Healthy Faith
May 4, 2022

Discipling To the Nations - How You Can Get Involved

Josh Howard discusses the important mission for impactful discipleship. Tune in now and engage your community for global change.

Josh Howard, an American missionary, joins us on the podcast today to talk about his personal mission field in India and how you can get involved in missions from anywhere in the world. Discipleship is more than just serving in third world countries. Serving in your community at home or your city can be just as effective discipleship. Listen as we talk about the current state of the church, global missions, and how people can be involved even if they're not a missionary.

Josh Howard is an American missionary, but he travels to many other places to teach people of Christ. A few years ago, Josh went to India to do his job. He ended up finding a woman named Lashi Loll. They fell in love and got married in India. They have lived there ever since. They now have two sons, Josiah and Jeremiah. Josh and Lashi and their sons go to many places to tell people about God. Josh and Lashi now work at a children's home for orphans in India and still travel everywhere as evangelists.

JOSH'S SOCIALS

LINKED IN: https://www.linkedin.com/in/josh-howard-609a4216b/

JOSH'S MINISTRY - Central India Christian Mission

PREVIOUS JOSH HOWARD PODCAST EPISODE

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When we think about discipleship or about teaching others about Jesus, we often think of going to a 3rd world country or somewhere far away. Josh Howard and I are here to tell you how to get involved in discipleship in your own community that also affects the nations. Listen as we talk about the current state of the church, global missions, and how people can be involved even if they're not a missionary.

Discipling To the Nations - How You Can Get Involved

I am pumped about this guest. He is a repeater, and don’t turn it off yet because this guy inspires me every single time I chat with him. He was on the Brett Snodgrass Podcast, numero uno. His name is Josh Howard. He is a missionary in India. He moved to India several years ago in the mission field. They are doing a movement that is going wildfire for the gospel in India. He said in 2022, they’ve seen 27,000 people give their lives to Christ. They have planted thousands of house churches. It is growing exponentially. God is doing the major work with Central India Christian Mission through Josh Howard’s ministry over there.

He has also started a real estate business in Indianapolis, Indiana. He doesn’t have to raise support anymore. He talked about, in their first full year, $500,000. He’s brought other people from his mission and his staff to work for his real estate company. He’s teaching other tempt makers in the mission field doing their own businesses. This guy inspires me. Before I get into Josh Howard and interview him, I want you guys to go over to the Iron Deep Channel on YouTube. Make sure you hit that subscribe button. Comment in the comment section if you like what we’re doing here. I also want you to go over to our brand-new website, IronDeep.com.

Check out our Men’s Awakening, September 25th through the 28th, 2022. Apply for the Men’s Awakening. We got a few spots left. You guys are not going to wanna miss that. We are going to dig deep into men’s lives. It’s going to be a little real and raw. It’s going to be amazing. I have a new book coming out. I’m talking about this war that drove men to struggle with the secret war that’s not all glamorous. Sometimes, we have this battle going on inside of us as men. I’m excited about what God’s doing. I cannot wait to introduce you guys to Josh Howard.

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I’m back with our guest. Mr. Josh Howard is a repeat guest. I don’t get to say that often. Welcome back to the show.

I’m sorry. You got to hear from me again.

I was looking back. You were on the first show. I did a lot of real estate shows before this show, but you were on the numero uno Brett Snodgrass when we transitioned to talking about men, business, and entrepreneurs impacting the world, which you are doing. You are living in India. Check out the first show with Josh Howard. That was an awesome show. My wife loved it. You are sharing about your faith. The title of it was Living a Life Worth Dying For. Thanks for being back and being a guest.

It’s an honor to be here. Thank you. I love you to death and I appreciate you.

Let’s get us updated with you. God has been working in your life. He’s been working out crazy through India. We heard about what you were doing before with the Central India Christian Mission, planning churches, doing this movement, and disciple-making. You started a real estate business. We want to talk about that because it’s important because most of the guys are business owners and entrepreneurs reading this. It’s important you’re out there impacting the kingdom, but you can start this business as well. Give us an update over the last several years.

God has been on the move in crazy ways. It’s getting crazy that we’re at a point where we’re trying to stay out of God’s way. He’s moving in miraculous and unbelievable ways. We’re trying to stay out of the way to see him continue to move. Here is a brief update on things. We’ve been pressing hard to see as many disciples made and as many churches planted as possible. We want to make disciples who make disciples and plant churches that plant churches. We want to see that happen all over South Asia and as many of the most unreached places as possible.

Our hardened vision is to see no place left without the gospel. Where are the places, gaps, and areas that the love of Jesus has not reached? How can we see disciples made and multiplied in those areas? We’re recording this in mid-2022. I don’t know the exact numbers. It’s off the top of my head, but we had between 5,000 and 6,000 churches started in 2021. That is crazy. God is moving in crazy, ridiculous ways. In 2022, we’ve seen over 27,000 people accept Jesus, and 4,100 churches started in the last six months. That’s January through June of 2022.

When you start seeing the exponential growth of disciples who make disciples and churches that plant churches, God is able to do unbelievable things. To remind our readers who may not have read the first one, these are not seminary bible college-trained people out there who are big-name pastors and preachers. These are ordinary, everyday people who have caught a vision to share the gospel with their friends, family, coworkers, other neighbors, and all those people. They’ve been trained and equipped in simple, reproducible ways to start house churches that multiply. God loves doing extraordinary things through ordinary people. That’s what we’re about. We want to see that happen in as many places as we can.

I love when you talk about the passion and the vision behind what you’re doing and what God’s doing, disciples making disciples and multiplying. You’re in India. You’re getting used to this, not used to it of God working, but you’re catching the vision. You’re seeing these house churches planted. Over here, it’s a little bit different. Can you dive into disciples making disciples, this movement, house churches, Eastern, what you guys are doing over there versus what we’re doing here in the United States?

One of the traps we’ve fallen into in the West is this whole idea, and there’s a ton of data around this. We’ve not done a great job making disciples of Jesus. People who look, talk, act, walk, and love like him. The systems that we’ve created in the West don’t do a great job of churning out great disciples. We get good disciples sometimes, but it’s more in spite of what we’re doing, not because of what we’re doing a lot of times. We’re almost accidentally making disciples, not intentionally making disciples. We want to and we talk about it. It’s our goal but you would never hear a pastor in America say, “I’m not into disciple-making.” You’ll never hear somebody say that because it’s the final command of Jesus.

The issue is we’ve created such a consumeristic culture that people are there at church or in small groups for what they can get out of it and what they receive. It’s not what they can give or how they can impact the area. I’m not talking about every Christian in the West. There are some great people out there doing great stuff. Traditionally speaking, this is the type of culture we’ve created.

IDP 88 | Discipleship
Discipleship: The issue is really, we've created such a consumeristic culture that people are there at church or in small groups for what they can get out of it, what they receive. It's not really what they can give or how they can really impact the area.

In India, we’re trying to focus on shifting from knowledge-based discipleship or discipleship that’s all about gaining knowledge, all about me, a consumeristic style of discipleship, to obedience-based and action-based discipleship. How are we living this stuff out on a daily basis? When we’re challenging, equipping, and encouraging everyday people to not just gain knowledge but also act out what they’re learning and do what Jesus has called us to do, they are radically changing their cities, villages, neighbors, and all these people because they’re truly becoming real followers of Jesus.

Brett, we say all the time in the West, “I’m a follower of Jesus.” We say that, but the truth is we’re not following him anywhere. What I tell our guys all the time is when you follow the footsteps of Jesus and if you’re truly following him, they’re always going to lead to 3 or 4 places. When you follow the footsteps of Jesus, they’re going to lead you to the lost, broken, prayer closet, and cross. When you look at how Jesus walked, lived, talked, and acted, his footsteps consistently led to lost and broken, hurting people, alone to spend time with his father to see what he needed to do next and to a cross that he sacrificed everything for the mission that he was on.

For us, as Christ’s followers, if we’re going to be true to disciples and followers of him, our footsteps must lead. If we’re going to follow Jesus, they’ve got to go to the loss, the broken, and the hurting. They’ve got to lead to personal quiet time alone with the Father. It’s got to have to pick up a cross man whenever we get there to sacrifice all of our wants, desires, and needs for the sake of the kingdom. That’s the type of disciples we want to try to multiply.

In the West, we say, “I’m a follower of Jesus.” We want Jesus in our life. We want what that brings, but we don’t want the sacrifice of living out the lifestyle he lived out, mimicking him and living in his image. I captured what you were talking about. We don’t have a great system and process of making disciples. If you were to ask me and anyone going to the church I go to, it’s like, “What’s your system of making disciples? What’s your process?” I would say, “I don’t know. Maybe I talk to someone if they bring up Jesus. That’s my system.”

I love that you have this process and system. Talking to business guys and entrepreneurs, you guys get that. We all have processes and systems on how to train and equip people to plant churches. We all have the same heart. We all want the same thing, especially as Christians, but you guys have this great system of discipleship-making and planting churches. I love the everyday people. I want to ask this question for you. I might ask this on the first show, but there’s been so much in the West. We’re talking about big churches, megachurches, celebrity pastors, consumerism, listening, getting some knowledge, going and not doing much about it. Do you think that way of doing church is dead?

Is it dead? No. There are still vibrant, incredible, and amazing churches out there that are large, doing a great job, and impacting their community. It is still alive and kicking. Many of them are doing incredible work. When I’m talking about more of the disciple-making movement stuff and the everyday people stuff, it’s not necessarily to say, “The way we’re doing church is bad or wrong. It’s dead. We’ve got to quit doing it that way. We’ve got to do it a different way.”

What I am saying is the longer time goes on and the more we lean into that consumeristic lifestyle, it will kill what we’re trying to do. It will internally begin to destroy the system in which we’re hoping to create. When we’re creating a system it’s all about me and not about what Jesus has called us to do, it sometimes leads to this inner decay that leads to this discontentedness. The majority of people sitting in the pews know deep inside there’s got to be more to this Christian life than this. There’s got to be more than me attending, giving a few bucks in the offering plate, maybe going to a small group, and going home. There’s got to be more than that.

What we’re seeing churches do, rather than dying, we’re seeing churches that are sensing this same thing, Brett. We even lead cohorts of churches and groups of churches that are all dreaming about making the change you and I are talking about. We’re seeing more and more churches across the world. Rather than sinking back and saying, “We’re dead. It’s done,” they’re beginning to see how we can shift and change to be disciple-making focused, multiplication-focused, and outward-focused rather than inward-focused, not consumeristic, but mission-oriented. How can we shift our church’s culture to be all about that? We’re seeing churches by God’s grace catch this vision and begin to make that change.

I will say this, Brett. If churches don’t begin to make that change, the pathway we’re on is toward death and dying if we’re not making that shift and change. The churches that are making that shift and change are beginning to see their people awakened with a brand new purpose and identity about what God is calling them to do. It’s bringing life and power back into their churches, which is unbelievable to see.

It doesn’t have to be an either or two. You guys are also coming alongside these churches and talking about this. I always tell my wife all the time, like, “I want to bring and do this inside of our home, not a building that we go to, sing some songs, and listen to a message. I want to live this out.” My heart is on fire. This is awesome what you guys are doing. It is amazing to see many disciples come into Christ. I want to transition a little bit because we’re talking to a lot of business owners and entrepreneurs on this show. I would call you a missionary. Is that right or not?

Yeah, that’s true.

You’re a missionary and you’ve been planting churches in India, but I saw a couple of years ago you started a business, which I thought was fascinating because I know how hard it is to start a business in Indianapolis. The real estate business is what I’ve been doing for the last several years. You started a business also in the Midwest. You’re flipping houses and doing some real estate as well. You lived in India and I was like, “This is fascinating.” Some people are like, “This is hard here. I can imagine someone living in India.” You were doing all this other stuff and God is doing amazing work, but you also launched this successful business. Can you talk about that? What was the reason behind that? Talk about what’s been going on with that and the results.

My brother-in-law, Greg, is my wife’s sister’s husband. He and I have been talking for years because we’re entrepreneurial anyway. We’re apostolic. We like to start new stuff. We’ve been talking for years about wanting to create income streams. We’re not living fully on support from the West. We can do the mission work we’re doing as volunteers and take care of our family and the future of our kids without needing to depend on foreign support. You never know when that’s going to stay or go. You never know when it’s going to dry up or increase. I don’t know if you know this. There’s a ceiling in the nonprofit world of how much you can make.

We had families and kids. We’re thinking about their future and college. We’d been dreaming for a long time. Could we potentially, like the Apostle Paul, do some tent making where we had a business that we were running where we were getting income from? We had kicked around a few ideas. We’d even dabbled in a few other things. Nothing stuck and nothing was good. A mutual friend of ours, Chris Galanos, who’s also been on this show before, he and I were talking on the phone one day and I was sharing with him this vision. I was like, “What would it look like for us to take care of our families through a business like tent making but still do our mission work?” He was like, “Have you ever heard of wholesaling real estate?” I had not. I was like, “No.” This was a few years ago.

I signed up for a course and started to learn. I tapped my brother-in-law on the shoulder, and I was like, “This is it. This is what we’ve been waiting for. This is what we need to do.” We launched a few years ago. We didn’t know what we were doing. We were trying. I still remember. About a month after marketing to sellers to try to buy their house, like direct-to-seller marketing, we closed our first deal.

It was a small deal. I think it was $2,400, but when that money hit our bank account, we were like, “We can do this. This is real. We can make a living doing this.” We went gangbusters. We increased marketing. We did everything we could. In the final quarter of that year, we made over $50,000 profit, which was more than my annual salary as a missionary.

We dove in and did everything we could. Our business brought in over $500,000 in profit in our first year of sailing. That radically changed not only our lives but the staff we brought on. We brought on a church planter as one of our acquisitions managers. He planted a church and wanted to do a similar thing. He made the entire salary he needed by being one of our acquisitions managers.

We hired another campus pastor of a church in another part of the country. He started making money. We hired another leader of a church to help us out. The COO of our real estate company is also the COO of what we’re doing internationally on the ministry side. It is unbelievable to see what God has done through this. He’s providing not only for Greg and me but now an entire team of people. It’s been unbelievable to see what God’s done from it. It changed our lives.

I’d have to lie. We chatted quickly after you started your business. You were telling me these things you’re going to do. I’ve been wholesaling and flipping houses for years. I know it’s difficult. There was some doubt in the back of my mind. I was like, “I hope this works for you.” I don’t know if it will because I get a lot of calls. A lot of people come to me, and a lot of people don’t end up making it. It’s heartwarming to see you guys being successful, not only impacting your own selves and your own family. I had no idea you had other people on your staff working this business and making their salaries.

How has your mind shifted from that mentality? I know you went and did some training on how to raise support, how to be a missionary, and what that is. I’ve talked to other missionaries. That’s what they do. They go to this course and get trained on how to race support. Sometimes, this other side of missionary work is frustrating at times and you have to do that. How has your mind shifted for yourself and other missionaries you come into contact with?

I don’t know if you know we’ve done this or not. This is a cool thing. First, let me tell you how my mind shifted about other missionaries. Honestly, it shifted a lot because the truth is I have a lot of friends who are missionaries on the field. They usually get their support from a ton of different churches all combined. If one of their major supporters ends up shutting down support or they say, “We can’t give anymore,” they’ve got to leave the field, go back to America, and raise that support because they can’t live there without that support.

When you’re constantly dependent upon the ebbs and flows of how generous people are or ungenerous they are, you’re fully dependent on that. There is a piece of living by faith. I get that completely. That’s awesome and great. This whole tent-making mentality radically changed the way I view this because of our first full year in wholesaling and what that did for Greg, me, and our team of people.

Me, Greg, and one of our other friends who’s also in South Asia, a guy named Jared, put our heads together and said, “What would it look like if we could help train other missionaries in other countries how they could do the same thing.” We launched this thing called Nomad Wholesaling. The idea is we’re targeting church planters, pastors, and missionaries on how they can build similar businesses to what we’ve done and help coach them through that process.

We’ve got a guy in Slovenia, Thailand, and Sri Lanka. We’ve got an old church planter in America. We’ve got these different people that we’ve been pouring into to try to help them start similar businesses. When it clicks for them, it changes everything. Our guy in Slovenia is killing it. He’s doing wholesaling from Slovenia. Not only that, he recruited a couple that’s going to come, live, and be part of their team in Slovenia. That couple didn’t have to raise support because his wholesaling company is now going to be supporting that couple in Slovenia. It changes everything.

You’d think Paul was onto something thousands of years ago with what he was doing. We’ve got a passion for trying to help other pastors, missionaries, and leaders. How can they start similar things to help provide for themselves and their families so that way they can focus on the work they need to do in that country and not have to worry about the fluctuations of support?

IDP 88 | Discipleship
Discipleship: We've got a passion to try to help other pastors, missionaries, and leaders so they can focus just on the work they need to do in that country and not really have to worry about the fluctuations of support.

I love your heart behind it because it goes back to that multiplication and abundant mindset. Everything you learn and in your heart, you pass it forward to impact people. I know what that’s like. There’s this double-edged sword. You have these marketplace leaders who are making a lot of profit and money, but they want more purpose and impact. They’re like, “I want more meaning to my life.”

You got these missionaries on the other side. They have purpose, impact, and a heart, but they don’t have a lot of profit. It’s this frustrating thing. I love what you guys are doing with that. That’s exciting to see. How was business? Sometimes, when you start something and you’re passionate, now you’re a couple of years in, is it still cranking? You got a good system down. You’re bringing this team and you’re helping them out. What’s it looking like now?

We’ve got the best acquisitions team we’ve ever had.

None of them are in the States.

Our acquisitions team are all in the States. Our church planter in Indianapolis is in Indi. We have two other couples that are in the Midwest. They’re not in Indianapolis but they’re strong believers. They love the Lord. They’re killing it. They are doing a great job. We’ve got several VAs in the Philippines that are on our team. The world is flat. Our new COO is in England. Greg and I live here in India. We’re doing it all from here. Like any business, there are ebbs and flows. This last quarter of 2022 of real estate was a tough quarter but you’re always going to have that. We’ve got fifteen properties on contracts. We’ve got four more that are supposed to be signing on. It’s picked back up again. It’s kicking again. It’s going well.

Anything has ebbs and flows. I’m sure your ministry throughout the years has had a lot of ebbs.

A lot of ebbs. Sometimes, there is no flow. Sometimes a lot of flow. You never know.

We got about five a few more minutes here, Josh. I want to dive in. We talked about what’s on your heart. Your heart is impact, multiplication, and making disciples. You’re in this business and impacting people that way. Is there anything on your heart that’s been brewing that God has been laying on your heart?

You’re always thinking about something. It’s like midnight where you’re at on this show. Wheels are turning. Is there anything stirring and brewing in your heart? I know you’re coming over to the Midwest in St. Louis. You’re meeting with some people there about what you’re doing. Let’s spend these last few minutes talking about what’s been brewing in your heart as you’re seeing success in India.

There are a few things that’s been brewing. I don’t know if we’ll have time to go into all of them. You know how it is. Entrepreneurs always have twenty things on their minds at once. One of them is more a personal spiritual thing that God has been doing in my heart. The other one is more of the thing you’re talking about and what we’re doing in St. Louis. Let me start with that one. If you had asked me, Brett, where I felt my burden of responsibility for the kingdom and Jesus several years ago when I moved to India, I would’ve said it was probably 99% South Asia and 1% the West. That 1% was the fund and provided finances for what I was doing in South Asia.

Over the last several years, God has been doing something different in my heart, where that burden of responsibility is beginning to even out. I’m feeling this deep longing and calling to take what we’re learning in the East and help the West begin to move in that direction. God is doing something special globally now. The way he’s moving in India, he longs to move that way all over the world. He longs to move that way everywhere.

I tell people all the time, “If you have a lost child, your heart breaks, whether he’s lost in Delhi, India or New York City. It doesn’t matter where the child is. Your heart is broken because he is lost and away from home. Our Father’s heart, when he’s lost sons and daughters who are dying without him is breaking whether that lost person lives in Mumbai, Beijing, or Chicago, Illinois. It doesn’t matter. That’s a child of God that is lost without him.

God is longing to see movement and multiplication and his spirit spread globally in every nation and place. He wants to draw every lost son and daughter home. That’s our God’s heart. Because of that, we want to take everything that we’re seeing God do in South Asia and help as many churches across the world no matter where they’re at. That type of movement and multiplication takes place. I’m a part of this initiative in America called Made to Multiply. The idea is that God created us men to multiply like Genesis 1, 2, and 3. When he created man and woman, he’s like, “Be fruitful and multiply. Have a bunch of kids.” The great commission was repeating that command in a spiritual sense. Go make disciples of all nations. Jesus was saying, “Go be fruitful and multiply.” Spiritually, go multiply yourselves.

The whole idea of the Genesis command was to spread the image of God across the Earth. We are made in his image. He wanted that image to be multiplied across the planet. That’s the same thing Jesus wanted. He wanted his spirit, heart, and love to be multiplied across the nations. That’s what this whole Made to Multiply idea is. We want to build citywide coalitions across the country of America to see gospel saturation take place. Every neighborhood, every nook and cranny, every street, every person, all lost people to see and experience Jesus.

We want the local everyday people to be equipped, trained and raised up so that they can go out and see amazing things take place in their area. That’s something that has been deep in my heart because we know in the West when somebody gets involved locally, they’re also going to be inspired by what God is doing globally. We want those two worlds to be connected. What God is doing globally, we want it to be able to impact locally where everybody’s at. That’s the heartbeat behind what we’re talking about.

IDP 88 | Discipleship
Discipleship: In the west, when somebody gets involved locally, they're also going to be inspired by what God is doing globally. And we want those two worlds to be connected, what God is doing globally. We want it to be able to impact locally where everybody's at.

It was funny because God was speaking to me. I’ve been talking a lot about fruit. I did an episode a couple of weeks ago. I did a solo tour. I was talking about fruit. I’ve been studying John 15. It is about the vine and the branches remaining in Christ. He will remain in us. I’m talking about how he will know by looking at our fruit. I was talking about fruit like we talk about in West heaven or eternity. One of the questions is like, “Where’s the fruit? Where are the people that came with you? Why are you by yourself?”

I love the message behind be fruitful and multiply. I know that I would love to get behind it. I love to learn more about it. It’s that shift in mindset is anything. We get ingrained with how we’re supposed to do things and the old way of doing things. Coming back to this is awesome. You had a story I want you to share before the show that we haven’t shared yet. You were talking about a couple of gentlemen over in India. They were going to villages, belly to belly, face to face. You talked about hundreds of villages these men have visited. Can you tell that story at the end of the show here?

A few years back, God put this vision in my heart about Luke 10 and Matthew 10 themes. Jesus sent out his disciples two by two in those chapters. They went village to village, proclaiming the kingdom, casting out demons, and healing the sick. They were seeing an incredible impact as Jesus was coming to town. The vision was, what would it look like to have teams like that now in a place like India, going town to town, village to village, proclaiming the kingdom? What would that look like?

We began to cast vision and recruit people. We got seven teams of two. These are fourteen guys that said, “We’re going to give the next year of our lives to this. We’re going to go after these two districts in India.” The goal is to hit every village in that district. We started this several months ago. They have already hit 303 villages in the last several months. Belly to belly, knee to knee, they have shared the gospel with over 3,200 people in several months. Every day, they are in new villages. It’s unbelievable.

On our WhatsApp group, we’re getting GPS coordinates every day where these people are at. It is cool to see every day what God is doing through these guys. They’re seeing miraculous things happen. They’re seeing people set free from demonic junk in their lives. They’re seeing the kingdom come. It’s cool to see their eyes light up.

I was with them, Brett. That whole team is here in my city. We had a meeting together to hear testimonies. When they thought about going into ministry, this is what they dreamed of. They get to do it. When I looked at these guys, I was like, “Most of the time, I’m in an office. You’re my heroes. You’re here doing it.” It was cool. This was a beta test. Our vision and dream is we want to scale this. We have teams like this in every district of India and South Asia. We can know beyond a shadow of a doubt that the great commission has been completed in every district of this nation. That’s the heart that we’re going after.

Can I ask you a quick personal question? When these gentlemen came in, what was their energy like? This sounds exhausting, going village to village, or maybe draining. I’ve talked to pastors in the West. A lot of times, the exhaustion sets in. I want to ask you personally. There is no right or wrong answer. What was their energy like when they were sharing with you the stories and testimonies?

All power, excitement, and energy. We’ve made a big deal about their rhythms of life. This is going to sound horrible. They are not allowed, one day a week, to do any of this work. They have one Sabbath day every week that they are not going out and doing this. We’ve made that a part of their commitment to us. Every morning, they have to have abiding time with Jesus before they hit the villages. If they’ve not been connected to the vine, they are not going out to try to get any fruit. Many of these guys spend a couple of hours every morning before they go out to the village alone with Jesus and the Father, abiding in him and worshiping him.

When you’re living a lifestyle and your rhythms are like that, all the ministry is out of the overflow of what God is giving you. You’re not depleting your tank like that when you’re living in those rhythms. I’ve been there and I still get there sometimes. The reason why most of us leaders get depleted is because we don’t have those rhythms in our lives. We’re constantly pouring out and never getting poured into.

IDP 88 | Discipleship
Discipleship: The reason why we get so depleted is because we don't have those rhythms in our lives. We're constantly pouring out and never getting poured into.

We’ve made it clear with these guys. This needs to be out of the overflow of your relationship with Jesus and the Sabbath, which is why when God created the Earth, day one after Adam and Eve were created was the day of rest. Everybody thinks, “God worked for six days and he rested.” Day one of humanity was rest. He was saying, “You don’t rest from work. You work out of the rest that you’ve received.” That’s what he was teaching them from day one of humanity being created. What we’re trying to teach them is getting proper rhythms in place.

I was curious about that. You’re right when we talk about that. When I feel depleted, it’s because I’m doing and not connected to the vine. We talked about John 15. We’re out of time, Josh. Thank you so much, but I want you to give one last word of advice. A lot of business owners and entrepreneurs are reading this. They’re in the marketplace and doing business. They’re normal individuals doing the business but influential, driven people. Do you have anything to share with them?

If I could sit down with every single one of these guys, what I would tell them is the global kingdom and the mission of Jesus desperately need you. We need your skills, abilities, minds, entrepreneurial spirit, finances, generosity, heart, and focus. If we’re going to see the great commission completed in our lifetime, it’s not going to be full-time pastors and missionaries who get that done. We need all hands on deck. Jesus has called us to complete this task. You are desperately needed, wanted, and valued because of the gifts and abilities you bring.

Many entrepreneurs have many skills around vision, planning, and strategy. If we’re going to get the job done, we need truckloads and boatloads of strategy, vision, and planning to get this job done. Please jump in, get in the game, and do whatever you can. If you don’t know what to do, give me a call. I will put you in the game. We’ll get you involved. If I could say anything, they are valued, loved, and needed in the global kingdom not for their checkbook but for their skills, abilities, vision, and strategy. We need all of it for the global kingdom.

I love what you said there because a lot of times, rich, wealthy, and successful people get hit up a lot for their checkbook. That’s why we have started Iron Deep. It is more than the skills and resources. If their heart gets touched by the gospel, I feel the leadership leading their families and organizations, influencing people, and multiplications. This is awesome. Thank you so much, Josh, for being on the show. I appreciate you and everything you’re doing. Maybe we’ll have you back.

It sounds great. It was awesome being here, Brett. Thank you. I appreciate it.

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