Welcome to Leading Simple with Rusty George. Our goal is to make following Jesus and leading others a uh bit more simple. Here's your host, Rusty George.
Hey, welcome to Leading Simple. Hello, my name is Rusty George and I'm so excited to have you with us.
Today.
We get to have a conversation with somebody who has quickly become a friend because of our interaction through Zoom calls. He's an incredible leader, a guy by the name of Paul Hicks with Search Ministries. You may have never heard of Search Ministries. If you're familiar with Alpha uh Ministries, it's similar to that, but done a little bit more covert, a little bit more face to face, one on uh one kind of perspective when it comes to helping people far from God, connect with God. You may know somebody in your life that you think they'd never come to Church, but they would come to a barbecue or they would come to a game night or they would come to a cigar night and you would sit down with them and have conversations and maybe have an opportunity to talk about your faith. What do you do in that moment? Paul is going to tell us how through the incredible resources they provide at Search Ministries. Today we are sponsored by Leader.com Leadr.com, which is an incredible platform that helps your Church, your business, engage with your employees. The past couple of years have been referred to as the great resignation, where people are leaving their place of employment to find something more fulfilling. And 70% of the people that leave their place of work do so because of a lack of engagement with their leader. Leader.com can fix that. They can schedule one on one meetings for you. They can give you goals. They can help prioritize what needs to be talked about and give you great resources that become a platform for you to use that help you engage with your employees. Check it out@leader.com. That's Leader Leadr. You drop a seconde.com for more information. And back on episode 199, we had a conversation with Holly Tate, who works for Leader, to give us much more information about it. Make sure that you check it out. Well, here's my conversation with Search Ministries Paul Hicks.
Well, Paul, thanks for joining the podcast. Uh we've had a chance to connect a little bit before this, but for our listeners who may not know who you are, tell us a little bit about yourself.
Yeah, thanks, Rusty. My name is Paul Hicks and I'm in Richmond, uh Texas, suburb of Houston and uh I've been married for 33 years and I have uh three grown sons, two grandsons. I was born and raised in the Houston area um and uh I was in the insurance business for several years, worked uh for a big Corporation and was uh a regional sales vice President at the end of my career with them and then started a little consulting firm for myself. And then I've been on staff with Search Ministries formally uh for uh about eight years now.
I think that's where our paths crossed through a mutual friend. And I know you're connected with Bruce Matthews as well, who's been a previous guest on the show All um Things Houston, I guess. So that makes you a um Texans fan, formerly an Oilers fan. Rockets, Astros. And I assume uh the Houston Cougars as well, am I correct?
Well, yes, uh for most of those, I like the Cougars. Fine. Our mutual friend is a big Cougar fan, but uh my youngest son was an Aggie, and I had to become an Aggie fan here in Houston. But, yeah, love very uh involved with sports. You mentioned Bruce Matthews. He's on staff with me here at Search after a uh 19 uh year career in the NFL and obviously uh a hall of Famer. So he and I have a lot of fun meeting uh with men here in the Houston area.
That's fantastic.
Okay.
So this is what I want to dive into today, because for many Church leaders and leaders in churches and people that have a different career, but they love their Church and they love just seeing people come to faith in the Lord. One of the most difficult things is to bring up the conversation is to have a conversation about faith without it feeling like it's. How shall we say this? A sales pitch. Um but you know that there's a deep hunger in everybody's soul for uh the Lord, as the scriptures say, he's placed eternity in our hearts. And you found through Search Ministries a great way to facilitate that discussion, to just get people, uh especially men, talking about faith and issues of faith and working through some of their issues to kind of remove some of the barriers between them and Christ. Tell us a little bit about Search Ministries and what it is you guys do.
Mhm yes. Well, Search Ministries is a 45 year old Ministry. It actually began by the man who was the Chapman on the PGA Tour for roughly 40 years. And uh it's a discipleship relational evangelism Ministry where we are really looking for primarily men, although the organization is uh trying to become more open to females. But when our Ministry was started, there was a real need for men to connect. And they weren't connecting in the local Church. They were often, for uh whatever reason, they let the wife take the kids to Church, and they were busy with whatever else. Um so what we do is we literally build friendships. And the problem, Rusty, that the local Church, we are so ineffective in bringing people is we really don't know how to attract the lost person. We are taught to invite them to Church. Well, they don't want to come to Church. If they wanted to come to Church, they would have come with their wives or another friend, but um they don't want to. And we find it hard to have start spiritual conversations. Well, uh the big struggle or the big thing that you need to do first is build a friendship and if you build a friendship, spiritual questions will come into the fray eventually. Um most of us Christians, we are not intentional about making friendships with lost people because they drink too much, they curse too much, they do everything too much. And we as Christians are so easily offended, right? And so they become an enemy. I mean, even our body language or the way that we hang out, we push the lost away, mhm knowingly or subtly. And so when we make it in our mind that Jesus Christ calls us to be ambassadors to a lost world, and we take that seriously, we put the souls of lost people ahead of our own comfort. And we realize, if I'm going to go into the mission field, which is my neighborhood, my Little League, my workplace, wherever, I'm um going to have to be inconvenienced for the sake of the cross. Um just as an example, I had a man that was in my office next door to me. He worked for the same firm that I was with, and he was the foulest man you would ever drop the F bomb left and right, the Lord's name in vain. But we found uh common ground in College football. I never had a spiritual conversation with him for almost a year. We'd go to lunch, I got um to know about his family. We um became friends in this crusty old man who was all about the world, very successful worldly. But he was lost, and he acted lost. And so we learned in one Corinthians that the lost. You don't judge the loss like you do the believer. There are two different things that we look at. And so, um Lo and behold, this man got cancer. And the Lord opened the door for me to have a spiritual conversation with him very gently, in private, in my own office, where he often came to visit about College football. And I uh just says, hey, I know you're afraid when we get cancer. We're afraid you don't have to go through this alone. I'll be your friend. I said, but I can tell you if you haven't sorted through the spiritual issues about death and eternity and you would like to do that, I could help you do that in a very non religious way. Would that be something you'd be interested in? I'd need about ten minutes to talk it through. And he looked at me and a tear ran down his eyes, and he said, yeah, I'd really like to have that conversation. Now. If I had invited him to Church at the beginning of that deal or talked about my faith or on that stuff, he would have said, F you and the relationship would have been over.
Yeah.
And so for the sake of Jesus and his calling on all of us, I allowed myself to be inconvenienced by a lost guy, to earn the right to have a spiritual conversation. And that is the hard part. That's why so many of us don't do it mhm is because I would rather hang out with my friends that I do like my friends at Church, the people who share my values. And mhm if I do that, I don't have any bandwidth for the lost guy who is making me uncomfortable. So mhm someone has to take the calling of the scriptures to go make disciples. As I tell the men that I call, the very first thing Jesus said when he met his disciples is what? Follow me and I'll make you fishers of um men. And the very last thing he said to them when he was about to go back up into heaven, he said, now go make disciples. So if the very first and the very last thing that Jesus told us was to go meet the lost, I think that's pretty important command. And yet most of us don't do it because it's messy. Yeah.
I want to ask you about that, because I've heard you say this before that to be a disciple, you have to be a disciple maker. Now, the image that comes to many of our minds the moment you say that is that I'm in a deep and serious Bible study with somebody. I'm leading them down the Romans road or for spiritual laws. I'm arguing them into the faith by a series of apologetics. What um you modeled for us with your relationship with the man that you talked about was really just you were there, you were in his life until an opportunity came about. Is that disciple making?
Well, that's the beginning of disciple making.
Okay.
Right. That is evangelism at that point where I am um letting uh my uh light shine, letting the Holy Spirit shine through me in a loving relationship. And as you build a loving relationship with someone, you'll know, they're ready to have spiritual conversations because they start leaning in, they start asking you stuff like, hey, Paul, can I ask you about something? There's something going on in my life, and you seem to be uh the guy that kind of has life figured out a little bit. And I can begin to introduce spiritual conversations uh into our relationship. The scripture says, Let your conversations be seasoned with salt. Well, Rusty, how do you salt your food? You do it carefully, just a little bit, and mhm then you taste it. And if it needs a little more, you give it a little more. But when you've gotten enough, then you stop. And yet most of us Christians, the minute that an unbeliever just cracks the door, we come rushing in and we just pour salt all over it and we choke them to death. Right?
That's true.
The first thing to do is to build this friendship, and you will begin to have spiritual conversations slowly. And as their trust in you builds, they'll lean in more and more. And so the first part of discipleship is getting someone introduced to the Lord Jesus. And so we do that. What I do is when they show some real interest. Well, then I say, would you like to go through just this basic foundational material that I went through with a guy helping me figure it all out? And it'll start at the very beginning. You don't even have to believe in God, but it's going to start at the very beginning of explaining who is God, how do we meet him, and then what we have to do with that. And so you get them uh into a discipleship program. We call it Foundations. There's tons of great material out there that you don't have to use the search stuff, but I like ours. I think it's very good. And anybody that's hearing us talk can get ahold of this information, just go on to search ministries.org and they can get our Foundation's material. It's open to the public great material. And it usually takes about a year mhm to walk through the stuff, meeting once a week at a coffee shop in their office, wherever. Uh and at the uh end of that, after we have helped them learn how to walk with the Lord, then we say, okay, um the scriptures clearly tell us that we're supposed to help people. Like, I've helped you. So if this has been meaningful to you, and it always has been, anytime anybody meets the Lord and the Spirit starts helping them change their life, it is the greatest thing that ever happened. So of course they say, yeah. I said, now you need to walk gently with another friend, and I'll help you. Uh and then lost people. No lost people. That's the great thing. Unfortunately, most of us in the local Church, we surround ourselves with friends. And if you say, go out and talk to your lost friends, well, they don't have any lost friends. And so mhm the first thing that you have to do is put your antenna in the air, realize that I'm surrounded with lost people. I just have to slow down, be intentional, um let a couple of them into my life and walk with them in a patient way that I earned the right to have spiritual conversations one day. That's the biblical model, but it takes a long time. It's messy, and so most people don't do it. But once you start doing it, you'll never stop doing it because it's so gratifying.
I completely agree with you there. I think once you begin down that road, first of all, I'm amazed uh how many Christians continue to tell me I need something more, something deeper, something more intellectual, more spiritually stimulating. And I asked them, well, who are you sharing the basics of the faith with? Well, nobody. I'm trying to grow on my own. I've never grown more in my faith than when I'm sharing it with somebody else. It challenges you. It makes you really wrestle with it. And to see somebody else light up, that's just the greatest thing. What are some questions that kind of start that conversation? You mentioned with your friend who was dealing with cancer, you kind of asked him, Would you be willing to talk about it? That's pretty straightforward. Are there other questions that kind of get people thinking below the surface? Below just College football?
Well, before I answer that, you brought up this point of people wanting more. And Jesus clearly tells us that we are to go make disciples. That's a command. When I started doing this, Rusty, it's not because I felt like I was qualified or I wanted to do it. It was unmistakable that that was a command. And so I dipped my toe in the water. And I use this analogy. Most of us Christians are like, we're on the driving range at a golf course, and we're beating balls and we're hitting balls. And I'm standing next to a guy, and I look over and he's swinging great. And I go, man, you got a good swing. What's your handicap? And he says, Well, I've never really played golf before. I'm trying to get better. I'm working on a few things, you know, I want to go get a little better. What are you talking about, man? You got a beautiful swing. Get out there. And so um most of us, I um look at the local Church, like the driving range, right? That's where we come to be equipped to be encouraged to work on our faith. And yet the game is out there in the real world, and people keep wanting to learn how to hit the ball a little better. Believe me, you're hitting it just fine. And Besides, the Holy Spirit is the one that's doing all the work. So get in the game. If you really want to feel the power of Christ, be obedient by getting in the game. And once you're in the game, it's amazing. I mean, when I saw God using a guy like me, and I don't want to get into all my faults because there's plenty and we'd run out of time, but I felt so inadequate and so unable to do this. And yet when I saw the Holy Spirit work through me to move in guys lives, then your faith becomes real. You say, oh, my gosh, this stuff, it's not just theoretical. It's just not. For when you die and go to heaven, it's real. The Holy Spirit will use me when I step out and say to make a difference. So I forgot your other question. Um i had to change that rabbit.
That's all right. I tease you with that. So I would say, the question is, uh how do you start some of those conversations? You're in a friendship. You've known the guy for a long time. You've never gotten below the surface. You've never talked about your own faith. He hasn't asked yet. Is there a couple um of questions that kind of just get you talking about things that are deeper than just College football?
Well, I've got to say um that we're in a fallen world. It's messy. Uh you're either in the middle of a tragedy or coming out of one. You've got situations that are always coming your way. And I um like to say that when somebody's bug hits the windshield, I want to be the person they think of. Okay. And so as you do life with someone, and they are going through marital problems. They've lost their job, they've got a cancer diagnosis. Uh they're having problems with their teenage kids, all of these things. Then they will say to you and I'll just look up and go, man, what's going on? You look like you're really troubled with something. And they'll begin to explain the hardships in your life, and it will get into a conversation. They'll eventually say, you got any advice for me? And that's when I can say, life is uh hard, and we go through them. And I don't know where you are spiritually, but I uh am a spiritual guy. I really believe that there is a God who is looking out for us. And I try to tap in and look for solutions to my problem by using some of the information that's available to us from God. Uh uh Is that anything that you're interested in? So I always ask for them for an invitation in. Is that something you're interested in, like I did to that fella that worked next to me? Would you be interested in hearing? Well, when people are hurting, they want solutions to their problems. That's why the library has the big self help section, right? Everybody wants relief, and they're going to find relief somewhere in a bottle or in a pill or in a new car or becoming a workaholic, something to ease their pain. And when you gently offer them something that might be of value to them, then they invite you in. And as you invite in, then you don't have to worry about the questions.
Right.
See, if you're trying to start it rusty with a question, you've got the um card ahead of the horse. So the relationship must come first.
That's so good. Great word. Okay. I want to get really practical for our Church leaders out there. Search Ministries does some really specific things more than just provide great resources like the Foundation's material. But what you have seen and what you were telling me about is you've developed these gatherings for guys to come to, and it creates an opportunity for everybody out there that's got a friend they're kind of praying for and walking with and all that a place for them to come. Besides just coming to Sunday morning at Church, it's uh kind of a stepping stone in their spiritual journey. Would you talk us through just how you've seen that play out and how you and even Bruce Matthews kind of leverage that and what those gatherings look like.
Hey, let's hit pause on the conversation for just a second. Today, and this month we are sponsored by Leader.com, Harvard Business Review tells us that 70% of the reason a person leaves their job is because of their relationship with their manager. Leader helps managers lead better through effective one on one meetings that drive outcomes and help each employee feel cared for and developed. So we have been using this at real life and it is a wonderful tool. It's a platform that you can use with all of your team members and it really helps keep you engaged. Make sure you check out Leader Leadr so you drop that second E.com Leader.com to find out more. Now back to the show.
Yes. Well, uh for the cities that have a search person in there, we are always looking for opportunities to throw the net wide and draw in the unbeliever to build the relationships. And so one of the things we do is called open forums. And it's done any number of ways. The only limitation is your imagination on how you can create something that somebody uh would want to be in. If it's just you, it might be inviting someone to golf. Right. You're just finding common ground. But one of the things that we do here locally in Houston is we have quarterly forums. We call them Fireside forums because we used to build a campfire and guys would come around it. But now the group is getting too big to be around a campfire, and we have to have a little sound system out there. But it's outdoors at Bruce. He's got uh a barn out behind uh his property there in Houston and a big lawn area. And we bring in a guest speaker this coming next month. We're bringing in John McClain. He's the NFL sports writer for the Houston Chronicle, covers the NFL, and he's going to give us a predraft uh talk about what uh the Texans are likely to do. We got a big Sean uh Watson problem down here in Houston, and he's looking to be traded as soon as he solves his domestic um problems. There's a lot to talk about. And so there's a lot of guys who would love to be sitting face to face with John McClain and letting a hall of Famer interview him and asking him the questions that we're interested in. And so that goes for about 45 minutes. And then we eat. We've got a Louisiana Cajun food uh restaurant that caters a meal that's real fast that guys grab and they get their food and sit back down in their lawn chairs. They bring their own lawn chairs. They bring their own beer. They bring their own cigars. We never had anybody uh smoke pot out there yet. Uh but if they do, that's fine. It's funny. Uh we create an environment that the Christians are uncomfortable with, but the Lost guys are very comfortable.
Right.
And so a lot of our guest speakers, they're not believers. In fact, I don't think any of them have been believers yet. So in their presentation, they'll drop the F bomb or something, and you can kind of see the Christians getting uneasy, but the unbeliever starts really feeling comfortable. So we're creating an environment that they are comfortable with. And then after people get their food, then I come up and I facilitate a discussion, and we pick one big question that people are interested in might be, how can you even know there is a God? It might be the reliability of the Bible, man. All you Christians, you say the Bible says, well, why do I care what the Bible says? Isn't it a document that's been written and rewritten through the years? And now how can you even know it's reliable? If there is a God, how comes uh there's so much pain and suffering in this world? And so as I facilitate that discussion, I say to the guys, hey, I've got three uh promises for you. The first promise is this isn't a lecture. It's a discussion I'm going to facilitate. This is all about you talking and asking questions. There's nothing off base here. You can't offend me. Um let's talk it through. The second promise is that this is going to be 55 minutes long. It's a hard stop. So if you try to wait till the end to talk, you're not going to get to talk because we stop. And if you want to hang around afterwards, you can. But our meeting is over in 55 minutes. And the third promise is at some point in the discussion after it feels like everybody's kind of weighed in, I'll give you a five minute biblical explanation to the problem. Uh and that's not the end of the discussion. I'm going to do that before the end so you guys can challenge it. I'm just throwing that chip on the table, and it's a lively discussion. And so we train the believer who's the invite her not to say anything. I say, you'll be quiet. I'll handle the God talk, right? You just be quiet. If your guest feels comfortable enough that they chime in, you might say, man, that's a great question. You might encourage them, affirm them, but that's your role. Uh and we let the guys drive together. The inviteer picks up his buddy and brings him. So when we're through, the buddy is taking his friend back home. And the feedback I always get is, oh, my gosh, we had more conversation in that drive home than we've had in our whole friendship put together. Mhm that's just one of many, many examples of what you can do if you just pray to God for an idea. Another thing that we'll do is these adventure dinners where each believer will bring one unbelieving couple, and you go to a dinner at somebody's house, and maybe you have a chef come over or somebody, and they will do a four course meal or a five course meal, and each course you have a question. And so the question might be with the salad or the is uh uh tell us one thing about you that nobody knows. So they have to get a little bit vulnerable. Then the next question might say, tell us the one thing that you are most afraid of. And then we'll go around the table, and each time the next course comes in, the chef or the Cook or whoever doesn't have to be fancy. But they'll describe what we're going to have here. And then you get to the main course and you say, what is the one question big uh question you have about God? A big God size question. And they'll say that. And then the last question, then you kind of bring it down and you say, really? What do you want to achieve for the balance of your life? What do you want next in life? What's one thing you really hope that would be a huge win for you if that could happen. And then it's over after the dinner. Well, now we've been vulnerable. We've gotten to know people at a deeper level. And everybody always says, let's keep this going. Uh and then we'll introduce something like say, well, why don't we next time we'll do it at somebody else's house, we'll do it next quarter at somebody else's house. And why don't we pick one of those big questions that we had about God, man, those were so powerful. Why don't we discuss one of those questions at each one of our dinners and just try that and see where it goes? So you see, the friendship is built, you earn the right for trust. And then these apologetic questions begin to be answered.
Wow.
And talked about in real context of life instead of an academic thing. If it's academic, nobody is moved by that. But if you can do it in the context of love, then people honestly consider it.
You mentioned to me in our previous conversation, kind of the three roadblocks people have to get over uh as they come to faith. The first one has to do with Church health. And then the second one, or I should say Church scars that they've experienced and intellectual. And then the issue of will. Can you walk us through those three barriers that most people have when uh it comes to faith?
Sure. If you don't mind, I'm going to kind of talk uh about the whole what we call the one two three method at search.
That's great.
I can do that real quickly. The one is that everybody matters. We go to Luke 15 and you see that where Jesus says, lead the 99 and go after the one. When we think about evangelism, we often think about getting a lot of people or going to everybody. And really the model talks about just leaving and going after one. So who is God laying on your heart? Who is the person that's in your life already that he's laying on your heart, that you can become very intentional with that's your one. The two are two principles. The first principle is that everybody's journey is a process. The scriptures use the metaphor of agriculture. Uh somebody plants, the other one waters, the other one does this, and eventually somebody harvests. But it's mhm God that makes it grow. And so you got to realize if you've got to go from A to Z, you've got to go from A to B before you can go to Z. And so often we as Christians try to jump right to, hey, can I tell you about Jesus? Well, that's X, Y and Z. We got to take them from A to B, from B to C slowly. Okay. So that's a process. We all have a process. And the second principle is God's responsible for the results. It's not me. We come to know Jesus at a spiritual level, and it's him drawing us in. So I don't have to say just the right thing. I mean, all the heavy lifting is being done by God. And when I really realize that, then I just relax and enjoy the ride. I start focusing on the relationship, trusting the Holy Spirit is going to be faithful to draw in their children, his children. So that's the two process. And then you'll find that we say that the three is the three barriers that everybody must overcome before they meet Christ. The first one is an emotional barrier. We've all been wounded somehow. It could be that your mother died when you were young and you're angry with God. It could be that your parents got divorced and you were hurt by it. It could be uh that somebody who claimed to be a Christian disappointed you very uh much. It could be that you somehow, some way you had been scarred by life and you're blaming God or you're blaming the Church for your issue. And we as Christians have to come alongside that wounded person and replace their bad experience with a good experience. Unfortunately, we in the Church, we often jump to step two, which is information. We start talking at the intellectual level, and people aren't even hearing us because they've got a wound that has their ears closed and their heart hardened. And so as we overcome their emotional barrier, and you'll know that it's overcome when they start leaning in and start asking um you questions, that's always the key. Mhm if you're investing and you're helping them, they'll start leaning in at some point, and then they will get to their second barrier, which is an informational barrier. They've got questions and they've been on the Internet and they've got all this bad information. Well, you need to replace their bad information with good information, and you do it in a loving way. The scripture says that we are to be prepared to give an advance for the hope that we have. And most Christians stop there. But the completion of that verse is but do so with gentleness and respect. And so as we do it slowly and lovingly, and we don't try to wrap it all up in one conversation. Uh we're willing to be patient and let the Holy Spirit do that. Then we overcome their bad information with good information. And then once they realize that, man, there's a whole lot more meat on this bone than I ever dreamed. Maybe I um need to take this serious and they understand what is needed to enter into a relationship with God. The last barrier is a volitional barrier. It's a battle of the will. They have to surrender. And that barrier, as believers, we help them overcome it by just prayer. Mainly we're praying for softness of their heart and encouragement. I know you're afraid because you are transferring trust. You are surrendering. You're giving yourself away to something new. And the unknown is frightening. But I'm here to tell you it's the greatest thing that can ever happen to you. And you just encourage and pray for them as they overcome that last and final uh barrier. And then the discipleship process takes on. They're a new believer, and you got to put down roots um in their journey and disciple them to the point where they can help their friend the same way that you've helped them. It's a Ministry of multiplication. That is the biblical model. It's not addition, it's multiplication.
Right. Okay, so let's talk to our Church leaders out there. How can they partner best with Search Ministries? Is it just maybe finding a couple of guys in your Church that are ready to lead some of this? Is there anything uh that can be done from the stage? Is there a curriculum to be used? What have you seen in the past where churches and Search partner together?
Well, we do come alongside the local Church in the areas where we're at. I've done a ten week Wednesday um night series to equip the people there. I've preached from the pulpit to help people gain a knowledge of this. But really, Rusty, none of this happens until you, as senior pastor, realize that we've got to start making this a priority.
Right.
Because we all look through worldview lenses. Right. I remember the first time um I have a dear friend of mine who's a missionary in Thailand, and I was on a missions committee of the Church, and we were going to fund this Ministry, but I had to go check it out, and I went over there ready to help them figure it all out. Right. I had all the answers. I was going to help them build a Church and all this kind of stuff. And I got over there and I got out of my worldview and I got into third world, country, worldview. Uh and I saw these guys begin to do what we try to do at Search. They came alongside people. They came into new villages, they lived uh with them. They earned the right to have conversations. Um and I realized that the model is not inviting them in. The model is equipping our congregation to go. And your people only have so many hours in a day and they only have so much bandwidth. So if what we're doing as the local Church is filling up their calendar with good things at the local Church, then they're never going to invest in people outside the Church.
Yeah.
It just doesn't happen. It just won't happen.
Right.
Until you create the environment and you say this is the most important thing that we can possibly do, and I am going to equip you to go, and that means that I'm going to be okay with you not being here. In every program that we have put together for you from a mindset, these pastors are going to have to realize if they don't lead from the pulpit, it just never happens. It just becomes a seminar that we come and do and it's interesting and people like it, and then it's like taking a time management course. Two weeks later, you're right back doing your same old thing because you haven't really digested it and acted on it. But for those who are willing and able, we are, in fact, just as we speak, creating something called Search Institute, where my colleague John Hopper, that wrote that book, Questioning God, that you heard his interview with Janet Parcel. It's a wonderful book. It's um called Questioning God. You might any of your people might get it. Not only is it an apologetic book, but it's done so with Search DNA, which is really biblical. Dna search didn't invent uh any of this stuff. It's all biblical. We just follow the biblical model of being relational. But the way that he approaches the questions and answers them in a very friendly, loving way uh is that same author. He is in the process of creating uh an equipping and training Department of Search that will come alongside the local Church for the people in your Church, your leaders, your core group who are really serious about this, we will help train them up. I can't tell you what the whole program uh looks like because uh it's just being organized, but it's very important and it's going to happen soon. But your Church leaders would uh come to a seminar and we would immerse in the relational evangelism model, and then there would be ongoing support as you begin to live it out. Uh so I would say right now, start with um a lot of prayer, check our own hearts, make sure that we really do want to be obedient and we're willing to do whatever God does for us. And then we help our congregation um realize that what God calls us into is a um messy mission outside the Church. And we have to begin to just mhm build friendships. Don't worry about apologetics and all that. I'm afraid they're going to ask me a question and I don't know, well, get the book Questioning God. It'll give you more information than you need. Most people don't ask all these questions, Rusty. The truth is God creates us with this desire for God in our own heart. We want to be fed this if we'll just have somebody feed it to us in a manner that is safe. And so I know all the answers to the questions. I like to kid with people and say, I know the answers to all the questions that nobody's asking. They just don't ask them, right. They ask a handful. Tell me about the Bible. Tell me about God. Who is this Jesus character? What about pain and suffering?
Right.
If I get familiar with the good answers to these three or four or five tough questions, then I can at least talk to any of my friends about that. And it's all right to say, you know what? I don't know that as I was finding God, that wasn't important to me, but I can see it's important to you. So I'm going to do a little research and let's find out and let's kind of learn together.
That's such a great answer, Paul. This is phenomenal. And I think that for a lot of us, we felt like disciple making, specifically the front end of that evangelism was just invite someone to Church and let your pastor do it. Or it was pray for them and never talk about it and hope God just does it on his own without your involvement, or we have to get in their face and condemn them for their sin and intellectualize them to death with apologetical arguments. But this is so relational. It's so doable. And it's so incumbent on us to actually engage in this uh for our Church leaders and individuals that would love to learn more. What's the best way to find out more just through the uh search website?
Yeah, search website is searchministries.org.
Okay.
Our national office is in Fort Worth, Texas, okay. And we uh have about 60 guys across the country. And uh if you can look up somebody and there's a place on the website to find the search staff guy uh who's closest to you for you personally. In California, we have a guy, uh Don Barclay, in Orange County. That's a wonderful resource, and he would love to talk to you about things and help guys out. But if your listeners are all over the country, you can find somebody that's sort of in your area, okay. And uh we can help you out.
That's great uh searchministries.org, Paul. This has been fantastic. Thank you so much and really grateful for your time with our listeners uh and just the uh inspiration you've given me and all of us. So I appreciate it, buddy. Thank you.
It was my pleasure.
Well, Paul, thank you so much. And a special thank you to my friend John Hyneman for setting that up. That was so fun to have that conversation, loved talking with him and hope to talk to him more in the future because it really sparked a lot of questions I have that we can talk more uh about. Next week, I'm going to bring back one of my failures to share and we started something uh a few months ago called how I broke this and we talked about something I did wrong in leadership and what I learned from it. I'm going to give you another one and this has a lot to do with culture on your staff so join us next week for episode 203 as we talk about how I broke this. Thanks so much for listening as always rate and review and share the podcast. That would be huge and we will talk to you next time.
Keep it simple, take a moment and subscribe to the podcast so you'll get it delivered every week and subscribe to the Rusty George YouTube channel for more devotional messages and fun videos. Thank you for listening to leading simple.