The Rusty George Podcast

00;00;07;25 - 00;00;17;29
Narrator
Welcome to Leading Simple with Rusty George. Our goal is to make following Jesus and leading others a bit more simple. Here's your host, Rusty George.

00;00;18;15 - 00;00;44;18
Rusty George
Hey, welcome to Leading Simple. My name's Rusty George. Episode 214 Today we're going to be talking to a pastor by the name of Ricky Jenkins. Ricky is the senior pastor of Southwest Church in Indian Wells, California. It's a thriving community of believers compelled by its vision to be a gospel centered, multi ethnic, intergenerational church that loves discipleship. It's located in the heart of the Coachella Valley and know that it's not just for the concert.

00;00;45;02 - 00;01;05;16
Rusty George
Southwest is one of the fastest growing churches in the nation who've been praying fervently for a revival in our times. I had heard about Ricky for years and finally connected with him on his podcast. Enjoyed him so much. We invited him to participate in our revival coming up in October. And you may be thinking, when is that? Hey, check out the real life website.

00;01;05;23 - 00;01;23;20
Rusty George
We will be giving you more information on that. In fact, go to the real life church app, download that enable your notifications and we will be sending you alerts about this revival coming up the first week of October that you will have a chance to be a part of. Cannot wait for you to experience that. You're going to love it.

00;01;23;28 - 00;01;42;03
Rusty George
Well, I had a great conversation with Ricky. You're going to really enjoy hearing from him. As always, we are sponsored by stadium stadiums, a church planning organization that is helping launch brand new churches. And we are in a mission right now at real life to plant 30 churches by the year 2030. And Stadia is helping us to do that.

00;01;42;12 - 00;02;06;13
Rusty George
They find potential church planters. They assess church planters, prepare them for the trials and tribulations of church planning, and send them out. And we get to help them along the way. So here's what I want to encourage you to do. Not everybody listening to this wants to play in a church, but you could support somebody who is. Would you go to stadia church planting dot org and make a donation to stadia?

00;02;06;21 - 00;02;25;03
Rusty George
Even if it's just five bucks, maybe it's going to be $5,000. But whatever it is, it's going to go to help plant more churches, go to stadia, church planning board, great organization. We support them here real life. In fact, every time you give the real life, part of that goes to stadia church planting. Well, we're honored to have Ricky Jenkins with us.

00;02;25;03 - 00;02;38;02
Rusty George
Here's my conversation with him. Ricky Jenkins, thank you so much for being on the podcast. For our listeners that don't know you. Let's start off with the low hanging fruit. Why in the world are you a Notre Dame fan?

00;02;38;27 - 00;03;06;04
Ricky Jenkins
Well, Rusty, you know I love Jesus and Notre Dame is Jesus, his team. We've even got a statue of him in South Bend. So but now everybody has asked me that for years. So, man, I'm originally from a small town called Pearl, Mississippi, and my parents were kind of old school like fundamentalist Christians. So no movies, no. No playing cards and no cable TV.

00;03;06;11 - 00;03;06;25
Rusty George
Mm hmm.

00;03;07;05 - 00;03;17;14
Ricky Jenkins
So if you're a ten year old kid and you want to watch college football, you knew that no matter what, Notre Dame was going to be on TV because of the ABC contract.

00;03;17;15 - 00;03;18;07
Rusty George
Absolutely.

00;03;18;07 - 00;03;43;11
Ricky Jenkins
So it was just by default they were on every Saturday. So from the Rockets mile days and Rick Miller and all those guys, those were my boyhood heroes. And I did Thick as a Thief with the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. Ever since I've got signed pictures from Lou Holtz at this office, I've got, I think, Jack Lalanne's over there.

00;03;43;11 - 00;04;02;10
Ricky Jenkins
I've got memorabilia from the seventies and sixties. So I'm a true fan. And you have to be a true fan because we will never win a national championship again. And I know we can't. It's impossible because we refuse to lower our grade standards because we're holy. Yes. And it is what it is. This is the price you pay.

00;04;02;10 - 00;04;05;05
Ricky Jenkins
Yes. So, yeah, that's that's the story, man.

00;04;05;06 - 00;04;31;08
Rusty George
Yes. Well, with great suffering, you know, really comes great reward one day. So good for you. Well, I. I respect that. I respect that for people that. Hang on. I'm from Kansas. So I mean, I've been a long suffering Royals and Chiefs fan and I got into basketball and same kind of deal. It wasn't on cable yet. So the only station carrying it was CBS.

00;04;31;08 - 00;04;35;07
Rusty George
And they played the Lakers all the time. So it worked out pretty well for me. But you.

00;04;35;07 - 00;04;35;16
Ricky Jenkins
Go.

00;04;35;22 - 00;04;47;29
Rusty George
To college for college football, not so much. So. All right. So you grew up in Mississippi. How in the world did you get to California? And for our listeners that aren't aware, tell us the name of your church and where you are and how long you've been there.

00;04;48;29 - 00;05;31;12
Ricky Jenkins
Sure, sure. Absolutely. So I am in Southern California in the Coachella Valley, which is most southern most southern California's referred to as the desert. So when you hear Palm Springs think Coachella Valley and Rusty, I've kind of been on a circuitous route, man. Born and raised in Mississippi. First church I pastored was in Oakland, California. Okay. And the traditional denomination I grew up in was there in my twenties for about seven years and just kind of making tents whilst I preached because it was like a, you know, on a great Sunday there were 40 people there and so definitely a megachurch background and got my teeth in Oakland for seven years but have linked up

00;05;31;12 - 00;05;59;15
Ricky Jenkins
and have been mentored for years at the time. This is 0708 by a guy named Brian Lorenz, and Brian was at a multiethnic church in Memphis, Tennessee, and had been trying to figure out a way to get me to Tennessee. I hadn't done my seminary yet. And so this church had this vision for pastoral residency raised but but a buttload of money to just gift seminarians tuition.

00;05;59;18 - 00;06;12;06
Ricky Jenkins
Right. And and train them up. So Brian comes to me in oh seven and says, hey, I want to I want you to move to Memphis, be one of the pastors on staff, and it will pay for your seminary. And I was like, I definitely want to let you do that.

00;06;12;21 - 00;06;13;19
Rusty George
So wow.

00;06;13;27 - 00;06;39;13
Ricky Jenkins
Felt the call got to jump. They're open. They went multi-site during those years, so I helped them become multi-site. I married my wife April in 2012, we jump to Chicago, where I was at Trinity Seminary working on my doctorate, finished coursework, moved back to Memphis, Tennessee at Fellowship Memphis Church, where we thought we were going to be there forever.

00;06;39;13 - 00;07;00;02
Ricky Jenkins
But if you want to make God laugh, tell him your plan. Hey, man. So around late 16, early 17, we're kind of feeling, man, we felt this this church that we've been at now two times, we thought this was kind of where God wanted us, but God sent us back to come and be a blessing to that church, help them out, but also to prepare our hearts for the crazy.

00;07;00;02 - 00;07;26;09
Ricky Jenkins
Because if you would have told me I'd be at a retirement village in Indian Wells, California, with mostly white brothers and sisters that I'm pastoring. I would have told you, man, whatever it is you're smoking, it is some strong stuff. It was the last thing on our minds. But man, you know, again, there's this church that was going through some challenges at the time.

00;07;26;09 - 00;07;51;15
Ricky Jenkins
Me and April were going through some challenges, trying to discern our long term, and it ended up being a match made in heaven, I would say. And so we came out to Southwest Church in January of 18, meaning we've been here just a smidgen over four years. Servant here, love it, love the people, love the region, love what God's doing here, love what needs to happen here.

00;07;51;29 - 00;08;02;10
Ricky Jenkins
So yeah, man, that's, that's a little bit of my kind of roundabout way and route to the desert. It's truly a god thing, and we just love raising up our family here.

00;08;02;23 - 00;08;03;24
Rusty George
How many kids do you have?

00;08;05;06 - 00;08;29;20
Ricky Jenkins
It's three kids. We're done. And so if we have another baby, it's. It's a miracle. But, yeah, three beautiful children. I mean, April, I've been married going on ten years, and so we've got two boys and a girl, Camden is my seven year old Grandy boy. We call them grand like grand piano because we named him after our grandfathers, whose names we don't like.

00;08;30;14 - 00;08;31;02
Ricky Jenkins
So.

00;08;32;18 - 00;08;34;02
Rusty George
Well, now you got to tell us their name.

00;08;35;08 - 00;08;41;27
Ricky Jenkins
Well, now I got to tell you the name. So my granddad, who's my hero, his real name is Willie, right? No, William, it's Willie.

00;08;42;03 - 00;08;42;16
Rusty George
Okay?

00;08;43;00 - 00;09;05;10
Ricky Jenkins
April's granddad. We just lost him. He's in heaven. His real name. Real name is Bobby, not Robert. And there's no way we're going to name this kid Willie Bobby. Right? It's just not going to happen. So we wanted to honor them, so that's why we call them grand. He's my little boy. He's five. And then my darling daughter Andy is three.

00;09;05;15 - 00;09;24;19
Ricky Jenkins
So, Cuevas full house spirit. We think adoption may be in our future once I finish this doctorate, if I finish this doctorate. And so, yeah, I mean, that's the family. Love it. Love being a dad. Just love it. It's just laughs and exhaustion, you know, all day. Yeah. Yeah.

00;09;24;19 - 00;09;47;12
Rusty George
You are in the thick of it right there, buddy. Well, good for you. Yeah, man. Well, listen, I have heard about you from our mutual friend Michael Hinton to Michael Hinton and others for years. And it's so great to finally talk to you. But tell me a little bit about, you know, Southwest Church. I mean, you mentioned it's you know, it's a retirement community at the time when you got there, mostly white.

00;09;47;15 - 00;09;51;29
Rusty George
What's been the most rewarding part of being there? What's been the most challenging part of being there?

00;09;52;25 - 00;09;55;22
Ricky Jenkins
Gosh, that question may have the same answer, right?

00;09;55;25 - 00;09;56;06
Rusty George
Okay.

00;09;56;29 - 00;10;28;16
Ricky Jenkins
First you, pastor, and you know that the same thing that stresses you is the same thing that blesses you often and the ministry. And so I would say I think the most rewarding thing is being you know, I'm not going to cliche it away. Right? I love shepherding. I really do love tending Christ's flock. There's something about that that just it resonates with the deepest part of the soul.

00;10;29;03 - 00;10;49;08
Ricky Jenkins
There's something in me that was made to shepherd and care for people, but that's any church, right? What's most rewarding here is that we seem to be in a paradigmatic shift for this the footprint of ministry that God's gift to this church, 50 year old church about to be. And here we are in the middle of the Coachella Valley.

00;10;49;09 - 00;11;34;17
Ricky Jenkins
It's the biggest church in the Coachella Valley. So it kind of has this responsibility to bless the whole valley and to nurture the smaller churches. So we've kind of got this position of responsibility. But bro, long story short, Southwest is a great church that's just been through a lot in her 50 years. Three very tumultuous endings to pastoral tenures as my predecessors and just a lot of honestly trauma with some of the ending of these ten years that this church had to suffer, that those leaders suffered, that has kind of become part of the story, the narrative surrounding the church in our city.

00;11;34;27 - 00;12;02;04
Ricky Jenkins
And so good or bad, ugly, that's another story for another time. But here I think God used those trappings to allow for openness for both the church to consider me and for me to consider the church. And I think I'm just here at a moment where I think, Rusty, we've been here for years, I think through this ministry, kind of a revolving door church, a lot of transient.

00;12;02;04 - 00;12;24;27
Ricky Jenkins
A lot of people come from over, from around the world to come vacation here. I haven't checked the numbers here lately. I'm very confident to say well over 3000 saved since early 18. Right. So just we've seen hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people come to Jesus, just 330 since Christmas Eve. Wow. And that's that's Jesus. Right.

00;12;24;27 - 00;12;25;02
Rusty George
Right.

00;12;25;18 - 00;12;49;17
Ricky Jenkins
My preaching and I, I know that's not it. So I feel like the most rewarding thing is that I seem God has seen fit to call me to minister at a time where He is graciously answering the prayers of that faithful remnant here who have been praying these prayers for 50 years. And I know that it is just obvious that's the most rewarding thing, man.

00;12;49;18 - 00;13;17;25
Ricky Jenkins
The most challenging thing, quite honestly, is just, you know, how do you love on a church but yet lead a church who has been through these tumultuous. The word I use is traumatizing moments in their history that have been so consistent for them that that was many of their spiritual formation.

00;13;18;14 - 00;13;18;24
Rusty George
Mhm.

00;13;20;07 - 00;13;45;10
Ricky Jenkins
Right, right. So like how do you love on a body for whom reality taught them that pastors are good then they're bad. Yeah, things at church are good and then it goes real bad right. And so that has been the challenge quite honestly. Obviously me and you have the same last two years as did every pastor in the world.

00;13;46;23 - 00;14;18;00
Ricky Jenkins
COVID political division, Amaud Arbery, George Floyd and all these other sensationalized moments. And I went through all that. But my biggest struggle the last two years was navigating a church through crisis for a whole crisis. It was normal and everything tells them to go back to those familiar trappings and surroundings. Right? Yeah. Because they went through these leadership shifts where leaders taught them not to trust leaders.

00;14;18;15 - 00;14;38;20
Ricky Jenkins
Yeah, it here I am in a moment of crisis trying to say, hey, I think this is where North is, let's go. Right. And so that's been the most challenging. There were moments in some of that up and down this where about a year and a half ago, I was just thinking, all right, I don't have to be paid to be a pastor.

00;14;38;20 - 00;14;59;00
Ricky Jenkins
I don't have to be on a staff to be in a pastor. Lowe's, Home Depot, they're still essential. So there were no there are members was just like, I just buy a small house and get some of this equity. I'll I'll load up lumber and trucks and I'll just have a small group because to the birds with this.

00;14;59;00 - 00;15;34;02
Ricky Jenkins
Right, exactly. So but on the other side, right of the up and down again, the sweetness of shepherding the body, it made me man, you know, I kind of want to finish here, right? Like I want to do the next 20 years here, if that's what Jesus has for us and what he has for this church. And I would I would be so honored to be that guy along with my wife, the gal, and a lot with our team, the leaders who nurse the church back to full health, where, well, after we're gone, they are continuing to make Jesus famous, which is kind of like our catchphrase here at Southwest Church.

00;15;34;02 - 00;15;44;02
Ricky Jenkins
So, yeah, man, we're trying to we're trying to raise up a church that we can hand down our kids when we're gone, bro. So that's what's happening, man. That's a long answer. But I'm a preacher, and you know what you're getting yourself into right now?

00;15;44;03 - 00;16;09;11
Rusty George
I know. I love it. And I love the fact that you've mentioned so many great things there about when you go through trauma, you kind of resort back to what you've you've kind of your muscle memory of what you've learned in the past. Right. The previous ten years of pastors that ended poorly, had they all had long stays there, or are you reaching a point where you're going to outlast some of their ten years as far as length goes?

00;16;10;13 - 00;16;35;14
Ricky Jenkins
Yeah, no, kind of kind of yes and no. And so the church's history is kind of really marked by a leader who was here three pastors ago, will not mention his name out of respect, but just a dynamic leader who was kind of the guy who brought the church from substantial to mega. Right. So like he took it at, let's say six, 700 and brought it to 5000.

00;16;36;00 - 00;17;02;17
Ricky Jenkins
Just an other worldly kind of gift, nationally famous kind of had the cream of the crop in the desert attending here was a mover and shaker and just struggled and what this a moral failure that made national news. Our story was picked up on Jay Leno's monologue. Well, one night it was such an embarrassing moment in the history of the church.

00;17;02;17 - 00;17;34;06
Ricky Jenkins
So he was here about 20 years, I believe. Okay. And the gentleman after him, true man of God, by the way, his successor, who really corrected some things and brought stability. But again, just kind of, you know, numbers were going down. He was more of a stability guy, not a mobility guy. Right. And so because of that membership going down and they decided to make a transition that perhaps they would say we could have done that better than the guy before was only about two or three, maybe three or four years.

00;17;34;09 - 00;17;51;11
Ricky Jenkins
And so about four years broke. So the guppy of the pond. Yeah. So we'll see how it goes. I've tried to. You know how it is, man. You're not the pastor till after 55 years and you're not a pastor who can actually lead till after seven. Yeah. So, yeah, definitely. But still on card.

00;17;51;19 - 00;18;08;25
Rusty George
Yeah. Well, the one thing you have going forward as all pastors who are still pastors have is we're the only ones to lead them through a pandemic. You know, when you are the guy that led them through COVID and right, wrong or indifferent, we all made our mistakes. We'd all do it differently next time.

00;18;08;25 - 00;18;09;14
Ricky Jenkins
Absolutely.

00;18;09;14 - 00;18;38;29
Rusty George
But to all the pastors out there, beat themselves up for mistakes. Listen, we didn't have a playbook. None of us were. We're calling up at Stanley saying, hey, how'd you handle the Spanish flu? Because, you know, he went there and we all learned on our own. So, right. This is who we have and we're moving ahead. So one of the things I love about how you describe your church and I took this right off your website, gospel centered, multiethnic make, intergenerational church walk.

00;18;38;29 - 00;18;41;08
Rusty George
Walk us through what that means to you.

00;18;41;20 - 00;19;03;01
Ricky Jenkins
Yeah, well, that's kind of you know, you know how it is when we do our vision mission stuff, bro. Right. It's just, you know, it's answer the question. What does the Bible say that the body of Christ looks like? What does the Bible say that the body of Christ should be doing? And how does the Bible suggest that that happens?

00;19;03;01 - 00;19;30;26
Ricky Jenkins
Right. So that that's just that, you know, I've been in I've been in Christ for almost 30 years. I think I think 30 years this year. So 45 since I was a teenager. And the echo of scripture and my relationship with Jesus in my own experiences growing up as an African-American in Mississippi and being raised by families who had been through the literal struggle that you see on documentaries, right?

00;19;30;26 - 00;19;52;10
Ricky Jenkins
Like that's all in my history. So I kind of grew up being well attuned to what Scripture has to say about obviously Jesus at the center of it all and having an understanding holistically of the gospel or about the gospel, not just this one point of what happens when I put my faith in Jesus on Friday night at camp when I was 17.

00;19;52;17 - 00;20;16;20
Ricky Jenkins
Yeah, that's certainly it, right? I'm saved. But now the gospel is is the framework. Yeah, right through which I live my life. It's not this point, but it's a framework and that's always been conviction. And obviously, man, you can't I'm not sure you can read the Bible and not see racial reconciliation, social reconciliation, whatever kind of reconciliation. What a fill in the blank on every other page of scripture.

00;20;16;21 - 00;20;46;25
Ricky Jenkins
Yeah. Seems to be this, this, this arc of reconciliation from Genesis all the way to Revelation. God progressively revealing Himself and overcoming the middle walls of partition, which is where this multiethnic ethos comes from. And then just inter-generational, you mentioned the word legacy and your prayer. And I definitely see this expectation that the gospel is having this this transmission that has taken place from generation to generation.

00;20;47;03 - 00;21;08;23
Ricky Jenkins
And the way we see it around here is you're never too old to stop. You're never too young to start. It's just this inherent embodiment where no one is left out because of age and discriminated against in the Gospel Ministry. Yeah. And then obviously we love discipleship. So that's the North Star. That's what we're supposed to be doing.

00;21;09;15 - 00;21;29;07
Ricky Jenkins
And now we're in that trajectory. Year four, right where vision what do we see? What do we hope to see? Gospel soon a multi I think it iteration mission. What do we do? We love discipleship. We make disciples well values principles whatever you want to fill in the blank with how do we do that? Which we call our pathway that I'm preaching through the first six months of this year.

00;21;29;11 - 00;21;51;12
Ricky Jenkins
And so God calls us to get people planted, rooted, growing going, which is salvation foundation maturation and replication and just helping people see this dream that Jesus is dreaming over all of our lives, that I'll get planted in Him, I'll grow up in him, I'll get I'll get rooted in him. I grow up in him and then I'll get going for him.

00;21;51;26 - 00;22;16;22
Ricky Jenkins
But making other disciples. So, man, that's all the that's all the stuff we're hoping that that's what God told us to do. But my prayer is that it will be portable, right? For the leaders we want to pour into, that they can take this DNA and plan it around the country because we really believe that the United States needs churches as the likes of which ours is trying to be.

00;22;17;13 - 00;22;27;13
Ricky Jenkins
Right. We have not yet arrived, but we're trying to be that and we think is an answer to the specific ideals of the democratic experiment here in America.

00;22;27;16 - 00;22;52;17
Rusty George
So I love that I'm picking up on something that is seems to be really true for you. And that is you have a set of phrases that you say that are probably part of your church's vernacular. What stresses you, blesses you, let's make Jesus famous. You rattled off about 20 great things there. That last minute that I was trying to write down.

00;22;52;17 - 00;23;08;24
Rusty George
What are the things that you think, boy, if someone were to come into our church, they're going to hear these five or six phrases over and over again. And it's created the culture of who we are, because you either start with that or you happen up with it. So what are those things that you see? Hey, let me interrupt for just a second.

00;23;08;24 - 00;23;16;08
Rusty George
Would you help us plan a church, go to study church, planting dot org today to find out more. All right. Back to our episode.

00;23;16;25 - 00;23;39;13
Ricky Jenkins
Yeah. Yeah, well, we've we've kind of, you know, massaged a few of them, but to your point, Russ is such a such a such a wonderful point you make, right? Like, culture is what we keep on doing. Good, bad or indifferent. That right culture is, is what we keep on saying. And I'm trying to ascend to that right where what?

00;23;39;13 - 00;24;06;12
Ricky Jenkins
I'm in trouble in my walk with faith. When I'm in trouble, rarely do I need something new. What I usually need is to hear something that I already knew but have forgotten in that moment of my life. And so good we are we are convinced. I'm convinced that man, the sheep of God, really need grass every day. They don't need extra, you know, alfalfa in a pasture every day.

00;24;06;15 - 00;24;31;26
Ricky Jenkins
That's what shepherds do. Lead them to grass. They need grass and they need the brook and babbling water. They don't need Kool-Aid, they don't need milk, they don't need salt water every day. And so obviously the gospel student, multiethnic generation, we love discipleship. Our people hear that every Sunday. So every service we have, they hear that, yeah, we closed services with the ironic blessing.

00;24;31;26 - 00;24;52;23
Ricky Jenkins
And then just the catch phrase that I think captures our soul, because I'm always thinking about the soul of the congregation. And the soul phrase for us is Make Jesus face. That's that's what when in doubt, do whatever that may make him famous. There's a couple of other things we say all the time. And this was resonated deeply with our congregation.

00;24;53;04 - 00;25;16;11
Ricky Jenkins
We always say this we don't care about a packed church. We care about a packed heaven. And always reminding our folks that, man, you can have 20,000 come in on a Sunday ten services a weekend. And the great Howard Hendricks from Deitz would say 20,000. What? So we're more concerned with the what than the number and just that's that's fun, right?

00;25;16;11 - 00;25;38;18
Ricky Jenkins
Because people hear that and they instantaneously know whether they're in the church or not. They instantaneously resonate with this truth that. That's right. That is better packed church. Sure. That may be healthy packed heaven. And everything we're doing is toward that North Star. It is healthy. So those are some of the things I think you'll hear this planet rooted, growing going pathways, brand new for us.

00;25;38;18 - 00;26;02;21
Ricky Jenkins
I've been working on it for years and the team really helped me kind of codify, you know, hey, the arc of I call it the arc of the gospel movement, right? What is Jesus want you to do from the beginning, all the way through to the end and that botanical metaphor growing go. I wish I had that. I do have the pictures right there but we're we're popularize that now and it's just fun, right?

00;26;03;02 - 00;26;30;10
Ricky Jenkins
Teaching and walking through a DNA that hopefully makes sense for 100 years and watching our people looking up at the screens like, okay, I don't know exactly what you're talking about, but I see these pictures and that sounds right and I could do that. So yeah, that's what we are. We're up knew right for years. I spent the last four years and our team spent the last four years and our elder spent the last four years fixing the last 20 know.

00;26;30;12 - 00;26;46;15
Ricky Jenkins
Right. Just just repairing the breaches. Lebanon people is a remnant here that's kept this church strong. And now we feel like, okay, so we're more excited about the other side of two three years. Yeah. Than we are even this year. Right. Because of that. What God may sprout as a result.

00;26;47;03 - 00;27;12;22
Rusty George
I love that. Thanks for sharing some of that. Okay. So I want to ask you about this. I think it's fair to assume and to even say that most churches want to be multi-ethnic, but we don't do that very well. So the typical response for a for a white pastor at a white church is, well, you have to have somebody on staff or on stage every weekend that looks different than you.

00;27;13;07 - 00;27;24;17
Rusty George
Okay. But what what beyond that, what have you seen really helps begin to change the culture of your church to make it more multiethnic? Sure.

00;27;25;02 - 00;28;05;13
Ricky Jenkins
Yeah, yeah. It's a complex question. And you know, I hate to use this metaphor, but different strokes for different folks. Right. I'm not sure if there's a I'm not sure if there is an actual step 1 to 10. I don't I don't. Right there is. Let me know. I'd love to steal it. But man, I think the significant thing that will qualify, you know, my sense of it is, especially with me kind of loving on partnering with serving majority culture churches in the past, is that you have to decide and make up your mind as to whether or not you're multiethnic with respect to empathy or multiethnic with respect to conviction.

00;28;06;18 - 00;28;36;19
Ricky Jenkins
And in my, my, my experience, I've recognized that, too. You reckon with that question you're not really ready to house what it takes to become a authentically, not successfully, authentically multiethnic church? Because it's not everybody's heart, it's not everybody's mind. Everybody feels bad about the state of affairs. But I find with a lot of churches, they stop at empathy and you're just empathetic.

00;28;37;03 - 00;28;58;10
Ricky Jenkins
Are you going to do is show up to say they're there. Mm but if you're multiethnic with conviction you're going to show up to say here, here is a difference. And so I find in my experience of the churches that just kind of and this is the joke we make. Here it comes. Yeah, man, I feel bad about what's going on, and I don't want that happening at my church.

00;28;58;22 - 00;29;26;27
Ricky Jenkins
So the second associate, part time junior high pastor, we've got to make sure that somehow we care. Our hearts are broken about. And here's the crazy thing, Rusty. You get it? Those guys are just as in love with Jesus and are sincere. But there's a whole system, if I might, that is taught them that that's how you do it, that's what you do, and that is good enough.

00;29;27;19 - 00;29;59;08
Ricky Jenkins
Well, if there's a race problem and if there's a injustice problem and if there's a have it have nots problem, X is x six or seven. When they first hired the deacons. Like the way you respond to those disparities is to lean in to the ones who are outside of the purview of influence and literally give that influence away, like Peter in the Apostles, like y'all fighting over tables, man.

00;29;59;11 - 00;30;16;04
Ricky Jenkins
And we're not about to do it. Our job is to pray and fast and preach and, you know, write the Bible. So, okay, here, let's get all these great guys who kick them out and give them a job just as good as the Jewish guys. And. All right, we got to get back to. Yeah, that's it. Literally. That's how they fixed it.

00;30;17;13 - 00;30;48;12
Ricky Jenkins
So if you are multiethnic by conviction, that's the Bible's prescription for that. And I think it's more so emphatic and so far of the significant history of America, race in America. Right. And so you'll see it here. Senior pastor know so, you know, that's pretty convincing to a community that says, oh, like we've got to pay attention to this.

00;30;48;12 - 00;31;18;11
Ricky Jenkins
And I'm interracially married and so I'm chocolate, my wife's vanilla, our children are caramel and it just screams, whoa, okay. You look at our team, you know, 50 something staff or whatever we are, and you look at the team and to some extent even our elder board, we're working on that. But you see our team and you just kind of see, all right, man, it looks like a good, significant, diverse strata of what God is, has in our valley that's on our team.

00;31;18;20 - 00;31;43;14
Ricky Jenkins
Right. And so my point is my point is this. It's one thing to say multiethnic. It's a sacrifice to be multiethnic. And you've heard that. You've heard it before. If it's not happening on every echelon of leadership is never going to happen in the church. And even if it does happen to the church, they will sense that as an esthetic and a cosmetic, and they will eventually leave to go find where that's real.

00;31;44;01 - 00;31;56;20
Rusty George
Mm hmm. That's really good. Really good. All right. Let me ask you this. Yeah, you and I both pastor in California. Yeah, we're not from California, but we've been here long enough. It feels like home.

00;31;56;20 - 00;31;57;18
Ricky Jenkins
Okay. That's right.

00;31;57;18 - 00;32;21;13
Rusty George
So everybody's, you know, as they say, everybody's leaving California, but house prices keep going up. So somebody is moving in. So here's my question for you. What what keeps you here? I mean, obviously, they call it God, but man, what what gets you out of the out of your bed in the morning for the state of California? What's your prayer for California?

00;32;21;23 - 00;32;28;14
Rusty George
Because the reason I moved out here is because a guy, Dudley Rutherford at Shepherd of the Hills, told.

00;32;28;14 - 00;32;29;25
Ricky Jenkins
Me, you know, Dudley.

00;32;29;25 - 00;32;39;05
Rusty George
Oh, my God, he planted our church. Yeah. And I, I, I was in his home church. His dad's home church is a church I grew up in, so we have a long history.

00;32;39;19 - 00;32;41;00
Ricky Jenkins
Well, that means Russ. Dad? No.

00;32;41;00 - 00;32;42;15
Rusty George
You okay? Okay. Well.

00;32;43;07 - 00;32;46;16
Ricky Jenkins
Unfortunate. Unfortunate. The late Dudley is one of my best friends.

00;32;46;19 - 00;32;49;03
Rusty George
Is that right? Okay, well, we we go way back.

00;32;49;03 - 00;32;50;18
Ricky Jenkins
We just play golf Monday.

00;32;50;23 - 00;32;54;22
Rusty George
Oh, my. I bet that was intense. Awesome. He takes it serious.

00;32;54;22 - 00;32;58;18
Ricky Jenkins
Yes. Oh, my gosh. Yes.

00;32;58;18 - 00;33;15;26
Rusty George
Wow. So, you know, he calls me up. I'm in Kentucky at the time and he says, Rusty, here's why you need to come to real life, because you're never going to change the world till you change America. You never gonna change America till you change California. Get out here. Go west, young man. Come out here to California. That's why I came out here.

00;33;15;26 - 00;33;23;25
Rusty George
That's why I stay out here. You come out here and I bought it and I'm glad I did. I've been out here 19 years now, so.

00;33;24;06 - 00;33;24;28
Ricky Jenkins
That's awesome, man.

00;33;25;08 - 00;33;32;28
Rusty George
I know what my prayer is. My heart is. What's your prayer? What's your heart for the state of California? As crazy as it seems right now.

00;33;33;06 - 00;34;01;27
Ricky Jenkins
My prayers revival. My prayers revival. I am, you know, because of what a little bit of what I've been through, but to a considerable amount. What my father went through, what my grandfather went through. I'm not one of those who have lost delusions of grandeur, so I don't see a great return for culture. I see God reviving a rip it right.

00;34;01;27 - 00;34;36;00
Ricky Jenkins
Like I just say and I say what you will about that. But but to your point, you're so right. If you want to know what's going on, what will be going on in the Midwest ten years from now, just take a snapshot of whatever's happened in. California and New York today. Yep, it is what it is. And so my my prayer for California is revival that in this moment of, you know, I think millennials, the largest generation in American history, I think there's 80 million of them.

00;34;36;00 - 00;35;11;13
Ricky Jenkins
And only 15% have some exposure to church, the lowest we've ever recorded. My prayer is that the spirit of the living god will so revive a generation for whom have lost all hope and all institutions yet are desperately looking for a vintage, authentic truth and reality. So it's crazy. Like they've lost everything about institutional movement from America to corporate America to academia has taught them institutions are failed and they're not cracked at what they're supposed to be.

00;35;11;23 - 00;35;26;18
Ricky Jenkins
And yet here they are desperately starving for destitution. You know, that's real in my prayers revival for them that in the brokenness, like the only thing that has me excited about the world right now is that it's all falling apart.

00;35;26;25 - 00;35;27;04
Rusty George
Yeah.

00;35;27;28 - 00;35;48;12
Ricky Jenkins
Yeah. But that is a recipe for what in the world is out there that I could stand on that won't crumble my feet. And you and I both know that that is a love affair with Jesus. So, man, my big answer to that is I'm praying for revival. I'm the guy who's been studying California's state house law for about 20 years.

00;35;49;10 - 00;36;13;10
Ricky Jenkins
I'm the guy who reads the bills that state congressmen in California write. Because I know, as you well said, whatever whatever's being written there will be written in my state ten years from now, you know. And so I started having a desire in my soul to, if not live on one of the coasts to do ministry there on some level, insofar that if I could figure out how to do Christianity and be Christian.

00;36;13;10 - 00;36;33;03
Ricky Jenkins
Lee in those places, I'll prepare my son for whatever kind of culture he's going to be growing up in. So a big part of the reason other than the call of God was that I wanted to make sure Cam knows how to be a Christian. Yeah, because he's not going to learn that in Mississippi. He will. But you know what I'm trying to say.

00;36;33;03 - 00;36;59;04
Ricky Jenkins
Yep. So a lot of it I mean, I'm 20 minutes from Palm Springs is right there. Right. Like wow. And Bill Gates house summer winter home is 5 minutes that way. There are some of the biggest agricultural fields in United States, 10 minutes that way. And so I've got literally the richest people in the world next to some of the poorest people in the world.

00;36;59;12 - 00;37;22;22
Ricky Jenkins
And one of the most liberal places in the world to figure out who Christ is in this moment. And there are so many believers who get so intimidated by that, I heck, I think I do, too. But when you know you've read your Bible backwards and forwards, this was Mars Hill. This is the Book of Acts. It was Christianity took over robe and we've never looked more like a robe.

00;37;22;22 - 00;37;30;16
Ricky Jenkins
Yeah. Than we do today in California. And revival happened in Rome once. It can happen in Rome again. So that's the prayer. That's the prayer. Praying.

00;37;30;16 - 00;37;31;11
Rusty George
Amen.

00;37;31;11 - 00;37;35;00
Ricky Jenkins
And I believing that. And I believe that in my soul.

00;37;35;09 - 00;38;03;15
Rusty George
I heard a pastor friend of mine from Arizona say as a Christian, this is the greatest time to be alive. That's right. Because we have the best technology and we've been surrounded by more lost people than ever before. You're right. This is it. And this this rabbit trail that the church has been on for the last two years to get back to Christian values and vote in the right people.

00;38;03;20 - 00;38;21;13
Rusty George
I mean, that'd be great. But let's let's seek something even better than that. Let's bring revival. Let's see, lives change. And it did change the world once without a Bible. And now we've got it. So think about what we could do exactly. Round man. Well, yeah, so.

00;38;21;13 - 00;38;45;03
Ricky Jenkins
Well, say well, think about all the things our folks are probably longing for. And that sincerely and admirably. Right? Lord, please put a gasp, a true gospel guy in the White House, right? Lord, please convict the hearts of Congressmen or please help us rail against all these great prayers, none of which were normative for all of the apostles.

00;38;45;11 - 00;38;45;19
Rusty George
You know.

00;38;46;16 - 00;39;08;20
Ricky Jenkins
Like they would knit. There wasn't a shot that you had a Christ follower sitting on the throne of Rome. So they never even employed that ethic as a part of their spirituality. Like it was never, No, no, no. We live for Jesus. Hopefully long and then they're going to behead us. Yeah, that's the deal. So we've got a long way to go.

00;39;08;21 - 00;39;15;20
Rusty George
They didn't have the the Emperors Prayer Breakfast on the first Thursday in May.

00;39;15;20 - 00;39;19;21
Ricky Jenkins
So if you go to the Emperor's Prayer Breakfast, you're going to get eaten by.

00;39;20;07 - 00;39;26;26
Rusty George
That's right. You are. You are the evening's entertainment.

00;39;26;26 - 00;39;27;19
Ricky Jenkins
Oh, my God.

00;39;27;19 - 00;39;48;22
Rusty George
So true. Okay. So I want to do something here as we wrap up I've never done before, but you've got just rows and rows of books sitting behind you that our audience can't see. But I can. I want to give you a moment to pick out five that are your favorite or must reads or whatever.

00;39;48;23 - 00;39;49;25
Ricky Jenkins
Oh, my God.

00;39;49;26 - 00;39;50;28
Rusty George
And we'll we'll cut that.

00;39;50;28 - 00;39;51;27
Ricky Jenkins
Oh, that's not fair.

00;39;51;27 - 00;39;58;07
Rusty George
Well, cut the dead air time. You need some time to find it, but I want you to pick out five and tell us what they are for our listeners.

00;39;58;25 - 00;40;01;29
Ricky Jenkins
So you want me to go to them to just tell you what they are?

00;40;02;05 - 00;40;04;00
Rusty George
You know what? If you can just tell me, go for it.

00;40;04;24 - 00;40;26;13
Ricky Jenkins
Okay? I'll just tell you. And gosh, I will change the answer if you ask me again tomorrow. So devotional Lee Max Lucado wrote a book about 20 years ago called 6 Hours one Friday. Oh, it's the best. I'll read it all the time. And I can still remember weeping and crying with tears of joy when I first read that book.

00;40;26;15 - 00;40;50;21
Ricky Jenkins
And then so 6 hours, one Friday is there what is the guy's name? Who wrote the John Adams biography is one of the best biographies ever written. What is his name? But it was the classic standard text for the John Adams biography. I forget his name, and that book's probably at home, but it was best biography ever written in the American English dialect.

00;40;50;21 - 00;41;00;03
Ricky Jenkins
It is masterful. Gosh, I got to put a Keller in there. So Counterfeit Guides. I probably give that book out more than any other book.

00;41;00;03 - 00;41;01;06
Rusty George
That's a brilliant book.

00;41;01;13 - 00;41;24;22
Ricky Jenkins
And my counseling man, it's just a brilliance. Masterful. I don't know why we don't just read that and just tell people to go home and read that instead of listening to us preach. Dallas Willard and his Spiritual Disciplines book is just when he talks about the embodiment that the guys like Mark Sayers and John Mark Comber are redoing and then Dallas Willard for us.

00;41;24;25 - 00;41;48;19
Ricky Jenkins
Yeah. And so that's just fun to see him reappropriated because the Millennials is so on time for them because they're looking for an embodied witness and authenticated witness. So he's present. So that's been blessing me. That's I think that's for and then there's another book called Sarah Osborne. It's a church history tech. I'm going to throw one more in.

00;41;49;06 - 00;42;21;17
Ricky Jenkins
And I don't remember who wrote these books because you know how a Ph.D. is made. You don't there's too many in your brain, but it's a busy ology history book of 19, late 18th and early 19th century America. So kind of like in between the Awakenings. So Edward's preaching, of course, starts these revivals in the Northeast. Well, there is this proliferation of gospel voices, right, where you just had these witnesses, one of whom was this lady Sarah, as pretty sure name was Sarah Osborne.

00;42;21;27 - 00;42;50;26
Ricky Jenkins
And so this guy is telling a perspective, social history. So he's he's doing a treatment on democratization of Christianity through this woman's mythological voice, as she was ministering to Indians who had come to faith through Edward's ministry, maxed her full wonderful book. And then I was just going to throw an extra one in there. Is it, Jonathan? Is the classic civil parting the waters?

00;42;52;03 - 00;43;16;19
Ricky Jenkins
What is that guy's name? He's a journalist who did the classic. If you haven't read this book, you're not you don't know anything about civil rights history. So it's Jonathan and the books right here. I can't remember authors. But anyways, it's part of the waters. I know that much as volume wired is. This is the second treatment. No, that's not it.

00;43;16;19 - 00;43;41;29
Ricky Jenkins
That's another one. Anyway, it's called Parting the Waters. It is the classic text. It's volume attic. Right? So the volume is like four inches thick, but it's the classic treatment of American civil rights history that starts with Martin Luther King's predecessor at the church that he was at in Alabama and then Atlanta. So it is just everything you need to know about American civil rights history.

00;43;42;10 - 00;43;58;20
Ricky Jenkins
It is if you haven't read it, you're not educated in the civil rights movement. You have no idea what it's even about until you read that book. And it just kind of really formed me. And man, it's not fair to just pick out six books. I just talk about top of my head.

00;43;59;04 - 00;44;08;22
Rusty George
Well, I was going to say, what's your favorite one back there? But that's truly not fair. So I gave you five. You took six, and I'll I'll ask you to another time.

00;44;08;24 - 00;44;09;19
Ricky Jenkins
Grace for me.

00;44;09;19 - 00;44;15;21
Rusty George
Yeah, that is. And this has been fantastic. Thank you, Ricky, for your time.

00;44;15;21 - 00;44;18;23
Ricky Jenkins
And thanks for having me. It's good to meet you finally.

00;44;18;23 - 00;44;27;07
Rusty George
Yes, you as well. I'd love to have you out to real life some time to speak for us. I think that'd be great fun just to hang out and I think you'd be a big blessing to our people.

00;44;27;07 - 00;44;28;03
Ricky Jenkins
Would love that.

00;44;28;03 - 00;44;28;19
Rusty George
Awesome.

00;44;28;19 - 00;44;32;02
Ricky Jenkins
Would love that. Well, I'll return the favor so you can come here and play real golf.

00;44;32;05 - 00;44;35;04
Rusty George
Oh, as long as it's not in the summer, it'd be fine.

00;44;35;28 - 00;44;42;21
Ricky Jenkins
No, no, no. Yeah, I wouldn't do that to you. I love you, man. I appreciate that. But you, when you have me, have me out in the summer.

00;44;42;23 - 00;45;02;03
Rusty George
Okay, we'll get you out here. Thank you, buddy. Appreciate it. Well, that was so fun. I really enjoyed talking with him. Love seeing his library of books behind him as we talked about. And I'd love for you to share this with somebody. Could you pass this along to somebody you think, hey, I think he'd enjoy this and would you leave a review?

00;45;02;10 - 00;45;30;23
Rusty George
You can do so very easily wherever. You get your podcast, take just a moment to do that. And at the end of the summer, we're going to draw from that list of reviews and give out a prize. You're not going to want to miss it, so make sure that you do that next week. You got a brand new episode with somebody that is an incredible executive pastor that started off as a volunteer in her church, joined her staff, and then became an executive pastor at a fast growing church in the Milwaukee, Wisconsin area.

00;45;31;00 - 00;45;42;07
Rusty George
You're not going to want to miss my conversation with Jodi Tonarelli, it's going to be fantastic. So next week, join us back for that. As always, keep it simple. We'll talk to you next time.

00;45;42;21 - 00;46;05;17
Narrator
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 devotionals, messages and. Fun videos. Thank you for listening to Leading Simple Lessons.