The “Jesus Model” For Loving Your Neighbor
There was a time when neighbors knew each other’s names… when children and old folks in the neighborhood had more than their families looking out for them. What happened?
This week on the Everyday Disciple Podcast, we talk with author, Lance Ford, as we ask the question: can you really love your neighbor as much as you love yourself?
We live in an age when it feels like we have very little time for new and trusting relationships–and it’s hard to trust people! So we tend to isolate or stick closer to home and keep to ourselves. But people are dying for real relationship, and isolation only breeds further distrust.
Maybe it’s time to change the narrative.
In This Episode You’ll Learn:
- What the Bible really says about loving your neighbor.
- What we have lost as a society through hiding away and loving ourselves.
- Why incarnational presence is the “Jesus Model” for loving your neighbor.
- Practical steps to restoring our neighborhoods to become communities filled with love and redemption.
From this episode:
“People are dying for relationships and connection. We can choose to push back against the consumerism and individualism that is so toxic. Let’s not let our affluence buy the very walls that keep us apart from real gospel-centered relationships.”
Each week the Big 3 will give you immediate action steps to get you started.
Download today’s BIG 3 right now. Read and think over them again later. You might even want to share them with others…
Thanks for Listening!
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Links and Resources Mentioned in This Episode:
Coaching with Caesar and Tina in discipleship and missional living.
Missio Publishing – Resources for a life on mission
Lance’s book: Next Door As It Is In Heaven
Transcript
I think we all love the way that Eugene Pearson put it in the message.
Lance Ford:He said, the word of God was made flesh and blood and moved into the neighborhood, right?
Lance Ford:So what happens when with the incarnation is when the word of God becomes flesh and blood and moves into the neighborhood, then the promises of God move into the neighborhood.
Lance Ford:The opinion of God moves into the neighborhood.
Lance Ford:I mean, that's.
Lance Ford:That's, that's it, isn't it?
Lance Ford:So what, that's the way that we can transform the neighborhood is we live this stuff out among our neighbors and we can change the narrative.
Lance Ford:I mean, they've had a narrative about what God thinks about them or what religion thinks about them.
Lance Ford:But the way we live our lives, when we let the word of God become our flesh and blood and we move that in the neighborhood, we start changing the narrative.
Lance Ford:And then what happens is they see the glory because of the grace and the truth that's moved in.
Lance Ford:So man, the incarnation, man, I mean, it's, it's the key to it all.
Heath Hollensbe:Welcome to the Everyday Disciple Podcast, where you'll learn how to live with greater intentionality and an integrated faith that naturally fits into every area of life.
Heath Hollensbe:In other words, discipleship as a lifestyle.
Heath Hollensbe:This is the stuff your parents, pastors, and seminary professors probably forgot to tell you.
Heath Hollensbe:And now, here's your host, Caesar Kalinowski.
Caesar Kalinowski:Another round, another day, another killer topic.
Caesar Kalinowski:It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood.
Caesar Kalinowski:It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood.
Caesar Kalinowski:I'm wearing my very, very ancient, yet super comfy sweater today.
Caesar Kalinowski:That's awesome.
Caesar Kalinowski:I'm gonna change it several, several times.
Caesar Kalinowski:You know, Mr.
Caesar Kalinowski:Rogers, I guess wife knitted those sweaters for him.
Caesar Kalinowski:Really?
Caesar Kalinowski:Yep.
Heath Hollensbe:Today we're talking with Lance Ford who wrote this amazing book about Next Door as it is in Heaven.
Heath Hollensbe:Oh, what a killer title, Next Door as it is in Heaven.
Heath Hollensbe:Yeah.
Heath Hollensbe:So Lance, uh, if you're not familiar with him, he's a church planner.
Heath Hollensbe:He's been a pastor for two decades and for the last dozen years or so, he served as both a coach and a consultant.
Heath Hollensbe:He's an adjunct professor at Fuller Seminary, serves on the team at Forge America.
Heath Hollensbe:He's written tons of books and his latest is next door as it is in heaven as we talked about.
Heath Hollensbe:Yeah, he's
Heath Hollensbe:he and he's one of my
Heath Hollensbe:favorite
Heath Hollensbe:pals.
Heath Hollensbe:I met him on the road like conference after conference and he's part of that crew where we would always do our speaking, all of us in our slots and then we would all like run from the conference and go out and hang out, you know, so I haven't talked to him in a while and I'm really looking forward.
Heath Hollensbe:He's one of my favorite people.
Heath Hollensbe:Awesome.
Heath Hollensbe:Hey Lance, thanks for joining us.
Heath Hollensbe:Great to
Heath Hollensbe:be with you guys.
Heath Hollensbe:Well, here we go.
Heath Hollensbe:So there was a time brother when our neighbors knew each other.
Heath Hollensbe:Okay.
Heath Hollensbe:And like neighbors knew each other's names and I, and I know there's lots of reasons like, well, we didn't have air conditioning back then.
Heath Hollensbe:And everybody had a front porch and all that.
Heath Hollensbe:But, and it was like a time when children and old folks in the neighborhood were like part of your family.
Heath Hollensbe:And I remember growing up, I can still picture Mrs.
Heath Hollensbe:Brink next door.
Heath Hollensbe:store and Mrs.
Heath Hollensbe:Salana on the other side.
Heath Hollensbe:And these were old Slavic ladies in my neighborhood and I'm Polish.
Heath Hollensbe:You know, they were just like grandmas, you know?
Heath Hollensbe:Um, and back then our neighborhoods were really our closest community connected with your family.
Heath Hollensbe:So when you hear the word oikos, you go, Oh, like the people you do life with.
Heath Hollensbe:That was it.
Heath Hollensbe:Um, what happened?
Heath Hollensbe:What do you, what do you think what's happened?
Heath Hollensbe:It's not that way, man.
Lance Ford:Well, I think a lot happened, you know, I mean, there's, there's definitely a different way that we live now.
Lance Ford:Uh, but I, I think the biggest thing.
Lance Ford:I think the biggest thing that happened is consumerism and individualism just has become on steroids.
Lance Ford:And so those chickens have come to roost.
Lance Ford:Now I'm a Texan, so that's a, that's a Texanism, but really, I mean, really we're, we're paying the price of, of consumerism and individualism run amok because, uh, people, you know, they live under their own.
Lance Ford:It's the old adage that you make your own way.
Lance Ford:And, uh, right now affluence.
Lance Ford:is equated with privacy.
Lance Ford:So the more affluent you are, the more private you can be.
Lance Ford:You can live in a neighborhood that doesn't just have a garage door opener that lets you hide during the day, but actually is gated, et cetera, et cetera.
Lance Ford:So, uh, individualism and consumerism and, and the way that those have manifest, I think it really, uh, uh, allied to, to shut down good neighboring.
Lance Ford:To a large degree.
Lance Ford:Well, when I hear those two words, like individualism, I go, okay, that's me loving me, which I say it all the time.
Lance Ford:Like, I'm sorry.
Lance Ford:I love me more than I love most everybody else.
Lance Ford:Okay.
Lance Ford:And that's softening it.
Lance Ford:Cause I put the word most in there, but, uh, and in consumerism is I want what I want when I want it and I want more of it and I want it like in free two day delivery, please.
Lance Ford:So that sounds like the problem and why the neighbors.
Lance Ford:And neighborhoods have all fallen apart.
Lance Ford:And that's like, we're not close anymore is because we, we love ourselves more than we love others.
Lance Ford:Yeah.
Lance Ford:And, and, you know, and the, and a big part of it is, is most people view their cities and they view even their neighborhoods from a consumeristic, uh, mindset.
Lance Ford:So I don't remember any time I've ever talked with someone that's moved into a new home and ask them, Oh, well, why did you choose to live here?
Lance Ford:Oh, well, the first thing I did was I scoped out the neighborhood.
Lance Ford:I got to meet a few of the neighbors, and then we decided to take a real hard look at that house and decide whether we wanted to live here.
Lance Ford:And a big part of the reason we did all that was because we felt called to that neighborhood.
Lance Ford:No, it's just the opposite.
Lance Ford:People choose a neighborhood, even Christians choose a neighborhood because the schools were good.
Lance Ford:Uh, you know, it was, it was a good drive to my work, you know, it was safe.
Lance Ford:It seemed like a secure place.
Lance Ford:What's in it
Lance Ford:for me?
Lance Ford:What's in it for me?
Lance Ford:It's, it's all comes back about me, right?
Lance Ford:You know, so it's, it's, it's, uh, it's not from the real kingdom mindset.
Lance Ford:It's not really that Jeremiah 29, four through seven mindset.
Lance Ford:You know, going in and looking for what's best for the city.
Lance Ford:And so we're trying to change that.
Lance Ford:You know, I, I know that's what you're on about.
Lance Ford:That's, that's what, uh, this latest book that Brad Briscoe and I wrote is, is, is about is to change the mindset to know wherever you live, work and play, these are the places you have been called to.
Lance Ford:You thought you just showed up.
Lance Ford:No, the Lord sent you there.
Lance Ford:And what can that look like?
Lance Ford:You embrace, and I know too many times and too many times in coaching, I've run into this and I'm guessing you have too, where people, they're wanting to live on mission.
Lance Ford:They're wanting to live this lifestyle of discipleship that we live and talk and write about.
Lance Ford:And, um, but then they'll, they'll kind of make the excuse of, yeah, but where our house is, is like, it's way out.
Lance Ford:It's like 45 minutes from our church.
Lance Ford:And it's like, you know, our closest friend is like 45 minutes away.
Lance Ford:And then, and I'm like, so why do you live there?
Lance Ford:What?
Lance Ford:Why do you live here?
Lance Ford:Yeah.
Lance Ford:How far is it to work?
Lance Ford:Oh, it's like an hour to work.
Lance Ford:Like, so why do you live there?
Lance Ford:How did you choose that?
Lance Ford:Right.
Lance Ford:Well, cause it was a killer house.
Lance Ford:It was a killer house.
Lance Ford:Like, but the rest of your life sucks and you're, and you're, you're crying about why you can't live on mission and you can't make friends and have relationships.
Lance Ford:And then the closest neighbor's a half mile away.
Lance Ford:Like, you know, people tell us like, Oh, we just got a place.
Lance Ford:We got 45 acres.
Lance Ford:Why?
Lance Ford:Like you just love cutting grass.
Lance Ford:I mean, what, you know, anyway,
Lance Ford:well, and that's consumerism to a large degree, you know, it's cause most people because they want to be alone, you know, or they want it, they want to have that space.
Lance Ford:Um, in fact, my wife and I, uh, before we moved to where we're at now, or before we moved to Kansas city, actually, when our kids were still growing up, we, we had about 15 acres outside of St.
Lance Ford:Louis, we had built a house and we went out there and, um, And I was pastoring at that time, but I really tried to get to know our neighbors.
Lance Ford:Now, this had been a 1600 acre farm originally that they broke up into like 12 and 15 acre lots.
Lance Ford:And, um,
Lance Ford:yeah,
Lance Ford:exactly.
Lance Ford:It was green acres.
Lance Ford:No doubt.
Lance Ford:You had to climb the pole to get the phone and Mr.
Lance Ford:Haney would come by once a week and sell stuff.
Lance Ford:Yeah, definitely.
Lance Ford:So.
Lance Ford:Uh, the thing about it was it was the hardest place to do neighboring I've ever been in my life.
Lance Ford:And it finally, it took me about three years to figure it out.
Lance Ford:It was because it was all city folk, just like us that moved out there to be alone.
Lance Ford:And most of the people that we try to reach, man, they had walls up.
Lance Ford:They did not want to interact.
Lance Ford:Uh, it was the hardest place we ever tried to do neighboring actually.
Lance Ford:Yeah.
Lance Ford:And that sucks because some people find themselves there.
Lance Ford:And I know that the, the evangelist in me goes, well, Nothing's beyond the reach of the gospel, but it is true, when loads and loads of people decide for selfish and consumeristic reasons to create and sustain a certain type of lifestyle, it can be really, really hard.
Lance Ford:And then there's a lot of people who haven't built up those walls, and I go, let's start with them.
Lance Ford:You know?
Lance Ford:Yeah.
Lance Ford:Golly.
Heath Hollensbe:Yeah.
Heath Hollensbe:So, uh, Jesus, and in your book you mentioned this as well, like Jesus talks about the concept of us loving our neighbor as ourself.
Heath Hollensbe:And I've heard certain people try to argue out of it like well Maybe back in first century Israel.
Heath Hollensbe:It was easier They all lived right next to each other But I have to believe that his intent is still for us today like to love our neighbor as us as ourselves Do you believe that that's true for us now?
Heath Hollensbe:And what might that look like?
Heath Hollensbe:in our day and age that might help us get away from having to try to jump out of the excuse that it wasn't for us.
Lance Ford:Yeah, you know, no doubt.
Lance Ford:I mean, those scriptures, they don't have expiration dates on them, right?
Lance Ford:You know, I mean, it's so, it would be so convenient, you know, and, well, what does that really mean in the Greek and blah, blah, blah, blah.
Lance Ford:Of course, that was the, you know, when, when Jesus said that quintessential phrase, um, love, about loving your neighbors and yourself, it was all in the context of this discussion or this challenge he had received You know, from, from a guy that was, that the scripture says, was trying to justify himself by saying, you know, what does it take for me to enter into.
Lance Ford:into heaven.
Lance Ford:And, and, and, you know, Jesus says, what does the scripture say?
Lance Ford:And he says, well, love God with your heart and soul strength and love your neighbors, yourself.
Lance Ford:And Jesus says, yep, you got it, man.
Lance Ford:And then, but then the scripture says that the guy wanted to justify himself by saying, yeah, but who's my neighbor?
Lance Ford:because basically he was wanting to keep that thing in the ethereal.
Lance Ford:You know, yeah, but at the end of the day, really, who is my neighbor?
Lance Ford:And of course, Jesus tells the parable of the sower.
Lance Ford:We all know the parable of the sower.
Lance Ford:So the irony of this whole thing is that Jesus actually flips the script on it.
Lance Ford:And, and because when he makes the Samaritan a hero, he says, the issue is not who is my neighbor.
Lance Ford:The issue is who will be a neighbor.
Lance Ford:So, that lets none of us off the hook, because it doesn't matter really who our neighbor is.
Lance Ford:It's will we be the Jesus type of neighbor?
Lance Ford:And Jesus really defined that in the parable of the Good Samaritan, in being there.
Lance Ford:for the, the, the least of these, be in there for the broken, be in there for whoever we come across and not, you know, not crossing the street to go away from them, but crossing the street to go to those, those people that are broken or whatever their situation might be.
Lance Ford:And so there's no expiration date on that, especially when he says we are to love them as we love ourselves.
Lance Ford:Uh, because that cuts through so much stuff, right?
Lance Ford:Uh, you, because he, you know, people today, a lot of times, and sad to say, a lot of evangelical Christians want to qualify the poor for assistance or help.
Lance Ford:Um, but we don't do that for ourselves.
Lance Ford:I mean, yeah, maybe we've made bad financial choices or whatever.
Lance Ford:But we still are ready to receive help or want help or whatever.
Lance Ford:That's what loving yourself or loving your neighbors, loving yourself means.
Lance Ford:We're so quick to want to help people that are, they're kind of in a bad place because of no fault of their own.
Lance Ford:Or, you know, someone screwed them over or someone robbed them or, you know, this guy left this guy, but like we go like, well, that's his fault, man.
Lance Ford:You know, that was his choice.
Lance Ford:It's like, wait a minute, we're, we're all in need of a savior because of our choice.
Lance Ford:Absolutely.
Lance Ford:Yeah.
Lance Ford:Absolutely.
Lance Ford:Yeah.
Lance Ford:Absolutely.
Lance Ford:Absolutely.
Lance Ford:And I love too, not only does he flip the script to like, who's your neighbor, but will you be a neighbor?
Lance Ford:But he also has sort of done away with the like, okay, so your cultural excuses.
Lance Ford:You know, or your, the, the walls that culture would accept for why you would not be a neighbor to that person.
Lance Ford:Those are also obliterated as well.
Lance Ford:You know, like when, when you say like, well, I'm not helping that guy cause he chose that like, well, yeah, but so I chose all the sin in my life.
Lance Ford:It's, I choose all.
Lance Ford:So Jesus, I think does away with all the walls and says, it's not even about them at all.
Lance Ford:It's about you and your heart.
Lance Ford:Yeah.
Lance Ford:And you know, the irony of this is that when we do choose to be the neighbor.
Lance Ford:The gift that the poor or the gift that the broken give back to us is as big or is as meaningful or is as transform, transformative as anything we do for them.
Lance Ford:So, uh, a part of, part of the wisdom of the Lord in all this is it changes us.
Lance Ford:Yeah, absolutely.
Lance Ford:You know, it really does.
Lance Ford:It makes a big change with us, you know, and so that's, that's part of the blessedness of identifying with the poor.
Lance Ford:is that we do see God.
Lance Ford:We get to see God in the midst of all that.
Lance Ford:Yeah, for what you've done for the least of these, right?
Lance Ford:Absolutely.
Lance Ford:Yeah, absolutely.
Lance Ford:It's a real key to it.
Lance Ford:I think he's a key to a lot.
Lance Ford:Uh, kind of just to tip into a little bit of the book here again.
Lance Ford:Chapter one, uh, really tends to lay the foundation for the rest of the book, I think.
Lance Ford:And it's about the priority of incarnational presence.
Lance Ford:Can you unpack this a little bit and maybe give us some examples of that?
Lance Ford:Cause, um, we're listening to this and I think, yeah, you've, you've helped us see more clearly what Jesus is saying there with the Good Samaritan parable.
Lance Ford:Um, and yet we still have to look outside, look across the fence, look across the street.
Lance Ford:What's this, uh, incarnational presence?
Lance Ford:Yeah, well, you know, and that's one of the most familiar verses for all of us is John 1, 14, the word was made flesh.
Lance Ford:And dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory as of the only begotten Son of God, full of grace and truth.
Lance Ford:Um, um, you know, it's very interesting that the, the, the term that John uses for Jesus, the title, the Word.
Lance Ford:So if you think about the Word.
Lance Ford:What's the word of God?
Lance Ford:So, you know, if someone gives some, you know, if I say, Hey, Caesar gave me his word, Heath, how would you, how would you interpret that?
Lance Ford:I mean, what do you think that means?
Lance Ford:If I tell you to get, Hey, Caesar gave me his word on this.
Lance Ford:What
Heath Hollensbe:does that mean?
Heath Hollensbe:It means he's going to hold up his end of the bargain, right?
Heath Hollensbe:Like he made a commitment.
Heath Hollensbe:That's right.
Lance Ford:He made a commitment.
Lance Ford:He gave me his promise.
Lance Ford:Or if we say, uh, here's my word on that, then that's, that's my opinion.
Lance Ford:So the incarnation of God in Jesus or the word made flesh and blood in our flesh and blood means, and I, and I love, I think we all love the way that Eugene Pearson put it in the message.
Lance Ford:He said the word of God was made flesh and blood and moved into the neighborhood, right?
Lance Ford:So what happens when, with the incarnation is when the word of God becomes flesh and blood and moves into the neighborhood.
Lance Ford:then the promises of God move into the neighborhood.
Lance Ford:The opinion of God moves into the neighborhood.
Lance Ford:I had an encounter with one of our, you know, I mean, that's, that's it, isn't it?
Lance Ford:So what, that's the way that we can transform a neighborhood is we live this stuff out among our neighbors and we can change the narrative.
Lance Ford:I mean, they've had a narrative about what God thinks about them or what religion thinks about them, but the way we live our lives, when we, when we let the word of God become our flesh and blood and we move that in the neighborhood, we start changing the narrative.
Lance Ford:The opinion of God about people.
Lance Ford:And then what happens is they see the glory.
Lance Ford:Because of the grace and the truth that's moved in.
Lance Ford:So man, the incarnation, man, I mean, it's, it's the key to it all.
Lance Ford:Living it is the key to it all, I believe.
Heath Hollensbe:It'd be really hard for people not to be kind of feeling excited about the possibilities of what this neighborhood could look like.
Heath Hollensbe:So, my question now is, as followers of Jesus, what are some practical steps that we could take as we look towards restoring our literal, actual neighborhoods to becoming communities that are filled with both love and redemption.
Lance Ford:It's interesting.
Lance Ford:We had this encounter in our neighborhood.
Lance Ford:Um, and Caesar, you were, you're at my house.
Lance Ford:You remember, we lived in this neighborhood.
Lance Ford:It was a very historic neighborhood in Kansas city.
Lance Ford:And there was a house across the street from us that had sold And, um, when I went over to, uh, took a bottle of wine over there one morning to, to home them to the neighborhood.
Lance Ford:I didn't know who they were.
Lance Ford:I just saw the moving van move in the night before.
Lance Ford:And a guy opened the door.
Lance Ford:Um, he was probably in his early mid sixties.
Lance Ford:And uh, uh, I welcomed him, handed him this bottle of wine, said, you know, told him my wife and I lived across the street, blah, blah, blah.
Lance Ford:And, uh, so we started chit chatting for about five minutes, just, man, just jovial, um, big smile on his face, big smile on my face, we're talking.
Lance Ford:And then he says, well, he says, I, uh, so, and he had told me.
Lance Ford:In the midst of this, that he was a retired IRS agent.
Lance Ford:And then he said, uh, after about five minutes, he said, Oh, I wish my, uh, I wish my partner was here, Richard works for Delta and he's in London or whatever.
Lance Ford:Well, okay.
Lance Ford:So my partner, Richard.
Lance Ford:Okay.
Lance Ford:So, uh, in a few minutes he asked me and you know how these conversations go Caesar.
Lance Ford:You can be having a great conversation with someone until they ask you what you do, you know, as a pastor or whatever.
Lance Ford:So it's going on great.
Lance Ford:And then he says, so what do you do?
Lance Ford:So I said, well, I was a pastor for about 20 years.
Lance Ford:And now, and when I got to that point, The smile dropped off his face and he just looked at me, you know, he looked at me and he said, Oh, he said, so, so are you one of those Christians that hate people like me?
Heath Hollensbe:Wow.
Lance Ford:And man, and, and I said, in one of those moments where I think I was here, where I think I was hearing from the Holy Spirit and I was begging for the Lord to tell me how to answer.
Lance Ford:I said, no, Jesus loved tax collectors.
Lance Ford:That's great, man.
Lance Ford:Boom.
Lance Ford:Yeah.
Lance Ford:Let that land and, uh, and, and it just kind of hung out there.
Lance Ford:It just kind of hung out there in silence.
Lance Ford:And I'm like, and I didn't say I do, that's all I said.
Lance Ford:And then I just looked at him with no smile or anything, and he's looking back at me with no smile, but then all of a sudden this big smile, after about 10 seconds creases across his face.
Lance Ford:And he just, he threw his head back and he laughed and he goes, okay, well, that's good enough for me.
Lance Ford:Well, what happened in that moment was I changed the narrative.
Lance Ford:Um, because by saying, because he knew I knew what I was doing there and, but what I was saying was, Hey, I'm not defining you by any of that.
Lance Ford:I want to define you as a friend and as a new neighbor, and I want to be your neighbor.
Lance Ford:Um, you know, so I think one of the biggest things we do is we try to change the narrative.
Lance Ford:And a part of changing the neighborhood, of changing the narrative in a neighborhood is when you are looking at consumerism and individualism and all this, one of the biggest things is most neighbors don't even know their, the, the names of their neighbors.
Lance Ford:And so I, you know, uh, the book by Dave, uh, uh, Runyon and, and Jay Paddock.
Lance Ford:Um, the art of neighbor, he's been really helpful in this because the big thing that they point out, first of all, it's just, you get to know the dadgum names of your neighbors, right?
Lance Ford:Yeah.
Lance Ford:Because
Lance Ford:most people don't even know the names of neighbors.
Lance Ford:So I think that that's one of the things is, and that becomes an embarrassing thing, especially if you've lived there for five years and you've been waving at your neighbor the whole time, or maybe you've even exchanged names two or three times, but you keep forgetting their name.
Lance Ford:Part of that is just take the pain to go across the street or next door and knock on them and say, Hey, you know what?
Lance Ford:I'm really embarrassed, but I've forgotten your name.
Lance Ford:Can we start over?
Lance Ford:Because most likely they're going to say, Hey, I'm glad you did this.
Lance Ford:Cause I forgot your name to open your home up, do parties, do, do dessert nights.
Lance Ford:I mean, that's one of the easiest things that we ever did.
Lance Ford:I mean, we caught onto this thing of doing these deals called cornbread suppers, which basically was just like a potluck that we did once a month.
Lance Ford:We invited, we invited, we use nextdoor.
Lance Ford:com or yeah, the app, and we just.
Lance Ford:Just invited people to, to, um, come to this potluck and basically we said, Hey, uh, we just want to get to know more of our neighbors.
Lance Ford:We have zero agenda.
Lance Ford:You don't have to RSVP.
Lance Ford:You can bring something if you want to.
Lance Ford:You don't have to.
Lance Ford:And you call them what?
Lance Ford:We call them cornbread.
Lance Ford:We call them cornbread Mondays.
Lance Ford:We were doing it on Monday nights.
Lance Ford:And we totally stole this idea from some friends in Lexington, Kentucky that we heard was doing the same thing.
Lance Ford:Now I'll tell you guys.
Lance Ford:It went crazy.
Lance Ford:I put the, I put the invite out there on nextdoor.
Lance Ford:com and my email box that first afternoon just blew up.
Lance Ford:And so the first time we did it was no, we did it on Wednesdays.
Lance Ford:And the first time that we did it, uh, we had 15 strangers show up to our house the first night.
Lance Ford:Um, and, and, and, and the next month we did it, all 15 showed up in five more showed up the next month.
Lance Ford:I'm not making it up.
Lance Ford:All 20 showed up and 5 more showed up.
Lance Ford:It was the easiest, best thing we ever did.
Lance Ford:It took off like a wildfire.
Lance Ford:People are longing to be known, right?
Lance Ford:They are longing!
Lance Ford:They're longing to be known and to know.
Lance Ford:And they're just waiting for somebody to be catalytic and to start it.
Lance Ford:And, you know, and anybody can do that.
Lance Ford:It's really easy.
Lance Ford:So, uh, and we kind of tell that story in there.
Lance Ford:I love that because
Lance Ford:we've talked a lot about how we, uh, well, like we moved to Manhattan, we did it, we moved here, same thing.
Lance Ford:We, uh, would start hosting a happy hour.
Lance Ford:Okay.
Lance Ford:On Wednesdays.
Lance Ford:Yeah.
Lance Ford:Yeah.
Lance Ford:And, and, and same thing, same kind of results, same kind of thing.
Lance Ford:But some people are like, man, I don't know happy hour if they don't drink or they don't even go to happy hour.
Lance Ford:They don't know.
Lance Ford:So cornbread Wednesdays.
Lance Ford:Come on.
Lance Ford:So Southern man.
Lance Ford:I just.
Lance Ford:Dig that.
Lance Ford:You must have also to get that kind of repeat business.
Lance Ford:You must have, I need that cornbread recipe for Tina.
Lance Ford:Tell you what, I can send you a bunch of them cause my wife's good at it, but I'll tell you what, now I've trained church planters.
Lance Ford:And so I spent a lot of time out in Southern California.
Lance Ford:I have a lot of church planters to work with out there.
Lance Ford:And so the big thing, okay, there's three things those guys have done out there.
Lance Ford:First, one of my planters started doing, uh, guacamole Thursdays.
Lance Ford:And so they did all kind of stuff out, uh, uh, around guacamole.
Lance Ford:And of course, then there was a taco Tuesday guy, and then there was a tri tip Thursday guy too, you know, tri tip is the big thing out there.
Lance Ford:So you can do it around anything, you know, you can do it just around anything, but the bottom line is people want to get together and, and you know, uh, there, there's no pressure.
Lance Ford:And so we kind of give the little story and we kind of give the little quote rules there in the book.
Lance Ford:And, uh, I just couldn't tell you how many stories I've heard of people that have started doing this over the last two or three years since we started telling our story.
Lance Ford:It's the easiest, best thing I've ever done.
Lance Ford:Well, I, I want to encourage everybody to get the book and um, Next Door As It Is In Heaven and, and read that thing.
Lance Ford:There's, it's going to be chock full of good stuff, but it's also going to move your heart towards the right stuff.
Lance Ford:And as we always talk about on the show, the thing behind the thing is our heart.
Lance Ford:and Changing How We See Ourselves.
Lance Ford:That stuff, man, that you said about, you know, the flesh moving into the neighborhood, and that's the opinion and promises of God moving into the neighborhood.
Lance Ford:And, oh man, good stuff.
Lance Ford:Listen, Lance, thank you so much for being on with us today.
Lance Ford:Let's do it again.
Lance Ford:I know listeners are going to love this and they'll be writing in a lot.
Lance Ford:Uh, tweet the heck out of this when you hear this episode, guys.
Lance Ford:Share this with other people and, uh, you know, get, get started, right?
Lance Ford:Lance, thanks, man.
Lance Ford:We'll talk to you soon.
Lance Ford:Okay.
Lance Ford:Thanks guys for having me.
Lance Ford:All right, man, what a great guest, Lance.
Lance Ford:He's a good guy, man.
Lance Ford:I
Heath Hollensbe:miss him so much.
Heath Hollensbe:What
Heath Hollensbe:a
Heath Hollensbe:cool thing to get to have him on today.
Heath Hollensbe:That's cool.
Heath Hollensbe:Hearing all his stories too, you know, things that are actually working and it just inspires you to be more creative, even in your own neighborhood, huh?
Heath Hollensbe:Oh, and the show is short, you know, we fly, we try to keep this thing compact for
Heath Hollensbe:everybody every
Heath Hollensbe:week,
Heath Hollensbe:but we could, that guy's got stories, man, for a mile, I'm not kidding you,
Heath Hollensbe:he really does.
Heath Hollensbe:Well, let's get to the big three, uh, for those of you who are now listening and maybe not familiar with what the big three are, it's just the three practical takeaways we'd love for you to leave with.
Heath Hollensbe:at the very least right now.
Heath Hollensbe:Yeah, big three.
Heath Hollensbe:You can get those for free by going to everydaydisciple.
Heath Hollensbe:com forward slash big three.
Heath Hollensbe:Caesar, what would you say the big three are for this week?
Caesar Kalinowski:Okay, first, number one, people are dying for relationship and connection.
Caesar Kalinowski:Don't, don't doubt that, please.
Caesar Kalinowski:I, and I know we have all these fears in our own hearts of meeting people and all that.
Caesar Kalinowski:People are humans.
Caesar Kalinowski:They're created this way by God.
Caesar Kalinowski:And so when you look around and you say, ah, there's not a lot of that.
Caesar Kalinowski:I don't know if there is people are, they're dying for connection.
Caesar Kalinowski:And as Christians, we can choose to push back against consumerism and individualism that's so toxic.
Caesar Kalinowski:Okay.
Caesar Kalinowski:So let's not let our affluence And all the blessing God's poured into our life.
Caesar Kalinowski:Let's not take that affluence and buy the very walls that keep us apart from real gospel center relationship.
Caesar Kalinowski:So, you know, taller fences, bigger property that's all separating us from everybody, security systems, gates, all that stuff.
Caesar Kalinowski:Let's, let's not take the blessing and affluence and make it the barrier.
Caesar Kalinowski:Okay.
Caesar Kalinowski:Second thing, Lance was going after this man.
Caesar Kalinowski:This was so awesome when he's reminded us from John, the word, Jesus was made flesh and moved into the neighborhood.
Caesar Kalinowski:He's saying that the word of God is, is God's opinion and it's God's promises and it moved in.
Caesar Kalinowski:And so now as his family in the neighborhood, That's every Christian in every neighborhood.
Caesar Kalinowski:You're, that's, we take the word with us.
Caesar Kalinowski:We take God's promises.
Caesar Kalinowski:We take his blessings.
Caesar Kalinowski:We take his opinion of how the world should operate and run and how generous he is and all that.
Caesar Kalinowski:We take that into the neighborhood.
Caesar Kalinowski:That's our privilege and opportunity.
Caesar Kalinowski:So don't take this as a, you should.
Caesar Kalinowski:or you're supposed to take it as the incarnation being passed on to us.
Caesar Kalinowski:Now we are the flesh wrapped around the very opinion and promises of God.
Caesar Kalinowski:That's us.
Caesar Kalinowski:That's cool.
Caesar Kalinowski:That's so cool.
Caesar Kalinowski:Right?
Caesar Kalinowski:Not because we're supposed to.
Caesar Kalinowski:We get to.
Caesar Kalinowski:Yep.
Caesar Kalinowski:Man, it's awesome.
Caesar Kalinowski:Okay.
Caesar Kalinowski:And then third.
Caesar Kalinowski:Change the narrative in your neighborhood.
Caesar Kalinowski:Begin to live and be and speak differently about all these things.
Caesar Kalinowski:Speak differently about people.
Caesar Kalinowski:I loved Lance's story there about, you know, God loves tax collectors.
Caesar Kalinowski:He just changed the story on the guy, changed the narrative.
Caesar Kalinowski:He didn't focus on something that maybe others in the church maybe would have and the guy was already fearing his sexual orientation.
Caesar Kalinowski:Um, so, get to know people's names, get to know their story, what they love and value or fear.
Caesar Kalinowski:And, and, you know, I'd say jump on it, start hosting a happy hour or a cornbread Wednesday.
Caesar Kalinowski:Did you love that?
Caesar Kalinowski:Yeah, that's cool.
Caesar Kalinowski:Don't miss, you know, and don't miss the great overarching theme here that he was pointing out like, you know, they, his one buddy was, he was doing cornbread Wednesday.
Caesar Kalinowski:Another guy was doing guacamole Thursdays.
Caesar Kalinowski:We always did happy hour.
Caesar Kalinowski:When you theme something.
Caesar Kalinowski:People love it and it's much easier to talk about than like, I'm a, we're some Christians and we're inviting friends over so we can get to know you and start to discuss deep thought, you know, it's like, Hey, cornbread Wednesday.
Caesar Kalinowski:I mean, it sounds so, yeah.
Caesar Kalinowski:And he said like 15 out of 15 people come back and they bring five friends, 20 out of 20.
Caesar Kalinowski:Yeah, that's, that's been our experience too.
Caesar Kalinowski:So de churchify things, get rid of some of the corny language and some of the wrappings that we don't have to.
Caesar Kalinowski:Yep.
Caesar Kalinowski:Pick a weird theme, borrow one of these, make up your own, share it with us over at the Everyday Disciple Podcast group on Facebook.
Caesar Kalinowski:Yeah, and, uh, but get started, right?
Caesar Kalinowski:Change the narrative in your neighborhood.
Heath Hollensbe:Yeah, that's so good, man.
Heath Hollensbe:Jump in, have some conversation, share with us kind of your modified version of the Cornbread Wednesday, what you're doing in your own neighborhood.
Heath Hollensbe:I'm not doing that one.
Heath Hollensbe:That's corny.
Heath Hollensbe:I'm not doing it.
Heath Hollensbe:Join us next week as we talk about how Jesus explained life and growth in the kingdom, and It'll be a fun topic to get into.
Heath Hollensbe:Yeah, there's some
Heath Hollensbe:stuff in scripture that I missed forever, and I'm gonna unpack it.
Heath Hollensbe:Okay.
Heath Hollensbe:Pattern of promise that Jesus has given us, and you're gonna go, I read
Heath Hollensbe:that
Heath Hollensbe:in one.
Heath Hollensbe:And it's still true for us today.
Heath Hollensbe:Thanks for joining us today.
Heath Hollensbe:For more information on this show, and to get loads of free discipleship resources, visit EverydayDisciple.
Heath Hollensbe:com.
Heath Hollensbe:And remember, you really can live with the spiritual freedom and relational peace that Jesus promised every day.