[00:00:00] The missional life podcast, inspiring kingdom minded believers around the world to live the mission of God in their lives.

[00:00:17] The Missional Life: All right, welcome back to missionland podcast today. We have dr. James davis on the show. Dr Davis is the founder of the global church network a visionary organization dedicated to equipping pastors and church leaders around the world with a mission to fulfill the great commission by 2030. Dr. Davis has impacted millions through his ministry and leadership in over 140 nations and authored more than 20 books.

[00:00:40] The Missional Life: Dr. Davis, welcome to the show.

[00:00:42] Dr. James Davis: Oh, it's great to be with you, Dan and Amanda, and to be a part of the missional podcast. And thank you for the opportunity. It means a lot. And I believe we're going to have a great conversation.

[00:00:54] The Missional Life: Amen. We're glad to have you. So, hey, this is a lot going on with this organization. There's a lot of people being impacted, but let's just rewind a little bit. Take us back to the start and tell us a little bit about the story of how the Global Church Network came to be and kind of its evolution into what it is.

[00:01:12] Dr. James Davis: Well, thank you. You know, I came to, I came to Christ as as my personal savior, July 15th, 1973 BC.

[00:01:22] Dr. James Davis: And BC stands for before computer.

[00:01:26] The Missional Life: Yeah.

[00:01:26] Dr. James Davis: And before cell phone and before COVID and within a year after that, I set a personal goal that I wanted to read the Bible through in 66 days. And I began June 1 1974, and I finished 66 days later.

[00:01:48] Dr. James Davis: By the time I was 14, I knew God had called me into ministry and I yielded to his plan, not knowing what all that plan would be. And if we're faithful in little things, he will give us more. If we're not faithful in the little, he's not going to give us more for those who are listening and watching the podcast, you know, I, I hear people say, well, the reason I don't surrender all to will of God is he may call me to police.

[00:02:19] Dr. James Davis: He may call me to Cambodia, but if he can't get you to cross the street, they share Christ with your neighbor. He's not going to trust you with a nation. If you can't take care of the little thing, he's not going to give you more. By the time I was 18, I began preaching and August of that year, and not knowing that I'd be fortunate to travel as much as I have and as, The ministry began to grow, and I was working on my schooling at the same time, and my graduate work, my doctoral work the Lord began opening doors, and, and I began to realize that small doors can open into big rooms.

[00:03:02] Dr. James Davis: And sometimes, the Lord says, I want you to step through that door. And on the outside, it looks, you know, maybe not that great of an opportunity. But on the other side, wow, it's a huge room and I can take you back to the moment where I stepped through a door and when I stepped through it, I've not found the back of the wall of the room yet.

[00:03:32] Dr. James Davis: And it was on a snowy day in Springfield, Missouri. I was sitting in my car and a Holy Spirit whispered to me, And said, call bill bright founder of chemist crusade for Christ and tell him about the network I put in your heart. And Dr. Bright and I were casual friends. We're not, we weren't close friends and I called him, he called me back and I told him about a network.

[00:04:00] Dr. James Davis: Of training and equipping that was in my heart. And the internet was only six years old at the time. And, and I shared with him about the future of online training that would be a part of what's going forward. And he and I fast and pray together for seven days. Then in January of 2002, we launched the Global Church Network with the ambitious goal of synergizing and mobilizing in order to help finalize.

[00:04:33] Dr. James Davis: The great commission. That's who we are. That's what we're about. And, and that's how it started for us. And the reason I brought my conversion into it is because without the conversion, the rest of it never comes into play. And it just starts with little things and whatever our viewing audience may be thinking about or listening and pondering, it really is the little things that make the difference.

[00:05:02] Dr. James Davis: And our character and in the level of commitment down the road,

[00:05:05] The Missional Life: Wow, I love how you mentioned BC, right before computers, before cell phones. I think it's really amazing and I think it's really God to take somebody who, lived and knows what it's like before all those things and

[00:05:23] The Missional Life: then saw the opportunity in harnessing that technology and leveraging that technology for the sake of the kingdom, for the sake of the gospel going out into the nations.

[00:05:32] The Missional Life: And I think that's, you know, oftentimes how God works. He takes, you know, as you were saying, being people who are faithful with the little and who are looking for opportunities to grow, looking for opportunities to multiply something. And he says, Look, here's the room here. Here, here's the door I want you to go through.

[00:05:48] The Missional Life: And I

[00:05:48] The Missional Life: think that's just amazing how you guys leverage that technology.

[00:05:51] Dr. James Davis: Well, thank you. I was on the back of the bus in Bangkok, Thailand in July of 2001. And for our audience, I'm going to use a word that some of you just don't even know what I'm about to say. I had a Palm Pilot in my hand and then I had an analog phone. That's before the phone became smart.

[00:06:17] Dr. James Davis: The Palm Pilot was used for cowering. It was the early phases of video chips that you could put in, you could write memos and different things. And and the Palm Pilot was not connected to the internet. And no phone was at that time. And, and so when the analog and the Palm pilot merged, it became smart.

[00:06:40] Dr. James Davis: And, but I'm sitting in the back of the bus between two pastor friends, I'm on my way to go see a missionary friend. And I'm looking at a small video chip and the Palm pilot, and it was a little video that Bill Bryant had given me called red sky in the morning, and I'm looking down at it. Looking at it, the film's kind of choppy, and the Holy Spirit whispers, and he says, They'll study like this one day.

[00:07:10] Dr. James Davis: They'll study like this one day. And when I came back from the trip, I said to Dr. Bright, Dr. Bright, the future is this. They will study like this one day. They will study like this one day. And so when we launched online training in January of 2002, I don't know of anyone in the ministry space, and I'm willing to guess even in corporate, but in the ministry space, that was very serious about it by the time October of 2002 was around.

[00:07:44] Dr. James Davis: We were involved in online training at 114 countries and, and we've continued to build it from there because we saw something, the Lord quickened in our heart, but we had to step into it. Faith becomes reality. When you take that first step, we know that the Bible says faith comes by hearing and it does.

[00:08:11] Dr. James Davis: But when this faith become real faith is when I pick up my nails and I build a boat like Noah, when I pick up my cell phone, I called bill bright because he tells me to do so that becomes that first step of faith that God won't say, aha, I'm pleased with that. And I want to use that woman. I want to use that man to in this generation.

[00:08:34] The Missional Life: That's, that's just really fascinating. Actually, to your point about the, Palm Pilot. I still remember I had a stylus and I still had that little, that little thing. And, and I actually kept it because I wanted to show show my children that before, you know, before things became smart. So,

[00:08:50] The Missional Life: so you said they will study like this someday. So there are a lot of pastors now studying like this so tell us how does that all work? How do people connect in with your organizations? How many pastors are working with your organization? What's the curriculum that they are going through?

[00:09:08] Dr. James Davis: Thank you. You're very kind. And, you know I live in Florida and and here in Florida, there's a highway called interstate 95 and it runs from Miami to Maine and, but it doesn't matter how good the highway is if I can't get on it and it's the on ramps. highway go. The on ramps really. We talked abo but it's the on ramps tha And so in the network for

[00:09:45] Dr. James Davis: to help men and women, both young and more seasoned to be able to get on the highway, to get on the highway, to go and develop and to grow. And so we launched what's called the Global Church Divinity School as one of our on ramps. We have many on ramps, but this is one and it's a, the Global Church Divinity School and it's gcds.

[00:10:08] Dr. James Davis: tv and, and in the Global Church Divinity School are more than 250 courses now taught by more than 200 different faculty. And by use the word faculty, I don't mean just professors. I mean, leading men and women in the body of Christ who are teaching their A game and, and we have incredible professors as well and from around the world, and it's taught in seven different levels from novice to mentor and seven ministry tracks.

[00:10:44] Dr. James Davis: So let's say. Preaching as a track. Then you have levels from novice to mentor, just in preaching. Then we have one on, on teaching and then pastoral life and so on. There's seven ministry tracks, but seven levels in each track, which makes up 196 courses. We're in eight languages. Now we're going to 25 languages.

[00:11:10] Dr. James Davis: By 2030, we're not trying to be the Jesus film, we're we. It's a training tool and 25 languages get us to 99%. It doesn't get us to a hundred percent of the Christian leaders, but it gets us to 99. And so one of our massive on-ramps is the Global Church of Indian School. And for those who are watching in the.

[00:11:32] Dr. James Davis: Participating in the mission of podcast. You know, when you go there, we do provide scholarships for unique places in the world. We want to provide that on ramp to help men and women to be able to get there and get the training, the teaching, the scholarship that is needed. It's an incredible tool.

[00:11:51] Dr. James Davis: And as the internet got faster, we got faster. As it got bigger, we got bigger and we're not going to say it's the best in the world. But we will say you will be baptized an amazing Christian worldview taught by men and women around the world. And it will help you define your role in God's goal as it relates to finishing the great commission.

[00:12:17] The Missional Life: with regard to finishing the Great Commission, you guys have set some ambitious goals . Can you talk a little bit about that as far as numbers? And as far as kind

[00:12:24] The Missional Life: of a time frame that you have set.

[00:12:27] Dr. James Davis: you know years ago, I was privileged to go and visit with the late Sir Edmund Hillary in his home, and he was the the first one to climb Mount Everest. And for the younger generation, you may not know who Sir Edmund Hillary was, and you may want to do a little research about him, but he was not a mountaineer.

[00:12:48] Dr. James Davis: And, but he had a mountain in his heart and he wanted to climb Mount Everest. No one had achieved it. He tried to do it in 1952 in May of that year, and he failed and he came back and and some people laughed at him and they said, yeah, you know, Edmund, you're never going to climb Mount Everest. And so he had a picture of Mount Everest on the wall and where the interview was being done the press conference.

[00:13:15] Dr. James Davis: And. He said, I want you to see how big it is, how tall it is. He said, but Mount Everest stopped growing a long time ago. He said, but Edmund Hillary hasn't stopped growing yet. And then he made this statement. He said a year from today, I will climb Mount Everest. And I will hoist a flag and I will stand where no one has ever stood before.

[00:13:40] Dr. James Davis: A vision becomes a goal when you put a date to it. Until you put a date to it, it's just blue sky. The reason the Great Commission It has never been done. One, it's hard. It's extremely hard, or it would have been done. But secondly, as long as it becomes a vision, we'll say we'll do the best we can and, and we'll pass it on to somebody else.

[00:14:07] Dr. James Davis: But the great commission was intended to be finished, not just something to be passed on. And so a vision becomes a goal when you put a date to it. I like what Edmund Hillary said, he said, if you only do what others have already done, you'll only feel what others have already felt. But if you would dare to do something that no one else has ever done, you have a satisfaction that no one else has ever had.

[00:14:38] Dr. James Davis: And when you're choosing your life's project, if there's no fear involved, you'll become bored with it and you won't finish what you began. But after you decided what it is, you're going to do start right now. Listen to what he said. If we only do what others have done, we'll only feel what others have felt.

[00:14:57] Dr. James Davis: What is. Our Mount Everest, I say it's the great commission and I believe the greatest satisfaction for this generation is to finish the Great Commission. And so we set a goal. We didn't set this goal just a year ago or two years ago. We set it back in 2016 as we were preparing for. The 500 year celebration of Martin Luther, and we were the only ministry privileged to host the Wittenberg 2017 Congress on the actual day of the 500 year celebration in Castle Church, where Martin Luther is buried.

[00:15:36] Dr. James Davis: It was there. We set a goal that we're going to do our very best by the 2000 year birthday of the church to finish the great commission. And so we're leveraging everything toward that goal because we believe there's enough money. There's enough people, there's enough tools and talents and skills and methods.

[00:16:02] Dr. James Davis: We just need to get enough motivation to get to the finish line. And the way we have to do it is get past ego and logo. If we can get past ego and logo, we can get to we go. And we can finish it. Ego and logo is usually the hardest of all of it. And as we push forward, we're going to get there.

[00:16:28] The Missional Life: Thinking about logo and I'm thinking how,, it's really important in our culture, to identify as something or as organizations. And I, I think that's really important. That's really important that as the global church body that we work together and that we put beside our egos our logos.

[00:16:45] The Missional Life: And I remember a few years ago, we were part of a community and every year on a certain Sunday, they would take a burlap bag and they would cover the church name and they

[00:16:55] The Missional Life: just put we are the church in our city And and I thought wow, that's really, what we're doing When we're doing what you're suggesting and so I really I think it's amazing and it's how the body is supposed to work together.

[00:17:07] The Missional Life: So as we we talk about You Finishing the commission at by 2030 and I hear that you guys are going after certain languages and you're hitting trying to hit about 99 And I see that you're kind of trying to leverage everything i'm curious Are you leveraging ai technology in terms of translations?

[00:17:25] The Missional Life: and are you beginning to leverage those sorts of technology because that could significantly expedite the the

[00:17:31] Dr. James Davis: We are, we are leveraging the latest AI technology as well. In language translation, there's a great missional shift that has developed around the world.

[00:17:43] Dr. James Davis: It's no longer the West going to the rest that right there. Is a huge missional shift. We're moving from parenting to partnering in the West. We've been the parents for so long, but the children around the world grew up. So we have to move from parenting to partnering. If we're going to get to the finish.

[00:18:08] Dr. James Davis: And when people ask me, what is the hardest thing you do in networking? And I, I say to them, it is to move. paradigms. We, we have, we've had a paradigm for so long that it's the West going to the rest. It's the, it's the parents, you know, going around the world and, and parenting is great. We fund and train.

[00:18:33] Dr. James Davis: However, the church grew up around the world and, and the church that grew up around the world, so many places around the world, they don't need our money. They don't need our publishing houses. They don't need. Our authors, they have their own God has blessed them in tremendous ways. And so we have to tie enough relational knots, no knot, no net.

[00:19:06] Dr. James Davis: No network. A lot of people like to talk about a network, but it has nothing in the net. So if your net is not working, it's not a network. It may be something you hang on the wall, but you have to tie enough relational knots to build a net that works and that net has one purpose to be filled, to be full.

[00:19:30] Dr. James Davis: And then the next piece is you have to share it. You know, when Peter has a net that's about to break. He's going to learn another lesson. He's going to have to share the fish and put it in other boats. And if we're going to finish, not only are we going to have to tie knots to build a net that works, but we're going to have to share the fish.

[00:19:50] Dr. James Davis: We're going to have to trust the Lord of the harvest for the fish to end up in a lot of boats. Or we're still not going to finish the Great Commission. And, you know, sometimes people say, well, if I network, I'm afraid I'm going to lose my brand. Well, Jesus is the brand, not our ministry, not our church, not ourselves.

[00:20:17] Dr. James Davis: Jesus is the brand. He is the greatest magnetic force of all time. And if we'll make him bigger, Oh, we'll have a harvest. That we cannot get in one net by ourselves. And, and I believe it's critical for brothers and sisters, fellow pastors, missionary friends, to see what the Lord is doing around the world.

[00:20:43] Dr. James Davis: So that we understand what our role is in the goal toward finishing the great commission.

[00:20:49] The Missional Life: You know, the number one responsibility of the leader is to keep the main thing, the main thing. And so I have to keep the main thing, the main thing. And what I mean by that is that I've seen people come in and say, you know, we want to network, we want to go to the finish line. They hang around a while and they go on and do something else.

[00:21:15] The Missional Life: They weren't there to go to the finish. They were there to pick fruit. And what I mean by that, they're fruit pickers. We grow relationships, cultivate relationships. They're just there. To meet some people and pull them off to the side to talk about what they're going to do or what they're not going to do.

[00:21:36] The Missional Life: And, and so if I keep the main thing, the main thing over time, I'll have great commission people in my life. And, and secondly, the, the main thing I have to do is I have to develop me. Because I'm going to attract who I am. Not what I want. And so if I'm a, if I'm a faith filled person, I'm going to attract faith filled people.

[00:22:03] The Missional Life: If I'm a great commission person, I'm going to attract great commission people. And, and, and so I have to work on me a lot harder than I work on anybody else, but in the meetings or in events, I have to keep the main thing, the main thing. And it's important for me to come back. And give reports, give updates as to what the Lord is doing.

[00:22:30] The Missional Life: And notice how I said it as to what the Lord is doing. A friend of mine Dr. Leonard Sweet and I've been friends for years. And one time he made a comment or asked a question of me and we were up in a New Jersey and going to his class to teach. And he said, James, what do you hope to hope to do in the years to come?

[00:22:48] The Missional Life: I, and I flippantly said, well, I kind of hope I can help change the world. And he looked at me and he said. Jesus didn't come to change it. He came to save it. And I began to think about that. You know, the Bible says Jesus came to seek and to save. He didn't just come to save. He came to seek and to save.

[00:23:11] The Missional Life: If someone is drowning in a river or in a lake or an ocean, they don't say to us, come and change me. He said. They say, come and save me. And after the saving is where the change is. And so we call it fruit. And we don't even get any credit for that. It's what the Lord is doing. Yes, the Lord uses us and those who are participating in this podcast.

[00:23:38] The Missional Life: He uses us, but it, all of it's got to go back to him. He is the greatest magnetic force of all. And so it's my responsibility to keep the main thing, the main thing. It's my responsibility. It'll work a lot harder on me than on anybody else. And then as it relates to bringing people together, not only in addition, keeping the main thing, the main thing working on me, but it takes time and we have to build relationship currency.

[00:24:12] The Missional Life: Relationship currency is the greatest currency in all the world. It's the most valuable currency. It's more valuable than all the wealth of the world. Relationship currency and properly steward becomes relationship capital. That's where trust is. We have to build trust. We have to build interdenominational trust.

[00:24:36] The Missional Life: When a pastor friend of mine says, well, we're a non denominational church, I said, wouldn't it be better to say you're an interdenominational? For you to say you're non denominational. Why not, why not be positive rather than be negative? I grew up in a, in a Pentecostal tradition and in the tradition I grew up in, we believe that we sure have it all figured out better than everybody else.

[00:25:03] The Missional Life: But as I got older and I traveled a lot, I realized others had the same philosophy and it was, we got it all figured out and what we're going to do is a lot better than anybody else. And so everybody got in their own lane and they're running in their own lane with the goal of finishing. But the problem is this, it's called lifespan.

[00:25:26] The Missional Life: We don't live long enough in that lane to finish. And so if you're going to bench press a thousand pounds. You're going to have to have some spotters. You can put the weights on the plate on the bar, but you're not going to do well after that. You're going to have to have some spotters. And what I've seen is that as population has gotten bigger and the weight has gotten heavier, more and more people are realizing we need more spotters.

[00:26:00] The Missional Life: And so it's easier today to network, to build bridges instead of fences. Than it's ever been because people are realizing it is our responsibility to finish the great commission. And if you're doing it in your own lane, let me just say to you, you're going to live and you're going to die and you will not finish it.

[00:26:28] The Missional Life: You're not going to live a thousand years. You're not going to live a thousand, 2000 years. So in that lane, doing it with your own group, you're going to make some progress. But you're not going to finish. You're going to have to broaden the tent and you're going to have to get to the place where you don't really care who gets the credit as long as God gets the glory.

[00:26:53] The Missional Life: The late DL Moody used to say, God has never seen a man, or this world has rather never seen a man, Christ that doesn't care who gets the credit as long as the Lord gets the glory. And if we get to that place, we're going to get to the finish line. And so it takes time. You got to build trust. You got to spend time with people and you got to keep the main thing, the main thing.

[00:27:21] The Missional Life: And you got to keep working on yourself. You got to keep getting sharper. If not, you're not going in, you're not going to attract the sharpest people possible. And that's a long answer, but I have spent a lot of time thinking about it.

[00:27:36] The Missional Life: Yeah, absolutely. I know that you spent a lot of time in this space and this is your main thing. I know you've kind of developed kind of five needs of getting the Great Commission done. Are those the five needs that you have come up with

[00:27:49] The Missional Life: what is

[00:27:49] Dr. James Davis: Well, a year ago, a friend of mine, actually two years ago, a friend of mine in August wrote me a letter, invited me to come speak to his leaders. It was the church of God and Dr. Timothy Hill was the general overseer. And he asked me to put together a presentation on why and how the great commission will be finished.

[00:28:08] Dr. James Davis: So I called him, I said, Tim. Thank you for the invitation. I said, but you know, this is a pretty big assignment. And I said, but thank you for giving me a month to get ready. And so I put together a presentation on why, why do I believe it can be done? Well, I kind of tapped on it a little bit ago. There's enough money that anybody thinks, well, we don't have enough money in the kingdom.

[00:28:31] Dr. James Davis: Oh my goodness. There's plenty of money. We have enough members. There's more Christians today than has ever been. And it's growing by about 130 to 140, 000 a day. We have plenty of members. We have plenty of methods, a lots of models, things we can learn from, but we need enough motivation. But then you got to talk about the how.

[00:28:53] Dr. James Davis: I believe every one of us who are watching the podcast. If you have a small Y, you need a small how. If you have a big Y, you need a big how. And the how comes out of the Y, not the other way around. And so how are we going to get there? Well, we laid out five steps in the word finish. Find, intercede, network, invest, send, harvest.

[00:29:16] Dr. James Davis: So find the remaining unreached peoples. So I recommend we start with the hardest ones. And people say, why is that? Well, because usually we work on the easiest ones and we die and we never get to the hardest ones. So I recommend we start with the hardest unreached people's first, then intercede. If we're not praying, we're not planting network for in you got in those, in the future, those who are not networking will be, those are not networking will eventually be not working.

[00:29:45] Dr. James Davis: And then invest time, energy, and money. Send the best young equipped. And then bring in the harvest. So we believe those six steps get us there. Then we went a little deeper. So we began to launch hubs. So we have 181 hubs today. We're scaling to 800 hubs by 2030. And every hub does three things. Synergizes the best relationships.

[00:30:15] Dr. James Davis: It systematizes the best training and strategizes for unreached peoples. So, and it gets us closer to those who've never heard the gospel and then online training, as we talked about earlier, not only the hubs, but the online. Training that's available everywhere in the future. It's not about where you go to school.

[00:30:37] Dr. James Davis: It's about who taught you when you went to school, when the internet was born distance died. So we're used to say, where did you go to college? Or where did you go to school? But in the future, it's not about where it's about who, and it's about when. And so we established the online, we established the hubs.

[00:30:57] Dr. James Davis: We've put a measurement stick out. As it relates to unreached peoples, we've identified those that we're targeting. And then Bible translation. Now, when we think about Bible Trace Translation in the missional space, the, the, the, the Western Way has been we have a small group of people who are doing the translation and we're grateful for that.

[00:31:20] Dr. James Davis: And we've gotten over 600 translations done in the last 700 or last 70 plus years. At that rate, we won't get done until 2235 at the rate we've been on. A friend, some friends of ours about 11 years ago began to kick around the idea of the Global Church Embracing Bible Translation. And then after they began to kick the idea around, They began to really think about how that could be done now on a global scale.

[00:31:54] Dr. James Davis: And some of this has taken place in the hubs, but the global church has embraced Bible translation. They anticipate in the next eight years, more than 4, 000 new Bible translations to take place. Now, this is huge. And the reason it's so big is because you had 70 plus years. You got, you know, 600 to 700 done.

[00:32:20] Dr. James Davis: Now we're going to do 4, 000 plus translations in, in eight years. How is that possible? Because the church grew up, the church grew up all around the world. And just because. They don't have some of the things we don't have today and here where I am in Florida does not mean they don't have the skills and the ability to do the translation that needs to be done.

[00:32:46] Dr. James Davis: And so Bible translation is exponentially growing in this season of time, which has been one of the big Achilles heels for a long, long time. But because the church is so mature today. We're going to be able to get the Bible translation completed, not just part of the Bible, but what's super cool, the whole Bible.

[00:33:07] Dr. James Davis: And so these measurement sticks help us to understand it is possible. It is doable for this generation. The people that are part of this missional podcast, we can be a part of finishing the great commission. And putting the cross on the roof of the world and letting people know who Jesus Christ is. This is our greatest and grandest moment.

[00:33:33] The Missional Life: Amen. To that point, how do people begin to get involved with your organization

[00:33:38] Dr. James Davis: thank you you know people can easily go to GCNW. TV, GCNW. TV. And that's our main site that is there and they can find all the information is there. Also, the hubs are highlighted. The global church of Indian school is there and we encourage local pastors around the world to consider becoming a billion soul church.

[00:34:02] Dr. James Davis: And and it's right there on the homepage, how you can become a billion soul church and and, and just get hooked in to the network. And I think it's a. A great relationship opportunity every other year. Right here in Florida. We have what we call this synergize conference and it's that synergize dot TV.

[00:34:23] Dr. James Davis: It's another one of the on ramps and that we're involved in and invite leaders come in around the world. And then in hubs, if those who are catching this somewhere internationally. We're launching hubs throughout the body of Christ. And it's a wonderful way to, to, to step in, to become very interdenominational to build relationship capital in your own life and in others, and to learn from some incredible trainers who are teaching in those hubs.

[00:34:52] Dr. James Davis: And, and so I would encourage people if they can. To get plugged in, but become missional, whatever you do, become missional, make it your goal to help finish the great commission. Because when you take ownership of it, then it changes everything. It changes how you plan, how you pray, how you go about your life.

[00:35:18] Dr. James Davis: It's okay to say no to certain things that are not going to help you finish. So you can say yes to the things that will. When you adopt the Great Commission as a goal in your life, it changes everything. It changes how you pray, plan and partner. And it makes you bigger. Not, it doesn't make you smaller. It makes you bigger.

[00:35:38] Dr. James Davis: And to know that everything you're moving toward is to the day of finishing the assignment. I can't think of anything greater and grander than that. Oh,

[00:35:50] The Missional Life: you know, we've done some work with pastors and kind of missionaries as they call them in Ethiopia out among the rural, rural tribes of Ethiopia. opiate, the region.

[00:36:00] The Missional Life: And, you know, for the, for the pastor that's out in kind of the developing world and the rural space, that's hearing this podcast and they're, you know, saying, Hey, I could need some training.

[00:36:11] The Missional Life: I need some training. I could use some help.

[00:36:13] The Missional Life: Can they connect by going right into your website or what, what is a good way for

[00:36:16] Dr. James Davis: They can, and I'll tell you what they can also do. And thank you for the question is you can go to, to the divinity school, gcds. tv and go over and click on sign up, and then you can scroll down and their scholarships, and you can click on that. And you will be granted a scholarship into the Global Church Divinity School.

[00:36:37] Dr. James Davis: And in the Global Church Divinity School, not only are there over 250 courses there, but there's over 1, 000 lectures taught by men and women from around the world in a systematized way. There are beautiful libraries that you can download of books and collections and resources in many different languages.

[00:36:59] Dr. James Davis: It's an incredible reservoir of resource and I would encourage men and women to do that. We help in, in that regard every day, and we'd be thrilled to do that for them.

[00:37:12] The Missional Life: As we kind of wrap this up, we want to be respectful of your time, but we have a lot of leaders that listen to this this podcast. And we know that you're a seasoned leader. You've been through time. You've been through challenges. You've proven yourself. You, you bear the battle scars in different ways, I'm sure.

[00:37:30] The Missional Life: And what do you say to the young Christian, the young leader who's listening to this and they want to make an impact in their community, in the world? What do you say as somebody who's You know, spoken to millions, if not tens or hundreds of millions of people around the world who's written books. What do you say from somebody who's lived it for years and has seen so much change? Speak to that person right now who's on the fence or wanting to step into the missional life that God has for

[00:37:56] The Missional Life: them. Silence.

[00:37:57] Dr. James Davis: Thank you. The first thing I would recommend is make a list of the closest friends in your life for that's where you're gonna be five years from now. If you don't like that picture. going to have to get some new friends. If the bus driver is asleep and he's driving your bus, it's not going to turn out good.

[00:38:20] Dr. James Davis: I think you should pray, but you better wake up the bus driver or remove him and put somebody else behind the wheel. It's so important. So many times we underestimate the powerfulness of great friends. I would never trade. The relationship currency that I have for all the wealth of the world. It's that valuable.

[00:38:46] Dr. James Davis: Make a list of the closest friends in your life, but that's where you're going to be five years from now. And then be willing to make some exchanges because. Sometimes you share with a person and they say, huh, and you share it again. Huh. And you've done it a number of times, but hope fills your heart every time.

[00:39:08] Dr. James Davis: I think she'll listen this time. I'll think you listen this time. They listened the 10 times before. Comes a place where you have to move on and, and embrace. what God is giving to you. And this next thing I would do is I would begin to understand what I don't know. You know, as if we're going to make incredible decisions, we're going to have to know more things than we do know.

[00:39:38] Dr. James Davis: Now begin to understand what is going on around the world. Just because you don't know about it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. 28 percent of the population in India I'd rather in Indonesia is Christian today. It's the biggest Muslim nation in the world, but it's 28 percent Christian. That's a big deal.

[00:40:04] Dr. James Davis: There are more Christians in Africa today than there are people in the United States of America. That is a big deal. There's 45, 000 a day coming to Christ in China. There's 108 million Christians in China. That's huge. There's over 20 million Christians in India, and one day in India, the largest Christian population in the world will be in India.

[00:40:35] Dr. James Davis: The number one fastest growing church in the world today is in the lovely nation of Iran. When was the last time you heard anything positive? about Iran. There are two million Christians in Iran today. When the revolution took place, there was only one million. You say, well, I didn't think there was any Bible schools there.

[00:40:56] Dr. James Davis: There's not. You said, I don't think there's any missionaries. There's not. The Lord has revealed himself in visions. And people are coming to Christ. What I'm saying to you is that you need to get to know what you don't know. And how are you going to do that? By getting some new friends, by spending time with people do know the late Reinhard Bonnke used to say, God goes with the goers, He doesn't sit with the sitters.

[00:41:28] Dr. James Davis: I want to spend time with people who know more than me. And if I find myself in the room where I'm the one who knows the most, I'm in the wrong room. I need to get in the room with men and women who know more than me. And when I get in that room, I just need to get quiet and listen. Don't come in trying to teach, come in to learn.

[00:41:54] Dr. James Davis: That's what I need to do. That's what you need to do. You need to learn what you don't learn, what you don't know, because then you're going to develop a Christian worldview. That you have an understanding of what the Lord is doing. Now if you're not a Great Commission person, none of this matters. If you're a one ring generality and you're content with that, none of this matters.

[00:42:19] Dr. James Davis: But if you want to be a definite specific, if you want to have razor focus in your life, then when you choose to adopt the Great Commission as your personal goal, you're going to want to get to know the people who know more. Who understand more who've been down the road a lot longer than you have, or I have, because it's going to shape us in who we are.

[00:42:46] Dr. James Davis: And it's going to help us to make decisions that are going to have compounding impact. It may only be a minute, but eternity is in it. And when you learn to live with that eternity perspective, it, it helps you to elevate your thinking. And your prayer life and what your goals may be. And I will close with this story.

[00:43:13] Dr. James Davis: I have an identical twin brother. I do. His name is James and he lives just South of me of a hundred miles. We're named after two different grandfathers whose first name was James. My dad is named James. My uncle is named James. My son who I buried years ago was named James and my brother has a son. I bet you can't guess what they named him, but I had an amazing dad.

[00:43:39] Dr. James Davis: And when we were 12 years old one afternoon on Sunday afternoon, my dad said to his two sons, why don't we fly a kite this afternoon? And so we went over to this large store that my dad managed. It was closed on Sundays. Back in those days, we went back to the toy department. My dad gathered as much kite string as he could and put it in a shopping cart.

[00:44:02] Dr. James Davis: Got the biggest kite he could find. We went out to the parking lot and we began again to put the kite up a hundred feet, 200 feet, 300 feet, another roll, another roll, and we put that kite up 5, 300 feet. We put it up a mile high. It was so high, we couldn't see the kite. We could just feel the tug on the string.

[00:44:28] Dr. James Davis: Then it came time to let the kite go. My dad said, we're not going to roll it back in. And we let it go. And then my dad said to my brother and me, you can put up your kite as high as you want. Don't let anyone else tell you anything different. And what I would say to the younger generation, You can put up your kite as high as you want.

[00:44:53] Dr. James Davis: There are no problems in heaven, only plans for your life. The Holy Trinity never meets an emergency session and say, Oh, we didn't see that coming. What are we going to do now? There are no emergencies in heaven. God has a plan for you and he wants you to step into it and you're going to need incredible friends soon as you adopt.

[00:45:20] Dr. James Davis: the Lord's mission. You're going to have to have incredible people in your life because it's time relational knots that makes a net work. And without it, you can do certain things, but you'll never finish the assignment. And that's what I would say. I would encourage you in this generation To be all you can be and to adopt God's goal for your personal life, and you'll see what he does for you.

[00:45:51] The Missional Life: Wow, well said. For those who, like us, are inspired by by what you've shared and want to know more about your organization and connecting, remind us again, and listeners will have those in the show notes, but remind us again how we can connect with your

[00:46:06] Dr. James Davis: Sure. Go to GCN W tv, and then you can go to Global Church Divinity School of tv, gcds.tv. You can also go to my personal website, james old davis.com, james o davis.com, and, and all the other books and resources that are there you'll find very easily. But. I just want to say it's been an honor to be with you on your missional podcast.

[00:46:31] Dr. James Davis: And, and I know you're getting ready to transition to Belize. But I'm looking forward to serving with you in the days to come. God's got amazing people everywhere in the body of Christ. And we just got to partner with them to get to the finish line. It's been a joy to be on your podcast. Thank you for the opportunity.

[00:46:48] The Missional Life: Amen.

[00:46:50] Mhm.