David: 0:02

Welcome to the Boundless Bible. My name is David Shapiro, hey, I'm Javi Marquez and I'm Jason Holloway. Welcome guys. How's it going? Awesome, Very excited today.

David: 0:17

Very excited Today. I'm excited because we have a very special guest. Today's guest is someone I deeply admire, not just for what he's done, but for who he is. Pastor Dan Sutherland is a kingdom-minded leader with a heart that beats for the gospel and a vision that stretches across nations. He's planted churches both here in the US and overseas, but more than that, he's poured into his life, into mentoring pastors and church planners who carry the same fire. Dan has a rare gift he meets people exactly where they are, connects deeply and somehow leaves you walking away feeling seen, stretched and stirred to do more for the kingdom. He lives out Paul's words becoming all things to all people so that, by all means, some might be saved. If you ever needed clarity, courage and confirmation in your calling, this conversation will give you just that. Welcome Dan.

Dan: 1:03

Thank you. I'm kind of excited to meet this guy, whoever he is. It's quite an introduction. David, welcome to the podcast. Thank you, javi, appreciate it, so excited for this.

David: 1:14

Why don't we just start off kind of telling a little bit about yourself and who you are and your journey with Christ?

Dan: 1:19

A Texican, was raised in a Christian home. Not sure that we were all in on following Christ, but we were church folks and we were believing folks and did not find my own way to Christ until I was a 17-year-old senior. In high school my youth pastor led me to Christ, which was amazing. I think she was the first real Christ follower I'd ever met and I kind of came out of that experience just wanting to pastor people and help others find their way to Jesus. And that's what I've been doing the last 50 years One wife, two kids, seven grandkids. Blessed to be back in South Florida, god's good and we're blessed to have you back here, Absolutely so.

David: 2:12

50 years. You've been doing this for 50 years in the industry. Yes, sir, Just an off the cuff question is you know, what is one thing you've learned in 50 years that you did not expect to learn when you?

Dan: 2:25

started. Oh wow, there'd be hundreds of those things. I think one of the things I've had to learn, david, is to take God more seriously and not take myself as seriously. Oh wow, you know, to lighten up on me and to tighten up on him has been a really good thing, and particularly around just who Jesus is and who he wants to be in our lives. That's been the fun part.

Javi: 2:51

That's awesome. Yeah, I'm excited for this. I I just love how you kind of make things that are complicated. It makes it so simple, easy to digest, easy to just kind of like take practice and and move forward.

Jason: 3:03

So and make practical right. Yeah, you can use. Every time I walk out of one of your sermons, it's like this is something I can use today.

Dan: 3:09

Well, thank you guys. I think I'm a simpleton so I have to do that. You know, I need to put the cookies on the bottom shelf so I can reach them. That's so good, that's funny that helps.

David: 3:20

One of the things that I've heard you speak on that is near and dear to all of our hearts but definitely we know it's to yours is discipleship. We've heard you speak on discipleship quite a bit. Why don't we just kind of go through the basics of what discipleship means and then we can go from there? Some of the passages that I've heard you speak about.

Dan: 3:38

Thank you, bud. I would love to do that. I think we have to start with what's the definition of a disciple? So for me I've wrestled with this some over the years but to me a disciple is someone who does what Jesus does and obeys what Jesus teaches. So you're trying to follow Jesus in doing what he does, but you're also really paying attention to what Scripture says. And we ask the questions all the time at the church what's Jesus teaching? What are you doing about it? So to me, that's the heart of a disciple. So if I could get that heartbeat, I'm well on my way.

David: 4:20

Which leads right into 1 Corinthians 11.1, which is Be imitators of me as I am of Christ. And that's exactly what you just said. But what does that passage really mean to you?

Dan: 4:29

Well, in the simplest English I know that passage means monkey see, monkey do yeah.

Javi: 4:35

As simple as that.

Dan: 4:38

That's what the passage means. It's I see what it means to follow Christ and I do what it means to follow Christ and Paul was able to say that to the Corinthians because he was sincerely trying to follow Jesus. He didn't have it perfect, but he was ahead of them. So it's kind of the concept that a fifth grader can disciple a third grader and a middle schooler can disciple an elementary kid and a middle schooler can disciple an elementary kid and a high schooler can disciple a middle schooler. Sometimes the best person to disciple use the one that's just ahead of you, not the one that's you know 10 years ahead.

Javi: 5:16

And I love that you you said that, I heard you say that before and to me that opened up so much to with discipleship and leadership in, uh, just in our walk, and I think to me that's I could take ownership in that right, me being maybe a fifth grader, maybe not a 10th grader, yeah, I can still teach somebody else that's in third grade, second grade, and play my part in in my walk to getting you know, to the higher grades, or maybe just continue to deepen in my relationship with Jesus Christ and my walk. I could do that, anyone could do that, and I think, yeah, now Right, and I love that you, that concept just opened up my walk and my sense of my purpose and what God calls us to do, which is the Great Commission, right, I think it helps me too, javi, we're a little bit afraid of I'm not deep enough yet, or I'm not far enough yet, or I haven't learned enough yet, or I haven't arrived yet.

Dan: 6:16

But again the concept is there's somebody ahead of me, yeah, they disciple me. There's somebody behind me, I disciple me, there's somebody behind me, I disciple them.

Javi: 6:26

Yeah, it eliminates the, the, the. I'm not talented enough, I'm not good enough, so I'm not going to do it.

David: 6:32

Yeah, it definitely disarms your, your inaccuracies. That's what it does it disarms it and you get to be part of the kingdom story.

Jason: 6:40

Well, I mean, that's kind of like the whole Christian faith, right? We always are waiting until we're good enough to approach God, and this is one of those times where you can really practically see that.

Dan: 6:49

I don't need to be ready. I think we don't understand that the disciples were sent out by Jesus, two by two, after they've been following him four months, right Four months. Not four years, not 40 years four months. And then Jesus leaves and leaves the whole thing in their hand after three years, right, yeah, so these guys weren't ready. That's it For what they were doing but they were ahead spiritually of where the people that they were leading were. So fifth grader leading the third grader.

Jason: 7:21

That's it, and it's so consistent with who God is right Again, God doesn't wait for you to be good enough to come to him. God says come to me as you are, I will help you grow and you will help others grow. And it's this beautiful symmetry to the whole Christian faith.

Javi: 7:37

Yeah, I think there's a lot there too, right? I mean, you'll probably go into it as far as maybe, how to disciple, how to go out. I think in discipleship, evangelism is involved in all that right and just kind of sharing your faith and all that.

David: 7:49

I know that when you look at 1 Corinthians 11.1, when Paul says be like me, who is like Jesus, a lot of people actually took that as him being vain. Is him saying you have?

Javi: 8:00

to be like me.

David: 8:01

Yeah, yeah, but he's not. And what he's saying I think this is a beautiful thing is anybody can be a disciple. Of a disciple, anybody can give knowledge and can share their life, their testimony, their knowledge of Christ with somebody else. And I think that that's a beautiful part of it and I think that Paul was very wise in how he formulated that sentence. The other thing that leads into is you know, 2 Timothy 2.2,. This now is when discipleship is being passed on. You see multiple people, multiple generations in this statement. Where you know a disciple, it's not just hey, I'm discipled, I'm a student, and then it ends what happens after that? Now, you've learned a little bit, you feel like you're a second or a fifth grader. What happens after that? Well, you've learned a little bit, you feel like you're a second or a fifth grader. What happens?

Dan: 8:45

after that. Well, to me, knowledge equals responsibility. So the minute I learn something, david, I'm now responsible A to live it and B to pass it on. That's what discipleship is. So the verse you're referring to in Timothy there are four generations in that verse. I think there's a fifth one, but the four that are in the verse are Paul says the things you've heard and learned from me. Pass these on to others who will be able to teach others as well. So you got Paul to Timothy, to Timothy's disciple, to Timothy's disciple's disciple.

Dan: 9:27

If you go back to the early book of Acts, barnabas discipled Paul. So you got five generations in this picture. So at the time Paul was discipled by Barnabas, barnabas was ahead of him, made sense. Timothy wasn't even in the picture yet, but now, years later, timothy's in the picture when that verse is written in Timothy. Timothy's now a young pastor. He's having to disciple people. I guess it's this idea for me. We are all children and we are all grandchildren and we all have kids and we all have grandkids and I'm talking about spiritually Right, right. So I look back at the men that discipled me and realize somebody discipled them. I'm 69 now. I've lived long enough to see multiple generations of people I've discipled. That's the fun part You're building the family of God. That's what discipleship is.

David: 10:25

Yeah you have a way of putting things down that that opens people's minds, and I'm going to try to see if I can do that to you. There might be a sixth generation in there, and the sixth one is if you look at original judaism, this you know, the discipleship program wasn't a christian notion. Yeah, jewish people did this, where the rabbi would take on students and they would teach them.

David: 10:47

And not only would the students want to learn the knowledge, but they try to become like the rabbi, exactly. Um, it's part of it, and paul's rabbi was gamaliel.

David: 10:57

Yeah, and he was somebody who paul was supposed to. Now Paul was way more extreme. Gamaliel was actually somebody who was known for being more moderate and being more respectful, especially to people outside of Judaism, but he was a highly respected Sanhedrin. He was actually the grandson of Hillel, who is one of the greatest sages, but he actually started Paul in that learning, so there might even be a sixth generation in there. The reality is David.

Dan: 11:28

If you're talking about 2000 years of Christianity, there are hundreds of generations. It's exponential. You won't even be able to diagram this till we're in heaven itself. But this is why Jesus' command to go make disciples is the central command. It's the idea of what I've taught you. You now have the responsibility A to live and B to teach somebody else. That's the fun part, yeah.

David: 11:56

Yeah, what would you say for somebody out there who is studying the Bible? They feel like they're doing the right thing. Hey, I pray. When I wake up in the morning I'm reading my Bible, I'm listening to worship music, I'm trying to live a more Christ-centered life. But they get to the point where, hey, we know we're supposed to go and evangelize or go and spread, and they're a little bit nervous. They're a little bit. They're not feeling like that's their strong suit, they're feeling a little inadequate and they're kind of keeping it to themselves. What would some advice you'd give to them.

Dan: 12:27

I think understanding the context of of the great commission helps me here, david, we read it as go make disciples. Right, it's a little bit more of as you go make disciples. This is not the idea of I'm sending you to South Africa to make disciples or I'm sending you to New York City to make disciples. It's more the idea of in your life today, make disciples, teach, baptize, share the gospel. That's the idea.

Dan: 13:04

So for me it becomes a little less formidable if I understand that Jesus simply wants me to disciple the people in my circles, my neighbors, my friends, guys I hang out with people that I run into. That's who I'm responsible for. That's God's plan for reaching the world. He scatters us all over the world, but he uses us each in our own locality. So to me I'm a little less intimidated by that get up and go thing If I read it as hey, lord, today I'm willing to share you with. Whoever you let me cross paths with, just put them in my path. Yeah, whoever you let me cross paths with, just put them in my path.

David: 13:47

Yeah yeah, I don't recall the name. I apologize, but there was somebody who is responsible for discipleship and who's discipled I mean thousands and thousands of people who is an extreme introvert, and one of the things he told me is I don't need to disciple a thousand people, I disciple one person who's an extrovert, and they can then go out. And so your reach is not based just on your own hands, it is discipling somebody you know. You start looking at some of these major evangelists. People have been out there, have spoken to millions of people. They had a teacher who just taught them.

Jason: 14:21

Well, you only have to plant one seed to plant a whole field, right, I mean it's it. It multiplies itself.

Javi: 14:26

Yeah, multiplication, yeah, it multiplies.

Jason: 14:32

And so one of the things that I'm interested in again, I kind of have a different angle from all these guys, because I'm still freshly back into the faith and I'm kind of relearning what it means as an adult, having learned it as a child, and one of the things that I'm kind of doing right now is just realizing that one of the best ways I can disciple is just by being a better version of myself than I was before. And when I'm. When I do that and people know who I used to be and they know who I am now, they start asking questions. And they start asking questions. You know why you seem a little bit more happy, or you know that used to really frustrate you. I usually get ticked off about that. You know five years ago what's going on now and I find that's a really easy way to like introduce. Well, you know. You know, like you said, sometimes people get uncomfortable sharing it, but it's very easy when people come to you for it yeah, sometimes they could.

Javi: 15:13

I think we see that in the bible too. I would say like, sometimes, when you do go to your locale, sometimes people would reject you because they know you as that way in the past or whatever it is, and we see that with like uh, I, uh I don't know the verse, but I think Jesus talked about um in your hometown the least respect what is that I forgot. I don't know.

Dan: 15:31

I don't know, profit without honor in their hometown.

Javi: 15:33

Right, and you know and and we see that I think there's a way of going about it and um, but I liked the, the the easy approach of that. Like, hey, start with where you're at, start with your friends, start with your neighbors and just open up about what's God done in your life.

David: 15:47

Yeah, I think that's it. Let me ask you, because you know there is also this question of biblical knowledge versus your own testimony. If you're going to disciple somebody, where do you think the best way to get the information is to disciple? Are you discipling someone based on what Jesus has done for you? Based on biblical knowledge? Based on both, yes.

Dan: 16:10

Right, it's got to be both. Okay, yeah To me. If it's just knowledge, david, then I am in an information-based discipleship. Discipleship at its best is relationship-based. Discipleship at its best is relationship based, it's me and you doing life together, learning about Jesus together, learning new truths together, praying for each other, applying them Is. Is the Bible knowledge part, a piece of it? Without a doubt, for sure it's. It's a main tool. Is it the goal? No, right, it's the tool. Is it the goal? No, right, it's the tool.

Dan: 16:50

We worship the living Word of God, not the written Word of God. Now, I grew up in a church. I came pretty close to worshiping the written Word of God. It was about Bible knowledge. It was about quoting Scripture, it was about understanding all the eschatology and all the history and, honestly, it was dry bones. It did not have life for me until I found that relationship with Christ as a senior in high school. So I believe that the best discipleship is I'm going to walk with you through your life right now. We're going to walk together and we're going to talk together about what's Jesus teaching us and what are we doing about it. And, by the way, studying this book together will be a big piece.

Jason: 17:41

I love what you say about relationship, because one of the first people I talked to in the church about all this stuff was you and you know you and, and both pastor Eric also said you know you both having known it or not known it you both said the same thing, which is you got a lot of information but you really got to find that relationship. Yeah, and one of the things that, like an analogy that I used I might have even used in another podcast is that the, the bible and and relationship with God is a lot like if you read a book about basketball and how you play it, you'd understand it. If you went to a basketball game, you'd understand it a whole lot differently. And if you played the game, you'll understand it in a whole different way because it's a part of your life, it's a part of your action, part of your emotion. You learn the details.

Dan: 18:19

So I think I could teach basketball from a book or from a bench as a coach Right from a book or from a bench as a coach. But I think if I truly want to experience basketball with somebody else, we're both on the floor. That's discipleship. We're both on the floor. I'm not just the coach, I'm not just the person in the stands, I'm not just the historian giving you the information.

Jason: 18:43

I'm on the floor with you and you have to be the person they're passing the ball to, and you got to be comfortable enough to pass it back. I mean, it's a. It's a. It's a very relational thing, and David and I have talked about this a lot. We read a million books and always throwing them back and forth to each other.

Jason: 18:56

But one of the things that I realized the other night as I was reading is like I love these books, I enjoy these books, but I don't think any of these books have brought me closer to God. I think they've filled the part of me I need filled, but what fills my heart of God is being in it for long enough to realize why it all matters in the first place. You know, being able to pray about it and having an answer from that prayer, or listening to a worship song and having it hit me in some deep place, so deep I didn't even know it was there. And it's interesting, for I don't know if everybody in this world is so academic like some of the people here on this podcast are, but it's important for me to remember the academics are a part of me, but it's not the only part and in fact, it's not the most important part, and so this relationship is really important. I think discipleship is about that too.

Javi: 19:38

No, I can relate to that. I think when I first came to Christ and I wanted to know more, I was diving into the books. I was diving into you know just everything about it and I even at times Bible-thumped people and just kind of threw these scriptures at people and just kind of lost relationships. In that it was really sad.

Javi: 19:56

But as I continue to grow in my faith and finding a church like ours and stuff like that, I've learned that the walk matters probably more and the life and doing life for others and just truly loving others, um, in Christ, and then you know really having patience and really having to to share what's gone in your life but also trying to raise them up and just dive deeper with Christ and seeking God first. Um has taught me a big thing about relationships and what God wants for us in, in, in our kingdom, you know, in the kingdom.

Jason: 20:30

Pastor Dan, what do you think some of the biggest challenges people have with discipleship are?

Dan: 20:34

I think the biggest challenge is we don't understand discipleship because we haven't been discipled. Oh, okay, it's. It's kind of like marriage. Yeah, you can study it, you can read about it, you can study it, you can read about it, you can observe it. Until you're married, it's kind of hard to know fully what's going on. So I think many of our churches if I could just go for it here are all about Sunday morning or they're all about Bible classes or they're all about going up through a certain system of learning, maybe not necessarily that much about making disciples Right, right. So I think the thing that holds us up the most is we just haven't experienced it. Once you have, you're hooked. Yeah, I mean you guys are discipling each other through this podcast For sure you know that's happening. You're sharper because you do this together. I've been thinking about that.

Jason: 21:34

Still pretty dull, but I'm sharper.

Javi: 21:37

I've been thinking about that lately. I think having a conversation with you maybe earlier on this year, and just having the perspective of multiplication as a, as a, as a goal, as a, as a purpose, um means so much more to me now in in my walk, rather than, you know, feeding myself and learning more and just kind of doing that and just really being well, what does multiplication looks like? What does go and make discipleship disciples look like? And that's truly, yeah, Doing life, life to life.

Dan: 22:11

But he did not disciple the 12 by saying, hey guys, let's work our way through the book of Isaiah. There's no place in the three years where he pulls out the scroll of Isaiah and says, okay, let's look at the first scroll. What does this Hebrew word mean? What is this about? That's a great point. He's not against that, but it's not what he does. Yeah, they do life together and in the doing of life they disciple each other. They talk about what's god teaching you. What are you doing about it? Jesus taught more parables. He quoted more parables than he quoted verses of scripture. Interesting, told lots of stories. Yep, uh, I'm not down on scripture. Don't hear that. I'm as up on scriptures anybody I know. But I have seen some people in churches that know scripture really well, but they're still mean. Son of a guns. Yeah, the character hasn't been changed right. So is discipleship working? I Maybe not in that setting, so to me that's the fun.

Jason: 23:19

I think there's a logistical problem with being, you know, with not discipling right. Like Jesus couldn't reach every human being on his own right. And some churches, like you said and it's not an accusation or anything else, but some churches are the leadership of the team is who you need to pay attention to, it's who you have to connect with, it's who you have to integrate with. Leadership of the team is who you need to pay attention to. It's who you have to connect with. It, too, you have to integrate with. You got 10,000 people all trying to deal with those five people. You know that's going to be. You're going to have some, some bottlenecks, but you know Jesus, like you said, four months he had two of them going out at a time, three years, it's on you guys. And then it was expansion by exponentialism And's like I don't need to be the head of anything. I'm just an arm, you know, one of many, many arms in in a much larger body, and that's both freeing and a sense of responsibility. It's both Right, yeah.

David: 24:05

I think that's part of having you know. When we're talking about having somebody you know above you who is discipling you, somebody below you you're discipling. I think that also keeps you honest. You're looking at somebody, you're discipling, and you need to make sure you're at your best and doing the right thing for them. Yeah, for sure. And the same thing, you're keeping the person above you accountable, you know, a lot of times. That's why they say students can teach the teacher, and there's no better way to learn than to teach. Absolutely.

David: 24:28

One of the other things that happens and God does this, and he's brilliant at this is he puts things in place in such a way where you have Paul, which I mentioned. He was more extreme than who had taught him, um, and and what ended up happening? Is God, what he does, is he uses what is quote unquote evil. So you have this man who is persecuting all of the Christians, who was doing all this evil, but he's doing it with this conviction um, changes it for good, and now he, with this conviction um, changes it for good, and now he has this conviction for spreading the gospel. Yeah, and it was only that type of conviction and that type of of gall to go out there that needed at that moment. And god used that.

David: 25:06

And I look at you know, listen, pastor dan is one of the people who, when I started my journey into academics, I was meeting with people who were college professors and part of academia, and they were great people, but they were.

David: 25:20

Their focus was solely knowledge, right, and I was there and I was like, no, this is where I need to be. And then, at the time where I met Pastor Dan, I was ready to release some of that and realize that the academics wasn't everything, that there is the part of the emotion, the relationship, the testimony. God did something in me that had nothing to do with what I was reading on a paper and and that was just that time. Again, god's timing was like hey, here's this person who has this education, who has this background, who has this knowledge, and nobody would ever know it. Um, because what he's going to lead from is he's going to lead from a relationship, and it was one of the most beautiful things that I got to learn from you, just by being around you, not even asking you to teach it, and that's that doing the life together, right, yeah, I mean can can you talk a little bit more about that relationship thing?

Jason: 26:09

I mean I'm, I'm getting, I'm starting to get something I don't know if I ever like practically put into terms before, but to get a better relationship with God. You get to better relationship with people who follow God and in watching their, their journey, you can then mold your journey more.

Dan: 26:25

You do. When the scripture talks about bad company corrupts good morals, yeah, yeah, the flip side is also true. Good company helps produce good more. Yeah, you become like the people you spend the most time with, jason. Yes, we just do. Yes. So if I can hang out with, do life with, people that love Jesus and are really going after him, that will help me to want to do the same thing.

Dan: 26:57

You guys have heard me tell the story. I have a third grade grandson. He was third grade at the time that was diagnosed with severe dyslexia very bright, but saw all his words backwards and scram. So they got him in a new school with a dyslexia expert at the school, somebody that had graduate degrees in dyslexia that could work with him. She worked with him. His parents worked with him. The most effective person to disciple him as a third grader was his fifth grade brother. No way, because his fifth grade brother could say I understand what you're dealing with here, try this, try this, and literally walked him through that. Yeah. So again, sometimes it's not sitting at the feet of a master that changes your life. It can. Yeah, it's these relationships where iron on iron, as the old testament describes, where it's about the relationship. If my relationship with god is the goal, then these relationships can help me get there. Yeah, yeah and vice versa yeah.

Jason: 28:09

And again, it's interesting because I kept hearing you have to have relationship with god. You have to relationship with god and I'm like how do I do that? I'm reading the bible, I'm praying, I'm doing these things, but I'm not changing very much. I'm getting to know him, but that's not a personal relationship. And it's only been kind of recently, in Ava even maybe in this moment, that I'm kind of realizing that how we get closer to God is literally by seeing him reflected in the people that we're spending time with. And also, side note, my dad used to tell me when I was a kid you hang out with people below you, they'll pull you down. You hang out with people above you, they'll pull you up. Oh wow.

Dan: 28:37

Well, it seems to be true.

Jason: 28:50

Same concept, less biblical, but same concept there. But it is true and that's what I. It wasn't because God didn't call me or because people didn't call me, or because I didn't call me. It was because I didn't have a community, I didn't have the discipleship of the people around me to bring me up and instead I had people bringing me down, and it just. These types of things are so important.

Javi: 29:08

Yeah, that's what I love about churches. I think church is a good way to find community with people that are going through life just like you and wanting to know God a little bit further. And I think those people if anyone out there is really struggling with going to churches or finding a good church, please go and try to find a good church. Churches are meant to shape you, to help you, to lift you, to give you a community where you could be able to lean on someone on a practical level, rather than like searching it from someone on the pulpit.

Jason: 29:38

Sometimes it's hard to you know that's a strong statement right there. Rather than searching for your safety from someone in the pulpits, search for your safety and your knowledge.

Javi: 29:45

Yeah, seriously, I mean, it's you know it's kind of hard to really I'm not. I'm a wait to be discipled because I want the person on the pulpit disciple because he's the one that knows. No, there's other people around you that going through same thing you're going through. You know and and could help you lift you up. I love the fact that you just said, pastor dan, your, your third grade, your fifth grader was teaching your third grade what it is is also the fifth grade. You said something there that was really key for me was the fifth grader knows what you're going through because I just I just went through that, rather than maybe somebody that was in 10th grade and going I'm already above what you're going through, cause I just I just went through that rather than maybe somebody that was in 10th grade and going.

Jason: 30:16

I'm already above what you're.

Javi: 30:18

I can't really see the little finite stuff that you're going through, because I I'm not thinking about that, rather than I'm thinking about something else. You know far from what you're thinking about. Wait, I'm in fifth grade, I know I went through that just yesterday, so I know where you're going to that little municipal thing. So I think that's big Totally and I think churches and relationships are are huge in our faith and I hold tight to that because relationships I just. The more I read the Bible, the more I see that it's all about relationships.

Jason: 30:47

It's funny because our again, I'm still new to this, and three years ago, if you told me I was going to have a series of friends who were men that we met with on a regular basis, I would have told you no way, that's just. That's not how our society works anymore. Our society is not built around communities anymore, you know, and and that's really detrimental to our society.

Jason: 31:05

And it's funny, because now I'm thinking that there was this meme. You ever seen this meme that the greatest miracle that Jesus ever, uh, ever, made come true was the fact that he had 12 friends after the age of 30.

Javi: 31:16

I think I've seen that.

Jason: 31:17

I thought that was hysterical, but I mean it's true, like the, the, the ability to have community at this age, the ability to be able to have a group of people who I have a covenantal you know relationship with. You know it's not. We don't just hang out to have fun, we hang out to talk about stuff, and when things aren't going good, we talk. And when things are going good, we talk. And that's not the relationship that most men and I don't know about women, but that's not the relationship most men have after the age of 30. And so being able to do so in a God-centered environment around a God-centered philosophy is probably the most valuable thing. Anybody who's listening to this, who doesn't have that, can get themselves into.

David: 31:59

I'll say that you know, we talk about God and Jesus, how they model everything for us, and this is what we're looking at. We're looking at what was modeled for us. When I look at the 12 disciples and I see how they were discipled. I even look at people who weren't even part of Jesus. And when you look at God and what he could have done, he could have sent a slew of rabbis to go and teach everybody he could have done.

Javi: 32:17

He could have snapped his fingers and everybody would have already had it and what he did was.

David: 32:22

you know we look at the, the timing at which jesus was crucified. You know this was done on purpose and what it was is. This is the holiday of passover. This is where the pilgrimage I think about this a lot the mandatory pilgrimage was for the jews to come back to Jerusalem, so you have the most amount of Jewish people from all these other nations there witnessing the crucifixion of Jesus, and they stayed because Shavuot was now seven weeks later, which is the other pilgrimage, so they're also seeing the resurrection. Oh, I didn't know that. Yes, so now you have all of these people who God has placed there for relationship to those next 40 days I'm seeing.

David: 33:00

I'm, yeah, and I'm seeing the crucifixion. I'm hearing about the resurrection, and now I'm hearing this new preaching, and, and it's amazing that God had created this for relationship. He wanted people to be together at the same place at the same time, and it wasn't. Hey, you're going to be here to listen to one person, one master. You're going to be there to share this, to witness this together. Um, it's just one of those things where I'm going. You know, God had it right from the beginning, Um, and and it's funny that you know so many people today still don't get it right. We'd still understand it. He's been doing it right for so many, you know, for so many years.

Jason: 33:36

I imagine there's more stuff that you've learned and forgotten in your life than I'll ever learn. I doubt that.

Dan: 33:42

There's a lot I have forgotten. No doubt about that.

Jason: 33:50

But I, you know, I wonder, like I, a question, maybe a kind of a selfish question, especially when I first got back in. When you really start being a disciple which which I give the terminology of being an apprentice really right, Like that's what you're trying to do. You're trying to be like Christ and one of the biggest things that comes up when you try to be like Christ is, the closer you get to being like Christ, the more far you realize you're from ever being actually like Christ. Do you find that people give up in that moment, or that they have a crisis of faith in that moment when they realize that they're just not there? Like, what's your advice for somebody who's trying to be a disciple, trying to apprentice to be like God, like Jesus, but are having a hard time?

Dan: 34:25

I don't see as many people giving up because they realize that it's unattainable, because I think what you also get to see, jason and you've seen it is you see the life change in your own life. So, yes, the closer you get to Jesus, the more you realize how far you are. Yeah, it's the idea of walking into the light. The more you're in the light, the more you see the shadow and the darkness in your own soul. But when I can look back at the life change that has occurred, if I had no other proof of the reality of Jesus other than the way he's changed my life, that's enough. I agree, the way he's changed my daughter's life, my friend's life, my grandson's life. So the fun part to me is's life, my grandson's life. So the fun part to me is, yes, I have more questions. Yes, I realize how vast God is the closer I get to him, but yes, I'm impressed with what he's done. That's it. That's the counterbalance. That's a beautiful answer.

David: 35:30

Thank you, that's great.

Dan: 35:36

Well, listen, we can talk about this for days and days and days.

Javi: 35:37

I kind of want to. I don't really want to let.

David: 35:38

Dan go, pastor Dan, I really appreciate you coming out here and having this conversation with us. If you have questions, if you want to get in touch with Pastor Dan, dansatthelocalchurchcom is where you can get in touch with him, and then you can also get in touch with us as well. Is where you can get in touch with him, and then you can also get in touch with us as well.

Jason: 35:56

Yeah, guys, this has been awesome. Having Pastor Dan on here has been a dream come true. But that's going to be it for today's episode of the Boundless Bible. So if you enjoyed this conversation, don't forget to hit follow so you never miss an episode. We'd love to hear from you, leave a review, drop us a rating on your favorite podcast app and, hey, share it with a friend if they need to hear it. So thanks for spending time with us and we'll see you next time. Thanks, thanks, guys.