Our Need For Innovation in the Church Today

There was a time when Christians and the Church pioneered much of the future, shaping culture in profound ways, from business to art to justice reform. But along the way, that redemptive, adaptive movement began to institutionalize, leaving us change-averse and frozen in time.

In this episode of the Everyday Disciple Podcast, Caesar welcomes innovation strategist and author, Doug Paul, who uses surprising stories and cultural analysis to help explain the five phases of Kingdom innovation. Doug offers valuable guidance for contemporary leaders looking to make a positive impact in their communities and beyond.

In This Episode You’ll Learn:

  • What true innovation is and who are the best innovators.
  • Why most leaders haven’t really innovated their churches during the pandemic.
  • 5 (easy to grasp) phases of innovation.
  • How to get the training and tools you need to begin to lead change.

 

A rocket's fiery propulsion contrasted against the serene floating of hot air balloons representing the role of the Church in shaping culture and society.

From this episode:

“Innovation is a skill and it’s a muscle you can grow. You can learn how to do innovation. You weren’t born to have it or not have it, and even people who think they’re naturally good at it have a lot to learn. Fundamentally, in the world in which we now live, the Christian leader missing the skill of innovation is like a carpenter missing a hammer. It’s not the only skill in the toolbelt, but not having it moving into the future, will be indefensible.

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!

Thanks so much for joining us again this week. Have some feedback you’d like to share? Join us on Facebook and take part in the discussion!

If you enjoyed this episode, please share it using the social media buttons you see at the top of this page or right below.

Also, please subscribe and leave an honest review for The Everyday Disciple Podcast on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen. Ratings and reviews are extremely helpful and greatly appreciated! They do matter in the rankings of the show, and we read each and every one of them.

 

Links and Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

Ready or Not: Kingdom Innovation For a Brave New World by Doug Paul

Coaching with Caesar and Tina in discipleship and missional living.

 

Join us on Facebook

Transcript
Doug Paul:

Fundamentally, I believe that in the world in which we now live that a Christian leader missing the skill of innovation is like a carpenter is missing a hammer.

Doug Paul:

Whoa.

Doug Paul:

It's not the only skill on the tool belt.

Doug Paul:

You, you need more tools than just innovation, but not having it.

Doug Paul:

If I, I'm gonna make a strong statement, not having it moving into the future is indefensible

Doug Paul:

for a leader, we've got to be adaptive for the world that we're living in.

Announcer:

Welcome to the Everyday Disciple Podcast, where you'll learn how to live with.

Announcer:

Greater intentionality and an integrated faith that naturally fits into every area of life.

Announcer:

In other words, discipleship as a lifestyle.

Announcer:

This is the stuff your parents, pastors and seminary professors probably forgot to tell you.

Announcer:

And now here's your host, Caesar Kalinowski.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Alrighty.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's awesome to be back together.

Caesar Kalinowski:

As always, love being with you guys, and I hope you're excited to be here as well.

Caesar Kalinowski:

This has been a great week.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I am feeling rested and ready And rock and roll, . Okay.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Hey, listen, if you've not joined us over in the Facebook group, I would appreciate it if you would.

Caesar Kalinowski:

If you just head on over to Facebook and look for Everyday Disciple, you'll find our group.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Or you can go to everyday Disciple dot com slash.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Facebook, how about that?

Caesar Kalinowski:

And then, uh, we'll join you there.

Caesar Kalinowski:

There's thousands of people, lots of conversation going on around discipleship and mission and Missional living and all that stuff, right?

Caesar Kalinowski:

So I'd like to invite you to be a part of that.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I think you'll dig it and, uh, I think you're gonna dig today's episode.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I'm kind of removing straight into things because I wanna leave plenty of time.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I got my buddy Doug Paul on today.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Doug's an innovator, he's a leader, and I've known him for years and always been pretty.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Amazed at the ideas he has and his ability to articulate 'em.

Caesar Kalinowski:

He actually calls himself an innovation strategist, and I think that is like a perfect title for who he is and what he does within the church.

Caesar Kalinowski:

He's a discipler who makes disciples, which I love.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I've gotten lots of ideas from Doug over the years, and he's just an all around good fun dude as well, and a good dad and church leader and all that.

Caesar Kalinowski:

He has recently written and just released a new book called Ready or Not, and the subtitle kind of says it all, A Kingdom innovation.

Caesar Kalinowski:

For a brave new world, and it really is.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I think by the end of this interview, as we talk about innovation in the future of the church, the future of your church, you're gonna be pretty excited about probably wanting to give this book a read as well.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It blew me away.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I'm not, I'm not kidding you.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I read a lot of books.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I get sent a lot of books, and I got to start reading this book before it came out and I was just like floored by it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So I'm really excited to have Doug on with us today, and I think you're gonna dig it as well.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Alright, so, uh, let me bring on Doug and, uh, we're gonna talk a little bit about innovation in the church today.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Alright, Doug.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Good to have you, brother.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Are you flipping out a little bit about what's going on with this book the last few days?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Man,

Doug Paul:

uh, I am flipping out is, I think I might be too tired to be flipping out, to be honest.

Doug Paul:

Um,

Caesar Kalinowski:

People don't know what I'm talking about.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You just just released the book a couple days before we're recording.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And it's shot straight to the top of Amazon's list in the categories you're in.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yep.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And then it kind of broke the internet a little bit where cuz they thought, Hey, there's no way anybody's getting this many reviews and positive reviews this fast.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So then they,

Doug Paul:

I literally, right before , right before we, we got on, I've been going back and forth with Amazon trying to fix this review problem.

Doug Paul:

It's maddening and Oh yeah.

Doug Paul:

And they will not get on the phone with you they're, they're committed to not talking to you, which is, it's

Caesar Kalinowski:

slightly, it's near possible, I tell you because, you know, we run a publishing company, it's, uh, near impossible to get on the phone.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Um, so anyway, so, you know, I've already kinda let folks know that, you know, the book ready or not's about innovation and, and specifically about kingdom innovation.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You know, one of the things you and I talked about, probably a month and a half ago now is like when, when I got the chance to kind of dip in and read you know, read a little bit of this in advance.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I was like, you know, dog, this book is, you know, written to the church, to our family, but this is really stellar and, and something that I think.

Caesar Kalinowski:

everybody in business and, and is gonna wanna read it cuz it's about innovation Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And how it works.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Um, and I, and that's still part of why I love it so much, man.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I love it so much.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But today specifically, I do want to talk about kingdom innovation and I want to talk about innovation within the church.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I mean, that is the crux of the book, that is the meat and the center of it for sure.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But it is applicable and I wanna let people know that, that this is gonna be applicable and start to get their juices flowing and thinking about innovation in new ways, not just connected to church.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But I think this is critical for where the church is at right now, obviously.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So do you Absolutely.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Or you wouldn't have written

Doug Paul:

it?

Doug Paul:

Yeah, absolutely.

Doug Paul:

I don't know that I would've written a book if I didn't think it was.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Right.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's too much work, . It's way too much work.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's way too much work.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So, so let, let's, let's start out, and I always like to do this, if we're doing a topic that, that I think is worthy of it, which is most everything, let's define innovation for people.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Okay.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I wanna, I wanna, I want you to do that and I, I wanna do it by having you answer two questions, okay?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Okay.

Caesar Kalinowski:

What do most people.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I would say in this case, you know, leaders in the church especially.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

What do most people think innovation is?

Caesar Kalinowski:

And then, we'll, we'll come to the second question is, and how would you truly define innovation in a way that we need to understand?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Let's start with what do most people think it means?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Like to I'm innovating something, or what's innovation

Doug Paul:

all.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

So I think the way that I would think that most, at least when I'm working with leaders, uh, who are Christians, I think most, I, I've got two formulas that I think they think that it is.

Doug Paul:

The first is that innovation equals invention.

Doug Paul:

Meaning there was not anything and now there's something and

Caesar Kalinowski:

boom, blue sky, I just pulled it outta the air.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

And it's no one before me.

Doug Paul:

Has ever thought of this thing before, and boom, there it is.

Doug Paul:

Just like God's saying, let there be light,

Caesar Kalinowski:

you know, pizza flavor, toothpaste.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I, I know that's brand new.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

No one's ever thought of

Caesar Kalinowski:

it

Caesar Kalinowski:

. Doug Paul: Um, and, and I think so, so that's a, that's a problem we can unpack.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But the second one, particularly for people in the church when we're thinking about innovation in the church, is that innovation equals dangerous.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Um, that somehow, Because innovation ultimately is talking about change and transformation that somehow we're, we're like skating on the edge of heresy, um, just by talking about innovation.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I, I think because of that, you, you really that, that, that inbuilt fear.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Right there.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Um, yeah, it's a big barrier for people in the church and it's a barrier for leaders, uh, pastors who might be leading churches.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I don't think it's just like the back of their head, like heresy fear, I think simultaneous to that brother that people are thinking like, and if we start to innovate or change, they have pictures of people popping up in their brain.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Like, that person won't go for it and that person's gonna leave and that tie that goes out the door or so-And-so who's been here since you know they have their name on the cornerstone cuz they laid it with their grandpa.

Caesar Kalinowski:

They're gonna hate this.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And that's what's running through their brain.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And it ends up being this big bucket of cold water.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah, absolutely.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And additional sort of negative thing of like, oh, innovation and change.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah, of course.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Before even gets started.

Caesar Kalinowski:

That is, that is the narrative.

Caesar Kalinowski:

That is the film that is running in the front of their, their head.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

All these things, they're gonna blow up if, if they actually were to step into these waters.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So like one of the, one of the funny things that we, we talk about with some leaders that we work with is like, how to innovate without blowing up your church.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

. Uh, because using up the, using those words, blowing up your church, I have heard that phrase thousands of times.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I'm gonna blow up my church, man.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's just inbuilt fear or blow up my family or blow up my business or nonprofit or whatever it is.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Just inbuilt fear that it's gonna trainwreck everything.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I

Caesar Kalinowski:

think additionally to these sort of weird misconceptions and fears attached to innovation and change, I think too, people.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Like probably perceive themselves in one or two categories.

Caesar Kalinowski:

They, some people think they're super innovative.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You know?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Um, cuz they, you know, they changed the, you know, we used to print this on the front of the bulletin and now we're putting it on the bag, you know, you know, or, and then you got those who think that they are not, or can never be innovators.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Which, just now I'm at the, you know, it's like the same person that says, no, I'm just not creative.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Everybody's creative, you know, in some ways.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Right.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Or can

Doug Paul:

be.

Doug Paul:

Right.

Doug Paul:

So, I mean, everything, that's, that's actually a really important point in that second one every.

Doug Paul:

Everyone can innovate.

Doug Paul:

And so one of the myths that we talk about in the book is just this idea that almost that some people have an innovation gene and other people, they're just missing that X or Y chromosome.

Doug Paul:

Like if you, if you are a person, a human being, you've been made in the image of God.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

Who is the most insanely creative, innovative being who has ever existed or will ever exist and you were made in his image

Caesar Kalinowski:

and, and now bear that same spirit Yes.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Of innovation and creativity.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Not just when you are out of strength or, you know, at the end of a long day, but like that's, that's part of who we are now.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's our identity.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's built in.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Oh man.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Okay.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So let's talk then about what is a better understanding of innovation, especially in light of the church today, but I think period, you

Doug Paul:

know?

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

So I, I'll, I'll, I'll give the headline and then I'll, I'll kind of double click.

Doug Paul:

Um, all right.

Doug Paul:

So the way that I, the way that I've defined it is that kingdom innovation.

Doug Paul:

So again, kind of going back to what you said at the beginning, uh, I thought about writing a book that could reach everyone that wasn't Christian and just decided.

Doug Paul:

, that that isn't the route that I wanted to take cuz I just really believe in the active involvement of the Holy Spirit in this process.

Doug Paul:

And so kingdom innovation is, it's new, it works and it brings glory to Jesus.

Doug Paul:

So it's new, it works and it brings glory to Jesus.

Doug Paul:

Now for each of those, like it's new.

Doug Paul:

I didn't say how new it had to be or how insanely creative it had to be.

Doug Paul:

It just has to be slightly different to brand new, never existed.

Doug Paul:

It's a brand new invention.

Doug Paul:

We'll talk about that in a second.

Doug Paul:

Uh, the it works thing is really important because, so one of the things that you see so often with leadership, uh, particularly with with Christian leadership, is there, there are things that we write on a piece of paper and they don't work

Doug Paul:

they actually don't work in reality.

Doug Paul:

We just think that because I had the idea, of course it's going to work.

Doug Paul:

Um, and then the last piece, it brings glory to Jesus.

Doug Paul:

This really centers what the purpose of kingdom innovation is about.

Doug Paul:

That it is reflecting, um, what it, who Jesus is and what he has done back to Jesus.

Doug Paul:

It is, it's Him glory.

Doug Paul:

It is not.

Caesar Kalinowski:

To me, that to me just puts the axe to the root of we're innovating for the sake of something pragmatic.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Or we're just sick of this, or no one's into that anymore, or that's not working.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And so we just start throwing change at the wall or at our people, or at ourselves or our family, or our communities.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And it doesn't, it's not driven by a desire to glorify God.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

As much as it is to put our finger in a hole and it's

Doug Paul:

got.

Doug Paul:

It's, it just, it's really important that Jesus is the center of that story because I think, I always think about that Tim Keller quote and I'm, it's not exactly it, but it's anytime you make a good thing, a great thing that's called an idol.

Doug Paul:

We have a word for that in the Bible, and I think that's there.

Doug Paul:

You can make anything an idol.

Doug Paul:

You can make your spouse an idol, you can make a job an idol.

Doug Paul:

You can make innovation an idol chasing that.

Doug Paul:

By saying like, and it brings glory to Jesus.

Doug Paul:

It centers the story around.

Doug Paul:

It's not actually about innovation in and of itself.

Doug Paul:

It's about Jesus and his mission and what he's doing in the world.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah, you have a quote in the book and I'm not sure who it's from.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It says, if you love the form, you have everything to lose.

Caesar Kalinowski:

If you love what gives it its form, you're free to receive whatever it's turning into.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I think that connects to that

Doug Paul:

man.

Doug Paul:

I really do.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

That's Scott Erickson.

Doug Paul:

He's a, um, I tell you, if, if you're listening and you're on Instagram follows Scott the painter, he has the most beautiful little illustrations with like, just these little profound.

Doug Paul:

Like that.

Doug Paul:

What you just read is one of his little things.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Awesome.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Well, obviously with all the changes that have occurred, you know, this year within culture and for the church in recent months, it's everything's, you know, changed.

Caesar Kalinowski:

No one, no one ever gets to say, well, we've always done it this way.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Nope.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Not anymore, but everyone feels like they're innovating.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But from your definition and, and how you're starting to articulate this for us, um, and what I've read in, in the book Ready or Not, a lot of leaders are not going deep enough.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

They're merely trying to figure out new ways of doing old stuff.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yes.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Right.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So, I mean, speak to that a little.

Doug Paul:

So going back to like that, that the definition, it's new at works, it brings glory to Jesus.

Doug Paul:

Like double clicking on the new thing.

Doug Paul:

I talk about how.

Doug Paul:

There are, there are kind of four different types of innovation.

Doug Paul:

Um, so, so one is where you're just tweaking something, right?

Doug Paul:

Like it's, it, maybe it was working, it's not working now, and you just need to, like, a screw fell out and you need to screw it back in . Um, or it just needs to be turned three degrees to the left and it, and it's going to work again.

Doug Paul:

But that's still, it's different than it was, even if it's three degrees different.

Doug Paul:

That still is an innovation um, then, then we talked about, so you've got, um, you got tweak, then you have adapt where it's taking something that already exists, but giving it a new paradigm.

Doug Paul:

So I love this story.

Doug Paul:

This is one of my favorites.

Doug Paul:

Um, so the, uh, the, the people who started Alpha in the, uh, in the 1980s in, uh, holy Trinity Brompton, they, uh, they, it was originally a class that was just to teach doctrine

Doug Paul:

that was why the class existed.

Doug Paul:

And Nikki Gumbel, who was coming on staff as a really young, uh, a really young man at the time, he looked at it and was like, that's interesting, but I'm not sure that it , it's best served just being a doctrine class for believers.

Doug Paul:

What if this was a class for people who don't know Jesus yet?

Doug Paul:

and so they just adapted the purpose of it.

Doug Paul:

It's not for believers, what if it's for unbelievers?

Doug Paul:

And a lot of the classes this, like the experience is the same as it was for believers.

Doug Paul:

Mm-hmm.

Doug Paul:

and 30 years later, 25 million people have come to faith in Christ.

Doug Paul:

So that was a massive innovation.

Doug Paul:

But again, yeah, it was just adapting what was already there.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

So we've got tweak, we have adapt.

Doug Paul:

Then there's, there is a engineer where we're kind of like stripping something down and rebuilding it same parts, but in a different way.

Doug Paul:

And I think that Caesar is really where a lot of leaders are stuck right now.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

It sounds like because they're thinking.

Doug Paul:

They're thinking, okay, I can't meet.

Doug Paul:

Or maybe you are meeting, but think about the time when you, when you weren't able to meet in part or it's very different.

Doug Paul:

It's very different.

Doug Paul:

And you, and the way that they're thinking, it was like, how do we do the worship service, the exact same way.

Doug Paul:

That we were when we were meeting, rather than asking if we're going to have a gathering online, what is the best way to do that, that will be meaningful for people?

Doug Paul:

They, they weren't going deep enough because they weren't asking, why do we get together in the first place?

Doug Paul:

And they were confusing the vehicle of the worship service with the vision of what the worship service is supposed to deliver and so you ended up with like, wow.

Doug Paul:

Some really, really just, let's be honest, awful experiences online.

Doug Paul:

And Yes.

Doug Paul:

I, and, and I don't wanna take a baseball bat to all these pastors who are really, like, no one was ready for this.

Doug Paul:

No one had like, well, let me pull out my global pandemic playbook that I just happened to have written in my back pocket.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

Um, but I think now that the air is clearing a little, and we're seeing perhaps it, it's, it's not as foggy as it was.

Doug Paul:

We can look back a little and we can start to evaluate some of our decisions.

Doug Paul:

We should do that.

Doug Paul:

You know, gracefully and kindly with ourselves, but we should be like, I wonder if I should have made that decision differently.

Doug Paul:

And I, and I think that's where a lot of pastors are.

Doug Paul:

And then Well, a lot of people just, yeah, go ahead.

Doug Paul:

Go

Caesar Kalinowski:

ahead.

Caesar Kalinowski:

A lot of people just punted, you know what I mean?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

They're like, like what you're saying, they just said like, let's just do what we've been doing as best we can online now.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So they just start filming and streaming the same old stuff and not going back to deep enough.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And like, why do we even gather when we gather?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Do have we even thought about that?

Caesar Kalinowski:

That's talk about loving the form and missing the point.

Caesar Kalinowski:

. Doug Paul: Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And, and then it, it really makes us ask or should make us ask some questions because we're all seeing the same research from someone like Barna, who, there are a third of people who right now are saying, I'm probably not coming back, who were, who were attending at least one or two times a month.

Caesar Kalinowski:

They were like, you know what?

Caesar Kalinowski:

I liked brunch.

Caesar Kalinowski:

The six months that I've had brunch on Sundays.

Caesar Kalinowski:

That brunch a good, good time and I'm, and, and I'm out.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Maybe, maybe they're gonna engage with something that's more decentralized.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Probably not.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Um, but, but I think that is that, that should be revealing of something.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It, it

Caesar Kalinowski:

should be.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I, and I, you know, I've been warning people a long time.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I said, as soon as we pop the top off of this, We're giving everybody permission to either never come back or go, wait a minute, it's legit to just stream a sermon and then go about my day.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Well then why do I have to stream yours

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You know, because there's a million killer ones out there and I, you know, I actually found some stuff I like better.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I, my heart has broken, uh, on some Sunday mornings when if I happen to be on any time between, Eight in the morning, or seven in the morning and noon my time.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Then all those time zones are all over the place, and you'll get these little alerts on Facebook like, Hey, so-and-so's going live.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It won't even be people I know necessarily.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Right?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And they're, oh, their service is going live and it's just, Stark.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You know what I mean?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Like what they're, what they're, what they're putting up with, what they're experiencing as the teachers, as the worship.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And the whole thing was just dark.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I was like, oh, no,

Caesar Kalinowski:

Oh no.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Who's, who's gonna come back?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Who's tuning in?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Talk about a need for innovation.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's, oh, man.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

That's, and that's probably why this book is hitting us all so hard right now, Doug.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And, uh, and, and it's so needed now in, in the book, you, you work through five practical phases of kingdom innovation.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Okay.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Now, I know you can't unpack these fully in the, you know, in the time we have here on the Everyday, Disciple Podcast, but real quickly, at least, what are these five phases?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And, and maybe just a bit of why each of these are important for us right now.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And, and maybe that'll just wet people's whistle as well.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But I think just as I even read through the five right now, I go, oh wow, this is so helpful right away to get me, get me started.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So

Doug Paul:

I, they, they all are, um, They all rhyme of course, because we, we couldn't do five things and not have them rhyme.

Doug Paul:

So the first phase is, is identification.

Doug Paul:

And that is identifying from the outset why you need the innovation.

Doug Paul:

Um, because sometimes what we do is we are really poor at asking the right questions at the beginning.

Doug Paul:

So an example of this, uh, that I talk about in the book is, and I, and I always use this cause I just hear it so many times.

Doug Paul:

um, leaders will be talking about how something like small groups don't work, um, or they're not working like you want it to.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

And so their question is how do I fix small groups?

Doug Paul:

Um, but I don't think that's the right question.

Doug Paul:

I think the right question is why did we start small groups in the first place?

Doug Paul:

Like what was the, what was the problem we are experiencing and what was small groups supposed to deliver?

Doug Paul:

Cuz I actually think small groups are delivering.

Doug Paul:

on what we started them for.

Doug Paul:

The problem is we've changed what we want them to do.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

And so if you want, if you want something that is going to Disciple people and is gonna mobilize people into mission and is gonna connect them into community, that is not what small groups are built for.

Doug Paul:

They weren't, they weren't.

Doug Paul:

They just weren't.

Doug Paul:

They were built to be fly paper.

Doug Paul:

to keep people going to that worship service and not going to another church down the road.

Doug Paul:

That's why they were started fly paper

Caesar Kalinowski:

identification thing.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Oh, I'm still stealing that

Doug Paul:

brother . You feeling that?

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

. So the identification phase is like, is is driving to framing the innovation.

Doug Paul:

Why are we going after this?

Doug Paul:

What's the problem

Caesar Kalinowski:

we're trying

Doug Paul:

to solve?

Doug Paul:

Exactly.

Doug Paul:

So it's Simon Sinek where he is like, you gotta start with why.

Doug Paul:

Don't go to the how.

Doug Paul:

Don't go to the what.

Doug Paul:

Start with the why all

Caesar Kalinowski:

right.

Caesar Kalinowski:

What's the second

Doug Paul:

phase?

Doug Paul:

The second phase is, is around ideation.

Doug Paul:

And this is probably the one that most people, uh, think they're familiar with, at least for get that whiteboard out.

Doug Paul:

Yeah, yeah.

Doug Paul:

Right.

Doug Paul:

Like, we're gonna have a blue sky session, get the whiteboard , no bad ideas.

Doug Paul:

We're gonna have a brainstorm.

Doug Paul:

Let's, let's just generate ideas.

Doug Paul:

Um, and that is certainly part of what ideation is, but it.

Doug Paul:

, it's generating as many ideas as possible.

Doug Paul:

Um, there's this, this crazy, uh, phenomenon that they've traced that the, uh, the organizations that are most successful are the ones that have generated the most ideas before putting something into the, into practice.

Doug Paul:

And so I think this really addresses, I, I'll just speak for myself.

Doug Paul:

It addresses my ego because I believe, let's just generously say half the time, and it's probably more like 80% of the time that if I had the idea that it must be right.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

Um, and it, of course we should put it into practice.

Doug Paul:

Um, but actually there is a discipline that comes with generating ideas and being able to decide whether or not this thing is worth trying out and testing and experimenting with.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Now, how do you address this issue though?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Because coming from a creative background as a record producer and songwriter and and writer and all that, and maybe this is my arrogance.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Okay.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Showing up.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You just nail me if it is.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah, but I don't feel like all ideas are created equal.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Oh no.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You know what I'm saying?

Caesar Kalinowski:

They're definitely not created, they're not all good ideas.

Caesar Kalinowski:

They're ideas.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I think it's fair enough to get 'em out in the air.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Cuz sometimes one thing takes your brain somewhere else and all that stuff.

Caesar Kalinowski:

There's, there's whole books and books and books, libraries on how to do that.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But not all ideas are created equal.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I think with such a, Uh, over like arching fear of man and stepping on anybody's toes.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I think another thing that keeps a lot of people from innovation is they either they do what you say is like, I have an idea, we're doing it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

or they're afraid Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

To open it up and let's just get a lot of ideas connected to that problem.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So going back to the first phase of identification, but let's get a lot of ideas out and then we're gonna have to do some thinking and praying and make some decisions.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But don't get offended cuz you know , not all ideas are gonna be good ones and or get accepted.

Caesar Kalinowski:

How do you address that so that you help people get past that crazy fear.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I, I,

Doug Paul:

I think for, cuz this is what I spend so much time on every day, it is helping people see there's a process and the process is committed to the best idea.

Doug Paul:

And so if, if Caesar happens to be the one that comes up with the best idea, then great.

Doug Paul:

Um, but it might not be.

Doug Paul:

And so it's saying to the Caesars of the world who are so insanely creative, um, you might have the idea, you might not have the idea and you need to be okay with both.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

On the other side, it's for, for a group of people who, um, are, are maybe change averse and who are, who are maybe reluctant to throw things out.

Doug Paul:

Um, it's really encouraging them that this is how they can be faithful.

Doug Paul:

That actually faithfulness, like innovation, like at the end of the day, success is simply faithfulness is obedience to what God is asking you to do.

Doug Paul:

And so it's stepping into something that might feel different and just being faithful to like generating ideas and.

Doug Paul:

, like actually torture testing some of them, because some people I, I will say that some of the people who are maybe not as natural at, uh, giving the ideas are actually, and this can be annoying, quite gifted at poking holes in the ideas, but you need those people.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

You actually like, and so all of the, all of the metaphor.

Doug Paul:

In, in the New Testament around, we need the whole body.

Doug Paul:

So we need the idea pokers.

Doug Paul:

We actually need those people.

Doug Paul:

They're gonna help us figure out how to make that thing work, even if they're not able to see how it will work before it goes into testing.

Doug Paul:

Well,

Caesar Kalinowski:

that takes some real humility and, uh, I think maturity to be able to say it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

We value the, the poll, the hole pokers.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah, because cuz it's, it's too easy to say like, well, all you do is poke holes in everybody else's ideas.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Where's your ideas?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Right.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And it's like, uh, it's . It's more

Doug Paul:

than that.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

I think part of it is like in the process it's like, no, no, no.

Doug Paul:

Wait, wait, wait.

Doug Paul:

It's not time to poke holes yet.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

Cause that's all, that's what they wanted.

Doug Paul:

Like, so there is a way that we can like lead a process with teams to help them generate not just ideas, but ways of talking through them that are helpful for the team as opposed to there's just nothing worse than every time you put out an idea that same person is like, Nope, won't work.

Doug Paul:

Oh yeah.

Doug Paul:

Let me tell you why.

Doug Paul:

Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

It's

Caesar Kalinowski:

demoralizing.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I'm feeling very convicted right now, brother . I'm feeling very, when I worked, when I worked at the Megachurch, okay, this has been a few years back, but when I worked at the Megachurch, one of the best compliments I got from the senior was he goes, here's why I like you on the team.

Caesar Kalinowski:

He says, you'll push so hard on everything and everybody's idea.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But at the end of the day, whatever idea we finally go, that's the one you'll get behind it and throw your shoulder behind it, just as hard as if it was yours or somebody else's.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I that stuck because I, I, not only did I feel good about that, you know, it was a good compliment, but I also learned something about leadership in that and allowing people, you know, to have different ideas.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And or just poke holes in others.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So, yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Awesome.

Caesar Kalinowski:

All right.

Caesar Kalinowski:

What's the next of the five

Doug Paul:

phases?

Doug Paul:

Yeah, the third phase.

Doug Paul:

Probably the most skipped by Christian leaders, and that is around the idea of experimentation.

Doug Paul:

So it was identification, it was ideation.

Doug Paul:

Phase three is experimentation.

Doug Paul:

It's all right.

Doug Paul:

We are going to construct the most simple version of whatever this thing is.

Doug Paul:

Uh, we in, uh, the business world, it's called the minimum viable product.

Doug Paul:

The MVP, right?

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

Uh, we talk about it, it's the, because we're.

Doug Paul:

When it's kingdom innovation, it's almost always having to deal with people and transformation.

Doug Paul:

So we call it, we call it the minimum viable process.

Doug Paul:

And it is, it's a, it's a beta, it's a prototype.

Doug Paul:

It is, it is.

Doug Paul:

Hey, we're renting a room for one night on a Friday night to see if this restaurant idea.

Doug Paul:

is a good idea.

Doug Paul:

Will people show up for it?

Doug Paul:

Do people want Afghani French fusion food or is that a bad idea?

Doug Paul:

I say that right out.

Doug Paul:

Let's actually pop-up.

Doug Paul:

We have a place here that does Afghani French Fusion food.

Doug Paul:

And see, that

Caesar Kalinowski:

sounds so good to me, brother.

Caesar Kalinowski:

That's I, I vote yes for that

Caesar Kalinowski:

. Doug Paul: Um, but the way that, the way that they got there is that they, they, they didn't commit to like, Hey, we're gonna have a five year lease.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Right out of the gate it was like, Hey, we're gonna rent a room for one night.

Caesar Kalinowski:

We're gonna see if it works, and then maybe we'll rent for two nights, over two months, twice a weekend, and we'll see if that work.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And you, you build, you learn and you iterate.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You experiment, you adapt, you tweak until you find that it's doing the thing that you want it to do because if it's not viable don't scale it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Do you think the church is flexible enough in our just , our culture to allow experimentation with stuff?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Especially now everybody listening thinks this through the lens of like what we do on Sunday?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah, and I, I, please don't hear this.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Please think about experimentation in.

Caesar Kalinowski:

, all kinds of ways of solving the problem or changing the issue or accomplishing what we're trying to do to glorify God or make disciples or multiply.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So I know it's hard, we wanna hear all this, but, but I know since people are hearing it, yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Through the lens of like, what do we do with worship services or whatever.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Do you think we're flexible enough of a culture to allow experimentation?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Like, Hey, we tried that, you know?

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I always tell people, we're not pouring cement here.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Like, Hey, we can try this.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You know?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Do you think we're flexible enough to actually allow this phase very well,

Doug Paul:

not yet.

Doug Paul:

Just not yet.

Doug Paul:

We, we, and, and that is why I, I mean, that, that is one of the reasons I, I spent so much time on the ideas in this book, and this is kind of my day job, what it is that I do.

Doug Paul:

We are not there yet.

Doug Paul:

And I think a big piece of that is baked into experimentation is that it very rarely works the first time that you are going to have missteps and mis-cues along the way in even failure.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

And that's okay.

Caesar Kalinowski:

There's failure if you're learning right, and you're

Doug Paul:

moving forward like failures, this is the cheesiest thing ever.

Doug Paul:

But failures are stepping stones across the lake to get you from one side to the other.

Doug Paul:

Yep.

Doug Paul:

And there is something, I so agree.

Doug Paul:

There's something in the water.

Doug Paul:

There is something in the water with Western Christianity.

Doug Paul:

With leadership that just cannot handle failure.

Doug Paul:

And so

Caesar Kalinowski:

we don't, we could do a whole episode just on this whole, this

Doug Paul:

phase three here.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

Wow.

Doug Paul:

So we, we skip it or be, if, if, remember the, the, uh, definition I gave is it, it's new.

Doug Paul:

It works, it gives glory lord to Jesus that it works thing we just assume.

Doug Paul:

I think that it's gonna work coming outta phase two.

Doug Paul:

I'm just gonna skip it.

Doug Paul:

So we've got a new program.

Doug Paul:

It's gonna be great.

Doug Paul:

We're gonna scale it churchwide overnight because that's how we know how to do things.

Doug Paul:

We run programs and we know how they work.

Doug Paul:

Well, if it, if it's new, you might not know how it works.

Doug Paul:

It might not do

Caesar Kalinowski:

it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Oh boy, what you think it does.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Oh man.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Oh, I gotta move us along to the next phase.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But, but that, no, that is so good, man.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I, oh, we're gonna, we're gonna talk more about this man.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Okay.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Stage four mobilization.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Phase four, I guess.

Doug Paul:

Phase, yeah.

Doug Paul:

Phase four is mobilization.

Doug Paul:

And that is when, when coming out of experimentation, you're looking at this thing, you're like, mm, it did it, it did the thing I wanted it to do.

Doug Paul:

Um, so whether that was, you've come up with a brand new way of discipling people, whether your nonprofit is working with un uh, under-resourced kids, uh, in a, in a way, and you are delivering breakthrough, whatever, whatever it might be.

Doug Paul:

You're like, we had an idea we experimented and man did it, deliver.

Doug Paul:

The question that you have to ask now is why did it deliver?

Doug Paul:

And this is called the process of codifying something.

Doug Paul:

Mm-hmm.

Doug Paul:

, it's, it's, it's distilling it down to its simplest form so that you can train other people how to do it.

Doug Paul:

Because if there's only one of you that can do it, or five of you that can do it, you can't scale it.

Doug Paul:

You can't multiply that thing.

Doug Paul:

And so if it's only the elite that can do the innovation, it's not that the innovation is bad, it just has a ceiling.

Doug Paul:

And so learning how, how to actually like drive down the simplest.

Doug Paul:

Expression of what that thing is.

Doug Paul:

So that lots and lots of, and why it works, people

Caesar Kalinowski:

can get access to it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And why, you know, you know, what comes to mind when you're saying this brother is, um, as we've built out and multiplied communities in lots of different contexts, uh, discipleship communities, one of the hardest things to mobilize is ethos.

Caesar Kalinowski:

. Yes.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Which has so much to do with the why behind stuff.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's, I think we, we think it's all just like, yeah, that guy's got a cool vibe, or she's just great to be around, or he's so creative or whatever.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But I know to get to multiplication and movement, we've had to work really, really hard to understand why is this different and why is this working and how can we train people in that?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Oh, that's, that's a hard, this is a hard phase, brother . Yeah.

Doug Paul:

It really is.

Doug Paul:

Um, it's really, it's, it's challenge.

Doug Paul:

It's it's learnable though.

Doug Paul:

Yeah, but it's challenging.

Doug Paul:

It's

Caesar Kalinowski:

learnable.

Caesar Kalinowski:

If, if, if the team or the leaders will take the time to do that codification, right?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

That's the problem.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Often I think it's just like, well see God's blessing it and just do what I did.

Caesar Kalinowski:

and, uh, there's stuff missing there and that, that reduces it to task and program again.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Real quick.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Which starts to erode the innovative aspect of it right away.

Caesar Kalinowski:

as a

Doug Paul:

small Yeah.

Doug Paul:

And there's things that you miss.

Doug Paul:

I mean, I think about that passage, um, it's kind of a funny story, but I think about passage in Mark nine where, you know Jesus is up on the Mount Transfiguration with Peter, James and John, and you've got the other nine disciples.

Doug Paul:

Who've just made this giant mess because they tried to cast out the spirit and it's just not working.

Doug Paul:

Like they are stuck.

Doug Paul:

But the problem is that they'd already in Mark six, been really successful in the past.

Doug Paul:

Hmm.

Doug Paul:

Um, and at the end of the day, they pulled Jesus aside.

Doug Paul:

This is, this is one of my all-time favorite Jesus stories.

Doug Paul:

And they just, they're like, Hey, can we debrief what happened?

Doug Paul:

Like, why didn't that

Caesar Kalinowski:

work?

Caesar Kalinowski:

We did all the stuff we've done in the past.

Caesar Kalinowski:

We did all the stuff.

Doug Paul:

And he was like, Yeah, you gotta pray like, and, and, and other ones.

Doug Paul:

It's like you gotta pray in fast and it's, it always struck me like, at what point did they think they could cast out an evil spirit without prayer?

Doug Paul:

And somewhere along the way they, they.

Doug Paul:

Thought that the hype was about them and not what Jesus was doing.

Doug Paul:

And they're like, eh, prayer.

Doug Paul:

And then see, I think I get to the evil spirit

Caesar Kalinowski:

without the prayer.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I think we take that passage right there, especially in light of this, and we go, oh, you know what, um, like a Tasman or something, uh, we didn't stop to pray, so God couldn't bless it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Like, like we earned it versus No, no, no.

Caesar Kalinowski:

What's going on?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Uh, prayer and fasting.

Caesar Kalinowski:

No.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Go and ask God what to do in this situation.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Listen back off.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's gonna take a while to get past what you think you want to do or what you've done in the past.

Caesar Kalinowski:

What's always worked, what makes you look good, what's efficient, blah, blah, blah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And listen, just stop and listen.

Caesar Kalinowski:

What's next word?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Listen to that.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Right?

Caesar Kalinowski:

We, I think our, my, I'll speak for my own heart.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I just go like, oh, wait, wait, wait, wait.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Hey everybody, let's just stop and pray real quick.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's almost like if we don't.

Caesar Kalinowski:

, then God won't bless it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah, no, no, it's not.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's not some act or a Tasman.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's like, listen and let the spirit of the living God, who you know, we're glorifying in all this.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Let him tell you in this situation, in that change, in this innovation, in this particular situation, yeah, that's key, man.

Caesar Kalinowski:

That

Doug Paul:

stop and just asking, Lord, what are you up to right now?

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

Is really important.

Doug Paul:

I mean, you think about Act 16.

Doug Paul:

where the spirit is blocking Paul every which way until finally he gets this vision of, of a man in Macedonia, and that's how he goes to Greece, and that's the first church that's planted on a brand new continent.

Doug Paul:

But it was because he was paying attention to the spirit.

Doug Paul:

and he was willing to pump the brakes on what he wanted to do.

Doug Paul:

Mm-hmm.

Doug Paul:

. And that's incredibly, incredibly important with kingdom

Caesar Kalinowski:

Innovation and then all the innovation that had to have followed because he's not all of it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

He's not Jerusalem or, you know, so, you know, really

Doug Paul:

different, really different context.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

All right, so phase number five, multiplication.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

I mean, it, it kind of is what the name says like we are.

Doug Paul:

It is you have codified what?

Doug Paul:

It has worked.

Doug Paul:

You've figured out how to get it into the hands of people, and you have reduced that thing to like what we call radical minimums.

Doug Paul:

Mm-hmm.

Doug Paul:

, which are the most, um, it, it's, you cannot ask everyone to do everything, but you can ask everyone to do a few radical things.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Say that one more time.

Caesar Kalinowski:

That's so good, brother.

Doug Paul:

You cannot ask everyone to do everything.

Doug Paul:

, but you can ask everyone to do a few radical things.

Doug Paul:

Wow.

Doug Paul:

. So if, if you think about, um, if you think about like the, the, uh, the Benedictines like they, their radical minimums, they have this thing called the rule of life.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

Um, if you think about aa, their radical minimums are what?

Doug Paul:

You're gonna need a sponsor, you're gonna need 12 steps and you gotta go to meetings.

Doug Paul:

, like there are a lot of things that could go into what it looks like to fight for your sobriety, but they've boiled it down to, there are a couple of things that you have to do and sort of the, the, the thing around multiplication.

Doug Paul:

When you're multiplying something and you're ask someone, cuz you're calling people up, you're not making it easier for people.

Doug Paul:

You're actually calling them up is you're saying what other people call radical.

Doug Paul:

Here we call normal cuz normal.

Doug Paul:

My, my wife and.

Doug Paul:

My wife is a, uh, cultural anthropologist.

Doug Paul:

The way that we talk, our definition for culture is culture is whatever's normal for a group of people.

Doug Paul:

Mm-hmm.

Doug Paul:

. And so the radical minimums are like embodied practices where we're saying, Hey, other people, we're not saying, you, you have to do this.

Doug Paul:

We're not saying if you don't do it, you're not a Christian.

Doug Paul:

We're just saying here in this culture, this is what we do.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

And you might think that's strange.

Doug Paul:

You might think it's crazy or radical or whatever.

Doug Paul:

It's just normal.

Doug Paul:

, Caesar Kalinowski: but you won't get to movement and multiplication without that.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

Identification and adherence to it.

Doug Paul:

And this, this is where we run into things as problems as well.

Doug Paul:

People are like, well, why do we have to, why do we have to have those minimums?

Doug Paul:

Or why do we have to have that?

Doug Paul:

You know?

Doug Paul:

And, and then, but then the.

Doug Paul:

You know, what's the phrase?

Doug Paul:

We've all heard it a million times.

Doug Paul:

Make sure innovate, I'm sorry, imitate before innovation.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

Like, hey, let's, let's stick to these.

Doug Paul:

You know?

Doug Paul:

Can you imagine coming to one AA meeting or something?

Doug Paul:

And this isn't a promotion for that.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

But you come to one and you're like, yeah, there's some good stuff in there.

Doug Paul:

And then the next day you just kind of like chuck a couple of the big tenants of it, and we only need eight steps.

Doug Paul:

These are a waste of time over here.

Doug Paul:

I like those.

Doug Paul:

And the whole making

Doug Paul:

amends.

Doug Paul:

Don't

Caesar Kalinowski:

really need to do that.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Don't even worry about that.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And it's like, yeah, not too many people are really helped by this.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I guess that whole thing doesn't really work anyway.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Like, no, you're not actually doing that anymore.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You lost some of the core.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

Wow.

Doug Paul:

I mean, there's this group that I'm working with right now, and they are, they have codified, um, a very specific way of doing what are called DMMs, which are Disciple making movements, and they, their mission very specifically is to work amongst unreached people.

Doug Paul:

um, people who have either never, who have not been, um, cultures that have not been exposed to the Gospel for at least 200 years or more.

Doug Paul:

Wow.

Doug Paul:

Um, and in the last 15 years, 1.8 million people have come to faith in Jesus.

Doug Paul:

It's in, in places that you would not believe in.

Doug Paul:

Places I can't even probably say in a podcast.

Doug Paul:

Um, wow.

Doug Paul:

And it's, but what they're like, it's, everyone has been like, This is what we're going to do.

Doug Paul:

And there's, there's flex, there is flexibility built in, but it's like these six things we're all going to do.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

And there isn't flexibility among these six things for our process, for what that looks like.

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

And that's made it incredibly, incredibly multipliable and repeatable.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Oh man.

Caesar Kalinowski:

All get so stoked.

Caesar Kalinowski:

. Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Wanna, let's do an episode on that.

Caesar Kalinowski:

All right.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Okay.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So we, I, I gotta, uh, I gotta sort of start moving towards, uh, the, the time, you know?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

We can start landing plane.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But, um, you've also made a lot of tools and training available in conjunction.

Caesar Kalinowski:

to the book.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And, and this topic of innovation and kingdom innovation in specific, um, real quickly tell us about what folks can get ahold of the training lab and what's going on there.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And maybe even, you know, feel free to go ahead and plug, you know, the work you're doing with Catapult.

Doug Paul:

Yes.

Doug Paul:

I mean, if you, if you get the book.

Doug Paul:

There is, we put a lot of time into creating what we're calling just a leader innovation lab, which is, it's training in a lot of the things that we talk about in the book.

Doug Paul:

So for each of the mass we, we've got, we, we just talked the five phases of, of kingdom innovation.

Doug Paul:

Each of those phases has a master tool, which allows people to really learn the process for that phase.

Doug Paul:

So like for the, uh, that fourth one that, that is about mobilization, we call it the call to arms tool, and it, it goes like, how do you codify something?

Doug Paul:

Like it's easy for me on a podcast to be like, you should codify.

Doug Paul:

Like, what does that look like?

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

How do you do that?

Doug Paul:

So it's a tool about that.

Doug Paul:

So we've got training on that.

Doug Paul:

We've got, um,

Caesar Kalinowski:

I've seen these tools.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You're giving the farm away.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I, I want everybody to, we're gonna put links in the show notes for folks to be able to get this stuff, you know, and there again, it's all in the book too, the lease and all that

Doug Paul:

stuff.

Doug Paul:

So, so we've got, we've got that, we've got case studies.

Doug Paul:

There are six case studies where we've just done a real deep dive around things that are happening.

Doug Paul:

Like the Bible project is one of them.

Doug Paul:

I got, um, did some extensive interviews with them trying to unpack how it is that they, uh, they got to this place.

Doug Paul:

We've got, I mean, there there's more training.

Doug Paul:

Uh, there are, uh, some other downloadables that are, I mean, we, we just try to give,

Caesar Kalinowski:

give as much way too many good things, man.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So much good stuff.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And what about Catapult?

Caesar Kalinowski:

What's going on with Catapult?

Doug Paul:

Yeah, so I, I helped lead an organization called Catapult and our, um, Sort of like our Strat line is we, uh, help leaders build successful ministries that scale.

Doug Paul:

When I say successful, uh, yeah, I probably mean something different than maybe most people would hear.

Doug Paul:

So thinking about how, uh, successes should always, and the, the Christian imagination be about the quality.

Doug Paul:

of the life that is being transformed and how that life is multiplying into other people.

Doug Paul:

And so a lot of the stuff that we do in, um, that we talk about in the book, we, there are a lot of these labs that we, that we lead where we're helping people create, uh, systems for Disciple making that are completely tailored to, uh, that church's, uh, theology context convictions.

Doug Paul:

The people that they have on the team, all the different things where it's not, it's not copy and paste or import from somewhere else.

Doug Paul:

It's, we are gonna get into the, the nitty gritty of what you think, what you believe, and why, and then we will construct a process for rapid reproduction and making disciples.

Doug Paul:

Wow.

Doug Paul:

Based on those things.

Doug Paul:

So that's,

Caesar Kalinowski:

it's not for the faint of heart that we leave, which yeah, what you guys are doing in Catapult.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's not for the faint of heart.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It's not a tire kicker thing.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Like, could I get, could I get you on the phone and just pick your brain for a half hour, you know, and throw you a couple bucks.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Now that's, it's a, it's definitely a deep dive and, and, and overhauling of systems and thinking and even really what to ask what.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You know, are we asking the right questions?

Caesar Kalinowski:

How are we thinking, man, I, I want people to, to be able to get all that stuff.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And, and again, you, you want, you're gonna want to get the book ready or not by Doug Paul here, but, um, I'll put links to all that Leader Lab and, and you'll be able to get, you know, find that.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But that'll just make you want to get the book.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Like I said, Hey, they're giving away the farm.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Hey, talk about, you know, stuff that people dig and it's helpful.

Caesar Kalinowski:

We always do the big three.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Doug, at the end of every episode, kind of like the minimum, Hey, here's three things we.

Caesar Kalinowski:

We don't want you to miss from today's episode.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Uh, regardless if don't miss these, they can always download the big three.

Caesar Kalinowski:

We write 'em out and make 'em a printable downloadable pdf.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You can just go to everyday Disciple dot com slash big three.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Um, why don't you, why don't you, this is, doesn't always happen, but this, uh, why don't you tell us what the big three are today, brother?

Doug Paul:

Alright.

Doug Paul:

Uh, number one, innovation is a skill and it's a muscle you can grow.

Doug Paul:

Innovation is a skill, it's a muscle you can grow.

Doug Paul:

It is, and this is kind of going what we were talking about at the very beginning.

Doug Paul:

You can learn how to do this.

Doug Paul:

Um, you, you weren't born to have it or not have it.

Doug Paul:

It is, even people who are, who think they're naturally good at it have a lot to learn.

Doug Paul:

And fundamentally, I believe that in the world in which we now live, that a Christian leader missing the skill of innovation is like a carpenter is missing a hammer.

Doug Paul:

Whoa.

Doug Paul:

It's not the only skill on the tool belt.

Doug Paul:

You, you need more tools than just innovation.

Doug Paul:

But not having it, if I, I'm gonna make a strong statement, not having it moving into the future is indefensible for a leader.

Doug Paul:

We've got to be adaptive for the world that we're living in.

Doug Paul:

Wow.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Alright.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Wow.

Caesar Kalinowski:

That's a powerful, how's that provocative statement there?

Caesar Kalinowski:

That's, that's, that's, there's, that's one.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Okay.

Caesar Kalinowski:

What's the second of the big three today?

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yeah,

Doug Paul:

the second.

Doug Paul:

For big three.

Doug Paul:

Uh, number two is be okay with something not working the first time.

Doug Paul:

Hmm.

Doug Paul:

Be okay with it.

Doug Paul:

It's okay.

Doug Paul:

Mistakes and missteps are part of the process.

Doug Paul:

And even failure, um, the, the, the phrase that we talk about a lot is fail faster.

Doug Paul:

Um, if, if some, like, the sooner you get to failure, the sooner you get to success.

Doug Paul:

Yes.

Doug Paul:

The su, I mean, like, it really is.

Doug Paul:

It's not always that simple, but it oftentimes is please

Caesar Kalinowski:

embrace this.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Like this is radical.

Caesar Kalinowski:

As simple as that is Doug.

Caesar Kalinowski:

This is just radical with this fear of failing, fear of man, fear of the board, fear of whoever.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Uh, yeah.

Caesar Kalinowski:

The quicker we, let's fail forward.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Here's how we say, you've probably heard me say this, but we always just go suck forward.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yes.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Just if it's worth doing right, just get after it cuz you're gonna get to success so much quicker.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I've told people, cuz they, they'll say, man, like, you just move ahead and you start trying things as if like, you're right.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And I said, I, I'm not necessarily right, but I'll fail enough times to get to the right thing.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Yes.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Quicker than a lot of people won't even get outta the starting blocks , right?

Doug Paul:

Yeah.

Doug Paul:

And, and this is important.

Doug Paul:

It takes tenacity, it's.

Doug Paul:

. It's an because so much of this is about expectations management.

Doug Paul:

Do you think that it's going to work right out of the gate?

Doug Paul:

And if you do, you're in trouble.

Doug Paul:

But if I think like there are gonna be mistakes, I'm gonna have failures along the way, but I will fight through it, that's about perseverance and tenacity.

Doug Paul:

That's incredibly important with this process we're talking about.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Wow.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Awesome.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Okay, let's go.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Big three.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Number three.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Number

Doug Paul:

three.

Doug Paul:

Uh, we've said it before, I'll say it again.

Doug Paul:

Kingdom innovation is all about Jesus.

Doug Paul:

It's all about Jesus.

Doug Paul:

And I think I've mentioned this a couple of times in the book, and it is one of my favorite verses, uh, from John 15 where Jesus says, for apart from me, you can do nothing.

Doug Paul:

Um, so if you think that you can advance the kingdom without the power and the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, good luck.

Doug Paul:

Um, but it's, it's about Jesus.

Doug Paul:

We are, we've been invited into this incredible relationship with him that will never, ever end and the kingdom is unfolding and we have the pleasure to be part of it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Doug, isn't it great to live in this kingdom with this king?

Caesar Kalinowski:

It is.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Isn't it amazing for those who are waiting for someday, we'll fly away.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I'm gonna go like, listen, I don't, we know that our minds can't conceive of it all, but it is great.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Now, the kingdom of God is here and now, and that's one of the reasons I love you, brother, and I love talking to you and I love hanging with you because you get that and you and the family and, and you're enjoying the kingdom now and you're helping a lot of people find spiritual freedom.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So man, that's.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Thank you, brother.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Well, I can't, I can't wish you more luck and blessing on the book and the release.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I know God's already blessing it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You've worked really hard on it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I, I know we've talked along the way and how hard it's been, how many times you rewrote sections of it, as the world just kept changing and innovating for you and all that.

Caesar Kalinowski:

But, uh, I, I think this is truly gonna be a book that people come back to over and over again because the principles won't change and, but the world will, and the church will need to, and um, like you said, it'll to not have innovation as one of your tools will be indefensible, I think at a, at some point here, or you just won't be in this, uh, in this game anymore.

Caesar Kalinowski:

You won't be in the church leadership sort of role anymore cuz it just, it won.

Caesar Kalinowski:

. Right.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So, yeah, I just wanna thank you again for being on, for taking the time to share with, uh, our listeners here at the Everyday Disciple Podcast.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I know they're gonna love this, and I know they're gonna love your book.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Again, please go out and get ready or not Kingdom Innovation for a Brave New World.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And, uh, I'll have links all over the show notes and you'll see me posting all about it as well.

Caesar Kalinowski:

All right.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Thanks again, Doug.

Caesar Kalinowski:

We'll talk to you soon, brother.

Caesar Kalinowski:

All right.

Caesar Kalinowski:

How great was that?

Caesar Kalinowski:

I told you I knew you'd love Doug, and I know you're gonna love the book too.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So check out Ready or not Kingdom Innovation for a Brave New World.

Caesar Kalinowski:

It goes so much deeper.

Caesar Kalinowski:

I felt like we were just skimming the surface here.

Caesar Kalinowski:

There is so much, it gets into step by steps and how to do all of that, and you're gonna love it.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So I'll have all the links for that in our show notes at the website.

Caesar Kalinowski:

So you'll be able to find all that and get all the goodness.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Okay.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Hey listen, we are opening up some new slots in coaching cohorts.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Uh, my wife Tina and i, we coach couples as couples, uh, for those who are in ministry and who are setting up discipleship and Disciple making systems and frameworks in their church and all that.

Caesar Kalinowski:

If you'd like to find out more about the coaching that we offer in everyday discipleship and how to find spiritual freedom and help others do the same and build out discipling processes that multiply, we'd love to love to have you.

Caesar Kalinowski:

We'd love to be able to serve you in that way.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Uh, there's new cohorts starting up right now.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Depending on when you hear this, they might be full.

Caesar Kalinowski:

We don't coach a whole lot of people, but to find out more information and to, uh, get to know us a little bit and for us to get to know you a little bit, you can go to everyday Disciple dot com slash coaching everyday Disciple dot com slash coaching to get all the information and contact us about that.

Caesar Kalinowski:

All right, listen, we'll talk to you next time.

Caesar Kalinowski:

We'll be back next Monday.

Caesar Kalinowski:

As always, here on the Everyday Disciple Podcast.

Caesar Kalinowski:

And looking forward to that as well.

Caesar Kalinowski:

Talk to you soon.

Announcer:

Thanks for joining us today.

Announcer:

For more information on this show and to get loads of free discipleship resources, visit everyday Disciple dot com and remember, you really can live with a spiritual freedom and relational peace that Jesus promised every day.