WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.380 Hey there, welcome to the Church Digital Podcast. My name is Jeff, and I'm excited 00:00:03.380 --> 00:00:09.580 to be putting this episode together for you guys. This is episode 24. We've done 24 of these, 00:00:09.700 --> 00:00:14.780 and we are not slowing down one bit. If you're absolutely new here with the Church Digital 00:00:14.780 --> 00:00:20.660 Podcast, the heart behind this is literally to facilitate a conversation about what church 00:00:20.660 --> 00:00:27.140 online can be. All of us across America doing church online, we don't have the answer yet. 00:00:27.140 --> 00:00:31.200 We're still trying to figure this out, from the big churches like the Saddleback and the 00:00:31.200 --> 00:00:36.300 Elevations down to the small churches that are struggling to put together a broadcast. There's 00:00:36.300 --> 00:00:41.600 no clear answer of what church online is, and truthfully, our goal here is to facilitate a 00:00:41.600 --> 00:00:46.440 conversation, to talk to some people, to ask some questions, and create a learning environment so 00:00:46.440 --> 00:00:52.900 that all of us can learn how to do church online more effectively. We've got a unique episode here 00:00:52.900 --> 00:00:59.040 with episode 24. We're bringing in one of my closest friends. His name is Ken Schaefer to 00:00:59.040 --> 00:01:04.700 the podcast today. Ken and I used to work together at Christ Fellowship Miami. He was stewardship pastor 00:01:04.700 --> 00:01:13.220 at the time and was responsible for a lot of things and utilizing Dave Ramsey and Financial Peace 00:01:13.220 --> 00:01:20.200 University in that. And so we're going to be talking a lot about that. And early on in Ken's in my 00:01:20.200 --> 00:01:26.660 relationship, because I'm an online guy, I really challenged him to think more about doing some of 00:01:26.660 --> 00:01:34.200 his trainings virtually in an online space. And what's fascinating, the reason I wanted to bring Ken 00:01:34.200 --> 00:01:38.560 back to the conversation, was the first time I had this conversation with him, Ken honestly looked at me 00:01:38.560 --> 00:01:44.700 and said, that's not theologically allowed, you're wrong. And okay, maybe he didn't say the 00:01:44.700 --> 00:01:49.640 theological word, but he basically was like, you're wrong, you're stupid. What I love about Ken and 00:01:49.640 --> 00:01:54.660 our relationship is I just kept pestering him over and over again, until he changed his mind. And he 00:01:54.660 --> 00:02:00.700 started to see the advantage of doing church online. And so really, I just wanted to wrestle with that 00:02:00.700 --> 00:02:06.240 conversation here. Okay, here's a guy who used to think against doing community and trainings and 00:02:06.240 --> 00:02:12.900 online environments. And now he's more comfortable with that and even uses it more in his current work 00:02:12.900 --> 00:02:17.040 space. And I'm going to let him explore it. I don't necessarily need to, to unpack it in detail, 00:02:17.040 --> 00:02:21.680 because I don't get away the podcast. So here you go. I've got Ken Schaefer, who actually works with 00:02:21.680 --> 00:02:27.620 Dave Ramsey. Now I've got Ray Diarmus, online pastor, Christ Fellowship Miami, and myself, Jeff Reed with 00:02:27.620 --> 00:02:34.520 the Church Digital, in a conversation centered around equipping, utilizing online technologies. Here you go. 00:02:34.920 --> 00:02:40.400 I got to tell you, I've been looking forward to this conversation, because man, Ken, I love you. And I 00:02:40.400 --> 00:02:46.320 really miss spending time with you and having some of these in-depth conversations, like we had at 00:02:46.320 --> 00:02:51.900 Christ Fellowship. And one of the things that I love about Ken is that he's never afraid to tell me 00:02:51.900 --> 00:02:58.740 that I'm wrong, because he's done that the majority of our relationship, telling me that I'm wrong, 00:02:59.200 --> 00:03:05.420 crazy. And in context, some of the, in context of the church online stuff, in the online community, 00:03:05.920 --> 00:03:13.180 that's been just an ongoing, a long conversation for someone who's been like, I'm not quite sure how 00:03:13.180 --> 00:03:20.720 that works to somebody who has kind of spun it and taken it to a different perspective. And so when 00:03:20.720 --> 00:03:27.080 Ken and I were together, and Ray was around down at Christ Fellowship Miami, Ken was doing a lot with 00:03:27.080 --> 00:03:32.960 the Dave Ramsey stuff and, and that, and we really wrestled with what that looked like in context 00:03:32.960 --> 00:03:38.920 of doing it online and offering it online. And so, hey, Ken, man, just take a moment, just tell us 00:03:38.920 --> 00:03:42.120 some of that story, kind of, kind of what that, what that looked like. 00:03:42.700 --> 00:03:46.320 Well, you know, I had the job as stewardship pastor there at Christ Fellowship. So my, 00:03:46.520 --> 00:03:52.560 my basic mission was to equip people in the area of biblical financial discipline and to give them 00:03:52.560 --> 00:03:58.640 vision and tools to achieve what God wants for them in that area. And financial peace 00:03:58.640 --> 00:04:02.520 university was a, was a big part of that. It's a nine week course, Dave Ramsey offered by Dave 00:04:02.520 --> 00:04:10.380 Ramsey's organization. A lot of churches use that as a building block for their stewardship and 00:04:10.380 --> 00:04:15.020 discipleship programs. And we had had hundreds or maybe thousands of people go through that at 00:04:15.020 --> 00:04:18.700 Christ Fellowship. And this was when you and I started talking about, well, what does it look 00:04:18.700 --> 00:04:23.200 like to do something online? I was never really a fan. I'm probably of all the people that you'll 00:04:23.200 --> 00:04:27.620 have on your podcast. I'm probably the least connected online. I, I checked Facebook three 00:04:27.620 --> 00:04:33.340 or four times a year. Uh, I, I actually received email summaries of Twitter accounts that I have, 00:04:33.340 --> 00:04:39.820 and I, I really don't engage that much digitally for a variety of reasons, but you challenged me. 00:04:39.820 --> 00:04:44.220 And your basic challenge was there's, there's people out there you can reach online. You can't reach in 00:04:44.220 --> 00:04:51.540 person. And I took that to heart. I piloted a few different ways to do some financial peace 00:04:51.540 --> 00:04:59.860 university groups online and actually had some tremendous and surprising success with that. 00:05:01.000 --> 00:05:05.560 Um, what I found was that in a, in a mega church environment or really any church environment, 00:05:05.560 --> 00:05:09.960 there's physical and logistical constraints that are real. So people might want to engage, 00:05:09.960 --> 00:05:13.880 for example, in a small group discipleship environment, but simply can't. Maybe they're 00:05:13.880 --> 00:05:20.040 parents with kids. They have conflicts that are really legitimate or perceived. Um, but the small group 00:05:20.040 --> 00:05:24.360 environment, the way you had me set it up online actually eliminated almost all of that. 00:05:26.900 --> 00:05:27.700 Yeah. Me. 00:05:28.420 --> 00:05:32.100 Yeah. You, are you going to ask me what you, what you, you know, what I did? 00:05:32.420 --> 00:05:33.780 Cause that'd be the followup question. 00:05:34.020 --> 00:05:38.220 Yeah. Describe in detail, like how some of that worked out for folks. 00:05:38.700 --> 00:05:44.180 Well, what I realized was so, and I think there's, you go through an evolution in your life, right? 00:05:44.200 --> 00:05:48.620 Where when I didn't have, when I wasn't married, I didn't understand the commitments that married 00:05:48.620 --> 00:05:53.660 people have. Right. Then I became married. We were 10 years without children. And so I didn't 00:05:53.660 --> 00:05:56.420 understand the commitments that people with children had. Then I had children. I'm like, man, 00:05:56.420 --> 00:06:01.060 how does anybody do anything right? That's, that's not Sunday morning at nine o'clock for 90 minutes, 00:06:01.060 --> 00:06:05.780 because like, that's, that's about it. So what Jeff, what you, what you suggested I do 00:06:05.780 --> 00:06:12.380 was actually have people watch the video content for financial peace, uh, ahead of time. And then 00:06:12.380 --> 00:06:17.480 we would do like a zoom group, like the format that we're on right now, recording this, we would 00:06:17.480 --> 00:06:23.840 do the zoom group and do just the facilitation of the questions online. It's good. Okay. That that's 00:06:23.840 --> 00:06:31.980 good by itself. The secret sauce. What I realized was that the time, all of a sudden becomes the time 00:06:31.980 --> 00:06:37.600 that you hold the group becomes, uh, inconsequential. So it can be strategic. So we had ours on Wednesday 00:06:37.600 --> 00:06:43.180 night at nine 30. And as I was talking about this with people, what I, what I finally came to realize, 00:06:43.180 --> 00:06:48.240 like, you're not competing with anything Wednesday night at nine 30, but your kids are in bed. Soccer 00:06:48.240 --> 00:06:53.140 practice is done. The only thing you're competing, whatever you recorded to watch on TV later, 00:06:53.140 --> 00:06:57.020 that's the only thing it's like, are you going to hit play on game of Thrones, which you shouldn't 00:06:57.020 --> 00:07:02.780 be watching anyway, or are you going to engage in a discussion, uh, discipleship discussion, 00:07:02.860 --> 00:07:09.380 help you grow your life. Um, so we had the last group I was responsible for. We had, uh, I think 00:07:09.380 --> 00:07:14.580 we had six or seven families and it looked kind of like the Brady bunch on the little zoom screen. 00:07:14.580 --> 00:07:20.360 You go to that gallery view and you can see everybody, but I, I had, um, I had a stewardess 00:07:20.360 --> 00:07:25.680 who was part of this group who one time actually joined the discussion leaving. I saw her on the 00:07:25.680 --> 00:07:29.800 jetway of a plane that she was leaving, joining the discussion with her headphones in. I don't even 00:07:29.800 --> 00:07:33.920 know what city she was in. I had a guy who worked at the Miami international airport, never met him 00:07:33.920 --> 00:07:39.260 in person, had a, had a friend of a friend somewhere in Naples, Florida, join our Miami group. 00:07:39.920 --> 00:07:45.100 So we found that by changing up the time, and then we also had families that had kids in bed, 00:07:45.100 --> 00:07:51.340 that same, that same, uh, scenario I described. So we found that by time, we, you know, not only 00:07:51.340 --> 00:07:54.820 can you time shift your programs, you can time shift your discipleship environments and it worked 00:07:54.820 --> 00:08:01.560 great. That's good. So how did this work out as far as, um, making folks feel like they were 00:08:01.560 --> 00:08:07.100 not just connected with it, but really engaging in the content? Because I know I've led FPU multiple 00:08:07.100 --> 00:08:11.760 times, Ken, and you've helped me out a ton with that. For me, there's always a breakdown in the 00:08:11.760 --> 00:08:16.920 group after week three. Like you really start to see like, who's really there? Because that's, 00:08:17.280 --> 00:08:21.260 for those of you who are, who are not in tune or you've not let FPU, that's after the budgeting 00:08:21.260 --> 00:08:26.120 week. And so a lot of folks tend to freak out after that. And so how did you maintain that kind 00:08:26.120 --> 00:08:29.640 of contact and communication, even though your group was online and encouragement? 00:08:30.520 --> 00:08:35.780 Well, that's where something happened that I really did not expect because the most common 00:08:35.780 --> 00:08:41.660 question in a full disclosure, I actually work for Dave Ramsey now. I'm, I was part of his 00:08:41.660 --> 00:08:45.300 organization. So I worked at the Financial Peace University all the time in churches all across 00:08:45.300 --> 00:08:50.860 the United States. Uh, although this podcast is not an official, we're not, I'm not the spokesman 00:08:50.860 --> 00:08:54.220 for that organization. This is more about the kind of our experience at the church. 00:08:54.340 --> 00:09:01.500 Sure. Um, what most churches will ask me, they will assume that because it's a zoom environment 00:09:01.500 --> 00:09:07.420 that the personal engagement will be lower. That was my assumption coming in and I was actually 00:09:07.420 --> 00:09:14.940 wrong. And I don't know that this would always be the case, but I found, um, I found you've 00:09:14.940 --> 00:09:19.000 got that gallery view when you've got six or nine families and they're all in a little box. 00:09:19.280 --> 00:09:24.720 It's even better than sitting in a circle. And the reason is because you actually are looking 00:09:24.720 --> 00:09:32.580 at everyone all the time. So everyone has to participate. That's good. Nobody gets a pass 00:09:32.580 --> 00:09:38.000 and the very, in my work now, I do a lot of work on zoom. And so I'm like, I'm talking to you 00:09:38.000 --> 00:09:43.020 gentlemen right now on an iPad, you're about 18 inches away. It's actually much more intimate 00:09:43.020 --> 00:09:49.100 in many ways than an in-person meeting. So the group calls itself out. I found the level of 00:09:49.100 --> 00:09:53.100 engagement and accountability in the last virtual group I led to be higher than that in many 00:09:53.100 --> 00:09:54.380 of the physical groups that I've led. 00:09:54.780 --> 00:09:55.280 How so? 00:09:55.960 --> 00:10:00.960 Um, I think that convert that basic conversation. I mean, we just stayed in, we stayed in touch 00:10:00.960 --> 00:10:06.020 by text throughout the week. I would text me if they couldn't come or whatever. But I, 00:10:06.100 --> 00:10:12.500 I think in a circle, a hand, one or two people are always going to dominate the conversation 00:10:12.500 --> 00:10:17.160 in a panel. When I'm looking at that, when I've had the gallery view and it's the Brady bunch, 00:10:17.800 --> 00:10:22.960 it's much easier. The visual cues make it much easier to know who's not participating and to call 00:10:22.960 --> 00:10:28.820 that person out. Um, in addition to what you're just closer, you're looking at everyone all the 00:10:28.820 --> 00:10:33.220 time. I can't do that in a circle. I can do it one-on-one or one-on-two, but in a group of, 00:10:33.220 --> 00:10:35.360 of 10 families in a circle, I can't do it. 00:10:36.140 --> 00:10:40.380 How did it work out in terms of, or did it work out? Cause you said the accountability ramped 00:10:40.380 --> 00:10:44.500 up. Was it just you to the group members or was it them to each other as well? Like, 00:10:44.540 --> 00:10:48.660 how did that happen? Uh, them to each other. I couldn't really speak to. Uh, I think if that 00:10:48.660 --> 00:10:53.940 happens, it probably happens more digitally because they largely had no context. They didn't know each 00:10:53.940 --> 00:10:58.600 other. And I would say this is a little bit different financial piece by its nature has a 00:10:58.600 --> 00:11:03.160 beginning and an end. I talk about it often being in it. It's a piece of sport kind of 00:11:03.160 --> 00:11:09.680 equipping the beginning and an end. My goal is, and that course is to teach you some specific, 00:11:10.020 --> 00:11:14.680 uh, some specific principles, habits, behaviors, and then you're going to learn them. And then the 00:11:14.680 --> 00:11:18.880 course is done at the end of nine weeks. And that frustrates the snot at a small group pastors and, 00:11:18.940 --> 00:11:22.700 and church environments. They say, is it a small group? Is it not a small group? Do we count it? 00:11:22.700 --> 00:11:27.180 Do we not count it? And you guys are laughing because we've all, we've all, um, been in that 00:11:27.180 --> 00:11:32.540 environment. Uh, the reality is people get helped, um, on an ongoing basis. I think if we were going 00:11:32.540 --> 00:11:36.600 to do community, uh, we would probably do it a little bit differently. I have a friend who just 00:11:36.600 --> 00:11:41.660 led a financial piece group virtually, like what I just described. And he actually had a group text 00:11:41.660 --> 00:11:47.060 going with all the folks in the group. And he found that to be, uh, quite good. And they stayed 00:11:47.060 --> 00:11:51.420 engaged throughout the duration. Um, you're always going to have folks drop out of things. 00:11:51.420 --> 00:11:58.880 What I found with doing the virtual group, the way we did it, it gives people an easier way 00:11:58.880 --> 00:12:05.520 to come online. So thinking about the environment that we, we had at Christ Fellowship or any, 00:12:05.660 --> 00:12:11.380 any church, not just, that's the one that three of us share in common. You have, uh, some folks that 00:12:11.380 --> 00:12:15.800 are, are attenders and, and really the other folks that make it happen. Well, the folks that make 00:12:15.800 --> 00:12:19.800 things happen, like their schedule is pretty well tapped out. They're coming for two certain, 00:12:19.880 --> 00:12:23.640 they're serving in a service on the weekend, maybe two, they're participating. They're in a small 00:12:23.640 --> 00:12:27.600 group, maybe a men's group as well. And on top of that, you're saying, Hey, look, I want you to 00:12:27.600 --> 00:12:31.260 engage in this content. That's going to change your life. All I need is you to pause something else 00:12:31.260 --> 00:12:35.440 for nine weeks. Well, they don't want to stop something else. Right. But at nine 30 at night, 00:12:35.440 --> 00:12:40.160 they can engage for 30 extra minutes as long as they can do it from their home. Coming to a small 00:12:40.160 --> 00:12:45.540 group is hard, right? You've got to drive across town. You've got to worry about your 00:12:45.540 --> 00:12:49.780 kids. You've got to dive into the thing. And I'm not saying there's not a place. I have a small 00:12:49.780 --> 00:12:55.480 group meeting right now in my house in Franklin, Tennessee, and I love these folks. Um, but there 00:12:55.480 --> 00:13:00.680 are seasons of being able to do that. And there are more efficient, there can be more efficient ways 00:13:00.680 --> 00:13:06.000 to equip people. Here's a quick trivia question for you. Are you ready? Okay. And you're, you guys are 00:13:06.000 --> 00:13:12.040 Florida guys. So if you tour the Thomas Edison home on the West coast of Florida, uh, one time when I 00:13:12.040 --> 00:13:15.780 went to her, they said what his favorite invention was and his favorite invention was not what you'd 00:13:15.780 --> 00:13:21.060 think. It was the phonograph. And the reason was not what you think when that was invented in the 00:13:21.060 --> 00:13:26.420 19th century, Thomas Edison thought about that device as being the democratization of education, 00:13:26.420 --> 00:13:33.660 that people would have access to education inexpensively at a distance. And it's taken more than 140 years, 00:13:33.660 --> 00:13:39.200 but kind of in our modern world with online education, even in the church with online discipleship, 00:13:39.200 --> 00:13:44.460 with some of those ideas, um, those barriers become blurred. And his vision for that is finally 00:13:44.460 --> 00:13:50.920 becoming a little bit more of a reality. It's funny because I, I, as, as I've studied history 00:13:50.920 --> 00:13:54.280 throughout that, and it's, it's interesting, you point out that that was Edison's perspective. 00:13:54.280 --> 00:13:58.580 And I know we're kind of looking at a grander conversation here, but even then I've seen that 00:13:58.580 --> 00:14:02.000 over time where a lot of folks look at new technologies and they see that in terms of 00:14:02.000 --> 00:14:05.880 sexual birth, but then they try other folks come along and try and restrict that and control that. 00:14:05.880 --> 00:14:10.260 So, you know, Edison events, the phonograph, and then, you know, eventually other, you know, 00:14:10.260 --> 00:14:15.260 copyright becomes an issue and other folks start to constrict and control. Whereas the internet has 00:14:15.260 --> 00:14:19.740 kind of freed a lot of content up and still a lot of folks are worried about, well, how do we control 00:14:19.740 --> 00:14:23.840 this, control that? But especially for those of us in the church world, shouldn't we be asking more 00:14:23.840 --> 00:14:29.200 how to leverage this for free for the sake of helping folks in terms of engaging in community and not 00:14:29.200 --> 00:14:29.820 just the content? 00:14:30.260 --> 00:14:34.760 Yeah. How do we release it? I mean, depending on how far back you go in history, movable type was 00:14:34.760 --> 00:14:40.660 considered the death of education. The idea that a print that the masses could have books was going 00:14:40.660 --> 00:14:50.260 to be an issue and a problem. So I'm all about equipping people and I'm about, I'm about removing their 00:14:50.260 --> 00:14:55.880 excuses to be equipped. I want to, I want to meet people where they are. I mean, there's the performance 00:14:55.880 --> 00:15:00.820 oriented part of me who I just want to say sacrifice, suck it up and let's get it done. And then the more 00:15:00.820 --> 00:15:05.020 pastoral compassionate side of me wants to make it easy and to bring people along somewhere in that 00:15:05.020 --> 00:15:07.840 mix is, uh, is the answer. 00:15:08.840 --> 00:15:13.420 Okay. Let me shift gears on something because we're, we're, we're talking about the easability of 00:15:13.420 --> 00:15:22.240 education in, in this. Um, what, what about the, in context of, of online, the anonymity, the 00:15:22.240 --> 00:15:29.040 safeness, the separation, uh, in context of what you're doing with, with FPU. Uh, I can be in an 00:15:29.040 --> 00:15:36.040 online group. Uh, I'm not in the physically same space. And so, because I'm not like breathing the 00:15:36.040 --> 00:15:42.400 same air, uh, there's oftentimes with online small groups, in my experience, there's a safeness where 00:15:42.400 --> 00:15:49.520 people are more open to conversations. They're more transparent because there's not this embarrassment 00:15:49.520 --> 00:15:56.400 of I'm in the same space. They can see me blushing and turning red. They're seeing my pixel turn red, 00:15:56.400 --> 00:16:02.200 uh, but not necessarily that. And so for me, like an, an online, just in my personal life, 00:16:02.260 --> 00:16:10.100 an online small group tends to be more transparent than the physical, because to me, the camera gives 00:16:10.100 --> 00:16:14.700 the separation that allows more intimacy. I'm just wondering kind of either, both of you guys, 00:16:14.700 --> 00:16:20.140 what your experiences have been in something like that. I'll let you go, right? Cause I talked a lot. 00:16:21.140 --> 00:16:25.280 Yeah, no, it's all good. And I, cause I think, and we want to hear more from, from you on the 00:16:25.280 --> 00:16:30.180 situation. Um, for me, it's, it's really like what Kevin was talking about. It removes a lot of the 00:16:30.180 --> 00:16:35.200 excuses and you really start to find like, who's really in and who's really out seriousness of 00:16:35.200 --> 00:16:42.240 community. Um, you know, and especially with, with discipleship, you know, so much of it. And this is 00:16:42.240 --> 00:16:47.060 hard in the local church content text, because we want more groups and we want people bought into 00:16:47.060 --> 00:16:50.420 groups. And, but then there's folks who are always telling you, Hey, I want to go deeper. I want more. 00:16:50.680 --> 00:16:55.700 And so with online discipleship, I found now you remove a lot of the excuses and you start to tell 00:16:55.700 --> 00:16:59.100 them, Hey, listen, if you really want to go deeper, if you want to go more, this is the commitment. 00:16:59.320 --> 00:17:04.140 Like you don't have to worry about like what Ken said, you worry about putting kids to worry about 00:17:04.140 --> 00:17:08.880 this because we're removing all of those excuses. What we do want to know is we want to know that 00:17:08.880 --> 00:17:12.400 one, you're engaging with the content and two, that you're ready to have real discussion with it 00:17:12.400 --> 00:17:16.320 because we've removed a lot of the other barriers from there, which means that number three, 00:17:16.420 --> 00:17:20.440 they're left without excuses. So now we start to get to the nitty gritty if they, especially if 00:17:20.440 --> 00:17:25.320 they've not engaged with the first two steps. So that encourages people in the group to call them 00:17:25.320 --> 00:17:29.100 out. But then also as a leader, it's our responsibility to step up our game and call them out and 00:17:29.100 --> 00:17:34.000 enter into uncomfortable situations of, Hey, uh, in this particular case with Ramsey solutions, 00:17:34.140 --> 00:17:39.000 Hey, so why didn't you watch a video this week? You know, we've given you an audio and a video 00:17:39.000 --> 00:17:43.880 portion of it. Why didn't you do those things on the side where I've done, uh, online groups where 00:17:43.880 --> 00:17:48.100 we've, where we've done scripture reading. Hey, so seriously, like what was the excuse as far as 00:17:48.100 --> 00:17:51.240 not engaging with the scripture this week? You could open the Bible app, you could have put it 00:17:51.240 --> 00:17:55.200 on audio. And I know that leads to a lot of uncomfortable conversations, but it's those 00:17:55.200 --> 00:18:00.220 uncomfortable conversations that leads to growth. Yeah. And I would add that I think, I mean, all, 00:18:00.280 --> 00:18:05.060 all three of us have spent our entire lives in a variety of ministry contexts. We each have small 00:18:05.060 --> 00:18:10.680 church, large church and medium church experience, right? What all those have in common is that when 00:18:10.680 --> 00:18:16.600 people say churches are full of hypocrites, they're largely right. I mean, I'm one. And so there's like 00:18:16.600 --> 00:18:23.800 intimacy in a church and transparency in person is difficult. I remember I was with a group of pastors 00:18:23.800 --> 00:18:28.740 maybe 15 years ago. It was a small group kind of accountability thing. And they said, how are you 00:18:28.740 --> 00:18:34.140 doing? And like seven guys in a row said they were doing great and just kind of painted it, you know, 00:18:34.180 --> 00:18:40.160 I'm fine. Right. And then the eighth one, I don't remember how many there were. It's funny. I can't 00:18:40.160 --> 00:18:45.100 even remember this guy's name, but he said, actually, he says, I'm struggling. I, I have, I have no 00:18:45.100 --> 00:18:49.180 motivation and I will never forget. He would said a couple other things. And then he said, and when I 00:18:49.180 --> 00:18:55.740 open up the Bible, it's as dry as dust. Wow. And I said, wow, I've never seen that happen before. 00:18:55.960 --> 00:19:01.300 And so like, and, and, and that's, that's hard, right? It's hard to do that. But here's what was 00:19:01.300 --> 00:19:04.960 interesting about those pastors. They weren't all in the same church. It was a group of pastors. It was 00:19:04.960 --> 00:19:08.800 kind of regional and they were meeting together. I wonder how difficult it would be for that same man 00:19:08.800 --> 00:19:13.100 as the pastor. And there's nothing wrong with him. We go through those seasons to have that 00:19:13.100 --> 00:19:18.440 conversation with his elders or with his peers. So I think there is, there is some value 00:19:18.440 --> 00:19:25.820 in anonymity isn't right, but maybe, maybe distance. And so I've known financial peace 00:19:25.820 --> 00:19:30.260 groups just because that's, again, that's my current context where they happen with, with 00:19:30.260 --> 00:19:35.600 guys from multiple time zones. I mean, you're just, so it's a lot easier to talk about what 00:19:35.600 --> 00:19:41.960 might be right or wrong with my money or my spiritual walk, uh, uh, with people I'm never 00:19:41.960 --> 00:19:48.600 likely to meet. Right. I can see tremendous, uh, I can see tremendous power in that. But if 00:19:48.600 --> 00:19:53.200 you guys have ever, if you've ever been to, uh, to, uh, to an AA or an NA meeting or anything 00:19:53.200 --> 00:19:59.300 like that, the name is Alcoholics, what? Anonymous. Anonymous. Right. Same, same kind of deal that 00:19:59.300 --> 00:20:02.640 we're going to, we're going to level set something so we all can recognize that we're struggling. 00:20:03.080 --> 00:20:06.760 So to me, it's the right tools, the right place. There's people for whom an online group or any 00:20:06.760 --> 00:20:10.920 kind of environment like that would never work. Right. And there's people for whom it's always 00:20:10.920 --> 00:20:14.960 the next best step. And that's, what's interesting about financial peace university. Right. I remember, 00:20:15.020 --> 00:20:19.460 um, when we first, when Lauren and I first launched our first FPU group, we actually had a visitor 00:20:19.460 --> 00:20:24.340 come to small group that night with, with his wife. And so like, it was their first time ever to our 00:20:24.340 --> 00:20:28.520 group and they weren't even coming for an FPU group. They were just coming. Cause Hey, we were a 00:20:28.520 --> 00:20:32.420 small group and we were, we just happened to be starting FPU that day. And I remember presenting 00:20:32.420 --> 00:20:36.780 the information, tell them, Hey, listen, if you want, you can engage, you know, and if not, that's cool. 00:20:36.780 --> 00:20:40.960 And, and I remember them clear as day telling me, yeah, we're okay. We don't need this. That's not 00:20:40.960 --> 00:20:45.560 for us, whatever. Well, they stayed throughout the group, just engaging in the content. And, and, um, 00:20:45.740 --> 00:20:50.620 and then after the fact, about two months down the road, they themselves were asking if they can host 00:20:50.620 --> 00:20:55.340 an FPU group at their house. And really what it took was it took time for them to get in that kind 00:20:55.340 --> 00:21:00.440 of community where they felt comfortable enough to reveal, uh, their finances and all that. Cause 00:21:00.440 --> 00:21:03.940 they weren't going to be open with that from the get go. They weren't just going to let us into their 00:21:03.940 --> 00:21:08.540 world like that from the first meeting. But after a while, the wall started to come down and they felt 00:21:08.540 --> 00:21:10.580 more ready to engage in community from then on. 00:21:11.160 --> 00:21:14.760 Yeah. And, you know, that happens independent of content, right? So if you think about, 00:21:14.960 --> 00:21:22.140 if you think about, um, I mean, like men's discipleship content, you know, a group of guys, 00:21:22.220 --> 00:21:26.580 they're not going to get together and, and, uh, and share that they're struggling until maybe the 00:21:26.580 --> 00:21:30.780 second or third time through that. Right. Right. And that is, um, 00:21:32.940 --> 00:21:38.240 just a reality of who we are and where we are in our, in our, in our culture. I don't think that 00:21:38.240 --> 00:21:43.100 struggles anything new. So one of Satan's best, uh, Satan's best tactics is to let us think that 00:21:43.100 --> 00:21:46.460 we're divided and alone. And when in fact, we're all struggling. 00:21:47.780 --> 00:21:53.660 That's true. How do you get, and how do you, how did you advise leaders to get beyond, um, 00:21:53.780 --> 00:21:57.040 just kind of the face answers? Cause I imagine a lot of folks, just like you're talking about come 00:21:57.040 --> 00:22:01.220 with, Hey, I'm fine at group. A lot of folks are coming with their budget and it's a total lie, 00:22:01.220 --> 00:22:04.640 you know, I've never seen that. I don't know what you're talking about. 00:22:05.760 --> 00:22:10.920 Uh, I mean, that strategy doesn't change whether it's virtual or in person, right? You're only 00:22:10.920 --> 00:22:14.220 going to get out of something what you put into it. And if you're, you know, if you're distorting 00:22:14.220 --> 00:22:17.620 your mirror, if you've got a fun house mirror, instead of one that's showing you a real picture, 00:22:17.780 --> 00:22:22.680 like you're never going to make progress. So, I mean, and it's, and that's independent of 00:22:22.680 --> 00:22:28.420 financial discussions. I mean, that's a conversation I'll have with everybody. Like who you are right now, 00:22:28.420 --> 00:22:31.780 is the sum total of decisions you've made and what you've been reading and 00:22:31.780 --> 00:22:36.300 kind of your actions. So if you like it, let's keep doing that. And if you don't like it, let's 00:22:36.300 --> 00:22:42.100 change. Yeah. How do you help folks balance out when they're leading a group? So, Hey, I got, 00:22:42.260 --> 00:22:47.400 I got two types of people in my group. I've got one guy who's got a lot of money and he's a lot in 00:22:47.400 --> 00:22:50.880 debt. And I got another guy with a little bit of money and he's a lot in debt for him too. Just 00:22:50.880 --> 00:22:55.880 balancing out those two. Cause especially when you're doing online, like you get a variety of 00:22:55.880 --> 00:23:00.140 characters, you know, some folks who are business folks on the go and they think that they've got 00:23:00.140 --> 00:23:06.040 everything under control with leverage and debt. And then, uh, we're just struggling. They're like, 00:23:06.140 --> 00:23:08.280 Hey, look, I'm just getting by with free public internet. 00:23:08.740 --> 00:23:15.460 I want to go to the library. Yeah. Yeah. Um, I don't know. And I guess I haven't had that in an 00:23:15.460 --> 00:23:19.560 online environment to me. That's really a pastoring question. I want to pastor both of those guys. 00:23:19.960 --> 00:23:25.180 Right. So I want to ask them. I always, I mean, I have this, I have a set of stock questions. I ask 00:23:25.180 --> 00:23:29.560 people about any situation, financial, otherwise, one of them is what's the biblical principle that 00:23:29.560 --> 00:23:35.960 applies to your situation right now. And most of the time people know it. Right. And so then the 00:23:35.960 --> 00:23:39.720 question is, okay, well, what do we need to do related to that biblical principle? 00:23:42.300 --> 00:23:46.220 Let me ask this because with, with you, with your relationship with Ramsey, 00:23:46.380 --> 00:23:52.080 you're working with churches across the country. You're having these conversations, um, about doing 00:23:52.080 --> 00:24:00.460 FPU. Um, you either, you know, physically and even virtually in some situations, um, average response, 00:24:00.460 --> 00:24:08.160 when you talk about FPU virtually, uh, churches, that's awesome. That's crazy. What is virtual? Like 00:24:08.160 --> 00:24:11.960 what, what is, what's the response? What's the temperature out there? Yeah, I would say the 00:24:11.960 --> 00:24:18.680 average response is open. Really? And, and, and, and I think, but I think Jeff, I learned that from 00:24:18.680 --> 00:24:24.120 you. And so I'm going to, and, and here's what I mean by that. That's the, the challenge to move 00:24:24.120 --> 00:24:28.660 content online is something I would probably not have considered, but for our friendship and what you 00:24:28.660 --> 00:24:33.320 are trying to help you accomplish. So when I talk to churches about that, I always talk about a both 00:24:33.320 --> 00:24:39.100 and I say, we're going to, you know, we're going to help you plan something for, you know, all your 00:24:39.100 --> 00:24:42.300 people to go through financial speech university. And then I will ask the question, what about your 00:24:42.300 --> 00:24:45.920 online strategy? And then if they have an online pastor and you and I know some of those guys in 00:24:45.920 --> 00:24:51.120 common, uh, they'll, they bring that person into the conversation. And if they don't, I'll say, well, 00:24:51.240 --> 00:24:55.100 you know, what do you do online? How do you engage? And then I tell them exactly what I told you, 00:24:55.220 --> 00:25:00.980 which is, look, if we do it this way, you have an opportunity to pick up people that you won't 00:25:00.980 --> 00:25:06.220 otherwise get. And, and then, and they say, tell me more about that. And I tell them the same thing 00:25:06.220 --> 00:25:10.160 and I throw in the game of Thrones and they always drop eye contact, you know, they'll also, you know, 00:25:10.180 --> 00:25:14.480 once a night there, I guess game of Thrones is off now. I read, I've never watched it. So, um, 00:25:14.720 --> 00:25:20.820 you need another analogy, game of Thrones, big little lies, big little lies. Okay. Big little lies. 00:25:20.820 --> 00:25:26.620 Okay. Whatever it is. Um, sorry, quick side note. You know, we had, we had a coworker one time 00:25:26.620 --> 00:25:34.440 asked me if I'd seen stranger things. And my answer was that what, just cause I, I didn't know it was a 00:25:34.440 --> 00:25:39.020 thing, even though as far as I'm concerned, the 1980s are the culmination of our civilization. 00:25:39.340 --> 00:25:40.440 I'm saying you would love it. 00:25:40.860 --> 00:25:48.200 So all that aside, I, I set, um, I, what I talk about is picking up stragglers. You know, I don't, 00:25:48.280 --> 00:25:51.960 I don't want to use this as an exegesis, but I've been giving thought to what does it mean when, 00:25:51.960 --> 00:25:57.840 when, um, when Jesus leaves 99 sheep and gets one sheep. And I'm not saying that online what is, 00:25:57.940 --> 00:26:04.880 is, is a, is it, is it, is it, is an application of that teaching, but I will say like using whatever 00:26:04.880 --> 00:26:08.260 tools we have to reach people that need to be reached for whatever thing it is we're trying 00:26:08.260 --> 00:26:11.700 to accomplish in the church, whether it's evangelism, whether it's discipleship, whether 00:26:11.700 --> 00:26:15.380 it's community, however it is, you want to draw lines around those boxes, which kind of bead 00:26:15.380 --> 00:26:21.080 together. Um, they're, they're kind of into it. And so it's a, no, I'm dealing almost primarily, 00:26:21.080 --> 00:26:26.220 almost exclusively with really large churches. That's kind of what I do. So they have a different 00:26:26.220 --> 00:26:30.200 set of resources at their disposal. But the hilarious thing is in the last week, like, well, 00:26:30.200 --> 00:26:33.360 what do we need to do? Is it something we need from you? Like, no, actually you already have 00:26:33.360 --> 00:26:37.580 financial peace and zoom is free. And they go that they said, there's no other spelling. No, 00:26:37.620 --> 00:26:42.060 it isn't even our thing. We don't even sell it. We just tell you, give you a vision to do it on 00:26:42.060 --> 00:26:46.240 your own. And they say, yeah, that's it. Like, I don't, that's not something we do. We just 00:26:46.240 --> 00:26:50.400 want to, we want to create multiple ways for people to access content and groups. 00:26:51.940 --> 00:26:52.740 It's amazing. 00:26:54.060 --> 00:26:57.320 Five years ago, five years ago, I don't think it would have looked five years ago when it 00:26:57.320 --> 00:26:58.480 looked like that. There's no way. 00:26:58.900 --> 00:27:04.020 Yeah. I, you know, and I will say this personally, like I've, I've seen just even within the past 00:27:04.020 --> 00:27:10.700 two years, um, conversations going from you're crazy. Like when I had these conversations with 00:27:10.700 --> 00:27:15.780 pastors and churches, I've literally been told you're crazy 18 months, two years ago. Now I'm 00:27:15.780 --> 00:27:24.020 being told you're right. We're just not ready for that. And so I get that. And so then again, 00:27:24.020 --> 00:27:28.280 in my context, which is very discreet, I have a beginning and an end. So I'm like, you know what? 00:27:28.580 --> 00:27:33.300 You're ready to try nine weeks. Like, just try this. And if you hate it, stop doing it. 00:27:33.300 --> 00:27:34.560 Yeah. It's very easy. 00:27:36.540 --> 00:27:40.600 Yeah. And that, that's gotta be helpful in the same way that, that in some ways, you know, 00:27:40.660 --> 00:27:45.520 financial peace groups have helped launch ongoing communities, you know, ongoing small groups. 00:27:46.380 --> 00:27:50.400 Some of these communities are going to continue on and stick, like whether it's for the existing 00:27:50.400 --> 00:27:53.760 online pastor or whether it's for somebody who just caught a bug for it. And they're like, Hey, 00:27:53.760 --> 00:27:57.360 we just like hanging out with these folks. You know, we're going to keep doing this and we're 00:27:57.360 --> 00:28:01.040 going to keep studying the word together or something else. I mean, it's just a continuation of great 00:28:01.040 --> 00:28:07.660 community. So let me ask this because you see the big picture and yeah, your context is, is centered 00:28:07.660 --> 00:28:12.140 around Ramsey and FPU, which is, which is a nine week. The thing that I've always loved about you, 00:28:12.180 --> 00:28:19.680 Ken, is you're open to the honest conversations and you speak your mind. So moving beyond the nine 00:28:19.680 --> 00:28:25.940 week window, theoretically, this isn't your Avenue, but I want you to speak into this. What challenges 00:28:25.940 --> 00:28:31.760 does the church need to overcome to create a holistically online biblical community that solely 00:28:31.760 --> 00:28:36.420 meets through zoom or texting other platform, digital platforms? 00:28:39.560 --> 00:28:42.960 Oh, you know, I think that as 00:28:42.960 --> 00:28:48.620 that's really a question, right? That's something you want Kurzweil or somebody to, 00:28:48.660 --> 00:28:53.400 to kind of throw some mind space at. I know people that pay more attention to that than I do have, 00:28:53.400 --> 00:29:03.860 given that a lot of words and a lot of thought. I think this is one of those areas where 00:29:03.860 --> 00:29:12.560 where, where change will ultimately become inevitable. And what I mean is society ultimately, 00:29:13.220 --> 00:29:19.260 like, like the church will track with that as people communicate, those changes just naturally come. 00:29:19.260 --> 00:29:23.400 So I don't know that we, we have a complete idea of what that looks like or what the barriers are, 00:29:23.400 --> 00:29:28.980 but if you think about, I mean, and you may have these statistics, like how many workers in an average 00:29:28.980 --> 00:29:35.440 week use zoom to connect for something? Like I don't use just zoom and zoom just in communities. I use it 00:29:35.440 --> 00:29:41.500 to do my job. Right. Right. So, so it's becoming more and more ubiquitous, which is like my all time 00:29:41.500 --> 00:29:48.700 favorite SOT word. I just love that word. So those barriers, those, those, um, as the barriers come 00:29:48.700 --> 00:29:54.540 down, it just becomes that much more acceptable and common. So I think maybe the answer is as 00:29:54.540 --> 00:29:59.340 community, not church community, but just as community becomes increasingly digital and legitimate 00:29:59.340 --> 00:30:06.580 community. I don't mean Instagram influencer, tribe, Facebook, happy pseudo stuff is people 00:30:06.580 --> 00:30:10.500 legitimately connect this way. It'll happen. It'll happen more and more. And I don't, 00:30:11.240 --> 00:30:14.220 there's folks are, that are always going to be on the front end of that. Like you two, 00:30:14.640 --> 00:30:21.580 that'll want to make that happen more quickly. Um, early innovators, adopters, that kind of thing. 00:30:21.580 --> 00:30:27.180 I don't, yeah, I don't know. I'm kind of struggling with that answer. It's the same thing I tell pastors, 00:30:27.260 --> 00:30:32.040 which is like, just try it. Cause you can, you can undo it. Like you can just stop, 00:30:32.040 --> 00:30:36.420 but see, see what value you get. And I think those answers ultimately emerge. 00:30:37.140 --> 00:30:41.320 That's good. There's a period in my life where it's very easy for me to meet for a breakfast 00:30:41.320 --> 00:30:45.300 meeting at six or 7am in the morning. And I treasured those times of personal community 00:30:45.300 --> 00:30:50.720 and Cuban toast. And you know, the whole thing in the cafeteria in Miami, the reality of where I live, 00:30:50.780 --> 00:30:54.820 the community that I'm in, the job I do in the stage I'm in life, that meeting today is 00:30:54.820 --> 00:30:59.640 basically impossible for me. But digital ones are always possible. 00:31:00.300 --> 00:31:04.660 Right. That right there was a hard thing for me to adapt as a, as a campus pastor that I think, 00:31:04.760 --> 00:31:08.940 um, like when I was leading a physical location, I was also going through a change of stage in life 00:31:08.940 --> 00:31:13.560 and that we just had a baby. And so beforehand I was like, Hey, I'm ready and adaptable for like 00:31:13.560 --> 00:31:18.380 6am, 7am meetings, that kind of thing. Where if I would have thought through, and this was a few years 00:31:18.380 --> 00:31:21.680 ago. And even though I was super into tech and all this stuff, I didn't think through the concept of, 00:31:21.840 --> 00:31:27.440 Hey, this is a great space to leverage for community, for all this stuff. I think it would 00:31:27.440 --> 00:31:31.000 have helped me out tremendously. And it also would have freed up the volunteer here just on a regular 00:31:31.000 --> 00:31:36.400 basis in the sense of, Hey, like you don't have to, you know, take time out of your work day and show 00:31:36.400 --> 00:31:39.900 up to a random Starbucks near you or whatever else. Like we can still meet and have this kind of 00:31:39.900 --> 00:31:43.940 community. And it would have provided more time for genuine questions or to dig in a little bit 00:31:43.940 --> 00:31:44.840 further. 00:31:44.840 --> 00:31:52.520 Mm-hmm. But I mean, again, my own current circumstance, we just recently moved from five 00:31:52.520 --> 00:31:57.480 separate buildings in my company into one giant building. It's a huge campus and 800 some 50 00:31:57.480 --> 00:32:03.660 something Dave Ramsey employees are all in one place. And do you know what is, is he talked about 00:32:03.660 --> 00:32:10.000 that vision? He talked about how creativity was going to be unleashed because we were in one location. 00:32:10.000 --> 00:32:15.080 And, and I kind of heard that, but you know, I was not in that. I was not in our new offices two hours 00:32:15.080 --> 00:32:19.640 before I was able to have a conversation and make something shorter and better because of the fact 00:32:19.640 --> 00:32:25.000 a guy was in my building that was previously in a different one. So it's always going to be a both 00:32:25.000 --> 00:32:29.680 ends. We're not, we are, we are analog creatures, not digital creatures. Digital is the tool. 00:32:30.000 --> 00:32:32.440 Right. Right. That's good. 00:32:33.100 --> 00:32:39.240 Yeah. Love, love that. It's not, and to that, to that point, like church online, a healthy church 00:32:39.240 --> 00:32:45.960 online, isn't the abandonment of, of the community. It's, it's the distribution of communities into, 00:32:46.080 --> 00:32:52.300 into other areas. And within recent weeks, we've, we did a deep dive, really discovering Church 00:32:52.300 --> 00:32:57.240 Anywhere, which is out of First Capital. They're a location, they're doing 16 micro locations, 00:32:57.240 --> 00:33:04.020 you know, in a, in a really small town, rural area of, um, Indiana. We just got off an elevation 00:33:04.020 --> 00:33:08.300 within the past week as well, talking about their watch parties and about how they're doing 00:33:08.300 --> 00:33:14.160 this in a big way. Saddleback is pushing, um, the micro as well. And so like, there's, there's 00:33:14.160 --> 00:33:19.860 legitimacy in, in not abandoning the physical space. God causes, God calls us, the Bible calls 00:33:19.860 --> 00:33:26.260 us not abandon meeting together. Um, and that, that isn't necessarily what's happening, but 00:33:26.260 --> 00:33:33.080 the ability to, to encourage, to strengthen, to disciple, to help others grow utilizing, 00:33:33.080 --> 00:33:39.560 uh, the virtual space here, like zoom. Uh, you know, you mentioned a text group earlier. WhatsApp 00:33:39.560 --> 00:33:46.060 definitely does that. Uh, we've talked with people, um, uh, Jate, who does the, the video 00:33:46.060 --> 00:33:51.480 game. What platform is it? Discord. Um, Ray, we've talked with him in the past. He uses like 00:33:51.480 --> 00:33:55.840 a, it's a WhatsApp Discord platform for that. You know, there, there's plenty of opportunities 00:33:55.840 --> 00:34:01.620 to, uh, to connect with, with community. One of the things that I love and I, and I heard, 00:34:01.620 --> 00:34:09.040 um, play Scroggins over at North Point. I heard him say this at a conference I was at. Um, the 00:34:09.040 --> 00:34:14.320 business world looks at the digital disruption as an opportunity. Um, and they see all of the, 00:34:14.320 --> 00:34:19.360 the functionalities and the features and the things in the business world adopts this digital 00:34:19.360 --> 00:34:25.580 disruption, all this new technology as a way to make what they do better. As a general role, 00:34:25.620 --> 00:34:29.840 the church has been more hesitant in that area. It excites me, Ken, that you tell me that, 00:34:29.840 --> 00:34:33.400 you know, a lot of the, the larger churches and the mega churches that you're working with 00:34:33.400 --> 00:34:40.380 have been pro doing this online and, and FPU may be the on ramping towards changing some 00:34:40.380 --> 00:34:46.820 of that culture. Um, that aside though, it's been very difficult, um, in recent years, churches 00:34:46.820 --> 00:34:54.140 may be starting to shift and get more on board and may be asking why or how and that. But even 00:34:54.140 --> 00:34:59.500 still, like I had a conversation, um, yesterday with the church that was actually going South. 00:34:59.500 --> 00:35:04.520 Like they were wanting to shut down their online campus because it restricted and it was taking 00:35:04.520 --> 00:35:10.760 away so much from the physical space, which to me, that's the worst thing you could ever 00:35:10.760 --> 00:35:14.540 do. But Hey, Hey, let's stop the thing that's working. 00:35:15.060 --> 00:35:20.740 Yeah. You know, I'm sorry. I mean, I'm not ostrich head in sand kind of came to mind. I kind 00:35:20.740 --> 00:35:24.980 of joked with the guy, but unfortunately some of that, that mentality is still out there. 00:35:25.340 --> 00:35:31.480 And so, man, thanks for using your platform with, with Dave Ramsey to try to bring some 00:35:31.480 --> 00:35:36.220 awareness to that. And even if it's just for a nine week trial period going through FPU, 00:35:36.400 --> 00:35:43.360 man, thanks for helping churches adopt that and start to realize the potential, uh, for education, 00:35:43.360 --> 00:35:46.360 education for community and context of using online. 00:35:47.160 --> 00:35:51.000 Yeah. Well, this is, I mean, I'm all about discipling people and equipping them. However, 00:35:51.000 --> 00:35:55.460 it is that we need to do that, right? Whatever the tool is. So sometimes that'll be in person 00:35:55.460 --> 00:36:00.540 back in the day. It might've been a conference call. I've been a part of email list serves 00:36:00.540 --> 00:36:06.720 and, and chains going back. I mean, I mean, that'll bring you way back, right? Right. That's an early 00:36:06.720 --> 00:36:14.200 nineties thing. And so there's, I mean, the tools change what our, our mission doesn't. And so we want 00:36:14.200 --> 00:36:21.500 to, we want to engage in it, but we are. Awesome. Well, Hey, it's been a great podcast. Ray closing 00:36:21.500 --> 00:36:26.280 thoughts before we, uh, land the plan here. No, I'm grateful for what Ken has done and how you're, 00:36:26.280 --> 00:36:31.060 and how you're encouraging church is to continue to use a digital platforms just to try it out, 00:36:31.120 --> 00:36:34.180 to test it out, which is really what all this has been about. For those of you who've been listening 00:36:34.180 --> 00:36:38.400 for a while, you know, that none of us have this down. We're all testing things. And so I'm going 00:36:38.400 --> 00:36:42.460 to encourage you, you know, even if you don't do online groups, financial peace university is a 00:36:42.460 --> 00:36:46.900 great place to start. It's a great structure. And if you've never done FPU, it's changed my life. 00:36:46.920 --> 00:36:51.520 It'll change yours. Wow. That was a good plug. I'll take that. 00:36:52.720 --> 00:36:58.680 Ken, anything on, on your side, anything to land the plane? 00:36:59.440 --> 00:37:04.120 But you know, here's, uh, I'll, I'll, I'll finish where I started, which is I'm probably the least 00:37:04.120 --> 00:37:11.860 digitally engaged person, you know, uh, and, and I still have a, I still believe that there's room 00:37:11.860 --> 00:37:17.820 for guys like me to access content in a digital or an online environment. And I've helped people 00:37:17.820 --> 00:37:23.080 change their lives this way. And when I do that in my life has changed. So there's, um, Paul talked 00:37:23.080 --> 00:37:27.700 about being all things to all people. So it all means he might win some. Again, we're not going to 00:37:27.700 --> 00:37:33.520 draw a theology of online church, uh, from, from a couple of random verses, but I think there's 00:37:33.520 --> 00:37:39.120 something to that idea. Uh, before I say no to something, I always want to say, what if it weren't? 00:37:40.120 --> 00:37:47.100 It's good. Amen. So since you're not socially accessible because you don't even know how to 00:37:47.100 --> 00:37:52.800 spell Twitter, um, but if somebody wanted to reach out to you, what's, what's a good way or to get in 00:37:52.800 --> 00:37:58.620 touch with Ramsey's? Smoke signals. Smoke signals. Yeah. Smoke signals are good. Uh, well, it's a, 00:37:58.620 --> 00:38:04.900 it's a pretty good question. Um, so I have an email address, which is Ken.Shafer, DaveRamsey.com. Email is 00:38:04.900 --> 00:38:10.900 something that people use before, uh, Instagram and Twitter and Facebook. Um, so Ken.Shafer, 00:38:11.020 --> 00:38:16.960 Shafer is S-C-H-A-F-E-R. And that's probably the easiest and fastest way to find me. So we'll, 00:38:17.000 --> 00:38:23.400 we'll put that in the show notes, um, as well as a number of articles, why, uh, Ken needs to watch 00:38:23.400 --> 00:38:31.120 Stranger Things. If there's anyone on this planet, Ken, that needs to watch Stranger Things, sir, it is 00:38:31.120 --> 00:38:36.180 you. Well, maybe I'll check it out. I, you know, I'm, I'm getting, I'm, I'm, I felt pretty good 00:38:36.180 --> 00:38:40.040 earlier this year when I finally watched my first episode of the Big Bang Theory about two months 00:38:40.040 --> 00:38:44.900 before it went off the air. Apparently there's this new show called The Office also. I might check 00:38:44.900 --> 00:38:50.380 that out. Oh, you'll love it. Hurry up. If you have Netflix, it's all going to go soon. It's all 00:38:50.380 --> 00:38:58.920 going away. I'm going to speak your language here, Ken. Um, it is a, it is a, if, if you are a fan, 00:38:58.920 --> 00:39:06.680 which I know you are Adventure of Bond Buckaroo Bonsai. Yes. The, the stylistic ness of that 00:39:06.680 --> 00:39:14.360 in an eighties, the randomness of it exists in Stranger Things. I might have to check it out. 00:39:14.460 --> 00:39:18.900 I'll see if I can get it. I do not. Okay. It's not like, you know, what's his name wearing the cowboy 00:39:18.900 --> 00:39:24.560 chap. They actually sell it on VHS. Funny enough. I think that exists. Yes. Like I, I just, I cannot 00:39:24.560 --> 00:39:29.240 believe you have not gotten into the Stranger Things thing. So, um, we're going to wrap with 00:39:29.240 --> 00:39:33.960 it. I'll see what I can do. Awesome. Thank you. So you're so, Hey, this has been the church digital 00:39:33.960 --> 00:39:39.280 podcast and not the Stranger Things fan club. That's another podcast that Ray and I will probably 00:39:39.280 --> 00:39:45.720 start sometime soon. And, uh, to be that, uh, that speaker. Hey, but this has been a great conversation 00:39:45.720 --> 00:39:50.960 on, on church online and creating these biblical communities. Uh, Ken, man, thanks for jumping on this 00:39:50.960 --> 00:39:55.820 and just helping us wrestle through this. Um, thank you for always telling me, no, Jeff, 00:39:55.840 --> 00:40:01.960 you're stupid, but then listen afterwards and at least being humble enough to say, Hey, you know 00:40:01.960 --> 00:40:06.980 what? You may actually be right. Cause that actually is really encouraging. Uh, things. So listen, 00:40:07.080 --> 00:40:14.800 a broken watches is right twice a day. So all good. Awesome. Totally insulted right now, but we're 00:40:14.800 --> 00:40:20.040 going to take it as a win and I'm going to walk away. So thanks everybody for listening. And we'll see 00:40:20.040 --> 00:40:22.360 you next time here at the Church Digital Podcast. Y'all have a good day.