Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 56 ｜ Discipling Millennials with Grant Skeldon

00:00:00.000 Hello, hello. Welcome to Relatable. My name is Allie Stuckey. This is a podcast by CRTV.

00:00:05.920 If you're not watching this, you should watch it. We've got like our little set in a tiny

00:00:10.640 corner of my little room that I'm in that you could watch and you could see how much I move

00:00:16.880 my hands and all the facial expressions that I make when I'm speaking. But you have to go to

00:00:20.620 CRTV.com slash Allie and you have to subscribe. You can use promo code to Allie20, I think,

00:00:25.560 and then you can get a discount or you can just listen on here. But it's not as cool that way.

00:00:30.940 Anyway, today we are going to interview one of my good friends and just an incredible

00:00:35.940 influencer in the Christian community. His name is Grant Skelton. He is a master of discipleship.

00:00:42.420 So he travels around the country and he really invests in or invests his time in and teaches

00:00:50.420 churches, churches, and pastors, how to attract and how to disciple millennials. He's a millennial,

00:00:59.420 I'm a millennial. And so the conversation we have is going to center on millennials and how to not get

00:01:06.280 us into church, but get us involved in our relationship with Christ through intimate discipleship.

00:01:12.040 He wrote a book called The Passion Generation that really helps older generations understand our

00:01:16.840 generation. We're often seen as these kind of mysterious, awful people that are completely

00:01:24.020 hopeless and are going to drive our country and the church into the ground. But neither Grant nor I

00:01:29.240 actually believe that's true. We believe that there's hope for millennials. But of course, just like 0.97

00:01:33.440 with any other generation, we need discipleship. We need help. We need others to come alongside us.

00:01:40.120 And I keep wanting to say mentor, not mentor, but give us wisdom and show us what life in Christ

00:01:47.660 looks like. And in turn, we millennials need to turn to people younger than us or behind us spiritually

00:01:54.720 and disciple them as well. So the conversation that I have with him is going to center on that.

00:02:01.540 Full disclosure, I haven't read Grant's entire book yet. I'm sure that it's wonderful. I've read a

00:02:07.260 large portion of it. I haven't read his entire book, so I'd love to hear your feedback about it,

00:02:13.080 what you think about it. I know we talk a lot about theology on this podcast. And so if you have

00:02:19.280 any questions or any feedback about his book that you're wondering about, I will certainly take those

00:02:24.760 questions. I can direct those questions to Grant. So like I said, I haven't read it in its entirety,

00:02:30.020 but what I know of Grant is that he is so passionate for Christ, so passionate for this ministry.

00:02:35.500 He's doing such good work for the church. And I am really excited for you guys to learn more about

00:02:42.220 him and about his book. First, I need to talk about something really important, really important.

00:02:49.040 And that is your pillow. What pillow you're sleeping on. This is a really important conversation

00:02:55.820 that we need to have. You didn't think that I was going to talk to you about your sleeping habits.

00:02:59.220 Actually, you probably did after the last couple of weeks of listening to this podcast,

00:03:02.500 because I've talked to you about it a lot. I want to talk to you about your sleeping habits,

00:03:06.440 because chances are you probably aren't sleeping as well as you could. Like you probably have a

00:03:11.300 crick in your neck. You're probably waking up and you're like, why do I hate my life every time I 0.96

00:03:14.980 wake up? Why do I want to sleep for eight more hours? Well, that could be because you're just not

00:03:19.020 a very fun person, or it could be because you're not sleeping on a bolster sleep pillow. I started

00:03:23.280 sleeping on a bolster sleep pillow, changed my life. Told you guys, I create like a little cocoon of

00:03:28.520 16,000 pillows around my head. I don't have to do that anymore because my bolster sleep pillow

00:03:33.160 keeps its form all night long. And it's just really comfortable and it keeps you cool. It has

00:03:37.980 amazing material that you don't have to flip it over to get the cool side of the pillow. It's just

00:03:41.840 cool all the time. And you want to know what? My husband started stealing my pillow and pretending

00:03:47.080 like he didn't steal it. And we ended up getting him another pillow so we could both have it so we

00:03:52.780 don't fight over it, which is what you should do. You should get one for you and then one for your

00:03:56.540 spouse. Because you don't want to fight over a pillow. That's no fun. And they're just that good.

00:04:00.720 And if you use promo code Allie, A-L-L-I-E, you get 10% off your entire order, which is a lot of

00:04:07.400 money. And don't forget, also, if you buy something from Bolster Sleep, you're also helping people in

00:04:12.320 Haiti because those are the people that they support. They help them get jobs and support their families.

00:04:16.880 So you get a better night's sleep. You're a good person while you do it. Definitely go to

00:04:20.860 bolstersleep.com. Use promo code Allie. Get yourself a pillow or why not? A whole mattress. 0.99

00:04:25.820 Sleep is that important. So that's all I'm going to say about your pillows and your sleep until next

00:04:31.440 week. Of course, for now, we are going to talk to my dear friend, Grant Skelton. Grant, thank you so

00:04:38.800 much for joining me. Absolutely. Thanks for having me, Allie. Yeah. Could you tell everyone a little

00:04:44.300 bit about who you are and what you do? Yeah. So my name is Grant and I have a huge passion for the

00:04:52.100 millennial generation. But really bigger than that, I have a huge passion in unity, really racial

00:04:57.900 unity, denominational unity. But a big part of God's using me for right now is just generational

00:05:03.060 unity. As you know, there's a lot of people trying to figure out millennials. And so I've found myself

00:05:10.280 a lot of times trying to help pastors that are trying to reach millennials, parents that are trying

00:05:13.840 to raise millennials, and even business leaders that are just trying to retain millennials. 0.86

00:05:17.440 But as I've looked into the millennial conversation, what I've found is, and really my hope is to help

00:05:25.180 older generations better disciple millennials and help millennials better show honor and hunger

00:05:30.200 towards learning from the generations before us. Because I actually think there's more of a

00:05:34.200 discipleship problem than there is a millennial problem. And so whenever there's a discipleship

00:05:38.960 problem, you'll always kind of have tension between generations.

00:05:41.720 And that's what really your book is centered on the passion generation. And one of my favorite

00:05:47.240 parts about your book is that there's, I don't want to call them cartoons, but they're kind of

00:05:53.020 they're drawings, they're depictions that I think, just send a very clear message of what you're trying

00:05:58.140 to say. And one part of that is, I think that you made the point through one of those depictions that

00:06:03.640 you shouldn't be criticizing this generation if you're not discipling this generation.

00:06:08.560 So can you tell us kind of how that disconnect happened? How that happened to where baby boomers

00:06:14.820 and older generations started saying, gosh, millennials, you need to fix yourselves without

00:06:19.340 saying, okay, let me take responsibility and start mentoring them myself.

00:06:24.440 How did we get there? I don't think I don't I never try to act like millennials of the first 1.00

00:06:30.060 generation to not get discipled or mentored. I think I think that's happened for a while. However,

00:06:35.680 you know, I had someone once say that like, maybe a little bit after the Industrial Revolution,

00:06:41.940 fathers and sons weren't going out together and working together and stuff like that. And maybe there

00:06:47.540 is some truth to that. But I really feel like, I don't know, there became a point in I'm talking

00:06:52.920 more from a Christian perspective, but it became a point when I think we wanted the church to do

00:06:58.580 discipleship when we left parents left it on the church to do the training and all that. And I think

00:07:04.060 discipleship first starts in the home. But I don't know, I don't know, I feel like it's a pretty rare

00:07:10.880 story to see a millennial come to Christ and then get discipled right after. For myself, I was very

00:07:17.920 lucky to the very first time I went to this new church. It was a very broken time in my life. I was 16

00:07:23.660 years old, and I gave my life to Christ. And then two weeks later, I had an older man take me under his

00:07:29.940 wing. And what I realized as I got older, most young people never had someone like that. And so

00:07:35.460 as you may have saw in the book, I also believe that this is maybe one of the most fatherless

00:07:39.260 generations. And so that is also, I think, something that has impacted millennials and where

00:07:44.000 discipleship is important, is there's a lack of fathers through divorce, but even spiritual fathers,

00:07:49.440 as there's a huge increase of mostly women in the church now, even though a lot of churches may be 0.90

00:07:56.180 led by males, it's filled by women. And so you have a lack of, I think, spiritual fathers, 1.00

00:08:02.540 and therefore also mentors.

00:08:05.320 Yeah, I agree with you that certainly millennials are probably not the first generation not to be

00:08:12.000 discipled, but it does, or I get the feeling maybe just as a millennial, that a lot of older people

00:08:18.400 think that we are the worst generation that has ever lived. They compare us to the baby boomers, 1.00

00:08:22.920 the silent generation, the greatest generation. And it said, oh my gosh, these millennials,

00:08:27.260 they're so entitled, they're so apathetic. And so there does seem to be this just very

00:08:33.040 intense feeling about millennials. And you talk about that part of that is because, like you said,

00:08:38.060 the lack of discipleship. So what is the first step that an older person can take to, instead of

00:08:44.660 just criticizing younger people for what are probably truly our faults, what's the first step that

00:08:49.980 someone can take to say, I'm going to take you under my wing? Yeah, I think the first step is,

00:08:56.860 of course, I think building a different culture, whether someone's listening and they're maybe an

00:09:02.040 employer that has a lot of millennials that are frustrating you, or if you're a pastor, or if you 0.98

00:09:06.860 maybe just, maybe in your own home, you have a lot of millennials. I do think having a heart shift

00:09:13.060 is one of the first changes, you know, because like I said, and I think the poster, the thing you read

00:09:19.680 is, it's hard to say out of one side of your mouth, millennials are this, like lazy entitled 0.99

00:09:24.540 slacktivists, all these negative things, and then another side, but we really want to reach them. 0.87

00:09:30.020 Why weren't they showing up? Because no group of people would ever want to be a part of a group

00:09:34.620 where they're made fun of behind the scenes or behind the back.

00:09:37.180 Exactly.

00:09:37.540 And there's one thing our generation is really good at is being raw and authentic, and we're so

00:09:43.860 marketed to that I think we can tell when you don't really want us, you want us, you don't like want

00:09:49.140 to use us, you just want us to be a part and be here. And we can kind of feel like a means to an end.

00:09:55.860 And so the other thing I would say, first step is, I always say just discipling is not mentoring.

00:10:03.120 Mentoring is when you meet with someone over coffee, which is good, but discipleship is a lot

00:10:06.760 scary. It's when you allow someone to join your life.

00:10:09.820 So tell me the difference between mentorship and discipleship, because I think that's probably,

00:10:15.140 discipleship sounds a lot kind of scarier than mentorship, because it sounds more vulnerable.

00:10:20.520 Yeah, it is. It's extremely vulnerable, even me today. I mean, the very first person that ever

00:10:24.560 asked if I would disciple them, I was 19 years old, so I'd only been discipled myself. By that time,

00:10:30.300 I would have been discipled for three years. And this guy named Nick, who was a freshman in college,

00:10:35.020 he's kind of like, hey, will you disciple me? At the time, I was pretty significantly mature for

00:10:39.800 my age. I was leading a ministry. I was leading on campus. I was pretty influential. I was speaking

00:10:44.780 just a little bit. And so compared to others my age, I was a little set apart. But when this kid,

00:10:51.900 Nick, wanted to get discipled by me, I was like, man, if he really does get, like, if I allow him to

00:10:58.420 follow me, he's going to see everything, like the good, the bad, and the ugly. And I remember thinking,

00:11:03.340 man, I play Call of Duty a lot, like hours of Call of Duty, even though I'm leading and I'm

00:11:08.340 doing this, like, yeah, I'm going to be embarrassed for him to see that. Or if he sees my room is such

00:11:13.100 a mess and my car is such a mess. And he's going to see like, at the time, I wasn't that close to

00:11:18.300 my family. I was still figuring out how do I do what God's called me to do, even though my dad

00:11:23.360 doesn't understand. And that kind of created some tension between me and him. And he's just going to

00:11:27.780 see that I'm not perfect, I'm still working it out. And so it does, it does require vulnerability.

00:11:33.900 I actually think that God probably likes that. I think it's very easy to live a type of cultural

00:11:40.460 Christianity or comfortable Christianity, when you don't have someone who gets to see your junk. 0.95

00:11:46.420 And so John Maxwell, I remember him saying a quote where he said, if you want to impress people, 0.98

00:11:51.040 just share your successes. But if you want to impact people, share your failures. And so I found

00:11:58.300 that the people that are willing to disciple and therefore share some of their failures in their

00:12:04.440 places where they're not perfect, are very attractive to young people. Like, I don't feel

00:12:08.520 like we're looking for perfect leaders. We're just looking for real ones.

00:12:11.760 Yeah. So you just touched on this, but tell me what a discipleship relationship looks like.

00:12:16.980 You talked about Nick, um, and you talked about how he decided to disciple you, but tell me,

00:12:22.680 walk me from like the beginning of Nick. Like, did he just come up to you and then what that

00:12:27.360 relationship looked like? And then kind of the impact that it had on you and what you took from

00:12:32.400 that discipleship relationship? Yeah, I'll probably, I'll use a kid named Connor. Um, he's another guy

00:12:37.760 disciple because Nick was me figuring it out. And, uh, it was crazy as Nick is still in my life today.

00:12:43.240 He talked to me today. And so, uh, it, it looks different for every person, but generally,

00:12:48.060 um, what one, I'll just say, how I define discipleship for me is someone is frequently

00:12:53.500 following someone who is spiritually a step ahead. So it is a key word of frequently. Um,

00:12:58.340 I don't like to say once a week or once a day, but just frequently, frequently, and then following,

00:13:03.320 it's gotta be joining their life. The four parts of life that I invited Connor, who I discipled,

00:13:08.520 but I said, Hey, you can join me in my work life, my church life, my personal life, and my family

00:13:13.440 life. Um, and usually when I asked to get discipled by someone older, and there's two guys that are

00:13:18.420 doing that now, I try to find an area of their life that I really want to learn from them in. And so

00:13:24.000 one of them is more of his personal life, which is like hobbies and fun stuff that he may do, or,

00:13:28.840 or, uh, maybe even disciplines. Like this one guy who disciples me, he's a very wealthy business

00:13:35.800 leader, a very strategic kingdom investor kind of guy. Uh, and he runs like every Tuesday and

00:13:42.120 Thursday at 6am. And so, uh, I went to jog with them and I, we did a talk about life and talk about,

00:13:47.940 um, I'm in a relationship now and I got to talk about, uh, the new year and some changes I may be

00:13:53.840 transitioning into. And so, um, it is trying to join their life. I, I like saying the work life,

00:13:59.440 personal life, church life, and, um, sorry, family life, because the number one excuse I've found for

00:14:05.640 why people don't disciple is they'll say, I am way too busy. Like I just don't have time. And

00:14:11.500 they're right. We, I don't know about you or me. We were just literally talking about how we don't

00:14:16.060 have a lot of time. We have to choose what we do. And so I can't, you don't have kids, right? Yeah.

00:14:21.460 Well, you have a cat. I do. I have, I have for, uh, children. It doesn't count. And so do you,

00:14:29.760 you have a cat too. I tell young people, I've never met a leader who's married and with kids

00:14:37.060 who's been like just twiddling their thumbs every day thinking, I wonder what I'm going to do with

00:14:41.180 all my free time. Yeah. And basically they don't have time, but you, so what we have to do is figure

00:14:47.040 out how do you not add something to their calendar? Right. How do you include yourself in their

00:14:51.440 calendar and join their life? And so that's what discipleship looks like. It usually looks like a

00:14:55.600 year for me. Um, and I, I like to disciple people in maybe two to three areas that they want to grow

00:15:02.580 in. And usually they will, I found that they tend to, people that I disciple tend to want to do

00:15:07.520 something similar to what I do. Like they want to learn how to better communicate. They want to learn

00:15:11.800 how to start an organization. Maybe they want to learn how to lead a team, stuff like that.

00:15:15.920 Yeah. So how do you know if you are quote, ready to disciple someone? I think a lot of people like

00:15:24.380 millennials, if we wanted to, um, if we wanted to go disciple someone, I think a lot of people would

00:15:30.260 say, well, I'm just not ready. Who am I to disciple someone and invest into someone it? Do you have

00:15:36.000 benchmarks for when someone is ready? Or is it just kind of this individual thing?

00:15:40.300 That's good. It's a good question. Um, I might be very generous with it, but I, I feel like,

00:15:48.440 so you're hitting on the second number one reason I said, number two reason I hear people not

00:15:53.260 disciple. Usually it's one, I don't, I'm too busy or two. It's like, man, I want to, and I can make

00:15:58.200 some time where I would include someone in my calendar, but I just don't feel qualified to do it.

00:16:02.380 And I would say, going back to your question, how do you know when you're ready to disciple

00:16:06.800 is I would say when you feel like you've been following Christ for a while. Um, and if you've

00:16:12.820 been following Christ for a while, then I'll, I'm not saying you'll never feel ready. And personally,

00:16:18.580 I, I think, um, if we waited till we felt ready or if everyone waited till they felt ready or qualified

00:16:26.380 disciple, I don't know if anyone would ever disciple because there's always that like whisper in our

00:16:30.780 ear that we're not good enough. So you can probably do what we're doing today, honestly, in some senses,

00:16:35.180 but I say like, if you've been following Christ for a while and simply say, and this is what Paul

00:16:39.780 said is follow me as I follow Christ. And so it's not a follow me because I'm perfect. It's follow

00:16:47.180 me as I follow someone who is perfect. And so it leaves room and grace for, I'm not going to be

00:16:53.920 perfect. I'm going to stumble, but I'm going to stumble towards Christ. Would you want to come and

00:16:57.880 follow me? And I find a lot of people say, but I just don't feel qualified. They usually think

00:17:02.480 because they're not maybe good communicators. They don't know the Bible too well, this and that.

00:17:06.540 I usually say, but do you feel like you're spiritually a step ahead than most millennials?

00:17:11.260 And that's when they're like, of course. And I'm like, great. Then you, you're, you,

00:17:14.940 you follow Christ a little longer than they have. So just ask them to follow you as you follow Christ.

00:17:19.680 Yeah. And I like your distinction between someone who, okay, I'm going to take an hour a week and I'm

00:17:26.040 going to meet at Starbucks and have a Bible study with someone. Uh, I've heard you talk about this

00:17:30.640 before that that's not, there's nothing wrong with that per se, but that's not exactly discipleship.

00:17:36.540 And I think that might take, well, in some senses it puts a lot of pressure on, but it also takes a

00:17:41.420 lot of pressure off that, okay, I am not some, um, you know, Bible teacher that is teaching someone

00:17:47.340 about theology. I am just inviting them into my life. I'm being open and honest about here's my

00:17:52.460 relationship with Christ. Here's how it affects my life. Let's grow in this together. I think people,

00:17:57.940 I don't think that most people realize that that's what discipleship is. I think that there's

00:18:03.180 a big confusion about what discipleship is. Absolutely. Absolutely. I have found a lot of

00:18:09.120 people, Christians, including pastors. I mean, I would say the book, The Passion Generation is the

00:18:14.540 name of the book and the subtitle is the seemingly reckless, definitely disruptive, but far from hopeless

00:18:19.940 millennials. And so now I'm speaking on this book. The first half of the book is how do you

00:18:25.160 practically disciple millennials in the 21st century? And what I've found is as I'm speaking

00:18:30.260 a lot more practically about it, two things, some people are like, and these are mostly pastors that

00:18:35.940 I've been speaking to lately. They'll realize, man, we don't disciple, we mentor, like we just meet

00:18:42.000 with them. We don't ask them to follow us. And Jesus didn't go to Peter and say, Hey, come and meet

00:18:45.860 with me once a week for three years. He said, come and follow me. And, but, or two, another thing happens

00:18:52.940 is as I define it and give more structure and language to it, I've found people say, you know

00:18:57.540 what? I realized I will kind of was discipled. Like maybe it was just for a short while, but there was

00:19:02.580 this person who let me like follow them or join them. A lot of times it happens in the workplace

00:19:07.580 or, or maybe it's a teacher that like, or a coach that I gave a little bit more substantial time to

00:19:13.400 someone, but they realized they were discipled, even though it was never called discipleship.

00:19:17.680 And how do you find someone to either disciple you or for you to disciple? What is that process

00:19:27.320 look like?

00:19:28.780 Yeah. So this is where, um, I don't, yeah, I tend to find that I, I look for two things. Whenever I

00:19:36.720 look for a new person to disciple me, I usually look for someone that has a characteristic I'm trying

00:19:42.060 to grow in or that has a competency that I'm trying to learn. And that's like, I want to learn how to do

00:19:47.800 something or I want to learn how to be something. And so, um, one guy that's discipling me, the guy

00:19:52.880 who's, he's an architect, um, he's a very influential man, but he's a very humble man, like incredibly

00:19:58.560 humble for how powerful and influential he is. And I wanted to follow him just because I, I, I was very

00:20:03.700 attracted to his humility. And at the time when I asked him, which was like a year and a half ago,

00:20:08.620 I was getting a lot of platform and a lot of stage presence. And, um, I was a little worried

00:20:13.980 about if I would have the character that could, um, right. Kind of, uh, hold up the stage time that

00:20:21.760 I was getting sometimes in our generation, we were literally talking about this is we can like get a

00:20:27.300 lot of influence, like in a year or in some, in one video, like one single video and they get way,

00:20:34.520 probably too much influence for the character that's been developed while before it used to have to

00:20:38.560 develop with it. And so, um, I wanted to learn a characteristic with him. Um, then there's

00:20:44.260 others that I want to learn a competency. Like right now I'm trying to learn how to better consult

00:20:48.020 larger churches because that's what I'm getting asked to do a lot. And so I'm going to look for

00:20:53.060 someone who's really, really good in that arena. And, uh, depending on how, like your listeners,

00:20:58.080 um, for young people, I, I highly stress, man, if you're young and especially if you're young and

00:21:03.800 single, this is the best time ever to like go and learn from someone who is actually doing what you

00:21:08.980 want to do. Um, it's better than college because college right now kind of has, I think, a better

00:21:15.480 guarantee of getting young people debt than getting them a job. But if you go and get like mentored and

00:21:22.380 discipled, um, by someone who's actually doing what you feel that you want to be competent in, uh, this

00:21:27.420 is the time to do it when you're young. But if you do it when you're older, like 30, 40, especially

00:21:30.920 when you're 50 or 60, uh, they'll maybe help you, but they'll then send you an invoice and it will

00:21:36.380 cost you money. It's called consulting. But if you're young, it's called discipleship. And so I'm

00:21:41.000 like, yo, leverage this while you're young rather than wait. And then people are a lot less open to

00:21:47.520 helping. Yeah. I think that your message is really important because, and I am so guilty of this. I'm a

00:21:53.320 very classic millennial in so many ways, but I, we are very much driven by hyper individualism.

00:22:00.720 Like I am my own unique individual person. No one can tell me what to do. No one's going to

00:22:06.140 interrupt my life. Whatever makes me happy, whatever is most convenient for me. And these

00:22:10.940 are all, it's a sinful mentality, but a lot of millennials think this way. That's what I'm going

00:22:15.620 to do. And discipleship really kind of blows that up. Whether you're discipling someone or you're being

00:22:20.700 discipled, it's not always convenient. It's actually kind of inconvenient. And there might be someone who's

00:22:26.160 telling you, you know, this area of your life needs to be improved. So, and I think really that

00:22:31.980 can only be overcome with the power of Christ. Someone in their own sinful nature is probably

00:22:35.940 just not going to approach that. And maybe, I don't even know if I have a question with that,

00:22:40.960 but is that something that I guess you have encountered when you're talking to millennials

00:22:45.240 about discipleship? Yeah, no. And I mean, you might be a disciple and millennials, we can be kind of

00:22:52.460 pretty bad at, we want advice from someone older and we really just want them to approve of the

00:22:57.360 thing we already want to do. But we want them to like co-sign it. And so, yeah, I have to tell

00:23:03.580 millennials a lot. Like, and it's hard even for myself. Like sometimes you, you know, you want this,

00:23:10.540 but you go to, and they've been there and they've done that. And they say, Hey, you should do X, Y,

00:23:15.180 or Z. And it might be really difficult. But it is like trusting that person more. My, one of my

00:23:21.160 favorite stories in the Bible where, I mean, this is, I never seen it this way until recently, but

00:23:26.460 you know, with a rich young ruler is this like young guy who's seemingly influential and powerful

00:23:31.440 and has wealth, but he didn't trust God's advice. Like he didn't trust Jesus advice. Hey,

00:23:37.440 sell all you have and follow me. And in a sense, that could have been like the 13th disciple. He

00:23:42.320 invited him to be a follower of his and a disciple. While Peter, who's like a real hothead, very

00:23:49.400 passionate, loose cannon, Jesus goes up to him and says, Hey, put your nets out again. And he did

00:23:56.480 trust him and he would listen to his advice as hothead as he was. He was still teachable. And so for young

00:24:01.480 people, I say a lot, you need to be faithful. You need to be available. You need to be teachable.

00:24:05.980 You need to try to need to be compatible to them. And then also you need to be hungry.

00:24:10.260 Yeah. So it takes effort on the part of the disciple too, not just the part of the discipler,

00:24:16.340 which I think is key.

00:24:17.360 I would say, I'd say discipleship hinges on the hunger of the disciple more than the availability

00:24:22.560 of the older generation. So that's where like me kind of have to call out our own generation.

00:24:28.000 I have to often call them out for their lack of hunger and honor.

00:24:31.840 Yeah. Yeah, I agree. I think that's hard. It's something that I'm guilty of too. I think

00:24:38.380 even Christian millennials, we get very complacent. We don't want people to speak into our lives. 0.99

00:24:44.160 What is the one thing that you want people to take away from your book, or maybe even the

00:24:49.400 one impact that you want it to have?

00:24:51.420 My prayer a lot with the book has been that it would normalize discipleship, not just for

00:24:58.020 the sake of millennials, but I, this is kind of doom and gloom. But it is sincere is I do feel

00:25:04.840 like what we do over the next five to especially 10 years in America and the American church

00:25:09.880 specifically will make or break what happens to the American church. If we don't disciple millennials,

00:25:16.960 because for us, I mean, when I met you, you were a millennial conservative. I'm kind of

00:25:22.420 like the millennial Christian pastor guy. Like we, in a lot of ways, we got our platform

00:25:28.080 by being bold, articulate and having a representation for millennials. And for me, the big question

00:25:37.120 is, I would assume for you, it's kind of like a little bit of how do we get millennials engaged

00:25:41.320 in politics for me? And I know it's not all of it, but for me, one of the big ones, the biggest

00:25:46.320 one I probably get asked is how do we get millennials more engaged in the church? And I personally

00:25:51.060 think that's the wrong question for me is how to get millennials to church. I think the question

00:25:56.140 should be, how do we not reach millennials, but how do we mobilize millennials to disciple

00:26:00.880 the Z generation? Because the Z generation is very close behind us. They're growing every 1.00

00:26:06.600 year, literally, of course, but they are more diverse than us. They are going to be, the conversation

00:26:12.600 should already be mostly moving towards them, utilizing millennials to impact them. 0.79

00:26:17.380 Yeah.

00:26:17.840 But have you ever been to Israel before?

00:26:20.300 I haven't actually.

00:26:22.480 Okay. I just recently went and it's crazy because of course, this is where most of the

00:26:27.280 Bible is written is in this region of the world. And what's crazy is like, this is where

00:26:32.120 Jesus is. This is where a lot of people have it on their bucket list to go and see where

00:26:35.820 Jesus really walked and changed the world. But there's not a lot of churches in Israel,

00:26:40.700 which is, it's pretty interesting because you would think if all the Christians in the world

00:26:45.740 want to travel to this one place to see like all these important sites, why would there

00:26:51.240 not be churches there? But it seems like God goes wherever his people are really hungry

00:26:55.320 for him. And if you're also familiar with like church history, a lot of it's in Europe,

00:27:00.240 a lot of the reformation, a lot of just church history happened there. But now Europe is not

00:27:06.080 this strong location anymore. And it seemed like God then started moving through the people

00:27:12.260 that were hungry in America. Uh, but now it seems like God's moving a lot in, uh, the

00:27:19.000 Middle East. It seems like he's moving a lot in South America and Asia where his people are

00:27:24.080 very desperate and hungry. And so my point is God, the church will never die, but it's

00:27:29.880 not promised to one location. And I do think we're in a season where we are either like Nineveh,

00:27:35.660 we're either going to repent and like, Hey, we got to get back to the basics or God's going

00:27:41.180 to keep moving and the church will be alive and well, but it's not promised to America.

00:27:45.060 And I, I don't want that. And that's why I'm like, my hope going back to your question is

00:27:49.680 that we would, um, I joke that we would make the commission great again, uh, because this great

00:27:55.900 commission of go and make disciples. It's not like I'm trying to say, let's go do something new.

00:28:00.260 I'm saying, let's do this old thing. Yeah. Work until Jesus comes back. Yeah. And I think that's

00:28:05.720 so important to something that, uh, I've heard pastors say in the past is that you never graduate

00:28:09.980 from the gospel. And that's true. You never graduate from the great commission. You're not

00:28:14.160 trying to rework something or reinvent the wheel. You're just saying, let's go back to that. The same

00:28:20.180 gospel that, you know, freed proverbial slave 2000 years ago is good enough to free people today.

00:28:25.900 I think a lot of people think that today we're faced with so much cultural backlash that

00:28:31.480 Christianity is so looked down upon that we have so many more obstacles than we've ever had in the

00:28:36.820 past. It's just going to be impossible. Um, but that's why I like your approach of really

00:28:42.020 intimate, uh, evangelism, not that mass evangelism isn't important, but evangelism through your own

00:28:48.960 life. Um, that, you know, there's not a law against that. There's not, uh, there's nothing that can

00:28:54.700 stop you from doing that and the impact that it can have, you know, tangentially is, is limitless

00:29:01.540 really. Absolutely. Like speaking on that specifically is, uh, there's a lot of fear of

00:29:08.120 like church and state and laws that may go against us. And of course I, heaven forbid, do not want any

00:29:14.600 of that to happen. However, like that wouldn't be a new thing for Christians. Like literally the church 0.69

00:29:19.740 was birthed in the middle of like persecution Christians and that actually grew the church. 0.68

00:29:25.040 Um, but there wasn't the ability to do, we're, we're in Dallas where like there's huge churches.

00:29:29.580 There's, uh, it's, you can do that here. But, um, if that ever was to happen, uh, it's like in China,

00:29:36.540 they can't gather a lot, a lot of Christians, but they can all make disciples. And so

00:29:40.820 discipleship is this model that works everyone everywhere. And I kind of liken it to, um, there's a

00:29:46.600 business model that I think is doing really, really well. That's usually discipleship or

00:29:50.420 multiplication, if you will. Um, are you familiar? Do you know what car company actually has more

00:29:55.660 global presence, um, than any car company right now? They're in Uganda. I've seen them in South

00:30:00.680 Africa. It's not just a guess, not Toyota, not Nissan. Oh, you want me to guess? Yeah, you can guess.

00:30:06.680 I've seen them in Israel. Honda. Honda, close. What's close to a Honda? Hi. All right. What's the,

00:30:15.480 what? Uh, yeah. What is it? It is, uh, a lot of people think it's like one of the Asian car

00:30:23.460 companies, but the car company that has cars, global presence in third world countries to large

00:30:28.560 cities is actually Uber. Um, and so the twist is of course, it's not actually a car company that makes

00:30:35.860 cars, right? It's a car company that gives this platform to people that already have cars. And that

00:30:42.580 has revolutionized the whole car industry. They don't need to keep building new buildings or

00:30:47.560 manufacturing sites. It's just like for us as Christians, a lot of times we think we need to

00:30:51.800 build a new building. It's build new churches. Instead discipleship, like, like Uber gives the

00:30:57.620 ownership to the everyday person. So you could be a mother, you could be a CEO, you could be, uh,

00:31:02.600 a college student, you could be a high school students and everyone can do it just like Uber.

00:31:07.300 They have big cars, small cars, beat up cars. And so I just think that model is the model that

00:31:14.700 works better. And this is why Jesus can leave just like us. I don't, I would assume most people don't

00:31:20.700 even know who started Uber. Um, it's this crazy car company that has changed so much, but it's not

00:31:26.200 built around just them. While many of our churches today are built around one person or one communicator,

00:31:32.380 Jesus's model is more built around this platform that is on the people, not just on, uh, one person

00:31:39.700 in the communication abilities. Yeah. So we are the, the Christians are the Uber of the world. Is 0.93

00:31:46.900 that what you're trying to Uber for evangelism? Yeah, no, I mean, if, if 2 billion Christians

00:31:53.140 disciple one person, I mean, the game will be over very quickly. Yeah, totally. Okay. Tell people

00:31:59.660 where they can get your book. I hear that it is in high demand on Amazon.

00:32:06.160 Yeah. So, okay. It is on Amazon. It's on book Barnes and Noble. It's at books, million

00:32:10.780 life way logos, but yeah, on Amazon right now, just for warning, if you go on there,

00:32:16.460 it's going to say it takes a month to two months to get the book. Uh, that was getting changed

00:32:20.660 quickly. We are sending more books, but it is a good problem. However, it is a problem that's

00:32:25.420 annoying right now that we, yeah, we need to get more books to them, but yeah, it's been

00:32:29.520 the number one book in four different categories. That's awesome. And it's called the passion

00:32:34.040 generation by Grant Skelton and they can find you on Instagram, right? Is it just Grant Skelton?

00:32:40.620 Yeah. Twitter and Instagram is just Grant Skelton and Skelton is with the D not a T.

00:32:46.520 Skelton S K E L D O N Grant Skelton. Okay. They'll look you up the passion generation, 0.96

00:32:52.180 Amazon Barnes and Noble. It'd be a really good Christmas gift. Like if you're a mom listening

00:32:56.220 to this or a dad listening to this, you want to give it to your millennial or read it yourself.

00:33:00.280 It's one of those books that really transcends generations. It's about millennials, but it could

00:33:05.480 be about discipling them if you're even a grandparent, or it could be about being discipled by them.

00:33:11.000 So it really works for any age group. Yeah, totally. I've seen a lot of parents and their

00:33:16.040 kids reading together and I've seen a lot of pastors with their young adults reading it, but it

00:33:20.140 was more designed for older generations to understand young generation. Yeah. Yeah. That's

00:33:25.280 good. Well, thank you so much for sharing all of your wisdom. I know that all of my listeners are

00:33:30.680 going to glean a lot from it and I will make sure to remind everyone again to check out your book.

00:33:36.240 Thank you, Ellie. I hope that you guys learned a lot from that conversation. I know I did. I always

00:33:41.400 learn a lot from him and I'm always really challenged by the things that he posts and the

00:33:44.900 things that he writes. He's just, he's a doer. I would say that I lean towards thinking, which is

00:33:51.520 good, but action is always required, especially in the Christian life. And I would say that that's 1.00

00:33:57.200 a weakness of mine, but he's just a doer. He gets stuff done. He organizes things. He makes sure

00:34:01.900 that he is living up to his word. Whereas I would rather just talk about things and think about things

00:34:06.960 all day. Grant is someone who actually goes out and does them. And that's what we all should be like.

00:34:11.800 And sometimes we need those kinds of people to speak into our lives, to motivate us and encourage

00:34:16.260 us to get off the couch and actually put the great commission into action, which is a lot more than

00:34:22.940 doing a podcast like this. It's loving your neighbor and doing the hard thing, inviting those people into

00:34:27.580 your life. So I don't know. I was really challenged by that conversation and I hope that it sparks a

00:34:33.560 change in all of us. Please feel free to send me your feedback. You can email me,

00:34:37.720 allyattheconservativemillennialblog.com. You of course can message me on Instagram.

00:34:42.820 I hope that everyone has an amazing Thanksgiving. This is, I think the first week since we started

00:34:48.500 doing twice a week podcast that we are only doing one podcast this week. We're going to take a break

00:34:53.860 for Thanksgiving. We're going to come back next Tuesday. I hope that everyone has a wonderful time

00:34:58.660 with their family. If you are dreading Thanksgiving, if maybe you don't have a good relationship

00:35:06.140 with your parents, with your siblings, and you are worried about it, just remember, just remember

00:35:14.300 one, who you are in Christ, that your identity is not in your family. Remember that your relationship

00:35:21.220 with him is far more important than your relationship with anyone else on earth. And your

00:35:25.400 goal in whatever interaction you have in your family is to be as loving and as kind and as Christ-like

00:35:31.860 as possible. I know sometimes that seems absolutely just, it just can't happen with your family as

00:35:37.620 crazy as they are. I understand. That's our role as Christians. And of course, just as human beings, 0.97

00:35:43.580 being as decent and as moral and as kind and as compassionate as we can be, even when that is

00:35:48.780 difficult. I hope that you find things to be grateful for. We can all be grateful because we

00:35:53.520 have the freedom and the privilege to live in this country. And we can all be grateful too, because Jesus

00:35:58.360 died for our sins. And if we believe in him, we get to spend eternity with him. Even if we had

00:36:03.180 nothing else in this world, we would have that to be thankful for. That's more important than politics.

00:36:07.980 That's more important than all of our differences and all of our division. That's the one thing that

00:36:12.480 at the end of the day can bring Christians together. And it's transcendent. It's our only

00:36:16.740 major ultimate purpose. So let us all be thankful for that. Let us take a breath just for one day,

00:36:23.040 maybe unplug, maybe don't get on Twitter, maybe don't scroll through Instagram,

00:36:26.400 just enjoy where you are, enjoy the people that you're with, and enjoy everything that God has

00:36:32.220 graciously given you. That's what I'm going to try to do. It's hard for me not to be embroiled in

00:36:37.440 Twitter conflict, but that is going to be my effort this Thanksgiving. And I hope that you

00:36:42.920 guys have a wonderful week and I will see you here next Tuesday.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - November 20, 2018

Ep 56 ｜ Discipling Millennials with Grant Skeldon

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