00:18:03.780 --> 00:18:05.280 Because, yeah, we're doing it. 00:18:05.480 --> 00:18:06.280 It's been fun. 00:18:06.520 --> 00:18:08.860 And Rob's been on the show quite a bit here. 00:18:09.340 --> 00:18:13.620 And so we'll link to some of his stuff in the show notes, talking micro, talking watch parties. 00:18:14.400 --> 00:18:17.000 And it's been fun in this COVID season. 00:18:17.320 --> 00:18:19.620 I don't consider Rob a digitally friendly guy. 00:18:19.760 --> 00:18:21.520 Like, he's been immensely supportive. 00:18:21.520 --> 00:18:26.220 But by default, he's not thanking digital communities, a community worthy of a church. 00:18:26.440 --> 00:18:31.880 That being said, in this COVID season, I have seen him take many strides towards recognizing 00:18:31.880 --> 00:18:37.060 the power and the influence of doing digital church and online and how digital can complement 00:18:37.060 --> 00:18:37.440 that. 00:18:37.580 --> 00:18:39.240 And so I would be interested. 00:18:39.560 --> 00:18:43.180 You know, maybe two years ago, I would have said Rob would have been like, yeah, not so 00:18:43.180 --> 00:18:43.420 much. 00:18:43.440 --> 00:18:48.820 But I really think he's coming around as he's seeing more and more stories that are happening. 00:18:48.820 --> 00:18:51.540 We did a podcast with him just recently talking about that. 00:18:51.920 --> 00:18:52.980 So that's awesome. 00:18:53.200 --> 00:18:53.920 Well, let me ask this. 00:18:54.520 --> 00:18:57.860 Like, okay, so you're doing this thing in Minecraft. 00:18:58.780 --> 00:19:01.820 Like, how did the conversation with your leadership work? 00:19:01.880 --> 00:19:04.340 Like, did they think you were crazy? 00:19:04.460 --> 00:19:05.600 Did they kick you out of the room? 00:19:05.980 --> 00:19:07.700 Like, did they even know what Minecraft was? 00:19:07.780 --> 00:19:08.580 What was that experience? 00:19:09.000 --> 00:19:10.360 Yeah, no, that's a great question. 00:19:10.620 --> 00:19:19.160 So I remember I sat down with our community life person, Janet McMahon, and I was just sharing 00:19:19.160 --> 00:19:22.240 with her, hey, so I want to do some online small groups. 00:19:22.240 --> 00:19:24.260 And we've had some online small groups. 00:19:24.380 --> 00:19:25.480 So that wasn't anything new. 00:19:25.880 --> 00:19:27.300 COVID, you know, everyone had. 00:19:27.820 --> 00:19:33.060 But I presented the idea of, I want to do this all inside of Minecraft. 00:19:33.500 --> 00:19:38.880 And I explained, like, I hadn't really found a small, an adult small group that I was super 00:19:38.880 --> 00:19:40.540 pumped and super excited about. 00:19:40.920 --> 00:19:43.920 But I think, like, this Minecraft small group could be really cool. 00:19:44.200 --> 00:19:45.340 What do you think, Janet? 00:19:45.680 --> 00:19:51.800 And Janet, in her wisdom and all of that, was just like, Theo, this sounds really, really 00:19:51.800 --> 00:19:52.340 creative. 00:19:52.720 --> 00:19:58.500 Why don't you find a group of people that you know and do, like, a little test group just 00:19:58.500 --> 00:20:00.340 to see how that goes. 00:20:00.340 --> 00:20:04.440 And then we could totally launch that full blown in the fall. 00:20:04.960 --> 00:20:06.420 And I received that. 00:20:06.520 --> 00:20:07.720 And that's exactly what I did. 00:20:07.840 --> 00:20:14.340 So I was grateful that, you know, she definitely looked like a little surprised, but she wasn't 00:20:14.340 --> 00:20:14.980 pushing back. 00:20:15.060 --> 00:20:17.960 She was embracing the creativity of it. 00:20:18.060 --> 00:20:22.320 And well, if this can help people find their way back to God, let's go. 00:20:22.680 --> 00:20:25.280 But why don't you test it first with some people that you know? 00:20:25.640 --> 00:20:33.660 So I'm super grateful for some leaders who are willing to take some risks in the digital 00:20:33.660 --> 00:20:36.220 world so that we can reach people in the physical world. 00:20:36.560 --> 00:20:40.080 Yeah, I tell you, that's a missing thing right now in a lot of churches. 00:20:40.080 --> 00:20:46.500 The part of them that wants to experiment, to try something different, to take a risk. 00:20:46.820 --> 00:20:47.900 And it's hard. 00:20:48.080 --> 00:20:52.020 You know, just even in some conversations today, you know, a couple of churches were telling 00:20:52.020 --> 00:20:54.120 me that they're operating at a negative. 00:20:54.500 --> 00:21:00.140 And so there's fear in those risks, which gets me to, and I was going to ask this later, 00:21:00.300 --> 00:21:03.140 but how much money have you spent on Minecraft? 00:21:03.480 --> 00:21:05.500 Like two, three, $5,000? 00:21:05.920 --> 00:21:08.220 Like what's it cost right here to run this experiment? 00:21:08.220 --> 00:21:14.820 Yeah, I, hang on, let me think, I'm going to try and think of a total cost for you. 00:21:15.540 --> 00:21:22.680 I would say I haven't spent more than 400 bucks, maybe 500 bucks. 00:21:22.920 --> 00:21:23.220 Really? 00:21:23.360 --> 00:21:24.840 What have you spent the money on? 00:21:24.840 --> 00:21:29.380 Yeah, so I spent the money, I had to buy two copies of the Java edition for myself and 00:21:29.380 --> 00:21:29.860 my wife. 00:21:30.220 --> 00:21:33.540 I had to buy one copy for one of our other experimentees. 00:21:33.960 --> 00:21:35.360 And Minecraft is cheap. 00:21:35.420 --> 00:21:36.480 It costs 25 bucks. 00:21:36.560 --> 00:21:37.580 So not a big deal. 00:21:38.040 --> 00:21:44.120 I bought some headphones with a microphone because the ones I had were crap and I just wanted a 00:21:44.120 --> 00:21:45.600 good, a good quality one. 00:21:45.680 --> 00:21:48.100 So those alone were 100 bucks each. 00:21:48.780 --> 00:21:50.320 Then the server. 00:21:50.620 --> 00:21:55.100 So in order to have a server where people can jump on at any point in the week, you know, 00:21:55.160 --> 00:22:01.020 I don't have to be logged on in order for people to, you know, build or enjoy the server that we've 00:22:01.020 --> 00:22:01.280 created. 00:22:01.360 --> 00:22:03.440 That costs 10 bucks a month. 00:22:03.780 --> 00:22:04.880 So that's not much. 00:22:04.960 --> 00:22:06.700 I'm trying to think, what else have I spent money on? 00:22:06.880 --> 00:22:12.680 Uh, I bought a keyboard because, oh, I bought a mouse too, because normally I'm just a trackpad 00:22:12.680 --> 00:22:12.900 guy. 00:22:12.980 --> 00:22:14.500 But with Minecraft, you really need a mouse. 00:22:15.560 --> 00:22:21.280 So yeah, I would say I've really spent somewhere between three and $500 on a variety of little 00:22:21.280 --> 00:22:21.540 things. 00:22:21.640 --> 00:22:22.480 It's cheap. 00:22:22.560 --> 00:22:24.700 It is not an expensive thing. 00:22:24.740 --> 00:22:28.860 And I've been talking to a bunch of my youth ministry friends, because I was a youth pastor 00:22:28.860 --> 00:22:31.600 for 16 years before being a digital pastor. 00:22:32.360 --> 00:22:35.900 And I've been like ringing the bell, like, guys, you got to try this out. 00:22:35.980 --> 00:22:36.760 It's cheap. 00:22:36.820 --> 00:22:37.460 It's affordable. 00:22:37.460 --> 00:22:39.980 The kids already know how to play this game. 00:22:40.400 --> 00:22:43.900 And you could have, you would have a captive audience right now. 00:22:44.020 --> 00:22:49.600 And then imagine if you could teach some of these teenagers how to run the groups themselves, 00:22:49.760 --> 00:22:52.500 because Discovery Bible studies are so straightforward. 00:22:53.140 --> 00:22:54.580 Um, so anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself. 00:22:54.900 --> 00:22:57.320 Overall, it was about three to 500 bucks. 00:22:57.500 --> 00:22:58.920 So yeah, that's awesome. 00:22:59.100 --> 00:23:02.020 We can follow that rabbit trail at some point. 00:23:02.080 --> 00:23:02.560 That's good. 00:23:02.840 --> 00:23:03.760 I mean, let me ask. 00:23:03.760 --> 00:23:07.060 Well, will you just kind of set yourself up there? 00:23:08.340 --> 00:23:09.660 Why are you doing this? 00:23:09.780 --> 00:23:10.460 What's the goal? 00:23:10.600 --> 00:23:15.240 What's the purpose behind doing, uh, Minecraft small groups? 00:23:15.460 --> 00:23:16.620 Where's this thing going? 00:23:17.060 --> 00:23:22.460 Yeah, I, I want to reach people, Jeff, that otherwise would not come to church, a church 00:23:22.460 --> 00:23:24.720 building, even church online. 00:23:24.720 --> 00:23:28.840 When they hear this, the, the, the, the phrase like, oh, join my church online. 00:23:29.060 --> 00:23:32.480 That can also generate a bunch of thoughts or concepts. 00:23:33.040 --> 00:23:39.040 But, um, if a friend were to invite me to, hey, uh, I'm do, I'm part of this Minecraft 00:23:39.040 --> 00:23:39.820 small group. 00:23:39.820 --> 00:23:42.720 We do lots of building and we talk about Jesus. 00:23:43.340 --> 00:23:44.680 That would pique my interest. 00:23:44.780 --> 00:23:45.700 I would be curious. 00:23:45.700 --> 00:23:51.760 And so this is really for people who just haven't been able to fit into the traditional 00:23:51.760 --> 00:23:57.680 way that we've done church, the traditional way that we've done small groups, even like 00:23:57.680 --> 00:24:01.880 even a zoom small group can be intimidating for some people sitting in front of a screen, 00:24:02.060 --> 00:24:05.500 looking at one another for an hour and a half, two hours. 00:24:05.620 --> 00:24:10.860 Um, like that, that can, for me, even that kind of raises my anxiety level, but to be 00:24:10.860 --> 00:24:16.260 in a game where you can kind of goof off and it, it, I don't know, it just, it invites 00:24:16.260 --> 00:24:17.680 different kinds of people. 00:24:17.680 --> 00:24:20.320 So that's really who I'm trying to reach out to. 00:24:20.320 --> 00:24:24.940 And already some people are interested who've never been part of a small group before. 00:24:25.560 --> 00:24:28.120 Um, so that's, that's my hope for, for us. 00:24:28.140 --> 00:24:31.900 And that's my hope for other people as, as they even experiment with this, that they'll 00:24:31.900 --> 00:24:35.460 discover, uh, people that otherwise would not have joined their groups. 00:24:35.620 --> 00:24:37.940 Are, are open to it at least. 00:24:38.160 --> 00:24:38.320 Okay. 00:24:38.340 --> 00:24:43.380 So, so let me ask this, you're doing a small group online and you're, the goal is you're 00:24:43.380 --> 00:24:44.360 doing a test beta group. 00:24:44.380 --> 00:24:48.360 The goal is to reach people maybe that are been burned by church or aren't comfortable 00:24:48.360 --> 00:24:48.720 with that. 00:24:48.720 --> 00:24:51.160 So you're reaching a unchurched, de-churched crowd. 00:24:51.480 --> 00:24:59.120 Like is, is the goal to do the entirety of church, like more of a rich ecclesiologically 00:24:59.120 --> 00:25:01.620 functioning church in Minecraft? 00:25:02.080 --> 00:25:08.000 Are you doing a small group in Minecraft that's feeding into, uh, you know, your, the church, 00:25:08.080 --> 00:25:14.340 restore churches, online services where they're getting teaching or it's like, well, how is 00:25:14.340 --> 00:25:15.240 this thing structured? 00:25:15.400 --> 00:25:19.980 Where is this separate to the church online and the physical church or a front door? 00:25:20.100 --> 00:25:22.420 Like what's, what's your strategy where this fits? 00:25:22.420 --> 00:25:28.240 Yeah, this is, um, right now our Minecraft small groups, uh, my hope is that it's a front 00:25:28.240 --> 00:25:31.720 door to our digital church or our physical church. 00:25:31.720 --> 00:25:33.960 So we're, we're, we're playing in the digital world. 00:25:34.140 --> 00:25:38.440 We have both physical locations as well as our digital online campus. 00:25:38.620 --> 00:25:43.860 And so my hope is that people will get plugged into this and it'll pique their curiosity to 00:25:43.860 --> 00:25:48.560 check out one of our messages, to join our discord, to become part of the larger digital 00:25:48.560 --> 00:25:53.380 community, or it might serve as a front door to have them head to one of our physical 00:25:53.380 --> 00:25:56.420 locations if they feel like that's a good way to go. 00:25:56.420 --> 00:26:02.080 Now, my hope is that as we start doing these small groups and already, like I was planning 00:26:02.080 --> 00:26:04.260 just to do one, but I found another leader. 00:26:04.360 --> 00:26:05.400 So I'm going to do two of these. 00:26:05.480 --> 00:26:07.420 I'm going to do a high school one and a adult one. 00:26:07.620 --> 00:26:13.320 Uh, my hope is, is to be open-handed with how this progresses. 00:26:13.620 --> 00:26:18.680 So I really don't want to, um, I'm not heading into this with, okay, this is our small group 00:26:18.680 --> 00:26:19.060 structure. 00:26:19.060 --> 00:26:20.960 These are only going to be for small groups. 00:26:21.160 --> 00:26:26.620 I'm totally open to the fact that, you know what, God might be, God might be doing something 00:26:26.620 --> 00:26:27.400 in the midst of this. 00:26:27.600 --> 00:26:34.460 Maybe I find, uh, a young teenager or a young person that wants to, that, that knows the 00:26:34.460 --> 00:26:39.640 community of Minecraft significantly better than I do, can reach out to that community and 00:26:39.640 --> 00:26:41.440 start a disciple making movement. 00:26:41.920 --> 00:26:46.820 Maybe it starts off as little micro churches in Minecraft, or maybe it's becomes this full 00:26:46.820 --> 00:26:48.640 blown faith community. 00:26:48.940 --> 00:26:49.640 I don't know. 00:26:49.640 --> 00:26:53.980 So I'm just like, uh, I learned from the beginning of this, like, okay, Lord, I have 00:26:53.980 --> 00:26:58.840 this idea, but, uh, you know, do with it what you want and I'm going to be open to it in 00:26:58.840 --> 00:26:59.340 the process. 00:26:59.580 --> 00:27:04.020 So to answer your question, our hope is that it's going to feed into our digital and our 00:27:04.020 --> 00:27:05.380 physical locations. 00:27:05.700 --> 00:27:09.280 But we're totally open to the fact that if the right people come along and the right 00:27:09.280 --> 00:27:12.500 ingredients are there, that it could spin off into its own thing. 00:27:12.900 --> 00:27:19.220 Um, but let's, let's do a success, successful full season of, uh, of a group before I get 00:27:19.220 --> 00:27:20.300 too far down the road. 00:27:20.640 --> 00:27:20.840 Awesome. 00:27:21.140 --> 00:27:22.500 Crockpot, not microwave. 00:27:22.840 --> 00:27:24.080 Take the time, let it develop. 00:27:24.180 --> 00:27:24.680 That's beautiful. 00:27:25.140 --> 00:27:30.820 I'm totally going to clip the video section where, where you said micro church in Minecraft. 00:27:30.820 --> 00:27:32.480 And I'm going to send that to Rob Wagner. 00:27:32.740 --> 00:27:37.840 Just, just, I want a reaction video with Rob Wagner when he hears that. 00:27:38.080 --> 00:27:38.660 That's beautiful. 00:27:39.240 --> 00:27:40.560 What's been, Rob, I love you. 00:27:40.640 --> 00:27:42.380 Hey, what's been the biggest surprise? 00:27:42.580 --> 00:27:45.040 Like in, in this, you've been, you've been running this test. 00:27:45.460 --> 00:27:50.140 Uh, you started with adults like our, and, and you're doing, have you started with teens 00:27:50.140 --> 00:27:52.400 as well, recruiting and developing the teens? 00:27:52.760 --> 00:27:55.500 So what, what's been the biggest surprise out of all of this? 00:27:55.500 --> 00:27:55.780 Yeah. 00:27:55.980 --> 00:28:01.140 Uh, and I think I mentioned this a little bit earlier is that, um, I invited one of the 00:28:01.140 --> 00:28:05.340 teenagers to help me because he offered, um, he's like, yeah, I can help you build some 00:28:05.340 --> 00:28:08.440 stuff out because you got to do a little world building before you begin. 00:28:09.160 --> 00:28:12.120 And, um, he invited a friend. 00:28:12.220 --> 00:28:14.820 He said, Hey, I'm doing, uh, I'm helping Theo. 00:28:14.920 --> 00:28:18.360 And so that kid jumped on and then we had another kid jump on. 00:28:18.400 --> 00:28:20.780 So I had three teenagers in this world. 00:28:20.780 --> 00:28:21.980 And here's what surprised me. 00:28:22.500 --> 00:28:28.180 Um, they were excited about it and they were picking out their plots of land. 00:28:28.260 --> 00:28:28.400 Okay. 00:28:28.440 --> 00:28:31.880 So when we do, when we do small group, it was just an assumption for them. 00:28:31.880 --> 00:28:32.880 Like this thing's happening. 00:28:33.020 --> 00:28:34.100 We're doing small group. 00:28:34.180 --> 00:28:36.720 Oh, I can already think of two friends I want to invite to this. 00:28:36.720 --> 00:28:39.620 So we're going to need eight plots of land for where we built. 00:28:40.020 --> 00:28:40.940 They were excited. 00:28:41.240 --> 00:28:44.700 And some of these kids, I could never even back when I was the youth pastor, 00:28:44.700 --> 00:28:51.000 I couldn't get them excited about just normal, uh, small group in person, but they were pumped 00:28:51.000 --> 00:28:51.640 about this. 00:28:51.760 --> 00:28:55.440 So I think also they taught me a lot. 00:28:55.640 --> 00:29:01.600 So I learned a lot in the process of just Minecraft and different builds and what we could do and 00:29:01.600 --> 00:29:02.740 how we could build out the world. 00:29:03.560 --> 00:29:09.460 So I think sometimes as adults, we have this tendency to just want to like do it all ourselves 00:29:09.460 --> 00:29:10.560 and set the whole thing up. 00:29:10.560 --> 00:29:15.760 But, um, if there's anyone out there listening, invite some of the teenagers of your church. 00:29:15.760 --> 00:29:21.020 If you plan on trying this out, invite some of the teenagers to be part of the planning process, 00:29:21.020 --> 00:29:26.260 part of the building process, because that's going to give them ownership of the group. 00:29:26.260 --> 00:29:30.120 And they're going to want to invite people to something that they helped to build. 00:29:30.620 --> 00:29:36.000 Um, so for me, that would be the biggest, uh, aha moment that the teenagers surprisingly 00:29:36.000 --> 00:29:38.080 were the ones that were flocking to it. 00:29:38.140 --> 00:29:41.980 And I'm having to do a little more reaching out to find adults that want to flock to it. 00:29:42.440 --> 00:29:43.240 That's, that's interesting. 00:29:43.240 --> 00:29:48.840 And I love the idea, give them an opportunity to have influence, to be a part of it, to come 00:29:48.840 --> 00:29:51.700 up with the ideas, let them lead out in there. 00:29:51.700 --> 00:29:56.320 Uh, it's, it's interesting in the, you know, and like I said, Minecraft, I don't have a lot 00:29:56.320 --> 00:29:58.760 of experience in that necessarily within Roblox. 00:29:59.120 --> 00:30:02.800 Uh, you know, I've got friends that are more in Daniel Heron's been on here quite a bit 00:30:02.800 --> 00:30:04.480 and he would champion in this too. 00:30:04.540 --> 00:30:08.100 You know, he started, you know, the Robloxian Christians when he was like, I don't know, 00:30:08.140 --> 00:30:10.540 10 or 11 and now he's 21. 00:30:10.700 --> 00:30:16.560 And so, and he's reached, you know, estimated 30 to 50,000 people through a Robloxian church, 00:30:16.560 --> 00:30:21.880 um, you know, in, in through over the years and it's still going, but, you know, and he 00:30:21.880 --> 00:30:25.100 talks a lot about how it's student led movements. 00:30:25.420 --> 00:30:29.560 Um, you know, and, and I've talked over the years with Daniel about, you know, what would 00:30:29.560 --> 00:30:31.280 it look like for a church to come alongside? 00:30:31.700 --> 00:30:35.060 And, and it's funny, like Dan, and Dan, just the way that he's wired and it's on the 00:30:35.060 --> 00:30:35.360 record. 00:30:35.540 --> 00:30:39.580 Uh, but he's so driven towards student led and operated movements. 00:30:39.960 --> 00:30:45.920 Uh, he's actually kind of fearful about letting organized churches kind of come in into that 00:30:45.920 --> 00:30:46.420 space. 00:30:46.420 --> 00:30:51.640 And so as an organized church coming in there, you know, the wisdom that you're showing by 00:30:51.640 --> 00:30:54.040 letting, Hey, students own this. 00:30:54.040 --> 00:30:59.180 Students run with this students make this bigger than I myself can be. 00:30:59.180 --> 00:31:04.940 Um, I mean, listen, if, if I was a digital pastor, I don't squat about, about Minecraft, 00:31:04.940 --> 00:31:10.920 but Hey, I recognize the fact that it's a community and that there are people that know that community 00:31:10.920 --> 00:31:11.760 better than I do. 00:31:11.760 --> 00:31:15.440 And if I really wanted to reach that community, I'm not developing the strategy. 00:31:15.440 --> 00:31:18.260 I'm talking with others that are developing it. 00:31:18.340 --> 00:31:23.400 So you've got some great wisdom that that's shown here, man, what are some other takeaways? 00:31:23.520 --> 00:31:28.400 What are some lessons that, that you've learned, um, you know, recently as you're going through 00:31:28.400 --> 00:31:28.980 these experiments? 00:31:29.320 --> 00:31:36.660 Yeah, I think, um, so one of the things is that what I found is that like whoever's leading 00:31:36.660 --> 00:31:40.600 the small group, they definitely still need to know how to lead a small group. 00:31:40.600 --> 00:31:46.640 So, um, you know, just, and I'm talking about, you know, working in the room, helping people 00:31:46.640 --> 00:31:52.280 connect to one another because we've lost all the verbal, uh, all of the visual cues and 00:31:52.280 --> 00:31:53.180 some of the verbal cues. 00:31:53.180 --> 00:31:57.620 Cause now we're in Minecraft, we're talking to one another through discord, uh, and all 00:31:57.620 --> 00:32:01.440 we can see are these little avatars that can't really express themselves very much. 00:32:01.960 --> 00:32:07.060 So as the small group leader, I had to make a lot more efforts of just helping to connect 00:32:07.060 --> 00:32:11.760 people, helping to lead the discussion, helping to just say, okay, guys, we're going to do 00:32:11.760 --> 00:32:12.120 this. 00:32:12.160 --> 00:32:13.060 Then we're going to do this. 00:32:13.140 --> 00:32:14.020 Then we're going to do this. 00:32:14.240 --> 00:32:17.980 All right, let's start with our opening activity and just doing a good job hosting. 00:32:18.480 --> 00:32:22.480 Um, so that's one of the things that as I'm getting apprentices to learn how to do this, 00:32:22.480 --> 00:32:26.360 that I'm going to be focusing a lot on, Hey, you are a host. 00:32:26.360 --> 00:32:29.600 Like, don't even worry about your Minecraft abilities. 00:32:29.960 --> 00:32:35.160 Like you might build great or you might suck at it, but you do need to be, um, you really 00:32:35.160 --> 00:32:37.060 need to practice how to be a good host. 00:32:37.420 --> 00:32:39.940 So that's one of the, that's definitely one of the learnings. 00:32:40.020 --> 00:32:44.780 Um, another learning people, sometimes people cancel and, and life happens. 00:32:44.780 --> 00:32:47.800 One of, uh, one of the couples, their car broke down. 00:32:47.800 --> 00:32:51.260 And so, uh, we, I had the choice, like, do I cancel? 00:32:51.360 --> 00:32:52.040 Do I postpone? 00:32:52.520 --> 00:32:53.300 I just postponed. 00:32:53.480 --> 00:32:54.120 It's not a big deal. 00:32:54.120 --> 00:32:57.500 Just like you would with a, with an IRL group, right? 00:32:57.880 --> 00:33:01.080 Um, we just postponed and we finished our group another time. 00:33:01.560 --> 00:33:04.440 Um, another man, another learning. 00:33:04.800 --> 00:33:05.180 Yeah. 00:33:06.480 --> 00:33:06.880 Yeah. 00:33:07.600 --> 00:33:09.800 Uh, I don't know. 00:33:09.860 --> 00:33:11.240 It's just, it's been fun. 00:33:11.480 --> 00:33:15.640 And I honestly just can't wait to start the group with the high schoolers and with the 00:33:15.640 --> 00:33:16.040 adults. 00:33:16.540 --> 00:33:22.000 Um, that's been, that's really been the biggest thing is just the eagerness that I have just 00:33:22.000 --> 00:33:24.220 to jump in with a whole nother group of people. 00:33:24.220 --> 00:33:25.940 So those are, those are kind of the main learnings. 00:33:26.080 --> 00:33:27.400 There's some technical stuff. 00:33:27.400 --> 00:33:33.160 I will say, um, it was not the smoothest process starting off. 00:33:33.320 --> 00:33:39.340 So having to learn about Minecraft realms, which is Microsoft's, uh, own little server 00:33:39.340 --> 00:33:44.860 that you can pay for having to learn, um, some of like the, the server commands. 00:33:44.860 --> 00:33:50.900 So slash changing the time of day slash, uh, you know, put a setting it in creative mode, 00:33:50.980 --> 00:33:56.380 uh, having to learn how to connect everyone on the same discord. 00:33:56.380 --> 00:34:01.220 And so there were some technical things for sure that took a little bit of, uh, a little 00:34:01.220 --> 00:34:02.320 bit of a learning curve. 00:34:02.720 --> 00:34:06.440 Um, more than happy to type up how to do all the different things. 00:34:06.440 --> 00:34:10.460 If anyone out there wants to try this out with your youth group or your church or whatever, 00:34:10.460 --> 00:34:14.640 um, so that you don't have to, it probably took me about five hours to, to troubleshoot 00:34:14.640 --> 00:34:15.360 all the stuff. 00:34:15.720 --> 00:34:20.580 Um, ultimately once I was like in the whole process, but now it's, it's runs perfectly 00:34:20.580 --> 00:34:21.560 smooth, no issues. 00:34:21.940 --> 00:34:25.780 Inviting people to the server took, it was a little bit of a challenge because the, uh, 00:34:25.780 --> 00:34:29.380 the invites apparently expire after a certain amount of time. 00:34:29.540 --> 00:34:34.500 So on our first group, they were logging on, but then they get kicked pretty quickly. 00:34:34.940 --> 00:34:36.600 And I'm like, well, wait a second. 00:34:36.760 --> 00:34:39.020 I, you got on, why is it saying you're not invited? 00:34:39.120 --> 00:34:42.600 So there's some technical stuff, just like with any digital thing. 00:34:43.040 --> 00:34:46.500 But once we ironed out all of those things, we are, our other groups were great. 00:34:46.920 --> 00:34:48.260 Hey, I'm going to put you on the spot right here. 00:34:48.260 --> 00:34:49.040 Cause you just said it. 00:34:49.080 --> 00:34:50.860 Would you write a blog for the church digital? 00:34:51.000 --> 00:34:51.520 Yeah, sure. 00:34:51.640 --> 00:34:56.700 Listing out some of those things, how to, how to do, how to do Minecraft ministry, the tips 00:34:56.700 --> 00:34:58.320 you need for Minecraft. 00:34:58.520 --> 00:35:00.260 We will, we'll, we'll offline and we'll figure it out. 00:35:00.300 --> 00:35:04.080 But yeah, we'll, we'll publish something and, and attach it in the show notes here. 00:35:04.080 --> 00:35:04.700 I love that. 00:35:04.760 --> 00:35:05.380 That's great. 00:35:06.100 --> 00:35:12.500 Um, and once again, I feel like this is like Rob Wagner's, like the, the guy over here. 00:35:12.500 --> 00:35:13.940 That's not part of the conversation. 00:35:14.160 --> 00:35:18.060 You said the word, you said the word apprentice that I'm like, Rob Wagner's shaking his head 00:35:18.060 --> 00:35:18.440 right now. 00:35:18.500 --> 00:35:18.960 I approve. 00:35:19.080 --> 00:35:20.120 I approve of this message. 00:35:20.200 --> 00:35:21.740 Well done with that. 00:35:22.240 --> 00:35:24.260 Um, no, all that was, was beautiful. 00:35:24.260 --> 00:35:27.300 So, Hey, listen, there's a church out there who's crazy enough. 00:35:27.300 --> 00:35:32.740 And what I want to call out here, let's, before I even get to that last question, you said 00:35:32.740 --> 00:35:34.200 that you're having fun. 00:35:34.820 --> 00:35:41.540 I want to draw attention to that because many of us in this 2020, 2021, mid post COVID, wherever 00:35:41.540 --> 00:35:42.980 you think we are in this thing. 00:35:43.360 --> 00:35:45.460 When's the last time we had fun in ministry? 00:35:46.200 --> 00:35:50.900 I like, it's, it's been a minute for a lot of us because we're, we're trying to honestly, 00:35:51.160 --> 00:35:54.500 part of me and we talk about the show, I feel like we're trying to force something to happen 00:35:54.500 --> 00:36:00.900 by how many of us are approaching digital ministry as the mirror image of physical. 00:36:00.900 --> 00:36:02.840 And it just doesn't work that way. 00:36:03.140 --> 00:36:11.280 And you're, you're having fun by doing something different by doing ministry, not to replace 00:36:11.280 --> 00:36:15.440 what's happening physical, but you're recognizing that digital is a different crowd and you're 00:36:15.440 --> 00:36:17.040 trying to reach different people through it. 00:36:17.080 --> 00:36:22.440 So I don't want the word fun to get lost because I think that's the most, other than Rob Wagner 00:36:22.440 --> 00:36:27.600 for the 47th time mentioned, I think that that's the most telling thing that's happening in 00:36:27.600 --> 00:36:28.620 this conversation here. 00:36:28.820 --> 00:36:30.320 So well, well done. 00:36:30.540 --> 00:36:36.100 And, and, and for restore man, way to be brave enough to like endorse some idea of, Hey, I 00:36:36.100 --> 00:36:39.700 want to do a Bible study in a small group in Minecraft. 00:36:40.240 --> 00:36:43.560 Like I can tell you, I've, I've been on some church staffs that would have chased me out 00:36:43.560 --> 00:36:45.380 of the building at that. 00:36:45.580 --> 00:36:48.980 So way, way to be brave enough to suggest it and to run with it. 00:36:49.020 --> 00:36:51.820 But so let me, let me, that'll segue nice into this last question. 00:36:52.220 --> 00:36:57.000 Hey, so some churches out there, some digital pastor, some guy listening to this podcast is 00:36:57.000 --> 00:36:59.720 crazy enough to think, Hey, I want to do this at my church too. 00:37:00.460 --> 00:37:01.920 Give me some practical steps. 00:37:02.300 --> 00:37:04.020 How does somebody get started? 00:37:04.460 --> 00:37:06.060 Leadership may or may not be on board. 00:37:06.380 --> 00:37:12.880 What does it look like to start an experiment centered around Minecraft church, Minecraft 00:37:12.880 --> 00:37:14.140 Bible studies? 00:37:14.300 --> 00:37:14.940 Great question. 00:37:15.120 --> 00:37:18.440 I would say the very first thing I'll break it down. 00:37:18.580 --> 00:37:23.200 Very first thing you need to do, get a copy of Minecraft, start playing it yourself. 00:37:23.380 --> 00:37:24.920 Just start exploring the game. 00:37:25.360 --> 00:37:27.520 It's not super intuitive. 00:37:27.820 --> 00:37:32.680 You'll have to watch a YouTube video or two, but once you get the concept, it's a lot of fun. 00:37:32.860 --> 00:37:39.420 The second reason it's important to get the game first and play it yourself is just to make sure it doesn't make you dizzy. 00:37:39.580 --> 00:37:46.200 Some of these 3D games where you're in a world and you're, you know, in tight spaces, it can make some people dizzy. 00:37:46.320 --> 00:37:47.280 It actually makes me dizzy. 00:37:47.420 --> 00:37:51.220 I have to eat Dramamine before I play each small group. 00:37:51.340 --> 00:37:54.460 And so if I don't, I'm sick as a dog afterwards. 00:37:54.460 --> 00:37:57.760 And so I would just highly recommend figure out if it makes you sick or not. 00:37:58.040 --> 00:38:08.400 The second thing I would recommend is find a small group of people that you could test this out with, because it might be a really great idea in your head, or you might have an idea of how it should work. 00:38:09.140 --> 00:38:16.980 But when you invite some other people into it and you actually try it out as a group, they can give you some honest feedback of, wow, that was really good. 00:38:17.060 --> 00:38:17.740 Yeah, that was great. 00:38:18.360 --> 00:38:19.840 Actually, that was kind of lame. 00:38:20.020 --> 00:38:23.140 Like, why do we have to just sit on these Minecraft couches? 00:38:23.220 --> 00:38:24.960 Why can't we go explore? 00:38:25.140 --> 00:38:27.260 Why can't we jump around and play around? 00:38:28.360 --> 00:38:33.540 So I would say get a small group of people, get the game tested out. 00:38:34.080 --> 00:38:44.080 And then, yeah, I would say another thing to do along with that, because there's so many steps. 00:38:44.160 --> 00:38:45.240 There's so many steps in between. 00:38:45.340 --> 00:38:47.480 I'm trying to make it as simple as possible. 00:38:48.100 --> 00:38:50.680 When you're testing it out, make it a short period of time. 00:38:50.780 --> 00:38:52.240 Make it three sessions. 00:38:53.040 --> 00:38:55.700 So, you know, session one, session two, session three. 00:38:55.700 --> 00:38:58.520 That can happen all in a week or can happen over three weeks. 00:38:58.900 --> 00:39:11.700 And that's going to give you a good rhythm and a good feeling for how many technical issues you might run into, how, you know, how the games or whatever happen in game, how the small group time runs. 00:39:11.860 --> 00:39:24.980 You might want to change some stuff up, yeah, and then after that, just get as much feedback from the participants as you can, because you know what, what works for me in my context may not work for you in your context. 00:39:24.980 --> 00:39:31.980 So those three things, the activity, discovery, Bible study, and then build time, you might need five, like, movements. 00:39:32.200 --> 00:39:32.940 You might need six. 00:39:33.020 --> 00:39:33.940 You might just need two. 00:39:34.040 --> 00:39:34.620 I don't know. 00:39:35.220 --> 00:39:37.980 But it all depends on who you're ministering to. 00:39:38.060 --> 00:39:38.680 Is it teenagers? 00:39:38.840 --> 00:39:39.420 Is it adults? 00:39:40.140 --> 00:39:41.320 And just experiment. 00:39:41.320 --> 00:39:51.020 I highly recommend a beta group before you actually launch the full-blown thing, because we definitely had lots of technical issues that first one, but then it was smooth sailing thereafter. 00:39:51.280 --> 00:39:58.660 You know, and part of that, having that small window to get feedback with that experiment is in receiving that feedback. 00:39:58.840 --> 00:39:59.700 And if it's good, good. 00:39:59.760 --> 00:40:03.000 If it's bad, that doesn't mean you abandon the idea. 00:40:03.120 --> 00:40:05.380 It means you try again. 00:40:05.380 --> 00:40:08.340 And so often it was, man, we had bad feedback. 00:40:08.480 --> 00:40:09.560 We had a lot of tech issues. 00:40:09.940 --> 00:40:12.300 This was the stupidest idea we've ever thought of. 00:40:12.360 --> 00:40:14.400 Throw it away and go back to normal. 00:40:14.700 --> 00:40:15.380 Don't do that. 00:40:16.120 --> 00:40:21.400 Look for the gold in the situation, but don't be afraid to say, this is a failure. 00:40:22.040 --> 00:40:23.300 Let me try something else. 00:40:23.600 --> 00:40:29.940 This is not the way to do it, but here's a better option and continue to receive that feedback. 00:40:29.940 --> 00:40:35.120 And we use in Stadia, we use the word iterate, experiment, iterate, try something different. 00:40:35.280 --> 00:40:39.760 Don't be afraid to go back to the drawing board within the same concept. 00:40:40.300 --> 00:40:46.420 To Theo's point, just because that's how he's operating in and you're mimicking small groups to start. 00:40:46.540 --> 00:40:56.420 Well, maybe it's something different that's going to evolve out of that within Minecraft or maybe on another platform where you can get more community and more easily connect into it. 00:40:56.840 --> 00:40:59.880 But don't be afraid to call a failure a failure. 00:41:00.320 --> 00:41:07.120 The quicker you can get to that fail point is the quicker you can get on to that next thing where there could be success. 00:41:07.280 --> 00:41:09.420 So that was well put there, sir. 00:41:09.780 --> 00:41:14.300 Hey, as we're landing the plane here, wrapping up, any closing thoughts on your side? 00:41:14.300 --> 00:41:23.560 Yeah, I would say that whether it's Minecraft or Roblox or there's so many other platforms out there. 00:41:23.800 --> 00:41:27.840 I think some of I think the principles are transferable. 00:41:28.940 --> 00:41:33.520 You know, so find whatever platform it is, find an activity you can do together. 00:41:33.900 --> 00:41:41.620 Maybe discovery Bible study sandwiched with another activity because the digital world, the gaming world is constantly evolving. 00:41:42.080 --> 00:41:43.300 New things are coming out. 00:41:43.300 --> 00:41:47.840 And so, you know, I don't even want to lock myself into Minecraft, although I love Minecraft. 00:41:48.120 --> 00:41:53.860 And I feel like I'm starting to become like the Minecraft guy or whatever, the way I've been like coaching some other people on this. 00:41:54.340 --> 00:41:59.640 But don't close your thoughts to, oh, this could only ever happen inside of Minecraft. 00:41:59.880 --> 00:42:02.740 No, there's so many ways that we can reach people. 00:42:02.880 --> 00:42:09.420 I feel like the way that the church is currently structured, sure, we're reaching lots and lots of people across the U.S. and throughout the world. 00:42:09.420 --> 00:42:15.900 But there's still billions of people that have not been reached and is going to take different strategies to reach those people. 00:42:16.080 --> 00:42:20.540 So maybe a couple thousand people, maybe a couple hundred thousand people, it's going to be Minecraft. 00:42:20.980 --> 00:42:26.200 I don't know about the other five point whatever billion, you know, else that's out there. 00:42:26.700 --> 00:42:30.780 So just encourage people to experiment and figure out what principles are transferable. 00:42:30.780 --> 00:42:33.720 Yeah, a podcast about the mission field of Minecraft. 00:42:34.140 --> 00:42:38.660 I, you know, you know, I don't know that you hear this too many places other than the church digital. 00:42:38.900 --> 00:42:51.360 But I love the idea of this, of how you're utilizing a platform to reach people for Christ in a different way and discipling them through different techniques than what we would normally see in the physical building. 00:42:51.880 --> 00:42:59.460 You know, here at Stadia, I'm going to shift into commercial, but here at Stadia, like we champion this idea and try to help churches understand. 00:42:59.460 --> 00:43:05.220 And we use the phrase multimodal, running multiple models, multiple modes of church. 00:43:05.220 --> 00:43:17.920 And even some of the experiments in the start of your crockpot experiment towards what a church could look like, what a disciple making process and system can look like on Minecraft is beautiful. 00:43:18.460 --> 00:43:29.220 And the experiments, the learnings from that and how it's going to redefine what church is going to look like, not away from the Bible, actually, maybe closer modeling what the Bible is. 00:43:29.220 --> 00:43:34.980 And the relational context in that authentic community piece of it is a beautiful, beautiful thing. 00:43:35.220 --> 00:43:36.480 I've said beautiful, 47. 00:43:36.480 --> 00:43:38.380 I'm not sure what I've said more on this podcast. 00:43:39.080 --> 00:43:40.760 Rob Wagner's name or Beautiful's name? 00:43:40.860 --> 00:43:43.880 We'll have to go back and maybe do a word count for that. 00:43:44.160 --> 00:43:47.260 I'm sure that'll never happen because I don't have that kind of time. 00:43:47.480 --> 00:43:50.640 Hey, listen, Theo, this has been an incredible conversation. 00:43:50.940 --> 00:43:51.940 Thank you for it. 00:43:53.160 --> 00:44:03.300 And Restore Church, man, thank you for being brave and doing what you're doing to reach maybe a different type of person utilizing some of these digital tools. 00:44:04.020 --> 00:44:07.400 But for Theo, I'm Jeff with the Church Digital and with Stadia Church Planning. 00:44:07.780 --> 00:44:09.060 Thanks for jumping on the show here. 00:44:09.120 --> 00:44:10.200 We'll see you next time at the pod. 00:44:10.480 --> 00:44:10.880 Y'all have a good day.