CFTROU 0201: Students- Spiritual Habits

Today, we continue our conversation on Student Ministry, focusing on the fourth leg of our Student Ministry philosophy at Family Church: Spiritual Habits. Although it’s the last talked-about leg, it’s certainly not the least important. Joining us are Pastor John MacTaggart, Pastor to Students and Families, and Tommy Lea, our Middle School Minister, both from Family Church Downtown. Tune in to hear about the essential spiritual habits we emphasize, why this aspect is so crucial to our Student Ministry, and the practical ways we help students build these habits.

Key Points From This Episode:

• Tommy shares the spiritual habits we emphasize in our Student Ministry.
• John’s thoughts on forming spiritual habits in students.
• Practical ways we help students form spiritual habits. 
• We share anecdotal stories about students who have gone through programs and the fruit we’ve seen.
• Advice on where to start to weave spiritual habits into your student ministries. 

Spiritual habits are going to create the opportunity for people to become life-long self-feeding disciples of Jesus Christ.
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I do think the impact on parents is huge. And our goal is always to partner with parents — I do think the ways we challenge our students is so encouraging to parents
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Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Jimmy on X

Leslee on X 

John MacTaggart on X

Church for the Rest of Us Conference 2025

Family Church Network

Family Church on Facebook

Family Church on Instagram

Church for the Rest of Us on Twitter

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CFTROU 0200: Students- Challenging Spiritual Experiences

This season is all about our student ministry philosophy, and today, we unpack the third leg of our four-legged stool that serves as the sturdy base of truth we’d like to pass onto our student leaders: challenging spiritual experiences. Jimmy and Leslee are joined by Pastors John MacTaggart and Jake Kimbrell to explore how we at Family Church instigate challenging spiritual experiences for our students. We begin with why it’s important to provoke our students spiritually, the three main events that serve as great foundations for this purpose, and how we ensure that our entire congregation is engaged and actively involved. We end with how adversity breeds success, confirming why we need to constantly challenge our students on a spiritual level, and our guests share some helpful resources for cultivating the right mindset in student ministries. Join us to discover how to create challenging spiritual experiences that foster growth in your students and empower your ministry to inspire the next generation!

Key Points:

• How we create challenging spiritual scenarios for our students at Family Church. 
• Unpacking our biggest three annual events: ADVANCE, Camp, and Block Party.
• Understanding what motivates students to grow in their faith and share The Gospel. 
• How adversity breeds success and why we should be challenging our students at church.
• Success stories from when we challenged our students spiritually. 
• Helpful resources for provoking challenging spiritual experiences.

Challenging spiritual experiences are the most unique thing that a student ministry has to offer.
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What we’re doing is we’re saying to the students, ‘We believe you’re not just the church of tomorrow; we believe you’re the church of today.’
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Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Jimmy on X

Leslee on X

John MacTaggart on X

John MacTaggart on Instagram

Family Church Network

Family Church on Facebook

Family Church on Instagram

Church for the Rest of Us on Twitter

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CFTROU 0199: Students- Significant Adult Relationships

Our students are the leaders of today, not just tomorrow, and that’s why our student ministry is so important to us at Family Church. Today is the second leg of our four-legged stool that defines how we approach our student ministry, and it’s all about the importance of having significant spiritual leaders actively investing in their student congregations. We are joined by Campus Director Jaqueline Smail and Student Pastor John MacTaggart, and Jaqueline begins by sharing her journey into student ministry to become one of the most gifted student leaders that Pastor Jimmy has ever seen! Then, we discuss why spiritual leaders matter for students, why parents appreciate the presence of significant adults in the kids’ lives, the responsibilities of adults who have students underwing looking up to them, and the characteristics of a great student leader. We end with some advice on how to support student ministries from the sidelines, what churches should be doing more of to enhance their student ministries, and some real-world examples of when spiritual leaders significantly impacted the lives of the students.  

Key Points From This Episode:

• Why students need to have significant relationships with significant adults. 
• What Family Church is looking for when hiring a student leader – must-have characteristics.
• How to support student ministry when you’re not directly involved. 
• What churches need to be doing more of for their student ministries. 
• Practical examples of when student leaders significantly impacted the lives of their students.

CFTROU 0199: Students- Significant Adult Relationships
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“We actually have a lot of people who are very gifted Bible teachers, and we have environments where we can create that. What we don’t have is authentic, life-on-life disciple-makers.”
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Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode

Jimmy on X

Leslee on X

Family Church Network

Family Church on Facebook

John MacTaggart on Instagram

Jacqueline Smail on Instagram

Family Church on Instagram

Church For The Rest Of Us Conference 2025

Church for the Rest of Us on X

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CFTROU 0198: Students- Partnering with Parents

Welcome to a new season of Church for the Rest of Us! Today we are joined by student pastor, John MacTaggart and student minister Christian Rodriguez to discuss student ministry and how to partner with parents. We then delve into ‘the four-legged stool’ that they implement in student ministry at Family Church, where it came from, and how our guests use it in their ministry. Today we focus on the first ‘leg’ of the stool; partnering with parents as our guests tell us how they create a sense of community within their student ministry, how they connect with parents and disciple their children alongside them, and so much more! We even discuss some important values we, at Family Church, like to instill in our children before John and Christian share advice for anyone in ministry wanting to connect with their students.

Key Points:

• The biblical foundations of student ministry and why it’s so important. 
• A breakdown of ‘the four-legged stool’ and how Family Church developed it. 
• How they disciple the children in their church alongside their parents. 
• The milestones they emphasize for both children and their parents. 
• How John and Christian connect with the parents of the students the disciple. 
• The kinds of questions parents as student ministers and their potential solutions. 

We don’t just want kids showing up on Sundays and Wednesdays, this is a family affair!
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Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Jimmy on X

Leslee on X

Family Church Network

Family Church on Facebook

Family Church on Instagram

Church for the Rest of Us on X

John MacTaggart on LinkedIn

John MacTaggart on X

John MacTaggart on Instagram

Christian Rodriguez on LinkedIn

Christian Rodriguez on Instagram

Axis 

Faith for Exiles

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CFTROU 0197: A Simple Way to Share the Gospel

In our final episode of this season, we delve into a simple method for sharing the Gospel. Joining us on the podcast today are Pastor Todd Thomas, who serves at Family Church Sherbrooke, Chris Kish, minister to the young adult’s ministry, and Robby Christmas, campus pastor at Family Church in the Farms. Together, we unpack the Three Circles, a gospel-sharing tool developed by Pastor Jimmy and one that we frequently utilize. Tune in to learn about the genesis of the Three Circles, its evolution into a globally recognized gospel-sharing tool, and why we prioritize not only teaching but also training our community in its use!

Key Points:

• Pastor Jimmy recounts the story of developing the Three Circles tool.
• How the tool has developed into a globally used gospel-sharing tool
• Why we don’t just teach, but train people, in the Three Circles.
• Robby walks us through what a training session on the Three Circles looks like.
• Why you, as a church leader, should have this tool.

Key Quotes: 

“What I want to do is make sharing the gospel normal. For the Christian, it should be normal!” — Chris Kish

“When you are training you are not just transferring content, you are transferring skills.” — Robby Christmas

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Family Church Three Circles

Turning Everyday Conversations Into Gospel Conversations

Jimmy on X

Leslee on X

Family Church Network

Family Church on Facebook

Family Church on Instagram

Church for the Rest of Us on X

Todd Thomas on X

Chris Kish on Instagram

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CFTROU 0196: Building a Leadership Pipeline

A leadership pipeline isn’t a new trend that only applies to multisite or church-planting contexts. While it has its challenges and requires that we rethink ministry roles, building a church’s leadership pipeline cultivates the God-given spiritual gifts and abilities of each person to accomplish ministry goals and intentionally develop ministry partners. Today on Church For the Rest of Us, we delve into one of our most asked-about topics with special guests Pastors Jose DaSilva, Christian Ramos, and Derek Simpson. Join us as we discuss the importance of people development, what goes into building a leadership pipeline, and how your church can create a better process for developing and multiplying disciples at all levels.

Key Points From This Episode:

• What it means to be a “people developer.”
• Reasons that churches need more qualified, capable leaders to accomplish ministry goals.
• Some of the cultural challenges that come with developing people.
• Identify, recruit, train, and place: the process of leadership development.
• How to identify potential leaders in your community.

One of our key leadership principles is that we want all of us to be people developers – Jesus was a people developer, all the best leaders in all the new testaments were people developers, and God is a people developer
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”[A
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is not a function of budget, size, or scope of ministry. It’s a function of intentionality by the pastors and believers at the church.” username=”dereksimpson”]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Christian on Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/christianramos

Derek on X — https://twitter.com/dereksimpson

Jimmy on X

Leslee on X

Family Church Network

Family Church on Facebook

Family Church on Instagram

Church for the Rest of Us on X

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CFTROU 0195: Embracing Meaningful Membership

There are numerous aspects to embracing meaningful membership at your neighborhood church. At Family Church, we consider membership a privilege, but it also involves a specific process. This process is designed to guide our members toward God’s design through fellowship, teaching, and accountability within their church family. Today, we’re joined by Pastor Derek Simpson, who serves as the campus pastor for our downtown campus and provides leadership for all our ministry teams across all campuses; Pastor Todd Gaston from the North Stuart campus and regional leader of the Treasure Coast; and Pastor Jose DaSilva, the pastor of Iglesia Familiar Greenacres. Join us as we dive into a discussion on the process and purpose of church membership. With this conversation, we want to encourage listeners, not to simply do what we do, but to build a process, stick with it over time, and begin seeing the fruit of it.

Key Points From This Episode:

• Pastor Derek further unpacks our First Connection tool.
• How we encourage people to attend First Connection.
• Why our number one metric is how many people are coming to First Connection.
• Pastor Derek drills down on what people can expect when coming to First Connection.
• Pastor Jimmy delves into what it takes to become a member at Family Church.
• Pastor Jose’s thoughts on the difference between a member and an attendee.

”First
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the family. We open the gate for you.” username= “JoseDaSilva”]

“Our
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Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Jimmy on X — https://twitter.com/JimmyScroggins

Leslee Bennett on X — https://twitter.com/lesleedbennett

Derek Simpson on X — https://twitter.com/dereksimpson

Todd Gaston on X — https://twitter.com/toddgaston

Jose DaSilva Email — [email protected]

The Three Circles Family Church — https://www.familychurchnetwork.com/category/3-circles-gospeling-tool/

Family Church Network — https://www.familychurchnetwork.com/

Family Church on Facebook — https://m.facebook.com/FamilyChurchVillage

Family Church on Instagram—

https://www.instagram.com/gofamilychurch/

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CFTROU 0194: How to Count Wins

In this episode, we dive into the numbers and metrics. While it’s not always all about the numbers in ministry, metrics help us gauge our impact in taking the gospel to every person in every neighborhood across South Florida. Our guests are Derek Simpson, Campus Pastor of Family Church Downtown, Todd Thomas, Campus Pastor of Family Church Sherbrooke, and Scott Crawford, Business Administrator and CFO of Family Church. If you would like to learn which metrics we measure, the process we follow to develop our metrics, and the goals we set around these metrics, then tune in today.

Key Points From This Episode:

• How metrics and dashboards are helpful reporting tools and help leaders determine strategy.
• The metrics and reporting tools used in different ministry areas.
• What the metrics mean to our Lead Pastor.
• The process of identifying and developing metrics used in our context.
• The importance of being good stewards of the resources that have been given to us.
• What we do if we see participation is waning.
• How metrics can help us look at the past to see what should happen in the future.
• How baptisms are a celebratory metric across our campuses.
• Building culture through a leadership development program for our kids.
• Cultivating our culture – our main goal.
• Lead measures vs. lag measures.
• The number one metric at Family Church.

If you don’t evaluate and measure, you can’t tell the impact of certain things and whether they are succeeding or not.
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Numbers paint a picture of what God is doing and they help us know what’s working and what’s not.
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Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Todd on X

Scott on X

Derek on X

Jimmy on Twitter

Leslee on X

Family Church Network

Family Church on Facebook

Family Church on Instagram

Church for the Rest of Us on X

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CFTROU 0193: How Meals, Meetings, and Retreats Build Culture

Meals and meetings are an everyday occurrence in most organizations and workspaces, and retreats are also commonplace. However, did you know that there are three aspects of work life can help to grow your culture? In this episode, our guests include Pastor Christian Ramos. He leads our worship ministry across our family of neighborhood churches. We also welcome Derek Simpson, Campus Pastor of Family Church Downtown, and Todd Thomas, Campus Pastor of Family Church Sherbrooke, to discuss how meals, meetings, and retreats work to help build culture. We discuss how meals strengthen relationships, how meetings grow culture, how retreats expand the mind, among other benefits. Be sure to tune in!

Key Points From This Episode:

• What it means to have meals that advance the church’s mission.
• How meals strengthen relationships and how to navigate meals with the opposite gender.
• Ways that the various types of meetings at Family Church affect our culture.
• The importance of preparation and advice for structuring meetings to grow culture.
• Why we go on several retreats.
• How retreats lead to mindset shifts and changes of heart.
• Retreats as cultural, relationship, and product accelerators.
• Tips to get the most out of your retreats.

A change of pace and a change of place means a change of heart.
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We’re big on accountability, so we have action items in all of our meetings.
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Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Todd on X

Genesis 3

Death by Meeting

If it Ain’t Broke… Break It!

Todd on X — https://twitter.com/indiantodd

Christian on Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/christianramos

Derek on X — https://twitter.com/dereksimpson

Jimmy on X

Leslee on X

Family Church Network

Family Church on Facebook

Family Church on Instagram

Church for the Rest of Us on X

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This will help us place the podcast in front of more pastors and ministry leaders. It also lets us learn from you. Thank you for taking the time to get the word out about Church for the Rest of Us.

CFTROU 0192: How Common Language Drives Culture

In this episode our hosts and guests explore how common language in a church drives culture. Joining the discussion are special guests, Seth Carter, Creative Pastor of Family Church, who leads his creative team to disseminate common language throughout our family of neighborhood churches. Also joining us, special guests, Winner Olmann, Campus Pastor of Family Church Lake Park, and Todd Thomas, Campus Pastor of Family Church Sherbrooke. Our guests unpack the definition of common language. They discuss Relentless Pursuit – what it is and how the team developed it. They also talk about the ways to communicate common language at Family Church, and what it means to be a culture carrier. To listen to this and much more, tune in now!

Key Points From This Episode:

• The importance of developing culture carriers as you develop common language.
• How we define common language.
• What Relentless Pursuit is and how we developed it.
• How common language has evolved in our context.
• Ways we communicate and deliver our common language.
• Informal ways we communicate common language.
• What it means to be a culture carrier using common language.
• The times it takes to embed culture in your organization.
• Being intentional about using common language.
• What common language needs to be–accessible, true, and real.
• The importance of culture in the Kingdom of Christ.
• Advice to pastors and ministry leaders looking to develop their common language.

Common language includes the phrases, words, and terminology that are important to Family Church, and in many cases unique to Family Church.
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Not everything that we say becomes common language.
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Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Todd on X

Email Winner

Seth on LinkedIn

Seth on X

Jimmy on X

Leslee on X

Family Church Network

Family Church on Facebook

Family Church on Instagram

Church for the Rest of Us on X

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This will help us place the podcast in front of more pastors and ministry leaders. It also lets us learn from you. Thank you for taking the time to get the word out about Church for the Rest of Us.

CFTROU 0191: Is It Time to Change Your Church’s Name?

Today on Church for the Rest of Us, we pose a question: Do you think it’s time to change the name of your church? If this is something that you’ve had on your heart, then do not miss out on our conversation as we share insights on how to go about changing the name of your church! We’re gladly joined by two incredible guests to dive into this subject, Todd Thomas, the pastor at Family Church Sherbrooke and leader of our campus pastors; and Winner Olmann, the pastor at Family Church Lake Park. We delve into three reasons why any church might think about changing its name, why we changed our church’s name, what you could potentially lose by proceeding with the change, and what you can gain from the change! We trust this episode will inspire and encourage you in your journey to reach your community with the gospel of Jesus Christ!

Key Points From This Episode:

• How and why we opted for a name change (implementing it gradually over some time).
• What it’s like to change your name when you’re planting something new.
• Winner speaks to the experience they underwent changing the name of their school.
• We discuss the potential things you can lose by changing your church’s name.
• The importance of laying the right groundwork with the right leaders.
• Encouragements on changing your church’s name.

CFTROU 0191: Is It Time to Change Your Church’s Name?
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Ideally, you want a name that accurately reflects the mission and vision you have for your church in your community.
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Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Todd on X

Email Winner

Jimmy on Twitter

Leslee on X (formerly Twitter)

Family Church Network

Family Church on Facebook

Family Church on Instagram

Church for the Rest of Us on X

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This will help us place the podcast in front of more pastors and ministry leaders. It also lets us learn from you. Thank you for taking the time to get the word out about Church for the Rest of Us.