Pastor Chris Anderson was our special guest speaker this year at Summit Meetings. He joins Pastor Walton today to discuss missions, music, and discipleship.
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Episode transcript:
Chris Harper: Welcome to Harvest Time. My name is Chris Harper, and our host on this program is pastor Gary Walton, the lead pastor at Harvest Baptist Church. Every week, we spend these 25 minutes together telling the stories of our church by interviewing our members and other friends of the ministry. We’d like to invite you to join us at Harvest Baptist Church this week. We have 2 services every Sunday morning at harvest.
The first at 8:45 AM, the second at 10:45 AM. We have Japanese and Korean translation available during that 10:45 AM service, and that’s also the service we live stream at hbcguam.org, hbcguam.org. This week, we’re back in Matthew 18 21 through 35 on forgiveness. Let’s begin today’s harvest time by welcoming pastor Gary Walton. Hi, pastor.
Gary Walton: Hey, hafa adai, Chris. This will be the second part of a message that we began a couple of weeks ago just talking about forgiveness from Luke 17 and then now, spending some time in Matthew 18. We had a fantastic, interesting conversation about God’s word in regard to this critical topic for believers and, actually, forgiveness affects every relationship. But we’re talking about 4 truths about forgiveness that come out of Matthew 18 and, and at the, the end of them, the 4th one is this idea that forgiveness is a promise. And so if you come this Sunday, we’re going to try to unpack that a little bit more of what that means.
There’s a really interesting text back in the old testament in Isaiah 4325 where, God says he talks about this idea that I will blot out your transgressions. Alright. So that’s forgiveness. And then he he uses this exact phrase, and I will remember your sins no more. So we talked about that idea real briefly.
I mean, we have an omniscient God. So does he forget? I mean, how does an omniscient God forget our sins? What does that mean that he will remember our sins no more? It’s a really key important part of what forgiveness means.
And so we’re gonna walk through that this Sunday. And we’d like to invite you to come and join us. You’ll find a very warm welcome, and you’ll, be encouraged by the ministry of the of the worship time and the fellowship around you. And then we’re gonna spend some time just kind of diving deep and digging deep in God’s word. So we’d like to invite you to come and join us.
We are finishing up at harvest a fantastic week with pastor Chris Anderson, and we have him in studio with us today. Pastor Chris, welcome. Thank you for being with us.
Chris Anderson: Thank you for the opportunity. It’s been just a super week to worship and fellowship with the people here at Harvest. Love that.
Gary Walton: Yeah. We’re finishing up our summit weeks. Annually, we have a series of meetings, where we, invite somebody to come to just minister the word to us. In fact, this interview is following up an interview that you did last week via phone, and now we have you live. And it really has been a fantastic week of just being in the word.
This is your first time to go on.
Chris Anderson: It is. I’ve kind of been a friend of the ministry, and and I’ve had a number of, people that I admire that, work here or have worked here, and then the Lord kind of takes this influence and scatters it all over the world for his glory. But my first time to actually, be here in person, and I’m kinda sad that it’s drawing to a close. I’ve just had such a good time, fellowshipping and, of course, the privilege of preaching the scriptures is always a blessing. So thank thank you, pastor, especially for the opportunity.
Gary Walton: Yeah. We’re sad too. It really has been a fantastic week. And there’s, you know, we’re we’re the day after our last meeting as we’re, taping this. And there’s still a murmur around campus, buzz.
Maybe a buzz is a better word than a murmur, of just what God’s been doing and we think just planting some seeds for the future.
Chris Anderson: As a as a preacher, you can kind of tell when a congregation is used to hearing the scriptures explained and applied. And, the people at harvest have such an appetite for the word. And, and, you know, I think that really is a testimony to years years of faithful bible preaching that they’ve been under. So it’s you know, then it’s easy to come in and say, alright. Let’s roll up our sleeves and dig into the text and and get busy.
And just really has been a joy. And, you know, we’ve prayed. We’ve prayed for months for God to meet with us and work. I can, explain a text, but only God can, open people’s eyes and open their hearts and bring conviction and, just a good sense that God God has been working. So praise the Lord.
Gary Walton: Yeah. Amen. Pastor Anderson is the vice president of Global Opportunities at Biblical Ministries Worldwide, writer, hymn writer. You are also the I don’t know the title of president, of ChurchWorks Media, pastor for 25 years, started a church in Ohio, and then the lead pastor Killian Hill Baptist Church in the Atlanta, Georgia area. And, a few years ago, God kinda called you out of that pastoral ministry to this work, with big, BMW.
Chris Anderson: Right. I’m kind of a a multitasker. My primary responsibility for 25 years was pastoring, and, you know, that takes plenty of focus and attention. But, just in my own meditation time, my own devotional time, I would I would, maybe take a sermon I had studied and and try to write on it. And it might turn into a devotional or it might turn into a hymn if I could make it rhyme.
And, mostly just did that for my soul’s sake. Just just kind of a a good way for me to meditate. But the lord, you know, allowed some of those things to be used by other churches and, always had a high level of interest in missions. Actually wondered at one point if the lord was, gonna direct me from the pastorate to the mission field. And eventually, as you described, what God did is, had me transition from pastoring to I I describe myself as a as a missions catalyst.
I’m going now to churches, conferences, to bible college, bible colleges, taking mission trips like this, and I get to just keep beating the drum for the great commission. And, I tell people calling someone to missions is not my job. Only God can do that. The Lord of the harvest has to send forth labors. But I can pray toward, more labors and I can be an agitator.
You know, I can just remind people the new testament talks about missions all the time. And, and it’s not just for an elite force of, super Christian superheroes. Missions is the job of every Christian in every church. So now in my role, I get to, I kind of get to be that that missions agitator to to remind people of what Jesus has commanded and and why, this should be something that is a daily part of their prayer life. Other ways they can engage by encouraging missionaries with an email or, you know, financial support.
But, missions is for all of us. And, I’ve been in this role now for 3 years, really good fit for my, my burdens, my gifts. And, I think I shared with Jared last week. I feel like after, 25 years playing now, I’m I’m kind of a coach and, trying to get other players into the game. And, really, it’s been a blessing.
Gary Walton: Well, it’s meaningful ministry. And, I believe God’s equipped you for it, you know, uniquely. There’s biblical models of this exact thing, you know, happy, taking place in the early church. I always think about this idea. I think for every believer, we’re we’re continually assessing, you know, god, how do you how do you get the most out of my life in this season?
This season’s not the same as the last season. You change certain things and want every part I think that’s a little part of redeeming the time. Every part of my life, God, I wanna invest in a way that could most impact eternity.
Chris Anderson: I love that. You know, part of part of the decision for the transition was just stewardship. Just okay. Lord, you’ve given me, you know, a a unique set of burdens and gifts. And then I’m also painfully aware of the of the of the weaknesses I have.
But how can I leverage my life in a way that will be most, most advantageous for gospel advance? And at times, that has been, church planting. And, you know, maybe the most rewarding thing that I’ve ever done is is, church planting. At other times, it was, pastoring kind of a a larger church that would be pretty complicated similar to harvest. There’s a lot of moving pieces, Christian school, and and, and the lord used that.
But he especially used that season where, the last several years I was at Killian Hill, just a work of god’s spirit. Our church ended up sending a dozen people out either to pastoral ministry or church planting or several to mission fields. And, that’s when I kind of, you know, had a sense like, boy, I I think god could really use me beyond at this church. Maybe the lord could use me, to help many churches get a vision for sending people. And it’s it’s a difficult thing.
I think sometimes pastors have really gifted people and it’s natural to wanna hang on to them. But the, you know, the concept of, alright, we’re training these people to send them out and approaching it much like we do with children. If I if I told you I’m such a great dad, my kids will never leave my house. You would think that was odd. You know, my job is to train them for a while and and then send them out.
You know, the picture of Psalm 127, they’re eros. They’re not supposed to stay in my, what is that? A quiver. Mhmm. You know, they’re supposed to be launched.
And I think, I I want churches and and pastors in particular to just delight in sending. That’s success. And it might mean that, you know, your attendance goes down for a little while because you’ve sent out some some really good people. Harvest is great at that, by the way. So your attendance may go down a little bit, but the cause of Christ is ever expanding.
That kind of generosity, is modeled in scripture. And, you know, 2nd Timothy 2:2 where Timothy teach faithful men and then they’ll be able to teach others also and this chain reaction just keeps going. But there’s there’s a culture of success. And I think sometimes, churches and even pastors, they just wanna kind of hold on to their best people. And, anyway, that’s a that’s a long description of of kind of how the lord moved my heart into this new role.
And, and I’m really enjoying it. I I miss parts of pastoring for sure, but but enjoying what god’s called me to do.
Gary Walton: Generosity is a good word, I think, you know, that open handedness with every part of our life. And, I think you’re right. It’s easy for pastors and churches. I mean, we feel this here, you know, when we when we have these deep fellowship relationships and then send them out, I mean, you feel that loss. You know, we’re in the season of that as your church experienced it too, and you feel that.
But there’s an amazing, really amazing part of saying this is actually how God designed this to work. And, this is a healthy thing for us.
Chris Anderson: Well, and if if it didn’t hurt, then you’re probably sending to young people.
Gary Walton: Right.
Chris Anderson: Exactly. I joke sometimes like, lord, why don’t you send that family? But usually send somebody that it it stings. And, you know, the book of Acts repeatedly describes when, when there’s a departure and there’s tears, it doesn’t mean it’s the wrong thing.
Gary Walton: Yeah. Well, I got a pretty good feeling that Acts 13, you know, sending out Paul and Barnabas were was not the easiest people to send
Chris Anderson: out of that
Gary Walton: church in Antioch. So and and yet
Chris Anderson: the church for generations continued to do really well. Yeah. Part of that, you and I have talked about part of that is, is leaders in the church are supposed to be expendable. You know, we wanna be faithful and and God uses us for a season. But you think about, harvest has had leadership transitions and the church keeps going.
Because the effective leader, makes people dependent on Christ and dependent on the scriptures. And, you know, if the lord calls him somewhere else or if if he passes away, the church should just keep going because the only one that is irreplaceable is Christ and he’s not going anywhere. Mhmm. You know? So we if you can’t tell, we’ve just had really good fellowship.
It’s the this week is the first time we met, and I can’t believe that because there’s so many things that we just see eye to eye. And I hope this friendship can continue to grow. It’s been a blessing.
Gary Walton: Yeah. I do too. And the church has been blessed by that too, and we’re thankful for that. I think there’s a kindred spirit. I wanna talk about hymn writing.
It’s not a topic we’ve talked a lot about on, you know, particularly here on harvest time. We we mentioned that you’re an author of 5 books. One of them is, Theology That Sticks, the Life Changing Power of Exceptional Hymns. And then on top of that, we mentioned just kind of briefly that, you know, just part of your pastoral ministry, you’ve been a songwriter, a hymn writer, over 70 songs. Some people will be familiar with songs like His Rubs for Mine, I Run to Christ, My Jesus Fair, and then a lot of others.
Let me ask you this. Why did you say this is life changing power of exceptional hymns? What’s that mean?
Chris Anderson: Yeah. Well, I’ll start with the title of the book Theology That Sticks. And what I mean by that is, you know, hymns are uniquely powerful in part because of their emotion, because they rhyme. Everybody knows what it’s like to be in a store and you hear a jingle or you hear a song on the radio, you haven’t heard it for 30 years. Yeah.
And you can sing every single word. You know, it it it’s it’s almost creepy a little bit, but but songs stick in your memory. And, exceptional hymns are hymns that are full of scripture. Not just generalities about God, but they’re full of the bible. And then we memorize them and, and it is it is life changing.
The main text I use in the book is Colossians 3 16. And the logic of the passage says, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly. But then it says, if the word is is filling your life, it will eventually overflow and come out of your life. It comes out in your words as we speak to each other in wisdom, but then it comes out in your songs. So I take that as a model, you know, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs.
The beginning point for a really exceptional Christian song, a Christian hymn, is that it has to be full of scripture. So I tell people who want to try, hymn writing, I’ll tell them, well, first, just open the bible and plagiarize. You know, I love singing a song. And when I hear a phrase in the song, I think, oh, that’s from this passage. Yeah.
You think of, there’s a hymn, by Charles Wesley called and can it be? And the last verse says, no condemnation now I dread. Mhmm. Jesus and all in him is mine. And everybody, who knows their bible and sings that phrase, they think, oh, that’s Romans 8:1.
There is therefore now no condemnation to, them that are in Christ Jesus. So I want them to be thoroughly biblical. And, not all Christian songs are. Not all songs that you hear on a Christian radio station are really full of scripture. Somebody misread the cover of the book and instead of saying theology that sticks, they thought it said theology that stinks.
And, that could be a sequel. We could write another book. But there, you know, there are songs that they might even mention Jesus, but they’re not really full of of truth. So I’m encouraging people. Alright.
There’s there’s hundreds of thousands of songs, in English, for example, and and, of course, other languages. But, in a in a church service, for example, we sing 5. So choose some that are really good. And I I don’t just mean they have a great tune. Choose some that are just the the text is full of scripture.
It’s teaching you about the gospel. It’s teaching you about Christ. And then, and then even beyond that, most most of your listeners aren’t picking songs for a church service, but they are picking their playlist, You know, and and say you have a 100 songs on your playlist. Alright. Well, choose some that are really going to drive your mind towards scripture and and exalt Christ.
And it’s not just about how you feel, but, you know, what are you putting in your brain? What are you memorizing that can really be good for your soul?
Gary Walton: It’s such a foundational idea. You know, we, it’s easy to get distracted in our personal and then our corporate worship by, you know, trying to figure out the kind of tunes or music that I like, and there’s a significance to that. But, man, if we could just rest in is this feeding my soul in the ways the scripture does, this idea that the bible talks about the meditation and psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. I mean, it’s it’s such an integral part. I think you mentioned the other night.
I mean, it’s not unusual, but all of the references in the scriptures to singing and the worship of God’s people. I mean, it’s just all throughout.
Chris Anderson: Yeah. It is it’s the commands to sing to God is the most frequent command in the bible. And sometimes, you know, in Psalms, it just says it 3, 4 times in a row. But, this isn’t a minor part of our Christian life. And I talk to churches and say, okay.
During your service, do you quote, a a doctoral statement? Do you quote the night scene creed, the apostles creed? And most churches like ours don’t. But you do recite doctrine
Gary Walton: Absolutely.
Chris Anderson: In your hymns. And, you know, I I I use an illustration. I mentioned Charles Wesley, the hymn writer. Well, his big brother, John Wesley, preached all over, the UK, all over the United States in the 1700, preached to 1,000,000 of people. Give me a paragraph from one of his sermons that you’ve memorized.
Well, you don’t you don’t have a memory that holds on to a sermon like that unless you did a doctorate on the life of, you know, john John Wesley. But if I say, alright. Now now see if you can recite for me, one of Charles Wesley’s hymns. And, you know, we mentioned and can it be, we might do hark the herald angels saying or Christ the lord is risen today and and you got it. Because we’re memorizing doctrine and sometimes, frankly, sometimes we’re memorizing things that aren’t true.
I was in a church, with my family year and a half, 2 years ago, and we’re singing a song. It’s, you know, if creation sings your praises, so will I. And, you know, the idea is is there’s a 100,000,000,000 creatures that are are listening to the lord. If if god’s creation praises him, then I should praise him. It’s a great thought.
I love that. But as we’re singing it, we come to a line and it says, something like this, as you speak a 100,000,000,000 creatures hear your voice evolving at the sound of your command. And I turned to my daughter and I said, I think we just sang about evolution in a church service. And my daughter said to me, dad, you’re talking so loud. And I said, I know, but I can’t believe we just sang that.
The church didn’t believe that. But it’s just a song after all. I think most churches, if someone got up in the pulpit and taught evolution, they would be highly offended.
Gary Walton: Yeah.
Chris Anderson: But but we don’t really filter out our hymns very much. Nobody is vetting them. Nobody’s, you know, it’s just I don’t know. It sounds good on the radio. And frankly, most churches are getting their new songs, from performance strikes from the radio or or, you know Spotify or whatever.
But we just need to take it a little bit more seriously. And I’m I’m actually not arguing for old songs. There’s some great new songs And there’s some lousy old songs. But I’m just saying we should have a grid. And we make our decisions not just, you know, do I like the style?
Do I like the tune? But but what’s it saying? So yeah. It’s something that that is very important. I mean, I I think very important for people, even even teaching their kids.
Gary Walton: Yeah.
Chris Anderson: The kids last night, from c two c c two c. Yeah. The kids came into this church service, and, I loved the description. There were somewhere between 50 a1000 kids up there. But they they got up and they sang a song they had memorized.
They quoted scripture first. Yeah. They quoted scripture and then they sang a song they had memorized. And, the song was about the holiness of God. Yeah.
And, I’m not sure they all understand it yet. I heard a writer, who described hymns, teaching hymns to children is like lighting a fuse. You know, you you light a fuse and it might take a while, but eventually there’s gonna be a boom, you know. And they’re gonna say, oh, I now I understand what that means. Teaching your children good doctrine about Jesus by teaching them good songs about Jesus is is an important thing.
I’m glad my parents filled our house with Christian music. And, you know, part part of my love and use love for and use of Christian music now is because my parents just surrounded us with good music.
Gary Walton: I do wanna, spend 2 minutes as we close out. I wanna ask you about disciple making, because, I wanna talk about it almost every time, you know, we, we we do these, conversations. Disciple making is such an integral part of God’s church and God’s plan. Could you give me just a 2 minute summary on, your view of, experience with how God is working, disciple making in church as a pastor, and then a little sense on the global, you know, work of disciple making that we’re burdened for.
Chris Anderson: Awesome. Well, disciple making is really the heart of the great commission. Of course, you know, Mark 16/15 says go into all the world and preach the gospel. But Matthew is more specific. Matthew’s great commission in Matthew 28/19 is to go make disciples.
That’s different than just getting people to pray a prayer. When somebody prays to trust Jesus as savior, that’s the starting point. It’s not the end. So we don’t, you know, we don’t kind of check the box and move on to the next guy. Once somebody comes to trust Christ as savior, now now they are a newborn and we can’t just set them down and go look for somebody else.
Now we need to nourish them, teach them the scriptures. We need to disciple them. You know, the word disciple, we’re using it as a verb. We disciple someone. But it it’s coming from Jesus followers, Jesus disciples.
And part of it is they need to learn scripture. In the churches that I pastored, we used a series called the foundation books. I worked on those when I was at Grace Church of Mentor. I think Tim Potter is coming out here and he’s really focused on discipleship. And, it would take them through basic lessons of Christian truth.
But it’s more than information. A lot of it is just life invested in life. So I would take my role as a pastor to kind of be a matchmaker. We would have a lady that was ready to grow and I would look for a more mature lady in the church and say, okay, you guys start meeting together, go through these bible studies but just get acquainted. And it might be 2 couples together, but over the years, we would see a new Christian discipled by somebody not me.
And eventually, you know, that guy became a deacon in the church. You know, they they really matured. And, so I think a church has to be committed to that. And part of it is grassroots. It just happens because it’s a value that you preach and talk about.
But I do think it helps to have some kind of strategy Intentionality. Intentionality.
Gary Walton: Yeah. Yeah.
Chris Anderson: And, and it is right at the heart of what god’s expecting us to do. So then we talk about a church sending people out. Yeah. But that comes from your discipleship program. You know, you’re maturing people.
And, I think there was a time when it was just we want to see somebody get saved and then we move on. And and it was kind of like a drive by evangelism as opposed to, alright. This is gonna be a lifelong process. And I love that you’re, so passionate about that. It’s gonna serve the church here well.
Gary Walton: Pastor Anderson, Chris, thank you for being here. Thank you for investing this time. Thank you to your wife, family for releasing you a little bit, to be here. I know that you’re gonna head out from here and spend a little bit of time on Yap with some of our friends, mission friends and churches there. So, God bless you.
Again, thanks for ministering the word.
Chris Anderson: It has been a joy. Thank you again for the opportunity. Next time, I need to bring my wife with me. She would love us.
Gary Walton: Yeah. We’ll have to make sure that happens. Good.
Chris Anderson: God bless you. Thank you.
Chris Harper: And thank you for listening to Harvest Time. Of course, at this point in the program, we always want to invite you again to services at Harvest Baptist Church. We have an 8:45 AM service and a 10:45 AM service on Sunday morning. Japanese and Korean translation is available at 10:45 AM. That service is also broadcast live here on 88.1 FM and khmg.org.
I hope to see you this Sunday. Thanks again for listening to Harvest Time.