There is no such thing as a typical week in the rhythms of a missional community. Healthy communities follow pretty surprisingly simple patterns. And the schedules of the families are not crazy packed and insanely busy. In this episode of the Everyday Disciple Podcast, I'll share a running narrative from the daily journals of a married father in a missional community. You'll get to see all of the "organized" and "organic" interactions that come up in their calendar as a family on mission for one week. Oh, it's messy... but it's a glorious mess! In This Episode You’ll Learn:

• How a married couple with three kids lives on mission together.
• The gospel-intentionality that is baked into their normal life.
• How living this way in community adds very little to their normal schedules.
• A great picture of discipleship in action in everyday life.

Get started here… From this episode: "Did you notice that there are really only two or three interactions with the Missional Community during this week that fall outside their normal daily and weekly rhythms? I also hope you see that one of the takeaways from this family’s schedule is that everything is moving outward with regard to its activities, responsibilities, and relationships. Growth is happening as the family includes others, more and more frequently, into the mix. Treating everyone like family."  

Each week the Big 3 will give you immediate action steps to get you started.

Download today’s BIG 3 right now. Read and think over them again later. You might even want to share them with others…

Thanks for Listening!

Thanks so much for joining us again this week. Have some feedback you’d like to share? Join us on Facebook and take part in the discussion! If you enjoyed this episode, please share it using the social media buttons you see at the top of this page or right below. Also, please subscribe and leave an honest review for The Everyday Disciple Podcast on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen. Ratings and reviews are extremely helpful and greatly appreciated! They do matter in the rankings of the show, and we read each and every one of them.   Links and Resources Mentioned in This Episode: Free Download of the Big 3 For Episode #393 Watch this short summary of Caesar teaching the 6 Gospel Rhythms Download this FREE 6 Rhythms Guide full of ideas to get you started.  Everyday Disciple: FREE Discipleship Resources and Training. Missio Publishing – More Missional Books and Resources  

Caesar: 00:00:00

To help give you a bit of a map.

Caesar: 00:00:02

So you'll get a little more oriented to the daily, weekly rhythms of life in initial community.

Caesar: 00:00:07

I wanna share a narrative of what life for one family living on mission can look like over a typical week.

Caesar: 00:00:13

Of course, there is no such thing as a typical week.

Caesar: 00:00:17

But I will say that everything here is real something either I've experienced in my own life or by others.

Caesar: 00:00:23

I know who are living as an extended family on mission.

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The names have been changed to protect the innocent.

Caesar: 00:00:28

Okay.

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And I've been careful not to make this too sanitized or unrealistic.

Caesar: 00:00:33

Some days are packed with very obvious kingdom activity while others feel like nothing special.

Caesar: 00:00:38

Until you look back and that's often how it goes.

Caesar: 00:00:41

You ready?

Announcer: 00:00:54

Welcome to the Everyday Disciple Podcast where you'll learn how to live with greater intentionality and an integrated faith that naturally fits into every area of life.

Announcer: 00:01:02

In other words, discipleship as a lifestyle, this is the stuff your parents.

Announcer: 00:01:06

Pastors and seminary professors probably forgot to tell you.

Announcer: 00:01:10

And now here's your host Caesar.

Announcer: 00:01:11

Kalinowski.

Caesar: 00:01:12

Hey, how's it going today?

Caesar: 00:01:14

I'm actually recording this episode on father's day before everyone else comes over.

Caesar: 00:01:19

Still kind of quiet around here.

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I hope.

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That you, uh, already had a great time being remembering, honoring and blessing dads out there.

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it's always wonderful.

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to have the family and extended family kind of celebrating together.

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So.

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Yeah, happy father's day in the rears.

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All right.

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God knows.

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And I love you.

Caesar: 00:01:36

All right.

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The same.

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Hey, I wanna invite you to, join us in the Facebook group.

Caesar: 00:01:40

If you've never done that yet.

Caesar: 00:01:41

Go to everyday Disciple dot com slash Facebook and join in.

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Join the conversation.

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This is how you can get ahold of me and talk about, every week's episode.

Caesar: 00:01:51

And I also drop resources there from time to time.

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I post question.

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I'm not only the only one in talking in there, obviously this is your community and I'd love you to be a part of it.

Caesar: 00:02:01

Okay.

Caesar: 00:02:01

So I hope you will do that.

Caesar: 00:02:03

All right.

Caesar: 00:02:04

So today's, episode's, a little bit different . Let me start by saying, if you've ever been hiking.

Caesar: 00:02:11

Or taken a long walk in the woods, you know, how easily it can be to get lost.

Caesar: 00:02:15

Even when you were certain you were following the map or sticking to the trail, that phrase, I couldn't see the forest for the trees becomes frighteningly real in an instant, even with proven directions and an experienced guide, we can get off course and be far from our destination before we even knew it.

Caesar: 00:02:32

And that's why the new satellite and aerial view maps are so helpful.

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You can see where you're at in relationship to everyone around you.

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Today to help give you a map and get you a little more oriented to your surroundings.

Caesar: 00:02:44

I wanna share a narrative of what life for a family living on mission can look like over a typical week.

Caesar: 00:02:51

Of course, there is no such thing as a typical week, but I will say that everything here is real something experienced either my own life or by others.

Caesar: 00:02:58

I know who live as an extended family.

Caesar: 00:03:01

Okay.

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The names have been changed to protect the innocent.

Caesar: 00:03:03

And I've been careful not to make this too sanitized or unrealistic.

Caesar: 00:03:08

Some days are packed.

Caesar: 00:03:09

Okay.

Caesar: 00:03:09

With very obvious kingdom activity while others feel like nothing special until you look back, that's often how it goes.

Caesar: 00:03:17

So here's a running journal for about a week or so of Missional life.

Caesar: 00:03:20

From the perspective of a man who is married and has a few kids at different ages and stages of life, he and his family have been living as a part of Missional Community for about a year or two he's learning and they're on an adventure.

Caesar: 00:03:32

That's how they see it.

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This may not be like your specific situation, but I hope this helps you find a few more markers along the path, on your journey into the frontier of mission.

Caesar: 00:03:43

Okay.

Caesar: 00:03:44

So I'm gonna be reading through this and just kind of going through his journal.

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So sit back and enjoy the ride.

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This journal starts out Friday 11:35 PM says what a day.

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I could not wait to get horizontal and watch a few minutes of Jimmy Kimmel before heading off to bed.

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I feel body tired, but soul energized.

Caesar: 00:04:02

It was a blast tonight seeing Sean and Dana part of our Missional Community, leading folks at the cafe through storytelling night, some of the stories they told and the people told were nuts, but the way they led the dialogue and honored people, especially with the discussion that exploded around Noah's Ark narrative.

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That was incredible.

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It's amazing to see the spirit lead people into truth through such a simple and non-threatening time together, like telling stories, several others from our MC were there too.

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I hope some will take a cue from this and start new story nights in the future.

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We'll have to see about that.

Caesar: 00:04:37

This morning before I left for work, the kids were so funny.

Caesar: 00:04:40

They were working on their list of who will I be a blessing to today, the Friday edition.

Caesar: 00:04:45

It's awesome.

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They seem to argue a lot about who and what, but they laugh a lot too.

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It seems that this is becoming a rhythm to our day.

Caesar: 00:04:53

Well, most days we prayed with them before they left for school.

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And now the list is display.

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In anticipation on the refrigerator.

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Here's what it says.

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Who will I be a blessing to today?

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Friday and says, mom, send a note, encouraging TIFF, who is sick.

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Dad drop off the lawnmower for Nick after work.

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Molly who's 18 offer to pay for the student retreat for Sarah Teddy.

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Who's 14 says, mow the lawn for Nick and old man Janssen and chase who's eight says, tell my teacher, miss Linda, how much she helps.

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Molly is now a freshman in college.

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Whoa.

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I can't even believe it.

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And Teddy is loving the ninth grade and chase is tolerating fourth, two outta three.

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Ain't bad.

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I have great kids.

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Thanks Lord.

Caesar: 00:05:36

I am sensing that Tony, a friend at work may be a person of peace in my life.

Caesar: 00:05:40

He is such a cool guy and he's always asking me questions about my past.

Caesar: 00:05:44

My marriage, why I do certain things or don't, and he's always offering to help me out with whatever I happen to mention I've gotta do or something that's happening in our MC our Missional Community.

Caesar: 00:05:54

I am stoked that he's coming with us to serve at the park tomorrow.

Caesar: 00:05:57

We could sure.

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Use the help.

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I'm intrigued by the conversation I had with Nick after work today.

Caesar: 00:06:03

He was grateful that we were helping him with his lawn and all the yard work, but he was more interested in how Teddy our middle schooler would be willing to help and have such a great attitude about all of it.

Caesar: 00:06:15

The last six weeks, since his surgery have been rough on him.

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And while he accepts our help, I can tell that he is feeling like a burden, but Teddy told him today, it's not that we have to help mow your lawn, Nick.

Caesar: 00:06:27

It doesn't look that bad, but we get.

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It's our pleasure.

Caesar: 00:06:31

Nick was blown away by that and he continues to promise to pay us back somehow, while we told him that we were both hoping for new Corvette's, I don't know.

Caesar: 00:06:41

I don't know how that's gonna.

Caesar: 00:06:43

Sherry is the best wife a guy could ever have.

Caesar: 00:06:45

I don't know how we would live our lives like this on mission without her, her growing flexibility.

Caesar: 00:06:50

When it comes to our family schedule is so awesome and helpful.

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She has always been great at having people over in hospitality, but now that she's not so worried about keeping a perfect house, it seems like she's having a lot more fun and everyone else is more relaxed around our place too.

Caesar: 00:07:05

There's definitely less leftovers in the fridge.

Caesar: 00:07:07

These days.

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Mostly because Molly seems to bring new friends over for dinner nights.

Caesar: 00:07:12

Most nights, I feel as if our family is growing up and in and out a lot quicker these days.

Caesar: 00:07:19

Well, I should sleep tomorrow will be cool, but busy.

Caesar: 00:07:23

And that's how he ends Friday's journal.

Caesar: 00:07:25

Right.

Caesar: 00:07:26

See how normal that all sounds, but it's pretty intentional and pretty cool.

Caesar: 00:07:29

All right.

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Next journal entry.

Caesar: 00:07:31

Saturday night around midnight.

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He.

Caesar: 00:07:34

My buddy, Bob is always the first to arrive again today.

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He grabbed a bunch of our younger folks and went over to set things up.

Caesar: 00:07:41

Way before the rest of us arrived.

Caesar: 00:07:43

Every few months, we work with our city officials to identify some park in town or other part of our city that needs some love and attention.

Caesar: 00:07:50

Today, we earned our stripes by pulling a record number of weeds from center park and spreading out literally tons of mulch, these projects, which we call sacred space, save the city a few bucks.

Caesar: 00:08:02

And more than that, it has given us the opportunity to invite lots of our friends and neighbors to join.

Caesar: 00:08:07

As we live as a blessing to others, we don't always point this out to them right away, but it always seems to come up in conversation.

Caesar: 00:08:15

When the question of why do you do all this stuff comes up and it always does.

Caesar: 00:08:20

I was able to make some great observations today about a couple of leaders I'm developing in our MC it's surprising to see how hard some work at the task, the task, while others work hard at the.

Caesar: 00:08:33

The mission is always about the people, always about discipling others to the truth in new areas of life.

Caesar: 00:08:39

And that's really starting to get this.

Caesar: 00:08:41

They all are pretty cool.

Caesar: 00:08:44

Sherry and a few others from our MC shot out a little early from the project to set up a barbecue lunch at our house.

Caesar: 00:08:50

When we finished at the park around half of our MC and a few others enjoyed a simple and much appreciated meal together, Terry and Taylor neighbors who came to help seemed to really be leaning into relationship lately.

Caesar: 00:09:02

They were so happy to do all this with us.

Caesar: 00:09:04

They wore their fresh blisters as badges of honor.

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It was great.

Caesar: 00:09:09

After the community helped clean up from lunch, I managed to sneak in a little reading.

Caesar: 00:09:13

Mostly napping.

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Yes.

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And the kids who were home seemed glued to their smartphones anyway.

Caesar: 00:09:19

So why not tonight?

Caesar: 00:09:20

Molly and a couple of her college friends came over to watch a basketball game on television and finish off the leftovers from the barbecue.

Caesar: 00:09:27

My job was to keep the mountains of fresh popcorn coming, Sherry bugged out and went upstairs early to read, rest, take a bubble bath.

Caesar: 00:09:34

Well, good for her.

Caesar: 00:09:36

When I came up to bed, myself, Sherry was still awake and she asked if we could pray together for Terry and Taylor.

Caesar: 00:09:42

She pray, father, thank you for loving us so much.

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Thank you for this awesome day to serve you.

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And thanks for Terry and Taylor becoming part of this family, your family.

Caesar: 00:09:51

Will you show us how to pass on to them?

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The love that you've shown us, we ask you to continue to stir questions and desires in their hearts.

Caesar: 00:09:59

Amen.

Caesar: 00:10:00

And goodnight father, Sunday, 2:30 PM.

Caesar: 00:10:04

After the gathering.

Caesar: 00:10:06

Crazy last night.

Caesar: 00:10:07

My work buddy, Tony texted me saying he wanted to go to the church thing with me this morning.

Caesar: 00:10:13

Wow.

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So he joined us with a few folks from the MC who decided to go to our church, gathering together.

Caesar: 00:10:20

He took a lot of notes and surprised me again, saying he wanted to ask me a few questions later.

Caesar: 00:10:25

A few others from our MC were here too, but dispersed into various serving jobs among the younger kids and some nursery duty.

Caesar: 00:10:32

We all had lunch at the salad soup shop.

Caesar: 00:10:35

After the gathering.

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I think Tony likes being around some of the single gals in our group.

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I can't wait to see what questions he has.

Caesar: 00:10:43

I have a few of my own.

Caesar: 00:10:45

That same Sunday at 9:50 PM.

Caesar: 00:10:48

I was catching a nap snuggle up on the couch with Sherry at around four 30.

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When the phone rang, it was old man Jensen calling to tell us his toilet at sprung a leak and he didn't know what to do.

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So I took the boys and Sean from our MC over there.

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Probably overkill and we fixed it in no time.

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Well, after two trips to the home Depot, Mr.

Caesar: 00:11:06

Janssen insisted that he order pizzas and feed us before we all left.

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He told us his entire life story, starting back from his childhood.

Caesar: 00:11:15

My boys asked him all sorts of questions, which only served to throw fuel on his fire.

Caesar: 00:11:19

He loved it.

Caesar: 00:11:20

And so did we, we need to start inviting this guy over for dinner and other MC stuff.

Caesar: 00:11:26

I think he's super ready and in need of a family and community.

Caesar: 00:11:30

When I got home, Sherry was in a spiritual discussion with her daughter, Molly, and a couple of her friends from her psych class discussing free will and the human condition or something like that.

Caesar: 00:11:41

They were deep into debating why the world is so messed up way to go college kids.

Caesar: 00:11:46

They pulled me into the discussion at one point, and I had the opportunity to tell a small portion of the story of God as part of my contribution.

Caesar: 00:11:53

Molly's friends really related to that and started kicking around the idea of going through the entire story formed way together with a couple others from their class, purely as an academic exercise.

Caesar: 00:12:04

Some of them suggested okay.

Caesar: 00:12:06

More to pray about Monday.

Caesar: 00:12:10

Okay.

Caesar: 00:12:10

A holiday and off from work.

Caesar: 00:12:12

It's dark.

Caesar: 00:12:12

Now this is what he writes.

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Holidays are the best.

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And busiest days of the year, what killer opportunities to lean into the celebrations of our culture.

Caesar: 00:12:22

I keep telling our MC that these days are low hanging fruit.

Caesar: 00:12:26

Today.

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We had a neighborhood cookout and watermelon eating contest.

Caesar: 00:12:31

A tradition we've started that gets bigger and bigger each year.

Caesar: 00:12:34

Normally Sherry meets on Monday morning with a few other moms and a single gal from our MC for their DNA group.

Caesar: 00:12:40

That's where like two or three of 'em get together and talk about things a little closer to the heart.

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But this morning she asked them all to come over to our place, to help her set up for the day.

Caesar: 00:12:50

Two couples that we've invited a million times to our parties and cookouts, et cetera, showed up for the first time they were super apologetic and stayed till the very end, thanking us repeatedly and asking if they could host something like this for the neighborhood soon.

Caesar: 00:13:05

if we would help them.

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Well, of course you get to, that's what we told them.

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You get to throw a party.

Caesar: 00:13:11

Our son Teddy's girlfriend and her parents came today too.

Caesar: 00:13:14

They're a part of a church in the neighborhood, but asked a lot of questions about our Missional Community.

Caesar: 00:13:19

They said they keep hearing from others in the neighborhood about us in the MC and have always wanted to be a part of something like this quote.

Caesar: 00:13:26

There has to be more to this Christian thing than just a couple hours each week.

Caesar: 00:13:31

being a school day tomorrow, most folks left by 7:00 PM.

Caesar: 00:13:34

Everyone helped clean up and put the yard and the house back together.

Caesar: 00:13:37

So Sherry and I were able to take a walk along the riverfront with Teddy chase and another family that we had just met today.

Caesar: 00:13:44

They recently moved to our neighborhood and are looking for a church or something.

Caesar: 00:13:48

They said their last experience left them dry and tired, and they're thinking they need to find a community to be with.

Caesar: 00:13:54

We might be able to help them out with this.

Caesar: 00:13:57

See how normal all this is, and it's busy, but it's not nonstop.

Caesar: 00:14:02

Right?

Caesar: 00:14:03

It's all woven in intentionally into the normal rhythms of everyday life.

Caesar: 00:14:08

All right.

Caesar: 00:14:09

He continues on Tuesday, 9:30 AM.

Caesar: 00:14:12

I got to work late today because I needed to help chase set up his project for the science fair at school.

Caesar: 00:14:17

I jumped in on this so that Sherry could watch one of our neighbors kids.

Caesar: 00:14:21

Her sitter bailed at the last minute.

Caesar: 00:14:23

And she had an important job interview.

Caesar: 00:14:25

Sherry's been doing Shonda's laundry for her for the past few weeks and picking up slack since her husband left her and the kids they've become part of our extended family.

Caesar: 00:14:34

They are super needy and we're glad for both the help our community offers.

Caesar: 00:14:39

And the opportunity for service that Sharonda and the kids give us helping them is teaching us to have the heart of Jesus while showing his heart to her.

Caesar: 00:14:49

It's cool.

Caesar: 00:14:50

How that works both ways.

Caesar: 00:14:52

Tuesday at 9:30 PM.

Caesar: 00:14:55

Wow.

Caesar: 00:14:55

This day flew by Tony.

Caesar: 00:14:57

My buddy at work, asked me more about God today, what I believed and some of the questions he had from Sunday.

Caesar: 00:15:02

He's been around our house a lot lately seeing and experiencing what our family's like.

Caesar: 00:15:08

He knows we're all about Jesus and seems drawn to our community and what we're doing.

Caesar: 00:15:12

I told my best understood my faith from learning the story found in the Bible and living it out tangibly with others.

Caesar: 00:15:19

My faith was not a set of religious dos and don'ts that I somehow espoused to something that I tried hard at keeping and felt crummy when I didn't.

Caesar: 00:15:28

He said he would love to hear this story of God thing sometime if there was ever an opportunity.

Caesar: 00:15:34

And I assured him there would be that a few of us were thinking of starting to have dinner together once a week and start going through the story of God.

Caesar: 00:15:41

Sherry took some extra brownies.

Caesar: 00:15:43

She baked to a neighbor across the street and ended up getting into a cool conversation about marriage.

Caesar: 00:15:48

She explained that marriage was given as a picture of what God is like when we live in light of God's plans for marriage, we see he is good and loving and forgiving.

Caesar: 00:15:58

When we don't, it reminds us of how much we really need him in our lives.

Caesar: 00:16:02

We had a quiet dinner at home tonight, and that was nice Sherry and I listened to the kids, share how their blessing.

Caesar: 00:16:09

For the day had gone.

Caesar: 00:16:11

And then we caught up on our favorite TV shows a little bit.

Caesar: 00:16:13

Teddy tried to get outta study in for an exam he has tomorrow.

Caesar: 00:16:16

Sorry, pal.

Caesar: 00:16:19

Now we jump ahead to Wednesday.

Caesar: 00:16:21

I really got a kick outta today's blessing list up on the fridge.

Caesar: 00:16:25

Here's what it says.

Caesar: 00:16:26

Who will I be a blessing today?

Caesar: 00:16:27

Wednesday and says mom loan Sharon to my car while hers is in the shop.

Caesar: 00:16:32

Dad give Tony that book.

Caesar: 00:16:34

He was asking about.

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Molly take mom to Starbucks so she can have a pumpkin latte, Teddy stick around after school to help set up the room for PTA.

Caesar: 00:16:45

Chase.

Caesar: 00:16:45

Tell my teacher, miss Linda.

Caesar: 00:16:47

She's pretty hot.

Caesar: 00:16:49

I've noticed a trend here with chase wanting to bless his teacher.

Caesar: 00:16:51

Miss Linda.

Caesar: 00:16:52

I have to talk to him about that one too.

Caesar: 00:16:54

wow.

Caesar: 00:16:55

Sherry took advantage of not having a car.

Caesar: 00:16:58

And organized a walk in the park with a few of the ladies from our neighborhood.

Caesar: 00:17:02

She said that nothing heavy was discussed, but they had agreed.

Caesar: 00:17:05

They all needed to do this more often and they swapped email addresses so they could make good on this promise.

Caesar: 00:17:11

Molly showed up as planned and took her mother out for a pumpkin latte.

Caesar: 00:17:15

They in fact did have a heavy conversation about boys.

Caesar: 00:17:19

In one in particular and Molly's growing attraction to this young man, he's a very casual Christian, and she's not sure how to respond to his advances toward her, in the relationship Sherry listened mostly.

Caesar: 00:17:32

And then suggested that Molly start having this guy hang around our community more frequently and meet a few of her brothers, right?

Caesar: 00:17:39

Not just her sibs let them do some of the hard work of vetting.

Caesar: 00:17:44

This one for her Molly liked the idea.

Caesar: 00:17:47

I'm glad for that.

Caesar: 00:17:48

This evening, we went to another couple's house for family dinner night with our entire Missional Community.

Caesar: 00:17:54

It was a fun night.

Caesar: 00:17:55

We discussed our plans for starting to go through the story formed way, the story of God thing in a few weeks.

Caesar: 00:18:01

And we prayed what next Lord for all of our People of Peace.

Caesar: 00:18:05

What next and before leaving, I promise to have coffee next week with a new guy, Nick, and talk about his job, future with him.

Caesar: 00:18:13

I'm gonna bring Bob with me from the MC because he's younger and just learning how to apply the Gospel to his own future career.

Caesar: 00:18:20

And he wants to learn how to help others do the same.

Caesar: 00:18:23

I think Bob is gonna lead his own MC in the near future.

Caesar: 00:18:26

And I told him this, and he's really stepping up to new areas of leadership and helping others grow in their Gospel fluency.

Caesar: 00:18:33

He is definitely yeast in the dough.

Caesar: 00:18:36

See how in this guy's life and in his narrative, he's got some things he's doing with others, but then he pulls another young leader along too.

Caesar: 00:18:44

So he can model that and they can watch it very smart, very natural, very easy instead of.

Caesar: 00:18:50

Another meeting where he just explains what he told the guy come along with me and we'll have that same conversation.

Caesar: 00:18:56

That's good leadership development.

Caesar: 00:18:58

His journal picks up Thursday 6am.

Caesar: 00:19:01

Up and out the door early today.

Caesar: 00:19:03

I really love these times with my DNA group this hour or so we spend over breakfast each week is often the richest meatiest time we'll spend together.

Caesar: 00:19:11

I'm amazed at the trust that the three of us have built and how it has allowed us to go so much deeper into the real stuff of life.

Caesar: 00:19:19

With one another, we all have so much farther to go.

Caesar: 00:19:23

Last week when we met, we almost forgot to pay our server time.

Caesar: 00:19:26

It slipped away again, and we all left encouraged, but super late for work.

Caesar: 00:19:31

Thursday that same night, 10:30 PM.

Caesar: 00:19:35

I was able to get home early today, which was awesome since there was a soccer game for chase at four o'clock, several of the folks in our MC showed up to cheer their heads off and help provide drinks and snacks for the whole team.

Caesar: 00:19:46

I love when they do that.

Caesar: 00:19:48

The other parents love that we do this every game, but are still a little perplexed as to why chase has such a large generous family.

Caesar: 00:19:56

We can't wait to get the opportunity to tell them a little more.

Caesar: 00:20:00

Chase and I grabbed some fast food on the way home afterwards, tonight is game night at our place with Molly's roommates, from college and a couple other gals from her volleyball team.

Caesar: 00:20:09

It followed a dinner that all the girls made together.

Caesar: 00:20:12

Getting cooking tips from Sherry along the way, lots of fun and a great meal of pork tenderloin with special bacon and cream mashed potatoes.

Caesar: 00:20:20

Yep.

Caesar: 00:20:21

Now it's getting loud in here.

Caesar: 00:20:23

But since my boy, Teddy and I play basketball with guys at the Y M C A most weeks on Thursday nights, we escaped this pandemonium.

Caesar: 00:20:31

But when we got home, Molly rushed up excitedly to tell me that some of the girls from her team have also agreed to start going through the story of God together.

Caesar: 00:20:39

She's a little scared to lead this, but I reminded her that she has grown up in the story and has been a part of taking others through this experience a zillion times.

Caesar: 00:20:47

And she said, I know, but always with you and mom and a whole bunch of people from the MC.

Caesar: 00:20:53

I hugged her.

Caesar: 00:20:54

And I told her, sweetie, you'll do this in community too.

Caesar: 00:20:57

You already have a big group that wants to do this with you.

Caesar: 00:21:00

And God has placed you in a huge family that is here to help.

Caesar: 00:21:03

It was a good day Lord.

Caesar: 00:21:06

Wow.

Caesar: 00:21:07

So there's a few days in this guy's running journal.

Caesar: 00:21:10

Again.

Caesar: 00:21:11

I realize this may not be the exact stage of life or the situation you find yourself in right now, but I hope it has helped you see the normalcy of a life.

Caesar: 00:21:21

As an extended family on mission.

Caesar: 00:21:24

Some days are busier than others.

Caesar: 00:21:25

And some things are organized while others are really organic and just sort of come up.

Caesar: 00:21:31

Not everything happens as quickly or in the way we want it to people drop off the radar and out of community.

Caesar: 00:21:37

This is messy stuff on this journey.

Caesar: 00:21:41

You'll have to trust God is filling your lives with opportunities for discipleship and kingdom expansion.

Caesar: 00:21:47

Everyday.

Caesar: 00:21:48

And some of them you'll notice, but others, you may not, at least not right away.

Caesar: 00:21:54

And right now you may be thinking, whoa, that's a lot of stuff.

Caesar: 00:21:58

I'm too busy for that.

Caesar: 00:21:59

Well, I've got two suggestions for you.

Caesar: 00:22:01

Okay.

Caesar: 00:22:02

First I want you to think over the six rhythms of everyday life that we all live in, you've probably heard me teach about that.

Caesar: 00:22:08

I'll give you some resources.

Caesar: 00:22:09

You can go deeper.

Caesar: 00:22:10

Here's the six rhythms, just really briefly story formed.

Caesar: 00:22:14

That's a rhythm of life.

Caesar: 00:22:15

Everyone has a story and has been shaped by a dominant story.

Caesar: 00:22:18

Well, how well do we know and teach the story of God and help others connect their story to God's big story.

Caesar: 00:22:26

Here's another rhythm listening.

Caesar: 00:22:27

Who or what are you most listening to?

Caesar: 00:22:30

How are you listening backwards through God's word and forward to the spirit through others in your community.

Caesar: 00:22:38

See, we're always listening.

Caesar: 00:22:39

That's a rhythm of life celebrate.

Caesar: 00:22:41

Okay.

Caesar: 00:22:41

That's a rhythm.

Caesar: 00:22:42

Who or what are you celebrating?

Caesar: 00:22:43

How are you regularly celebrating God's extravagant generosity together as a community.

Caesar: 00:22:48

And how are you inviting others to the party.

Caesar: 00:22:52

Eat?

Caesar: 00:22:52

There's there's the fourth rhythm eat well.

Caesar: 00:22:55

Listen, we live in a rhythm of eating 21 meals each week.

Caesar: 00:22:58

You're already eating them.

Caesar: 00:22:59

Meals are a daily reminder of our common need for God.

Caesar: 00:23:02

And when we eat together, we commune around this truth believers and not yet believers bless it's the fifth rhythm.

Caesar: 00:23:10

We're all super resourced.

Caesar: 00:23:12

We really are.

Caesar: 00:23:12

If you're listening to this, you are resourced and you've been blessed to be a blessing.

Caesar: 00:23:16

How can you intentionally bless others through words, gift or actions each week individually and has a community.

Caesar: 00:23:23

Remember they were starting to get so intentional in their family.

Caesar: 00:23:25

They were posting it on the fridge on the days that they wrote it out and then seeing how it went.

Caesar: 00:23:30

And then the last rhythm is recreate.

Caesar: 00:23:32

It's this idea that we live in a rhythm of rest.

Caesar: 00:23:35

To create we work from rest.

Caesar: 00:23:39

So you need to take time to rest and play and create and restore beauty in ways that reflect God to others.

Caesar: 00:23:46

Rest in Christ in his completed work on the cross.

Caesar: 00:23:49

And from that rest, then we work.

Caesar: 00:23:51

Okay.

Caesar: 00:23:52

Now, did you notice how many of these six rhythms fall under the normal patterns of everyday life?

Caesar: 00:23:58

Right.

Caesar: 00:23:58

Listening, eating, celebrating, right blessings all around us.

Caesar: 00:24:02

The difference is, is that they are being sort of recycled with new intention toward discipleship in the Gospel, but no real big extra time is require.

Caesar: 00:24:13

Like I said, I'll give you some links so you can go deeper into some of that stuff.

Caesar: 00:24:15

If you've not heard me teach on that.

Caesar: 00:24:17

Okay.

Caesar: 00:24:18

Second, this is my second bit of advice.

Caesar: 00:24:20

If you're feeling like whoa, this is a lot.

Caesar: 00:24:22

Remember that there are really only two or three interactions with the Missional Community during this week that fall outside of the family's normal, daily and weekly rhythms.

Caesar: 00:24:31

But you in your own life can find your sweet spot.

Caesar: 00:24:34

And in your schedule when these few organized activities pave the way for all the rest of discipleship to naturally occur, that's where the organics kick in.

Caesar: 00:24:43

I also hope that you're seeing that one of the takeaways from this family schedule is that.

Caesar: 00:24:48

Everything is moving outward with regard to its activities, responsibilities and relationships.

Caesar: 00:24:54

Growth is happening as the family includes others more and more frequently into the mix.

Caesar: 00:25:00

In words, they're treating everyone like family above all.

Caesar: 00:25:04

This is really a matter of Gospel intentionality.

Caesar: 00:25:07

That's what it takes.

Caesar: 00:25:09

Now I hope did this journey, uh, through the week of this family on mission, give you any specific ideas for your own organized or organic interactions that you can incorporate into your life right away.

Caesar: 00:25:21

What are they?

Caesar: 00:25:23

Write 'em down, brainstorm this as a couple, or if you have a community group or Missional Community already, who else will you need to include before you start to implement this?

Caesar: 00:25:32

This would be a great episode, probably to just listen to together, by the way this narrative was, uh, taken and excerpt from my book, smallest, big slowest fast.

Caesar: 00:25:42

So if you found this helpful, there's a lot more good stuff in the book.

Caesar: 00:25:46

Wink, wink, all.

Caesar: 00:25:49

As always, uh, I wanna kind of give you some summaries here and I make sure you get the big points.

Caesar: 00:25:54

So I'm gonna, I'm gonna leave you with the big three takeaway from today's discussion.

Caesar: 00:25:58

If nothing else, you don't wanna miss these three big thoughts.

Caesar: 00:26:01

And by the way, as always, you can get a printable PDF of this week's big three as a free download by just going to everyday Disciple dot com slash big three.

Caesar: 00:26:10

You can do that right away.

Caesar: 00:26:12

All right.

Caesar: 00:26:12

So what are the big three for this week?

Caesar: 00:26:14

Well, here's the first one.

Caesar: 00:26:16

Hopefully you're seeing how normal life.

Caesar: 00:26:19

Can involve discipleship and the development of others, including leaders, as long as you choose to include them in the things that you do, this is how Jesus did discipleship.

Caesar: 00:26:29

So what are one or two new daily or weekly activities you can invite others to join you in as a part of the mission and their ongoing discipleship and development.

Caesar: 00:26:42

Okay.

Caesar: 00:26:42

That's a good question.

Caesar: 00:26:43

Right?

Caesar: 00:26:44

So don't miss that second one.

Caesar: 00:26:46

God's love for you is not based on how busy you are.

Caesar: 00:26:50

Or how many times you have people over to your house each week.

Caesar: 00:26:54

Our heavenly Dad sees us as his dearly loved sons and daughters, and he desires that we would live the best possible life.

Caesar: 00:27:02

The life he created us to live and the life that Jesus lived...

Caesar: 00:27:06

and that is the life lived close to God and guided by his own Spirit.

Caesar: 00:27:10

Which leads us to a life on mission and with others.

Caesar: 00:27:14

A life in community with others centered on the Gospel is the best life, but it's a messy one.

Caesar: 00:27:20

But it's an adventure!

Caesar: 00:27:22

Okay.

Caesar: 00:27:22

And number three, set aside an hour or so this week to create a calendar that blocks out very specifically the organized aspects of your life on mission

Caesar: 00:27:32

there won't be that many, this may not represent what you are currently doing, but should be the goal to which you strive to get in line.

Caesar: 00:27:39

With the more intentional we are about things like meals with People of Peace time with leaders, serving times and our own development, stuff like that.

Caesar: 00:27:49

The greater momentum in consistency on mission will all experience this small exercise, I think will have great impact on your life.

Caesar: 00:27:57

If you'll do.

Caesar: 00:27:58

I'm gonna give you a couple of links.

Caesar: 00:27:59

Like I said, to learn some more about the six Gospel rhythms and, how to integrate them into your life and into community life, both up in and out, and all of that.

Caesar: 00:28:08

So as you move further down the path into this life on mission, your family and community will continue to evolve.

Caesar: 00:28:15

Just like ours has, and you'll develop your own patterns as you grow in greater Gospel intentionality.

Caesar: 00:28:21

And you're seeing that this is a messy process.

Caesar: 00:28:24

Things come up that you could never have planned, and they are very often the best occasion for discipleship that you could have hoped for.

Caesar: 00:28:31

That's how it works.

Caesar: 00:28:31

God's good to us that way.

Caesar: 00:28:33

Look, to see all of life as an ongoing opportunity to help others move from unbelief to belief after all.

Caesar: 00:28:39

That's what discipleship is.

Caesar: 00:28:41

All right.

Caesar: 00:28:42

It's been a blast.

Caesar: 00:28:43

I hope you liked that running narrative of this guy's journal.

Caesar: 00:28:46

Hopefully that was a cool way of painting that picture of life and gave you a bunch of ideas.

Caesar: 00:28:51

Well, time is up for today.

Caesar: 00:28:53

Join us again next week or go back through our hundreds of episode.

Caesar: 00:28:57

To continue to learn discipleship as a lifestyle in everyday life and how the good news of the Gospel speaks into everything naturally and powerfully.

Caesar: 00:29:06

I'll talk to you soon.

Announcer: 00:29:08

Thanks for joining us today for more information on this show and to get loads of free discipleship resources, visit everyday Disciple dot com.