00:00:10:19 – 00:00:47:09
Wendell Morton
Welcome, everybody. To act like men. Men’s Leadership Podcast. This podcast is designed to be a resource to pastors and men’s leaders as they build out that engaging ministry with their men. We do this and you do this because, you know, every man deserves an opportunity to become an authentic, biblically based man of God. This podcast is sponsored by Men’s Ministry Catalyst, a ministry now in its 41st year founded by Dr. Jim Grassi, with a focus on helping church leadership reach their men.

00:00:48:09 – 00:01:01:19
Wendell Morton
Good day, everyone. My name is Wendel Morton. I’m the executive director of Men’s Ministry Catalyst. Welcome. It’s so good to have you here today. I also want to introduce you my co-host, Dale Eudy. Dale, it’s always great to have you aboard.

00:01:02:03 – 00:01:06:14
Dale Eudy
Always good to be here. We talk about some very key topics as we get together.

00:01:08:20 – 00:01:55:17
Wendell Morton
So today is a critical part three of a three part series called Six Steps to Engaging Ministry to Men. It’s a critical piece. We’ve highlighted the first two steps on podcast one and podcast two or step two is the steps three and four. I encourage you, if you have not already gone back and listen to the first two in this series of three that you do that it’s actually podcast number ten and podcast number 11 on our website, just a reminder, as we’ve started each of these in the series that we have stated, there are there are only 1% in most churches of men who are actively engaged in ministry.

00:01:55:22 – 00:02:26:06
Wendell Morton
Hmm. 1%. 10%. Roughly 10% of churches in America sustain this ministry to men over the long term. We’re talking about something very important today that can help that actually occur. And one more step that’s absolute wakeup call is that 93% of time when a man comes to faith in Christ, his family will follow. 93% of the time, when a man comes to faith in Christ, you’re going to, well, the whole family.

00:02:26:16 – 00:02:58:20
Wendell Morton
It drops to 30%. Dale, when the woman comes to faith in Christ, to be able to get the whole family to come to Christ. Hmm. So the men perform a critical role in the life of the family, the life of believer’s life for the community, life of the church. And we pray that this that will not be true of only 13%, 7%, 10% of churches have active ministries.

00:02:58:20 – 00:03:05:17
Wendell Morton
1% are involved through what we’re doing here, we pray that you’ll be motivated to bring your men to Christ.

00:03:06:04 – 00:03:37:23
Dale Eudy
You know, Wendell, I think one of the key areas here that we often have to remind herself of, one of the most difficult challenges is that few churches in North America have a clear strategy and process to intentionally grow their men, to disciple them, to build then the processes that will sustain this ministry for the long term. You know, men’s ministry Catalyst has a strategic six steps to engagement strategy, and it’s worked for hundreds of churches across America.

00:03:38:08 – 00:03:57:23
Dale Eudy
And in this podcast, what we’re going to do is we’re going to walk through these two steps. Step ever five is developing ministry teams, and that will provide tremendous leadership and support to building out a long term growing ministry to men. But then step number six, too, says that we need to follow up and evaluate. Boy, that’s a key part.

00:03:58:14 – 00:04:18:00
Dale Eudy
If you’re going to take any journey and let us know, are we making progress? Are we getting there? And it’s so important to create a culture of evaluation and care for all of the men by following up with any opportunities expressed by the men in the vital ministry themselves. In other words, you you get your heartbeat from the men that are in your ministry.

00:04:18:07 – 00:04:39:06
Dale Eudy
And that heartbeat sometimes will be at a different pace than it will at other times. But listening to them is a key part of this window. Like you said earlier, if guys haven’t been listening to these first two podcasts in the series, all they have to do is go back to Men’s Ministry Catalyst to our website, and they can pick up pod podcasts number ten and number 11.

00:04:39:06 – 00:04:40:13
Dale Eudy
They’ll be caught up to date.

00:04:41:05 – 00:05:04:00
Wendell Morton
That’s right. Well, with that foundation in mind, let’s jump right in. Dale, step five you highlighted was developing ministry teams. And last week you said that it’s a team sport as we’re involved in ministry to men. And boy, that is absolutely so true. I mean, we need a team for a variety of reasons. I need ideas. But if I’m the leader, I need ideas.

00:05:04:11 – 00:05:30:20
Wendell Morton
I am not the end all be all. Your ideas tremendously benefit us. And there are other teams, other people that are on the council. I need encouragement. Yep. Ministry to man is the hardest avocation or vocation in the world, and yet it’s the most important. So we need that encouragement. We need to cover my weaknesses. I have I have always so many strengths, and there’s a lot of things I don’t do well.

00:05:31:02 – 00:05:52:15
Wendell Morton
I need the team to cover the gaps and fill it out. Yeah. And this one is not talked about much, but I think it’s critical. We need another sphere of influence to reach men that I, for example, as a men’s leader, could cannot reach. You can reach men because of your personality, your giftedness, the way you connect. You’ll reach your sphere of influence.

00:05:52:15 – 00:06:09:00
Wendell Morton
You’ll reach men that I’ll never even have, have a shot at like boys. So when we build out a team of 5 to 7 people, potentially we’ve got a lot of spheres of influence within the church and within the community. So let’s let’s jump into these tapes. What is the.

00:06:09:00 – 00:06:33:04
Dale Eudy
Purpose of breaking that task down? Because it is a team sport. Everybody has a role. But finding the right key people to put on these teams is going to be a critical part of this. One of the more important ones is because the strategy is to disciple men, to again teach men how to be fishers of men reproducing themselves, you know, spiritually and other guys with the flow.

00:06:33:04 – 00:06:53:17
Dale Eudy
One of the first key things is to have a discipleship team. And from the assessment, the team can create a path toward really the most finding, the most pressing needs that were identified by the men in the church. And what this creates is a chance for the majority of your focus to be directed, focused. And then the key part of that is continuous.

00:06:54:03 – 00:07:16:09
Dale Eudy
We have a plan. We put it together. For instance, often a group will have a great speaker or an awesome event, but there is limited continuity. They don’t follow up. They maybe generate some momentum, but it quickly dies off. So if you’re going to grow your men deep, there has to be a clear understanding of what our discipleship goals are and how we plan to get there.

00:07:16:17 – 00:07:39:10
Dale Eudy
And this can be from a small group materials to a Saturday breakfast topic to a big weekend event that you are hosting. All of those things need continuous, intentional focus direction for the men of your church and their friends. So this key part, this discipleship team, has to really earn their chops and they have to know what they do, what the plan is a key part of that.

00:07:40:00 – 00:08:05:19
Wendell Morton
I like to tell it. You’re key. You’re your opening. Part of that was it comes out of the assessment. So the men have expressed their needs, have expressed where they want to grow a little. What we’re trying to do is build a long continuum to help these men plug in and find what the next steps are for them as they’re working through this journey to becoming a disciple maker.

00:08:06:09 – 00:08:33:02
Wendell Morton
Absolutely critical. So let’s talk about second team. Second team is a communication team. Now, I know this that’s going to shock you, but it takes the average man over three invites. Three to get them to attend. So there’s a handful of loyal guys who are going to show up if you open the door. Right. It’s a handful. But to reach the man you’re trying to reach, you’re going to have to intentionally communicate with them in a variety of ways.

00:08:33:03 – 00:08:56:05
Wendell Morton
I mean, everybody wants to know how they want to be communicated with some like text. Yeah. So like a phone call from a friend that usually helps a flier that they’re handed as they walk into church. But you’re not connected to everybody because they don’t all come to church on any given Sunday. So it’s important that you continually reach out and try to connect with them in a variety of ways.

00:08:56:10 – 00:09:17:05
Wendell Morton
But the communication team is really critical. They create the communication, whatever it is, they follow through and they keep at it till they reach all the men that are on their database or mailing list. And then they know who they believe, have an interest in what we’re trying to accomplish. So discipleship, communication, what’s the third team there?

00:09:17:13 – 00:09:38:16
Dale Eudy
Well, the next team is now you’ve got a strategy and now you’ve communicated it out. What do you do next? Got to get your service team together. And this team is two really main functions they set up. They serve and clean up the events and activities. You look for a variety of men here, creative people, some that have the gift of service and then unique gifts.

00:09:38:16 – 00:09:51:08
Dale Eudy
You recruit for specific tasks. For instance, you show me a guy that knows how to make good pancakes are good and or to flip a good burger. Yeah, yeah. Person guys will follow him every time he goes.

00:09:52:14 – 00:09:54:09
Wendell Morton
And I think all of it.

00:09:54:11 – 00:10:21:08
Dale Eudy
Exactly. But if a person has skills for building things or whatever, you you latch on to the skills that are there. Let the people that have those gifts put them into play. And the other men will watch and they’ll see that passion and they’ll join them. The second part of that service team, though, is really mission minded in this team is also going to be creating the service projects in the community, maybe even within their own church or even possibly a mission trip abroad.

00:10:21:18 – 00:10:33:17
Dale Eudy
But these are the people that say, look, I can swing a hammer. I may not be able to talk a lot about my faith, but I give you something and I’m going to help other people. So put me on that team. I’m going with you.

00:10:34:18 – 00:10:58:03
Wendell Morton
And the thing you talked about today, I was also you find the area of giftedness. And when they’re working in an area of giftedness, I don’t care if it’s the discipleship team or the communication team or the the the the service team, all of those areas, they find fulfillment and they have staying power when they’re fulfilled. If you got a guy out of place, he’s got to know he’s out of place and he’s not going to stick around very long.

00:10:58:08 – 00:11:20:22
Wendell Morton
He’s not going to do it with joy and gusto. So it’s really critical. Let me just highlight a couple of common failure points, places where mistakes can be made. One is that you focus on the activity, not the prayer that you have to beat it in and not the heart of disciple making, which is what you’re really trying to do out of whatever these events or opportunities are.

00:11:21:05 – 00:11:41:10
Wendell Morton
Even out of small groups, even out of Bible studies, even out of big weekend events, it’s all about getting disciple making. And if you if your leadership team doesn’t have a big passion for that, they’re in the wrong place at the wrong time, focused on the wrong things. And we’ve seen this happen again over and over again, just an activity.

00:11:42:05 – 00:12:05:11
Wendell Morton
Then recruiting the wrong people are the key leadership roles. Now you need men that are respected by their faithfulness and their skill set by other men. You need a man that when he stands up to speak or to share or to lead, the other men automatically listen. And that’s not a leadership position. That’s leadership influence, because they know the man.

00:12:06:00 – 00:12:25:14
Wendell Morton
And so those are the kind of guys you want with certain skill sets, of course, but those are the kind of guys you want on your on your key leadership team. And we recruit the wrong people sometimes in the leadership. And I kind of said this earlier, but we focus on the immediate looking only what comes next and not a strategic adventure.

00:12:26:01 – 00:12:46:02
Wendell Morton
Men want to be part of something bigger than themselves. They don’t they don’t want to come to an end. They will come to an event. But that’s not their primary focus. They want to go somewhere as an organization, as a team and within themselves. And if they have pressing needs, they want those met. So don’t focus just on the immediate, but focus on the long term.

00:12:46:08 – 00:12:47:02
Dale Eudy
Important.

00:12:47:19 – 00:13:11:09
Wendell Morton
Absolutely critical. Well, let’s move on to the next one. What we what we have some time here. Number six is follow up and evaluate. And so after Dale and you know, I know both of those having been in the local church for a long time, this is sometimes the missing link to be able to build your next set of opportunities with what you’ve learned from the previous.

00:13:11:16 – 00:13:35:21
Wendell Morton
You do this in corporate America, do this certainly in the military. It’s important we do this at church, whether it’s a small church or whether it’s a very large church, and things are professionally done, meaning by hired professionals. It doesn’t matter. You still need to evaluate and let me let me just highlight a couple of points. I’ll start with the first one here, committing to evaluate all ministry related activity with your men.

00:13:36:12 – 00:13:57:18
Wendell Morton
So again, it doesn’t matter if it’s a small group in the curriculum, a men’s event, a breakfast with a great speaker, whatever it happens to be, you’ve got to evaluate how did we do to make it to make it better for the for the next time. If you don’t if you don’t prepare to make it easy for the men to evaluate, they’re not going to evaluate.

00:13:58:02 – 00:14:17:16
Wendell Morton
I recommend just a little questionnaire at the table. Wherever they are. Sell it out 3 to 5 questions. Check a box if they have to fill in the blank, or if they have to fill out a narrative, they’re not going to do it. They’re going to skip that question. I do. And all the evaluations I have, I mean, every time you buy something, somebody says your email.

00:14:18:01 – 00:14:33:18
Wendell Morton
Once you do evaluate your experience, right? Yeah. If there is a box, you have to write something. Then I’ll just tell the truth. I don’t do it. If it’s a check the box, I’m happy to do that. That’s easy to do. So I think that’s an important part. What would be another one, Dale?

00:14:34:01 – 00:14:53:21
Dale Eudy
Well, I think it is. And, you know, once once you kind of you have a little bit of a plan for evaluating and reevaluating after the event is done, you need to commit to having each ministry opportunity, build on the previous thing. In other words, everything that you do builds for the next option or gives you another strategic place.

00:14:53:21 – 00:15:18:00
Dale Eudy
It gets your feet planted, if you will, and ready to take on the next step of the process. So ask yourself this question where can you improve your pre opportunity process? In other words, you have to give yourself a little bit longer lead time, maybe a little bit better communication pads or options for getting the word out. Maybe, maybe you just need to buy better bake it better food.

00:15:18:05 – 00:15:33:09
Dale Eudy
I think it could be something really, really simple, but it can make a big difference. The next thing you should do that evaluate. And of course, the key part of all this too is, well, did this event give us another step in the disciple thinking process of our church?

00:15:33:17 – 00:15:34:06
Wendell Morton
That’s right.

00:15:34:15 – 00:15:53:19
Dale Eudy
And secondly, where can you improve your opportunity process? In other words, if you got off track on the program and maybe you didn’t have evaluation forms or the speaker kind of missed the mark or whatever, the food wasn’t good, where can you improve? How do we get this back? We’ll get it corrected, get it back on track. And that’s a key part.

00:15:53:19 – 00:15:59:15
Dale Eudy
Again, sometimes you have to take a good, honest look in the mirror and figure out what do we need to correct for the next one?

00:15:59:15 – 00:16:01:01
Wendell Morton
Yeah. Yeah. And then I.

00:16:01:01 – 00:16:27:02
Dale Eudy
Think, what can you do to improve your follow up process? Did you contact the men that asked for a reach out timely? In other words, if someone said, Hey, look, I need some extra help on this or I don’t quite understand that, right? Because if that sits there and that lead goes cold, that man is gone. He’ll check out and just send out thank you notes to the guys that were involved or took a maybe a leadership role or something that really happened.

00:16:27:13 – 00:16:46:23
Dale Eudy
Or maybe you have a mechanism to capture the information, but you really want to follow up on whatever you say you’re going to do. You need to tell it and go after them. And is the content or the value, does it does it really need to be better? Or is it just a case where we had great content, we just didn’t execute it very well?

00:16:46:23 – 00:16:54:11
Dale Eudy
So again, those are key things that look yourself in the mirror after each of those events and really come to grips with what can we build on.

00:16:54:15 – 00:16:55:09
Wendell Morton
What happens.

00:16:55:09 – 00:16:56:00
Dale Eudy
Next?

00:16:57:00 – 00:17:21:16
Wendell Morton
That’s really important. Absolutely. And then let me just highlight one more point, and it kind of fits with the first two that we are talked about. But evaluate your overall strategy to stay on track. So we have the assessment, we put a plan action plan together. We talked about that step four. Now we’re working on the teams to make sure we have the ability to execute the discipleship, the communication and the service teams.

00:17:22:08 – 00:17:43:00
Wendell Morton
So are we on track? What adjustments do we need to make? Do we need to have less affinity opportunities and more discipleship opportunities? We will need have less large group, more small group, more small group, less large group or more large group, whatever. However we need to do are we reaching the target audience? What are we trying to do?

00:17:43:00 – 00:18:03:15
Wendell Morton
And ultimate you said it. We’re trying to it’s a it’s a matthew 418 we’re trying to be an Andrew who meets Jesus and bring other met with him the next time around. So I think that’s very important. What’s our target audience? Are we inter-generational or are we all a group of guys that are 60 and over? I mean, what is the make up of our group?

00:18:03:23 – 00:18:24:06
Wendell Morton
Are we intercultural? In other words, are we all a bunch of old white guys are all a bunch of young white guys? Do we have the ability to reach out to another culture? And if they’re not part of a church or even not part of our community, how do we reach out beyond our local to make sure that we are intercultural?

00:18:24:12 – 00:18:34:11
Wendell Morton
That is a key piece. What the Bible talks about, every tribe and every town. It’s a key piece to make sure that we are intercut all in our attempt. Absolutely.

00:18:34:16 – 00:18:34:23
Dale Eudy
Great.

00:18:35:05 – 00:18:49:08
Wendell Morton
So are we reaching a large number of men with different interests? Are we collecting the people that are not just like us is really an important factor. And are we? This is the most important? Are we intentionally making disciples who make disciples.

00:18:49:13 – 00:18:50:09
Dale Eudy
Who sit.

00:18:51:01 – 00:19:12:17
Wendell Morton
There and this starts with the men’s counsel. If the men’s counsel is activity driven and not discipleship driven, really, their passion is not to reach men for Christ who will reach others. Then we’re going to have a hard time getting there at any one point. Wow. Any other thoughts on that?

00:19:12:21 – 00:19:45:07
Dale Eudy
Yeah. Well, I think the key is always managing your expectations and you start with that. What are what are the expectations you want your men to leave with each opportunity that you give them? In other words, kind of create the event with the end in mind. When a guy leaves this event, we want them to know this, that there’s a connection point or that maybe it’s a piece of information or a strategy, or that’s a coaching moment where somebody is going to come along and mentor them, whatever that is, put that expectation is part of that opportunity and that part of that ministry.

00:19:45:16 – 00:20:07:19
Dale Eudy
And this is what they really come in to the next event carrying that way they may bring somebody with them. If it’s if it’s great enough, they’ll return. If it’s loyal enough or whatever. If they pick and they choose going forward, I’ll tell you, if it’s mediocre that you won’t, you may not see them again, like you said earlier, the handful of guys that will show up for just about anything.

00:20:08:05 – 00:20:44:22
Dale Eudy
But if you’re intentionally going after guys that are not part of your church or not actively engaged in your church, the best way to do that is to engage them here to find out what you can do and go after those guys individually. And here’s a quick reminder for our resources to again, we’ve mentioned it several times, but if you’ve not taken advantage of our free resources available, go to our website, the full graph of the six step engagement strategy and you can really print that off is really found that men’s ministry development process really is there at Men’s Ministry Catalyst website.

00:20:45:04 – 00:21:06:19
Dale Eudy
And again, just to remind everybody, that’s men’s ministry catalyst dot org. I know these resources we’re not we’re not just talking about something that doesn’t have some back up material notes for this talk earlier, too. We’re trying to give a verbal indicator of where guys can go find this, get more in-depth or certainly call or email men’s ministry catalyst and we’ll help them out.

00:21:08:02 – 00:21:26:13
Wendell Morton
I think it’s really good. And also daily we’re available to consult. I think that’s a big one as well. So you understand where you are. You have a good evaluation of yourself. You know where you’re trying to go. Maybe you need some help, maybe we need a guide and we’re here to help you do that. The result is is phenomenal.

00:21:26:13 – 00:21:51:08
Wendell Morton
Now it’s a simple but not easy process we’ve outlined in the last three podcasts. You could be way down the path of building, engaging ministry or to your men that can have an impact for generations yet to be born. It’s the service itself. 76 hour prayer is that you will be a catalyst for your local church to help build out this kind of ministry within your men who can that reach other men also.

00:21:51:16 – 00:22:13:08
Wendell Morton
So a couple of quick evaluations. One is, which of the six steps have been most insightful to you as you work through this with us? Which one do you feel like can have the most immediate impact on your ministry to men? And then what’s one small step you can take to make a difference in that local ministry? Again, very few things that start big, stay big.

00:22:13:13 – 00:22:37:18
Wendell Morton
Yeah. So the big go big or go home is usually they go home. So we don’t want that to occur. Take a small step and just consistently take more small steps and then if there’s any way we can help, you just hit the email contact admins ministry catalyst dot org. Mr. Dale, thank you for your involvement. These last three especially, but also every time we were together.

00:22:37:18 – 00:23:00:07
Wendell Morton
So important your experience, your heart, your passion, what you’ve done in the lives of men will replicate itself in the lives of those who listen. So I’m thrilled with that. A lot of this material is come from our founder, Dr. Jim Grassi. Certainly want to create a path to keep giving him credit for all the work he’s done for the last 41 years.

00:23:00:22 – 00:23:20:06
Wendell Morton
Just a reminder that our episodes are launched on the first and third Thursdays of every month. If you’ve not yet subscribed to, please do so at our website and prior to the episode, we have the show notes that are available as well. Please share this with others. Rate it on the on the podcast site. Let us know how we’re doing.

00:23:21:00 – 00:23:36:12
Wendell Morton
Thank you again for joining us today. You are the reason we exist. We do all this for pastors and leaders of men because every man deserves an opportunity to become an authentic, biblically based man of God.