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GodWorx helps equip all Christians to influence their workplace and integrate their faith, by making disciples and unleashing the kingdom of God wherever they are.
Hi, everyone. My name is Carrie Whitcher, and you too can be a marketplace multiplier because marketplace multipliers equip all Christians to influence their workplace and integrate their faith by making disciples and unleashing the kingdom of God wherever they are. Welcome to another episode of the Marketplace Multipliers podcast. I'm Jeff Clark, and I serve as the associate head basketball coach at Indiana Wesleyan. Today, we're gonna be joined by David Drury who works with Global Marketplace Multipliers, a new initiative that's come out of Marketplace Multipliers in Wesleyan Church.
He's gonna talk about how work as worship has been part of his heartbeat for decades now, and the new initiative that he's part of now living in Istanbul and doing this work and raising others up to do it as well. We're joined now by David Drury. And David, I wanna go back 16 years, because my first interaction was when you were one of my pastors at College Wesleyan Church, and really you were part of the birth of this, passion inside of me. And it started with, what was called at that point sheep to shepherd in the in the whole soul shift series from you and Steve Deneff's book. So can you go back to that time and maybe even tell how did this whole concept of work as worship become such a major passion for you?
Yeah. I think that the main thing there is there's a bit of a drift in western church culture towards the clergy, the pastors, the priests, whatever you wanna call them, the paid people that that are a part of the kingdom of God being the center of kind of the activity. And the sheep to shepherd concept was just we aren't intended to remain as sheep forever. All every disciple has a future of influencing others for Christ and really shepherding other people. It starts sometimes with just kids, but it really extends to anybody you have influence over.
So that's really the the fundamental call for every disciple is to move from just being a sheep to being a shepherd, which includes for all of us most of the time we spend is in our workplace, and we all can move from, just being sheep that listen to a sermon on Sundays to really shepherding those around us. And then our work becomes part of our worship in that way. I know I can take for granted having been inside a local church that really values this for 15 years. It's intuitive to me, but I know it's not for everybody. So fast forward 10 years or so, and we're working together with marketplace multipliers.
And I know you were on the ground floor and had a lot of vision for this and passion. And now there's this new initiative with global marketplace multipliers that's come out of that in some way. So if you could just take us through, how this thread of passion for you went to First and now is part of this new adventure that you're on. Yeah. And it real you know, it's nothing new, but it sure feels new.
Nothing new in the sense that, you know, Paul was a literal tentmaker. In fact, tentmaker became kind of a term for somebody that does a job, and does it well, but then also has ministry in their mind. But of course it feels new because again, in the world of missions, it's similar to everything else in the Western church culture. We have thought of paid people, in this case, missionaries who raise funds from churches, as being the primary way that we go after the unreached around the world. And, we're trying to upend that and say, hey, that that's one way to do it.
It's not the only way to do it. And it's possible that people, because of the global economy, because people are moving from country to country, because they get transferred to another place, because they do have a marketable skill in the global economy, or at least, you know, their their career might not work in every country, but it certainly would work in some country. Or some people can just do their job anywhere, and they're a digital nomad. And why not do that someplace strategic for the mission of God? And so we're trying to kind of infuse that marketplace energy into the global context, and so Global Partners spun us off to do this as another option for people to get engaged globally if they really care about the unreached people groups around the world.
And, you know, it's not just something that somebody can give to or pray for. Man, their career might actually be the way God gets it done. Well, it's interesting that we sit today and talk about this because you're in Istanbul. This morning, I got a email update from you. Now I sit and I can look at you in a screen and it's like we're talking face to face.
So everything you're saying is even a living reality for me today in my communications, hearing what you're doing across the world. So what opportunity are you seeing emerging now, especially you say for the unreached people groups of the world that maybe has never existed in the history of the world? Yeah. I mean, things have changed, pretty dramatically. Like you say, you know, I mean, in some ways, I'm strategically positioned here to live in Istanbul.
It's kind of the center of the world. I actually did some research on this. There's people that figured out that Istanbul, part of Turkey, is actually the land mass center of the world. It's the place that's closest to all of the land mass of the world. It's kinda weird detail.
So it's good for time zones. Like, I can meet with almost any time zone in the world other than Hawaii. So far, Hawaii is not working. I'd be fine to move to Hawaii too, by the way. But, really fine for me to meet with people all around the world from Asia and even North America, like I'm meeting with you now.
My the workday is done here. Business hours are done, but I'm able to meet with you in your morning. But there's a lot of people like that. The world has shrunk that could do their job anywhere or do it remotely, and then a lot of places are hiring people from other spaces. So there's really lots more possibilities.
And so the world has shrunk, but it's also so in some ways, it's getting there's more opportunity. But in another way, things are getting worse. 4 in 10 people still live without access to the gospel. And just to put that into perspective, 1 in 4 people don't have food security, so they're not sure where their next nutritious meal's coming from. 2 in 10 people don't have access to clean water.
Those are 2 huge things that a lot of people are working on in relief. A lot of those places that that's actually happening, by the way, those places have a ton of resources going to them and try to counter those problem. And then there's a third one that a lot of tech people are working on, and that's the 3 in 10 people don't have access to the Internet. A lot of people are working on that. And then 4 in 10 people don't have access to the gospel, which means they can knock on every door in their neighborhood and never find somebody that knows Jesus.
They wouldn't be able to find somebody that could disciple them. We're trying to work on that problem, and there's hardly any resources going to that problem. Hardly any people. Even all of the people that are going and working in missions, people that are working in relief on those other problems, Almost none of that is happening in places where there's not access to the gospel, including where I am right now. And so we need people to think about, boy, do what you do for the glory of God your career, but do it in a place that would be strategic for the mission of God.
That's the real message that we're going at. That's from a book I love to recommend called Gaining by Losing. We really need to be thinking about that. Anybody that's thinking and praying and giving strategically about the mission of God around the world might need to also think about, boy, is your job actually a part of how God wants to solve some of these problems and change that gospel access problem worldwide? I know knowing you for so long at a heart level, you're an activator.
You activate people, you activate initiatives. So talk to the person who as they're listening to this, they have a heartbeat for an unreached place. They have skills that might be able to apply there. Speak from that role of activator. What would you activate in their lives that could actually connect those dots where they could take their skills in the workforce and be part of God's mission in an unreached place?
Oh, that's funny you say that. That's actually my title now for my job is activator. I don't know if you even know that, but they gave me that title. But I, so that apparently, that's a good title for me. it's also very vague.
I like vague titles because then they can just tell me to do whatever. But, so I love, I love seeing people just educate themselves along this front. I feel like some of this is just do some recon. Some people that are listening to this right now didn't really know that 4 in 10 people, you're talking literally billions of people, about 3,000,000,000 people that don't have access to the gospel, they might not have known that 15 minutes ago. So if that's the case, then it might be time to kind of research that a little bit.
Go to the Joshua project online. Just Google Joshua project and missions or gospel access or whatever. The four intent. These are things that you can just Google and learn about and find out who are those people groups, where are they located, how many people are being sent in order to reach them. All that stuff just grows our heart for and that's the most important, step of all.
It means we'll pray more. It means we'll give so that it'll happen, but it also means we might be able to say, like, boy, could I go of course, a lot of people. That's terrifying. Of course, it is. I it's problematic.
It's how would you do this? Yeah. It might be nice not have raised money, but it does mean that you're living in another culture. It does mean that you're having to learn all the adjustments I've been making here. That might be terrifying, but it it's also an adventure.
It's something to say, man, maybe I'm giving my life to something that's not just so I can maybe have a nice house and be able to maybe get a second home or have a boat or take nice vacations, but maybe I'm I'm doing my career in order to do something nobody else is doing. And here's the thing. You might think like, oh, I'm not prepared for that or equipped for that. But the reality is if you know Jesus and you've known him for 5 years in the west, you know more than anybody in the neighborhood you'll move to. You know, if I had been converted in 5 years ago, I would know more than anyone in not only in my entire apartment here, not only my whole, Mahale, they say here, the neighborhood.
I would know more than most of this whole city about Jesus. And it doesn't take much knowledge. It just takes a little bit of experience. And if you've had an experience with God, he's equipped you with it. It's really just a matter of getting there.
So I suggest that people do a little research, grow their heart for it, come to our website to be able to learn more about global marketplace multipliers. If they go to, GPonline.org/gmm, which stands for Global Marketplace Multipliers. They can sign up for a newsletter. They're gonna hear about all this stuff, become more knowledgeable about it, and maybe we can help them find a job in another country at some strategic point. But it takes a lot of preparation to get there.
We do some things to prepare people and train them, and then keep them connected afterwards so they don't get lonely in the task. Well, we will link to that in the show notes and challenge people to do this, educate themselves, learn because there are a lot of people who listen to this who have a heartbeat for work as worship, but maybe they'll grow in their heart for the lost people, the unreached people groups of the world. So thanks, David, so much for embodying this work, actually doing it, but also for your passion in activating, the gospel going to new places through the marketplace. Well, it's a real privilege to be able to talk about I mean, in the end, know, we don't wanna push anybody to do this, but we do wanna help people dream about it. There are a lot of people out there that maybe they thought about, maybe I would like to live and work abroad at some point, or maybe they're just like, boy, I'm really engaged with my church.
I love what I'm doing, but I really feel like I could be doing so much more. But I don't wanna not do my work. It's my career is my calling. I feel like the thing I do is my job, and they haven't found a way to do that and have it make a difference. I tell you what, if they could do their job in some of these places with unreached people groups, man alive.
The impact they could have could be generational for those people. You could be the start of a whole movement of disciple makers in a place where there are no disciple makers. That is the kind of thing that's a life legacy that is kind of almost immeasurable for eternity. Well, we'll be praying and hoping for the people who are listening that God will stir their hearts, and maybe you'll have more people engage in this mission. Wonderful.
It all starts just with taking your work seriously where you live now. That's certainly the start of it. And over time, though, it can be pretty crazy. Thanks so much, David. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Marketplace Multipliers podcast.
For more information, go to www.marketplacemultipliers.com. Please like and subscribe to this podcast and share with others who may benefit. And remember, you too can integrate your faith and influence your workplace for Christ.