Pastoral Ordination- Church of the Nazarene #pastor #ordination #nazarence

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Welcome to the truth and love podcast we are thankful that you were able to join us tonight or you're watching listening later we really appreciate you tonight we are continuing our series on pastoral ordination we're gonna look at the church of the

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Nazarene with our new friend James Erickson stick with us welcome back to the true love podcast the comment line is open let us know that you're watching ask a question give us a critique if we can pray for you let us know that as well we are with our new friend

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James you hopefully you know me and Dan this is our friend

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James Erickson but before Dan begins our question James would you introduce yourself please sure

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I'm a pastor in Rovaline Louisiana it's a small rural town pastor a church of about 40 to 50 people

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I've been here eight years I have a wife and a foster daughter and a dog but love the love the

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Lord and love working and doing serving him and however I however I can and yeah we met through I met

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Rob through tick -tock and it's been an interesting kind of thing how tick -tock has brought people closer together and meeting new connections and it's been really cool so it's great to be with you guys today thank you brother

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I'm sorry I got thrown off by this comment we got I wonder who it's from I'm gonna guess it's my wife

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I hope it's my wife I'm guessing it's your wife it's not my wife I'm gonna need you to get lost we're gonna make it my wife well not make that person my wife we're gonna make those comments come from my wife and my wife alone we're gonna go but we're really happy to have you on today you just tell us what what church denomination you're a part of and give us a brief history of it it's one that I'm not very familiar with I know maybe a little bit

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I passed by one when I was driving through Concord North Carolina one time on my way up to I don't know

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Albemarle or something yeah but um yeah it's about it's about the extent of it so can you just tell us uh you know your denomination give us a little bit of history just tell us where you're coming from a little bit about all that sure sure the

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Church of the Nazarene is the denomination I'm in and it's been around since 1908 so it's a relatively younger denomination what happened was a lot of it's in the

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Wesleyan holiness theological tradition so a lot of holiness churches that were smaller came together around that time and joined together in a little town called

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Pilot Point Texas and the founder of the denomination is

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Phineas Brazee he was from California he was a Methodist minister and he had been a part of a revival and I think a

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Seuss Street Revival had been out that way as well and he really wanted to minister to the poor and then talk about this idea of sanctification and holiness and so he started a small denomination and then a lot of other denominations joined in and they started the

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Church of the Nazarene at one point it used to be called the Pentecostal Church of the Nazarene but they a lot of the changes in the name the connotations of the name

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Pentecostal kind of they changed the name just to the Church of the Nazarene as it like I said an emphasis on sanctification and holiness ministry to the needy missions those were all kind of historically foundations of the church we have denominational leaders called general superintendents so we have six of them and they are jurisdiction of over like six regions of the world because it's global it's not just here we've got churches all around the world and they serve until they're 70 or they just decided to retire they kind of put an age limit on it so due to after 70 sometimes age things happen but they're voted on huh we ought to do that with our president elected officials elected officials it's probably a good idea um you know because honestly some of the general superintendents they travel all the time so they're going into countries all

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I mean they're always traveling so they're they're tired and after a certain point they're like okay I'm done and they want to be done and so it's a great honor to be it that but and we're broken down into districts so we have district superintendents some districts have more than some states have more than one district in them

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Louisiana is just one district we have a district superintendent who's kind of a district leader and then we have the churches who have pastors and that kind of thing so that's kind of how we set that up their organization was there's a lot more of youth

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Nazarene Youth International we have Nazarene Missions International and we have Nazarene Discipleship International so there's three leaders in that as well so kind of broke it though break those down so now a little bit of your your personal history what what led you to this particular domination

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I was born into it okay to be honest with you my grandfather started a

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Nazarene Church in a little town called Moundsville West Virginia and he was part of that church he wasn't a pastor he was just a layperson but he's one of the founding members and so I was there when

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I was two weeks old and I've been in the church ever since grew up in the church there were times where we didn't go to church my dad was not the strongest

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Christian but he he believed in making sure I was there if he could get me there my mom did too and yeah

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I just I love the denomination love the people I love the doctrine love the people like I said love love everything about it and just it's a part of who

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I am my wife's the same way she grew up in the denomination too so when we met it was like oh there you go it works the stars aligned it's good to have a little bit of background now we're gonna start getting into the the meat of it we know actually why we had you had you on we're gonna start talking about pastoral ordination sure just in your own words could you tell us what is pastoral ordination like I said

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I did a little research about this and and just kind of more studying on my own because you know what it is but you just want to like you said put in your own words of it's more just this authorizing kind of act of the church recognizes that God has called you to ministry that they see the gifts they see the graces in you they see that there's something that God is doing within you a work within you and they want to affirm that as acts says the laying on of hands scripture talks about that Paul talks about that you lay on the hands of people who are are called to ministry and called to work and if that's the case and they are sent out and they're ordained and set apart for that work and so for me that's what ordination is you've you've been set apart for that work and we're gonna affirm that and and send you out into the pastoral ministry will that be youth children sending out that way but I hope that's a good explanation of it something that the

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Bible describes that we should do yes okay well why

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I I believe the early church fathers especially when you think of Paul and those even the

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Apostles they were seeing those who were working in minister roles and already sending them like I said with Paul the missionaries he sent those out and even specifically talks laying on of those hands and commissioning to go and go out to do that I believe that it's important that they have that affirmation of the church not just somebody saying well

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I'm a I'm a pastor because anybody can call themselves a pastor or sometimes they can even hit

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Reverend on the name it's kind of like when you see people doing weddings and they went they say they're ordained and like well how did you become ordained and they're like well

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I went online and now

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I'm an ordained minister and I'm like I'm like you do not realize the process that it takes to get to that I had to go through at least you know

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I'm not sure of other processes to an extent but that you could just go online and print off a certificate like it's there's more to it than that like it's also $15 exactly so should we charge him $14 .99

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and shipping and handling there we go sorry this is the humor coming through so it'll come through no it's all good it in a way it's funny and but then it is such a serious matter that yeah it's not funny on the other hand so right it's both yeah so anytime

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I've ever heard that it's it's one of those things where it's like this cringe -worthy moments the hair stand on the back of your neck and you're just like ah like no no no no no it's not that's not it there's more to it than that so so this is a two -parter are you ordained

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I think we already went over that you are and so describe what led you at least from from your end to that decision because obviously from what you've been saying there was a lot of other people involved yeah but at least at least from your end what went into maybe sensing that call for yourself that this is something

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I need to do right great question when I went to the altar that night at year 2000 last

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Sunday in July I just felt God speak to me saying I want you to preach okay yes

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Lord what does that look like I want you to go and immediately everything kind of just started clicking into place the pastoral ministry and the college

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I would go to Trebek and Azrin University right there in Nashville Tennessee that wasn't a shameless plug at all but that's where I went and it was all these things just started lining up and and my dad was even like so I don't know how we're gonna pay for this and then we get a letter in the mail from financial aid saying you got scholarships you've got this and I was like this is it this is what

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God wants me to do and I was it was strong in that and so I felt purpose I felt mission and I knew the first thing

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I needed to do which we'll get into the process was work towards ordination and again it's a process it's a good long process and so I got my call to ministry in 2000 in 2009

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I got or I got ordained so nine years ish doesn't happen like that all the time sometimes it's a little less but I went through college and then

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I had to do pastoral ministry for a little bit and then ordination was next but yeah that's that's why

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I felt the need. This next question is why

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I said earlier the kind of the easy question is is it biblical one on one that question kind of leads to this one so and you somewhat answered it you you were talking about some people who print off their certificate of ordination or take it very lightly so biblically does it does a man need to be ordained as they to to pastor a church or or can someone pastor church and not be ordained how do you feel about that?

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So good question because that kind of goes into a little bit of the process of ordination in the

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Church of the Nazarene we have folks who are pastoring churches that are not ordained yet but they're working towards ordination so they have a district minister's license so they're still commissioned in a way to do that but as far as pastoring a church not under those conditions if they're not working towards that process and that ordination

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I don't think that's a wise thing I would say that again we get get the thing out of the box of Cracker Jack but you know like I'm ordained and I mean you have people who have gone through years of schooling seminary course of studies to to prepare for ministry and for someone just to go print it off and say well look

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I'm a pastor now well yeah but there's a lot more experience that needs to go into that like there's a lot of life things that you've got to learn before you can get to that point

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I at least in my opinion but if you're working towards it and you have some people mentoring you and backing you up on that and affirming you that this is what your call is and they're working you towards that ordination it's a different thing

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I wonder if some Paul knew some of these guys were gonna be missionary he knew these guys were the ones and he was discipling them and mentoring them and he's like okay now it's time to go and you're called and he

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I'm ordaining you into that ministry so all right so I've got a

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I've got a three -part question for you that you kind of answer all three of them at the same time

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I'm gonna say it twice once forward and once backwards and I think that'll help to figure out what exactly we're wanting and that and I just want you to go for 15 20 minute however long five minutes however long you want to because this is this is the the the real meat of the discussion here this is what we're trying to bring out of all of these these podcasts all right so number one it's not really a question it's a it's a command

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I guess I can do it describe the ordination process in the

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Church of the Nazarene as one two is it the same in all Church of the

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Nazarene churches and three how does your church polity affect the ordination process so I'll say that backwards give our listeners a chance to catch on what we're saying how does the

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Church of the Nazarene church polity affect the ordination process is it the same at all the

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Church of the Nazarene churches and describe what that looks like as you go through the process okay so it's it's mainly the same across the denomination generalized if you go into our manual they'll talk to we have a

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Church of the Nazarene manual it's about that thick and it gets revised every four years they'll add to or change some wording some language but it's mainly same across the denominational lines what happens when you first go to your pastor and and talk to them about feeling a call to ministry you'll interview with your local church board and and apply basically for a local ministers license that means you can serve in local church one of the things with local ministers license you can't do weddings and you can't serve communion with that it's just a kind of a standard thing but you can preach you can teach

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Sunday school classes and you can even choose if you want to get ordained as an elder or deacon at that point like you got a little time to figure that out but you can hold you hold that for a year after a year then you can apply for a district ministers license to do that you go before the district's board of ministry sometimes they call them credentialing boards or studies boards but our district calls it board of ministry that's one little change different districts call them different things but it's basically the same thing you'll go in front of them in interview and they'll talk about your testimony why you feel called to the ministry how you you know what your call to ministry was about like a little bit about their life a little background spiritually where they're at let you know spiritual level as far as their faith and then go from there and then wait up we vote after they leave we vote to approve that and grant them that district ministers license from the time you get that ministers license you have ten years to get ordained within that ten year space now if you had a district ministers license and you decided to take a break then this time stops and then you come back to it the time starts again then while you're doing that ten years you go through a course of study you can either go to a

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Christian University go through that Nazarene universities already are kind of set up for ordination process or you can go through a course of study the districts every district usually offers one some of the pastors or professors they have a master's degree or doctorate will teach those courses on the district

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I know my wife's uncle he does that and then of course the college or university needs to be accredited to go through that if you meet that then you finished all your studies some people who do the course of study that actually takes longer because some people are working full -time and they're taking one to two classes a semester just to that's one requirement is you have to take at least one class every year we have a lot of Hispanic pastors on our district who are going through the ordination process and they're so busy their work their workaholic sometimes they all they will work and but they will only take about one to two classes just so they can keep up with their studies what are some of those classes

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I'm preaching classes biblical theology ethics

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I mean just I never took that this course of study classes systematic theology those those types of theological classes

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Old Testament New Testament well again preaching learning a little exegesis and all the all the fun stuff so kind of like a seminary level education only it's done through the denomination correct

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I like that especially with the way the education system is

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I'll be honest with you sometimes on the district

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I think one of the strengths of that is you get a more one -on -one relationship more mentorship that way like I said my my wife's uncle does it and and he teaches with the district he was on and he said man that was it's still rewarding because you're you're getting that one -on -one with people who are going through that and I'll go back to a little bit about our

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Board of Ministry and how we how that looks on a actually that's in a couple weeks for our district but when they when they've experienced three to four years of work experience as either a pastor or a youth pastor associate pastor children's pastor then they can go before the

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Board of Ministry for an interview there them and their spouse will come in and they'll be we examine them basically we just we ask them again some of the same questions we ask at their district license we ask them about their thoughts on evangelism their thoughts on denominational things you know how many how many times you share the gospel it was interesting one time we had this

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Hispanic family come in and they're like we're like do you share the gospel oh yeah we when

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I get off work me and my family we go to Walmart at like 11 o 'clock at night and they're they're sharing the gospel to people they're praying with people they're preaching and I'm like man

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I gotta be a Walmart 11 o 'clock at night you know but they're just willing to do that and yes but then we'll we'll vote on that for approval and then ordination takes place at our district assembly once a year the district assembly is delegates from each church that have been elected by their local church to come and then they'll vote on things there we vote on the district superintendent things but we'll also vote on four nation candidates and usually

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I mean that's usually accepted because the Board of Ministry is already recommended that we it's more but more of a formal thing there it's a formality yeah it's a formal thing and then they're ordained by the jurisdictional general superintendent well that's a big service he comes and he preaches the service and then he he ordains each candidate for that whether they're going into Elder track or Deacon track so now one of the things about the

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Board of Ministry we have what we call a ministry assessment weekend that's where we interview the candidates we also have other candidates who are in the process of going for ordination have already got their district license but we hold work workshops for them and the denomination recommends these different workshops on again personal finances church finances on how to handle church finance budgeting some people come in don't know how to do a budget personal work church budget some then we offer on ethics see some other things we'll have local university pastors or teachers come and talk about certain theological courses holiness sanctification salvation

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I think would baptism some just so they have a good grasp of what we mean when we talk about doing the sacraments this is what we're talking about like this is why you need to take this seriously again like personal finances as well we need to take this seriously and not just especially church finances but but yeah we kind of make it a workshop weekend and then we do the interviews for the district license first time district license and also the ordination but we have them in little groups we call them cohorts and so each group has two pastors with them that will kind of just be evaluating them and also talking to them about their strengths and their weaknesses some things to be cautioned like those ones who are workaholics like how much time are you spending with your family are you actually taking the time to spend time with family or are you putting this first because God didn't just call you to minister to the church he called you to minister to your family and you got to be ministering to them too so we just put some things and every year we put a an action plan make sure you get your courses done make sure you're getting prepared for ordination because that's gonna come up here in a couple years and do this with your family go on a vacation you haven't a vacation in five years that's what you told us take a vacation like do this and like so we're just trying to encourage them and mentor them into that into that path so when they get to or date or nation it's it's a special moment well yeah two follow -up questions that I pulled out of what you were telling us was the first one is and you showed us your coffee mug and and the the college that you you attended but you said something interesting you said

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Christian University would the church of Nazarene except someone going to a different college and different Christian college yes yes

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I think they just have to turn in their transcripts to the district secretary and show it to them and if I think it would all work out yeah

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I don't think that would be an issue okay and the second follow -up question that I was thinking of when when you were telling us these things you talk about how the the ordination for the deacon ordination for the pastor elder happens at the same time so does the deacon have to go through the same theological training track that someone going to the pastoral ordination goes through yes really mm -hmm interesting okay yeah it's a definitely interesting thing yeah yes

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I kind of sets a sets apart let's go kind of a little differences it does and that it makes sense figure what was

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Steven doing when he wasn't serving tables he was preaching to get himself stoned yeah there you go yeah makes sense all right so my follow -up question is say for instance in a say say five years from now

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I've already gone I've finished up the ordination process in my denomination but I've become convinced of the doctrinal distinctives of your denomination and wish to switch is the process any different for someone who was ordained in a different denomination but then would like to come over and join up with y 'all now so that's a great question and if you're ordering it ordained in another denomination and you decide that you want to come over to the

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Church of the Nazarene and be ordained whatever district you live on you go to your pastor and say that you you know you're thinking about doing this and wanting to switch over to the

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Church of the Nazarene if it's a Nazarene pastor and they can talk to the district superintendent and you would come in and be interviewed by that same board of ministry and all we'd have to do is approve a basically a recognition of your credentials and you could be recognized now as an ordained elder in the

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Church of the Nazarene we had a guy a couple years ago that he was

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I don't think I've ever heard of this he was evangelical Catholic never heard of it but maybe you have and he but he saw he's like the same thing he saw that huh

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I really like this denomination and he had a professor in college who was of the

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Church of the Nazarene he goes I really do think that you would lean more towards that denomination well where he was working in New Orleans was at a bank and one of the churches down there banks there and he saw the he saw this thing and he's like oh it's this

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Church of the Nazarene where is it and so he started attending and he's like well I'm ordained in this denomination would you let me in here and they're like well we can talk to him about sure enough it's and he came in before us we interviewed him and we were like we don't see any issue with you being recognized as you know as an ordained elder in the

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Church of the Nazarene as well so it just it's basically almost like a transferring of that or date or nation over to us sure do you contact the previous denomination to see if he's left in good standing or yes yes so one of the things we do here too in the nomination is background checks sure we do background checks we also go through NAZ safe training it's ministry safe training with a lot of abuse things going on that's almost basically a requirement now it's just a denomination wide thing to do so it's just become commonplace for us to do that background checks are definitely important that we we do those but well the next question is in your experience in your time there what would you what would you consider the strengths of this process in your denomination and have you noticed any weaknesses where we could maybe shore up this area in our denomination yeah so I'll start with the

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I'll start with the weaknesses thing first I think there's at times I know when

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I was going through the process it was very much all about the interview it was not about the mentorship it was all about that interview so it's changed now so I think that's a big strength but there's some some districts who are very much that interview kind of and it puts a lot of pressure on the person because they're afraid they're gonna say something wrong and that's gonna be it you know like I think there's a lot of undue stress in that but I think it's starting to change little by little a lot of places one weakness

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I would say is we don't just want to ordain people to ordain people we want to make sure that who we're ordaining is is someone who's preaching the gospel they're not just saying they're going to win people for Jesus they're actually out there trying to win people for Jesus they're actually making those connections and serving in their communities they're not just there to for the title of pastor or the title of Reverend I remember my dad buying me business cards for the first time

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I was I was only a local licensed minister and I was a freshman in college and my dad's like you need these business cards because it's got

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Reverend on it I was like I was like no dad no you don't get it like this

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I don't want that that's not you know the recognition that I'm seeking I'm just wanting to do what

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God wants me to do and be obedient to that and I've always been learned taught from a mentor from church when

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I was growing up be humble and obedient and I think you know we had had this conversation at one of our

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Board of Ministry things a couple years ago of are we just gonna ordain this person because we think they should do it because they've gone through this process well if they need to wait another year they should wait another year like and one of the questions we actually asked the candidates our district superintendent asks it it's the best person to ask it so if we decide that you need to hold off another year how do you feel about that and they're like well

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I guess I trust your judgment like I trust what you have to say because you guys are the the leaders here so okay you know and I think that's probably a weakness in some places where they just ordain them because well we've got connections with them they're so -and -so son or that that's kind of got to be shored up a little bit strength though I think the process is necessary I think that having that theological background having that education having the surety that this is you know what

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I want to do and you know if they're halfway through the process and they're like they're realizing wait a minute maybe God didn't call me to this well then now's a good time to find out not after you're ordained 20 years later down the road this is a good time to figure out is

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God calling you into this and we've actually had people come to our Board of Ministry things because we encourage it if they feel a call to ministry even if they're not licensed just to come and see is this what

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God's really calling you to and if it is well let's get you an action plan of how we can get you on that path so I think there's some real big strengths there maybe you've heard some as I've been talking but again

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I think there's just that accountability part of it that's a really strong thing that is needed in a lot of denominations at least in our denomination but I guess part of the strengths and weaknesses you know one of the things that I hear from you is that you you take it serious and that's a big deal yeah to me that's a huge deal

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I can appreciate that and I've got several pastoral friends who on the district at least that they take it serious too

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I mean they're there's usually there's a few people who ask the questions the other ones are just listeners and for me

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I just if I'm there to question you and I'm there to examine you and figure out if you if this is it if I'm I'm gonna put my yes vote to it there's some there's some things

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I'm gonna ask and I've got some friends too I've got one friend that he's a he pastors in Baton Rouge and he's part of the he's like the vice chairman of the

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Louisiana family forum and he asked those he asked those tough questions and it's like that's what we need we need that question asked like I didn't even think of that question but I'm glad you asked it like what we'll say that afterwards we're like I'm so glad you asked that question because we're trying to be as serious as possible and when candidates come in the ordination candidates we stand up and let them sit down and we sit down so there's a level of respect there that hey this is someone who's taking this serious too so we're gonna show some respect that you've made it this far in the process and your time's coming if this goes well this interview is what your time's coming so yeah so what what advice would you give to someone who is seeking pastoral ordination whether they be young or maybe they're a little bit older if if they're kind of at the beginning kind of looking at the road ahead and saying no maybe maybe this is me maybe this isn't what what what advice would you have for them as they get started on the process then maybe for somebody who says yes

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I am gonna go down this road what advice would you give to that one as they they start that journey definitely walk that journey humbly and obediently and then find that pastoral mentor whether it's their own pastor and what

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I love about the Church of the Nazarene we had our General Assembly this past summer and it we have it every four years

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I COVID messed it up a little bit so it was six years this time but you see people from all walks of life and you you run into people that you you know every you met through college or other districts who were very influential in your life and it wasn't just my local pastor it was other pastors

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I would run into and I remember some of the advice that they gave me and I have a friend of mine when

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I was in high school and I got my call to ministry I was at a teen talent thing the

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Nazarenes do and so one of those things is biblical exposition aka preaching and it's a he heard me preach and he's like hey

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I want you to come preach to my youth and I'm like really I got my first gig you know it's got the first like I get my first opportunity to speak in another church like this is this is what you've been working for you know and and you don't let them down you don't want to do those things but those kind of pastor mentors who are like I want to give you the opportunity to experience what it's like to preach you know sure you'll probably fail and your sermon will probably be five minutes to ten minutes but you're trying and your heart is with the intention that you want to preach the gospel you want to share

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Jesus with people and his death and resurrection with people so find those people who are here who can partner with you can coach you can pray with you who you can be an accountability partner with and just say look

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I need discipled those missionaries Paul sent out they needed to be discipled and we need to be discipled and so find that person who can help you continue to grow in that call then nurture that call that you have within you so that you can find that and I had a great church family who just when

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I announced when they announced to the church that I had to call to ministry I had these little old ladies coming over we already knew that we already knew

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I was like why didn't you tell me I said because that was God that's for God to tell you and I'm like that's true that's true but they nurtured that they still nurtured that so that's what

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I would say sure that now in the church of the Nazarene do y 'all do a single pastor model or they'll do a plurality of elders in this in one church well what's the the local church government kind of like just as we try to put together on our brains know what all that looks like that really depends on the size of the church honestly so we list all the elders in our district manual we have a district journal that we have every year from district assembly as the list of all the elders from the district some churches have associates some have children's or youth pastors my church

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I'm the only elder here and so depends on the size of the church some are retired who attend the church there yeah it really just depends on that I'm the only pastor here if we ever hired somebody to be a youth pastor then they would be the other maybe elder if they're ordained here at the church so that's kind of how it structure wise we have church board but they're not the church board is made of people from the church who would get elected each year my church boards the same so they keep getting elected so but they're great people and we have committees in the

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Presbyterian Church I don't think have changed in decades well let me tell you and it's like that in a lot of the church a lot of churches that it's the same people and because when you try to get someone new they're just intimidated by the whole process they're intimidated but I don't

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I don't want to do that but it's like it's okay if you say no I've got the people

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I trust too so we're good you know but I get it I get it well continuing on that same thing that you were sharing with us earlier this will be the last question for you tonight you were talking about ministers sharing

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Jesus with others we'd like for you to do that with us tonight would you share the gospel share Jesus with us tonight sure sure you know not all kids are bad as far as like I wasn't a bad kid

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I really wasn't I didn't I didn't do anything out of the ordinary I didn't vandalize anything but I still knew that sin was in my life hearing the preaching hearing what

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I just feeling that pull from the Holy Spirit they look you got to get this taken care of even just the little things you do wrong you just just feel guilty and but I knew sin was there and I could never figure out well if I just do this

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I'll it'll be okay if I just keep going to church or I go to more youth events or I do this it it's gonna take care of it and really it when you come right down to it the only thing that can solve that sin is

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Jesus Christ his blood that was shed on the cross and his death and resurrection those are the only things that can cover that sin and forgive find forgiveness and grace and then you become a new creation and when you become that new creation it is evident to everybody around you like when

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I got my call to ministry I also feel like God's kind of transformed me something we call in church that's sanctification just cleansed me at that point those are further things from a mind

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I had no idea but my dad of all people told me said son I really do believe that like you're changed like you are different you're new like I've I've never seen somebody like this and and I said really and I used to be a really bad cusser can

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I say cuss on here can I do can I do that is it pop okay just checking and I used to say every kind of word that was out there sailors would blush at some of the things

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I probably said but when God changed me and he forgave me of my sins

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I got it from that altar and I never said a word like that again and I believe if he can change old cussing sinner like me when

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I was a teenager he can change anybody he can take any sin away he can forgive anybody of their sins and they can find healing and forgiveness yeah sure there's a reward in heaven when we get

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Jesus in our life and he forgives us and changes us but there is no greater gift no greater gift than to knowing that one day we'll get to see

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Jesus Jesus face to face because of the sacrifice that he made on that cross for us and if you don't know him let me tell you it is pretty easy to get to know him all you have to do is confess that sin to him he will he will forgive you he'll give you his grace his love his forgiveness because that's who he is we hear people all around the world said he's a hateful vengeful

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God that's not what I see no what he's done for me nobody did for my dad before he passed away my dad was a really bad place been laid off from his job and he was questioning everything but the week before he died he said

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I got everything settled he found forgiveness and got from God he found forgiveness and was able to forgive others my dad was a new creation that day

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I'll never forget it if he can do that for him he can do that for you he can love and forgive you of any sin all you do is accept it it's a free gift he's never he never charged for it it's a free gift already bought by his blood seek forgiveness and seek grace from him he loves you don't ever forget that praise the

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Lord let me pray for us by the way cuz you tonight ending this this episode thanking you with grateful hearts we thank you for our new friend and brother

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James thank you for his willingness to come on and father we pray that you would use this episode along with the others to glorify yourself and encourage others we pray these things in Jesus name amen amen

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James my friend thank you so much for coming on and sharing with us about the church in Nazarene it was fantastic and we really appreciate it and thank you guys for watching and listening thank you for your support and your prayers if you'll give us a like follow share so we can work together to get the message of Jesus Christ and the gospel out there to others as always remember that Jesus is