Reimagining Faith with the Pastors Jackson

Sermon on Joshua 24:1-15 (Pastor Nichole Jackson)

This sermon was delivered by Pastor Nichole on October 16th 2022. Check out the full service at the link below...
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utJn2FyjbBY
 
Come join us either in person or online on Sunday mornings at 10am. 
 
https://www.opentablepottstown.com/ 

Agitational Questions with Will Fuller

Episode 8
We are back and on schedule from our new "podcast studio" in the basement of our new house. This week, we are talking with community organizer, local agitator, and Regional Director of POWER Metro, Will Fuller. Will spends his days bringing likeminded people of faith together to make positive change in Pennsylvania. We talk about school funding reform, climate justice, fair housing, and how Jesus is the animating energy behind it all. So settle in and get ready to make some good trouble. 
 
Join us for Sunday worship services at the Steel River Playhouse (245 E High St, Pottstown, PA 19464) at 10am or online at https://www.opentablepottstown.com/live.
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Living Where Your Feet Are

Episode 7
Several people have asked us, "Can we join your church if we don't live in Pottstown? You seem really focused on being local". Well it was an answer so important that we made an entire episode to answer it! It's also something we've been thinking about a lot as we have spent the past month cleaning, preparing, listing, and selling our home so that we can officially move to Pottstown and live where we serve. Thank you all for your patience as we got through that wild month, but we are back on schedule and ready to publish new episodes! 
 
Join us on September 11th at 3pm at the Pottstown Carousel for Open Table UCC's official launch party! We'll have food, fun, worship, did we mention an actual carousel? Come celebrate God's faithfulness and all the hard work that our team has put together to make this happen! You can RSVP on Facebook here (https://www.facebook.com/events/3361092994112741?ref=newsfeed)
 
After that, we will begin regular Sunday worship services at the Steel River Playhouse (245 E High St, Pottstown, PA 19464) at 10am. 
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Being Interfaith Allies with Rabbi Rachael Jackson

Episode 6
We are joined today by Rabbi Rachael Jackson, rabbi at Agudas Israel Congregation and co-host of the Down the Wormhole Podcast. She shares her experience being the only Jewish kid growing up next to Focus on the Family, what it’s like being the only non-Christian clergy at an event, and ways to use whatever privilege we have to make space for others. This episode was a lot of fun to record. If you want to hear more from Rachael, you can check out the Down the Wormhole podcast here. The latest episode is about the difference between healing and curing and the efficacy of prayer. 
 
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The Lifelong Work of Antiracism

Episode 5
Open Table UCC is striving to be an actively antiracist church community, but what does that mean? What does the work of antiracism look like in a Christian context? What are the roots of White Supremacy, and how do we pull those roots out of our soil so that our land may flourish? What is the role of the local church in this and how can we become good allies without making the whole thing about ourselves? It may take a lifetime of unlearning, but it's the most important work of our time. 
Listening, watching, and reading for later...
The Color Correction Podcast - https://www.colorcorrectionpodcast.com/
White Homework - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/white-homework/id1481083774
Be Antiracist with Ibram X. Kendi - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/be-antiracist-with-ibram-x-kendi/id1564144316
 
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: The danger of a single story - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9Ihs241zeg
Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates - https://amzn.to/3OmmHLi
 
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”Jesus Takes a Side” with Jonny Rashid

Episode 4
Today, we are joined by pastor, author, and activist Jonny Rashid. Jonny is one of the pastors of Circle of Hope in Philadelphia, and someone that we’ve respected for a long time. His first book,“Jesus Takes a Side: Embracing the Political Demands of the Gospel” is out now wherever books are sold.  It is a deeply challenging and important book which calls out the inherent oppression of “third way” thinking and compels Christians to join Jesus on the side of the marginalized. We’ll be leading Open Table UCC in a book study based on it sometime this Summer, so stay tuned for that. 
You can follow Jonny on social media here...
https://www.jonnyrashid.com/
https://twitter.com/jonnyrashid
https://www.instagram.com/jonnyrashid/
https://www.instagram.com/foodpastor/
 
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Where is Jesus When Everything Sucks?

Episode 3
Last week, there was a terrible home explosion in Pottstown that claimed the life of at least five people, four of whom were children. A dozen church leaders from the borough held a prayer vigil for healing for the community, and as it was wrapping up, someone was fatally shot a few blocks away. All this on the heels of the shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde. Even as I write these show notes, there was a shooting in a Tulsa hospital that left 5 people dead. Around the country and across the globe, it all just feels too heavy to hold right now. Where is Jesus in the midst of these endless tragedies? What is our role in the aftermath? Can rediscovering the historical Jesus provide new insights into God's overall plan for humanity? Heads up, there are no easy answers in this episode, but there are a lot of honest questions.
 
If you'd like to help the injured and displaced in Pottstown, two funds have been set up to help those victims. One is through the TriCounty Network. Donations to build on that may be made online at www.tcnetwork.org/donate-pottstown-explosion-fund. Checks may be mailed to TriCounty Community Network’s office at 724 N. Adams Street, No. 203, Pottstown, PA 19464, with Pottstown Explosion Support Fund in the memo line.
The other is through the Foundation for Pottstown Education and will go directly to the families. If you wish to contribute, go to https://foundationpottstowned.org/donate/ and in the notes section, you can indicate your support for families affected by writing  “Pottstown 526 Emergency Fund.”
 
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Transcript 
This transcript was automatically generated by www.otter.ai, and as such contains errors (especially when multiple people are talking). As the AI learns our voices, the transcripts will improve. We hope it is helpful even with the errors.
 
Zack Jackson 00:00
Welcome to the reimagining faith podcast with the pastor's Jackson. This is a podcast for seekers, dreamers and fellow sojourners who are trying to figure out what it means to be followers of Jesus in the 21st century. We want to thank all of you who have been with us so far on this journey, those of you who listened to the first two episodes of the podcast, those you who shared the first two episodes, those of you who left comments and give us suggestions of people, we could talk to a special thank you to all of the those of you who support this podcast on Patreon, if you are interested, as well, in supporting this work, you can find us at patreon.com/reimagining Faith, where you will find all kinds of fun perks as well as opportunities for connecting with us and with the larger community. I also want to say a huge thank you to everyone who has showed up in Pottstown, the past couple of days, those of you who may not be aware who may not be following us on social media, there was a awful traumatic home explosion on last Thursday, that left at least five people dead and two more injured, just destroyed an entire family and rocked the whole neighborhood. And we're going to talk a lot more about that today about that specific trauma. And as well as a lot of the national and international trauma that the world seems to be facing. Right now. We want to get into a little bit about how Jesus is there through that, and what that even means and how we can say that with any kind of authenticity, knowing the true horrors of the world and wondering where God is in the midst of all of that. So we hope to get into some of that, and maybe, you know, answer the problem of evil that's been around since Babylon. In the next 45 minutes or so.
 
Nichole Jackson 02:03
Or maybe just prayerfully consider them. I don't want to know we have answers prayerfully
 
Zack Jackson 02:09
consider them. Yeah, so Nicole, you want to tell us a little bit more about what's been going on?
 
Nichole Jackson 02:16
Yeah. So as Zack mentioned, there was a horrific house explosion in Pottstown, a couple blocks up from the high school that completely destroyed two homes, terribly damaged others, and just sent shockwaves through an entire community of people who, who are left with a lot more questions and there are answers and who are trying to grapple with collective grief. And that not only happened this past week, but it feels like it was in this like series have on ending trauma. I don't even want to mention all of them. Because honestly, it's quite possible we could leave something out. So but just last week, is when we heard about this horrendous school shooting another one that took the lives of children and the adults who are caring for them. Again, a lot more questions than there are answers. But that happened early in the week. And then this happened on Thursday evening and left a lot of us trying to grapple with what to do next. And so there were all kinds of folks who showed up to help. I mean, definitely the first responders there were people who showed up to this scene that was just traumatizing. I would imagine. I earned a new respect for our first responders in the work that they show up to do when things are just chaotic and awful and terrible. And still show up and still do an amazing job. There were faith leaders, there were neighbors, adult volunteers, student volunteers, I think the question on everybody's mind was how can we help? What can we do like and that was beautiful, absolutely beautiful. Our favorite saint Fred Rogers said that when he talked to his mom about the bad things that were happening in the world, she said, look for the helpers. Look for the people who who show up and go to them. Look, look to them for for hope, and for help, and even just their hope. And so that happened within you know, an hour. People were on the scene. A couple of faith leaders came together on Saturday. and said what it what do we do? How can we support this community? We know we can't fix this. We know we can't even assign meaning or purpose to it. But what do we what do we do in these times we gather, and we pray. And so we couldn't we put a call out 24 hours before the planned event. And I would say, What do you think like 300 people at least 300, at least 300 people showed up, there were multiple news sources, there were folks who showed up to sing folks who showed up to pray folks who showed up to honor the names of the deceased and lots of clergy who showed up to offer support, it was a tough half hour, it felt like a lot longer than a half hour, but we gathered for a half hour and held each other and we cried. And we prayed. And we held each other. It was a powerful scene, after days of horrible scenes, but it felt like, okay, like we can, we can breathe our grief a little bit. And when we do that together, it's a little, a little, I don't wanna say easier to hold, but it's more possible. So, yeah, so thank you. First of all, if you have been one of those people who physically showed up, if you have been one of those folks who have been holding Pottstown, in prayer, thank you, thank you for your questions about how to help and how to show up. And if you would, please continue to keep Pottstown in your prayers in the midst of all of the other horrible, horrible things that that seem to just keep happening, we would greatly appreciate that.
 
Zack Jackson 06:48
Yeah, and thank you for the couple dozen of you or so who showed up on the live stream, as well. If if you wanted to watch any of those, any of that live stream, you can go to the OpenTable UCC Facebook page, where it is now I think you can pray along at any point in time as well. Because this is going to be a long process, we'll have links in the show notes for ways that you can help if you'd like to give money, if there's things that you can give time you can give, we will have all of that down below. So make sure you check that out. You know, one of the things that that I've been struggling with, that really hit me during that time. I don't think we mentioned this before, that four of the five people who died or children between the ages of I think seven and 15. And the other fatality was their grandmother, and their parents were in critical condition in the hospital. And everything that they have as lost and their children. And when when there's tragedy that happens to some of us, it can be so easy to then be like, well, you know, God is going to teach you a lesson through this right God is going to use this to make you better. I've heard that this existence is a veil of soul making is some long dead Christian once said that this is this is we suffer so that we might grow. But how do you possibly make sense of the senseless death of children? You can't? This is literally the plot of The Brothers Karamazov. And so when we were singing some of the songs at this vigil, especially his eyes on the sparrow, I sing because I'm happy I sang because I'm free. His eyes on the sparrow and I know he watches over me. And I thought I'm not happy. Sure as hell don't feel free. And was God so busy birdwatching that he wasn't looking out for these children. How? How on earth can I affirm this beautiful song that made everyone cry? While at the same time acknowledging the reality. There was one of the one of the prayers I think it may have been one of the closing prayers or it was the Reverend Justin Valentine. Oh, no, it
 
Nichole Jackson 09:30
was the opening opening prayer. Okay. Where is he the pastor of he's pastor at kingdom life. Church
 
Zack Jackson 09:35
Kingdom left church. Yeah. So he said, and this I'm taking from the article that was in the Pottstown mercury. He said, Lord, we come to you asking that you could provide hope. We ask that you provide healing. Do what you said you do best. Send your Holy Spirit, because your Holy Spirit will comfort those who mourn. So every broken heart, every grieving heart, every heart that mourns every heart that is heavy laden and burdened down today, and all these young people here, pray that they know that there is real hope and real healing in you. I pray that this community that has seen better days, begins to realize that its greatest days are yet ahead. And that new things are springing forth, and great things are to come. And the next line in the article is what hit me in which the journalist Evan Brandt wrote, but it may be a while before residents of the chicken Hill neighborhood are ready to accept Valentine's words on faith. He said in that one sentence, this feeling in my gut that I have had this whole time. It may be a while before the residents are ready to accept Valentine's words on faith. I don't think I'm ready to accept those words on faith. I don't know if I have the the rock solid, steadfast faith to say, Glory to God in this awful tragedy, tragic time. There's definitely a reason for everything. And all things come together for good. I, I want to, but I don't know if I can.
 
Nichole Jackson 11:14
I had a conversation with a priest once in which I was having a really hard time doing, quote, the right thing, believing that you know, God was going to come through and that I could still do the right thing. And you may even do it with my heart because I was like, Well, I can forgive this person, but I don't know that I can actually forgive them. And so is it just lip service. And he said, sometimes you don't have to, quote, do the right thing right away. Like you keep praying that God will help you to do the right thing. And you'll keep, like, sometimes the prayer doesn't start with God, we trust you. Like sometimes the prayer starts at God, I really want to try, like, I really want to trust you, I think I need your help to even get to the point where I can. And so when I hear songs, like his eyes on the sparrow, or, you know, hit Justin's prayers, I mean, they were, it was beautiful, and it was moving and and I felt, I felt them deep within me. Because even if I'm struggling with them, I can lean on his hope until I get there. So I feel like a lot of the things that we do as faith communities is praying for the thing that can't quite be here yet. But like, we want to get there like it as well is one of those beloved hymns by so many people and I have such a hard time singing it because we sing it when it's not well, like we sing hit when our hearts are breaking, and we're crushed. And, and so I often feel like we sing those songs, we say the words we pray the words that we most hope for, even when we're not there yet. Yeah, I think for me, I really want to lean on on his prayer. I want to be there. I want to get to the point where I can see that good days are ahead. But yeah, I think a lot of people I think I think what Mr. Brandt wrote in his article is, is valid and maybe speaking what a lot of us are probably feeling how do we get to there? How do we get to the point where I can believe that better days are ahead.
 
Zack Jackson 13:43
Yeah, what I what I'm hearing, you saying reminds me of one of maybe the hardest books I've ever read in seminary, just from a density standpoint, as well as from a subject matter standpoint, a book called Christ and horrors by Marilyn McCord, Adams horrors, H O R R O R S, which is just an awful word to say horrors. Basically, she defines a horror as something that is so bad, that it diminishes our ability to make meaning out of something. So suffering is one thing, right? You, you stubbed your toe, you lost your job, you did whatever you know, and you can learn from it and you can make meaning out of it. And then you have now just redeemed that suffering. By making something good out of it. You did that yourself. Congratulations, humans are really good at this. But then there are some things like the death of children or torture, atrocities that are so bad, they break us and there's no way to make meaning out of them anymore. And that to her was the main problem of how God can be good and still have these things exist. And so for her, there were three stages of God's victory over that. So the first stage is making meaning out of these horrors. And for most people who experienced something like that, that meaning can only be made in the next life or in some kind of recreated world, there's, you kind of need to have a hope of heaven in some way, shape, or form in order to have that thing be overcome. The second stage is that God needs to be able to suffer with us needs to Chaplain us, in the midst of it, because if God has overcome it in stage one, but we're still living in the effects of it, now, there needs to be something. And so God can't understand suffering, because suffering is all about a lack of control, it's about losing your control. Because if you, if you have control over your suffering, then it's just tourism, or it's a horror movie. You know, it's not real suffering. And so that is where Jesus comes in for her. And then the third stage is ultimately recreating a world in which horrors are not possible. And we are fundamentally remade, so we are not vulnerable to that anymore. And that's a her is the Christian faith, right there. And that's how God overcomes horrors, by by giving us meaning in this life or the next by suffering alongside us in this life and the now, and then by recreating us and the world in such a way that we are no longer vulnerable to that. And, I mean, that's, she says it in a whole lot more words than that.
 
Nichole Jackson 16:50
But maybe can put a link to that book in the show notes
 
Zack Jackson 16:54
for anyone who was interested enough to read through this book. But I did want to latch on a little bit to step two, if I can. Yeah, because we are planting a church that we say is, Has Jesus at the center of everything that we do. And a part of this podcast is unpacking some of our convictions. And our conviction about who Jesus is, matters. Because Jesus is kind of like a has been kind of a green screen for so many people that you just kind of you put whatever you are on that you can just change Jesus to mean 10,000 things Jesus votes for whoever you vote for, hates whoever you hates, and he's a good moral teacher. He's a social revolutionary, he's, he's whatever you want him to be. But above all of that, before he was anything else, he was just a guy. Just a guy born into a very specific time. And so I want to take a second and tell you a story about that time, if that's okay.
 
Nichole Jackson 17:58
Just the guy who is also God, but like, again, I mean, we can impact that too. But
 
Zack Jackson 18:05
I don't know how high your Christology is. Yeah, apparently mine is fairly low. So I don't want to start with Jesus. I want to tell you a story about Jesus, His great great grandfather, by the name a man by the name of Lea czar, at least that's how that's what Matthew tells us. Jesus had many great, great grandfather's I would imagine, but le A's are lived in Judea. So the southern parts you think of Jerusalem Jericho, down south, the main part, that's where he was from. And he lived in a very unique time, he got to see a free and independent Judea. For the first time and 500 years, the prophets had been had been praying for this time prophesying this time, in which the kingdom of Judah would be made free, again from foreign occupation from these empires that were just draining them dry, that the Messiah would come and would free them and would reestablish the kingdom in Jerusalem. And he got to see it happen. And under under the rulers at that time, the Hasmoneans, who had forcibly taken their country back from the latest empire that was oppressing them, they expanded the territory, up through Samaria and Galilee. So think Judas at the south, Judea, Samaria, Galilee galleys on the very top. And for the first time in 1000 years, they had reestablished the original boundaries under King Solomon, who is at this point is basically a mythical king. And he has seen this amazing time of growth and God's faithfulness of, of underdog victories and the sorts of things that legends are made out of. This was the time of the Messiah and the rule her in his day gave three options to the residents of Samaria and Galilee. He said to them, you can leave, you can die, or you can convert, which by the way, the only time ever, that a Jewish leader has forced people to convert that is not in their history. So after that there's all of this land was open land, this new territory, and they want to solidify a Jewish presence in these places. And so he pays all of these people to leave Judea take their families North to Galilee, and to plant farms to make homesteads that land up there had not been lived on for hundreds and hundreds of years, because that's like the first place that the the wandering armies from the Empires enter into. And so if there's ever a city or town there, it gets ransacked and burned down first. And so it's mostly just been laid fallow land that has so fertile and ready for farmlands. It was the promised land. And so the rulers paid these families to move up there, and to start their own farms, their own little heaven up there. So LEA is our took his his his wife and his children, and they marched up there that week long journey. And they built a little house, a little homestead for them and their their descendants. And they farmed a little plot of land that became a little bit bigger and a little bit bigger and LA's RS children, they built homes on that land. And then eventually you had a little town, a little town springing up where before, there was nothing but now there was promised and prosperity and people living by their own hands. People were creating the future that they wanted a place where their hopes and dreams could grow from the very soil, a free independent and self sufficient people of God. And Lea czars children grew old and passed the land on to their children as well. But then something happened, something changed. The husband and family that had freed Judea from the grip of exploitative Empires was falling apart, due to their own infighting and greed and the Roman Empire stepped in as it is all too willing to do in those days and annexed all of Judea, Samaria and Galilee, ending the dream of a new golden independent era, and the hopes of the Messiah being dashed along with it. Can you imagine, had disappointed Jesus's grandparents must have been like to see God's promises of a new kingdom come to fruition in their lifetime, and then just to have it snatched away so quickly, by yet another empire. And under Rome, things started to change, things were worse than they had been under any empire under Rome, Rome appointed an intermediate man named Herod to become king of the Jews. And it domion Not even a Jew, not even a proper Jew is now the king of the Jews. And Herod starts handing out land rights left and right to his friends all throughout Galilee. And those farms that he gave to them were massive tracts of land. And they were farmed, not by families, but they were farmed by slaves brought in from across the Empire. And they were given special tax breaks, because they're buddies with Herod. And so these little farms, these little homesteads from the settlers three generations earlier, they can't compete anymore. And they start to close down, they get bought out by the rich neighbors, or they get their land seized, you know, Dad might get conveniently arrested for something he didn't do, and then their property taken from them and their families left destitute. This happened over the course of a generation or two. And left and right, these family homesteads were were just disappearing. And under Herod, the wealthiest 2% of the population ended up owning every single square acre in Galilee. And once he owned your farm, if you were lucky enough to continue to live in the house that your great great grandfather built, well, then you needed to rent the land back from Herot. You had to pay exorbitant taxes on everything that you put in the soil. And if there was a drought one year, and you didn't really get much more than now you're in debt for next year. Same thing with fisherman, right? Oh, my goodness. Herod in the law literally owned all of the fish in the sea of Galilee. Like that's in the law. He owns the fish. He also owns the boats and he owns the water itself. And so if you wanted to fish, then you needed to buy a fishing permit. You needed to rent a boat, and then you needed to go out there while the tax electors were in boats out there checking your permits. And then after you caught your fish, you came back and you gave it right away to the tax collector on the beach, who weighed it took what belonged to Herod and gave you a little bit back. And so if you didn't catch fish one day, like we read about the Gospels, like you did, it's not just that maybe you don't eat that night. It's that you now Oh, you're in debt, you're in debt. Yeah, the whole process is created to hold people down. And so Herod and his son that aptly named an easy to remember, Herod Herod Antipas, as you might see Him in the Bible, same as it ever was same as it ever was. They just created this system in which 2% of people owned everything, and the poverty rate was close to 90%. So men like Lea Tsar's great grandson Joseph would have been forced off to the family farm. And he would have found work anywhere he can, like in one of Herod's newly constructed cities, looking for construction work, spending his days doing heavy labor building the opulent palaces of men who robbed their family's land. Forget what you think you know about Joseph and his, his his woodworking career. The fact that we think of Joseph and Jesus as carpenters, and that meaning somebody who you know, was cutting wood and building tables and stuff is pretty anachronistic. There's not a whole lot of trees in Galilee. That's something that Europeans read into the text. You know, a couple 100 years later, most of them had never been to Galilee. More than likely, Joseph is a day laborer, tradesmen, he's a tradesman, maybe he's laying stone when he can, he's fixing rooms when he can. He's going into the city with groups of men and waiting for some construction manager to pick him out of a crowd, throw him in the back of a pickup truck and bring him off to earn his day's wages pickup chariot, pickup chariot and the pickup wagon. Yeah, but by the time that Joseph and his fiancee marry, well, by the time Mary was pregnant, galleys poverty rate was about 90%. So there was no middle class, there was no comfortable living, you were either obscenely wealthy, or you are close to starvation. So within two generations Galilee went from a place of promise and family and opportunity to a blighted hellscape, in which 2% of the population sucked the people and the land dry for riches that they couldn't possibly ever spend in their lifetimes. And this was the land that Jesus was born into poor, exploited and hopeless, having just been promised something great, a time of a messiah a two generations prior, and now, nothing. And even probably within his own community was ostracized, for being born out of wedlock. Right. And when Jesus was six years old, Rome tightened its grip once again, and ordered a census of the land, which Luke gets wrong, and puts at the time of Jesus's birth. Right. The census when Quirinius was governor of Syria that we read about in the Christmas story actually took place in about three ad. So when Jesus was about six years old, and the point of that was, so they could tax you more, so that they would have a better count of how many people were there, so that they could somehow extract more wealth from the people who are already dying of starvation. You know, like, charging overage fees on overdrafting a an account, right? Now you owe more because you don't have anything. It's basically what it was. And so at when Jesus was six years old, and this happened, a man named Judas of Galilee, not Judas Iscariot, this is one of Jesus's followers. Jesus as a kid at this point, creates this terrorist organization that we later know is the Zealots who roams the countryside and, and promises to burn down anyone's house who complies with the census. They ambush and kill Roman soldiers and tax collectors and even priests and anyone who complies with Rome. They are threatening to murder and kill their whole families to terrorize the both the Romans and the Jews into I don't know, making it so costly for the Romans to be there that they'll back off, I guess,
 
Nichole Jackson 29:40
meaning violence of violence. Yeah. We think that works.
 
Zack Jackson 29:45
Right. At later we learned that one of Jesus's 12 disciples is identified as a zealot. Right, Simon the Zealot. So it makes sense, because Jesus was teaching a pretty radical message that would have really appealed to people like the zealots. I think about the fact that Jesus's ministry was almost entirely done in the margins. He was just among his fellow peasants, he traveled into towns like Nazareth that maybe had 300 people in it. On a good day. All the wealth and power in Galilee was centralized in the cities of Tiberius, and sephorus. But the Gospels don't have him going there at all. Not one time, that's where the money is, the power is the government is the people who make a difference. That's where that is. But Jesus doesn't step foot in Tiberius, or sephorus. fact, the only place of power where Jesus seems to show up is Jerusalem. That's at the end. And that's right, that's at the end. And that's only because that's where the temple is where the religious center is, he has to go to Jerusalem. And when he does go there, well, what does he do he, he literally braids a leather whip, and assaulted bankers and businessmen around the temple whose transaction fees were further burdening the poor. And then he got killed for it. Yeah. I mean, simply put, Jesus did not just advocate for the poor, the hurting, the broken, he was the poor, the hurting, and the broken. And I think that has to be intentional. Because what if Jesus was born in in the palace, or Jesus was born into a royal family, or Jesus was even born into a priestly family Jesus was born the right way. And he grew up with any sort of privilege, then how does he truly understand suffering? Yeah, he doesn't, in order for if one of the purposes of Jesus's birth life death incarnation, the whole deal was to be able to Chaplain people through the suffering of their lives. He had to experience it for himself. He had to take that suffering back with him into the Godhead. So the God of all the Creator, the Sustainer, the one who is untouched by by suffering, had to feel that powerlessness and suffering in order to then suffer with us in a way that is authentic and true. So we can rejoice that one day, God will save us and make things better. But what about in the meantime, what about now? What about the senseless tragedies that we keep experiencing? Like how could a God who was always in control ever comfort people who are suffering that God can't? And that's why Jesus is particularity matters so much, at least, at least to me.
 
Nichole Jackson 32:50
I think that brings the scripture passage and Matthew 25 that talks about how when we feed and we give drink, and we visit those in prison, and we do these things, we're doing it as if to Jesus, right, like Matthew 2534. Starting at 34, reigns, Then the King will say to those that his right hand come you that are blessed when my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world, For I was hungry, and you gave me food. I was thirsty, and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me. I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick, and you took care of me. I was in prison and you visited me. Then the righteous will answer him, Lord, when was it? That we saw you hungry and gave you food or thirsty and gave you drink? And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcome to you are naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you? The King will answer them. Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me. Every time you come alongside folks in pain, you're coming alongside me. I came to this earth, to accompany you, to to be you, to save you and to love you.
 
Zack Jackson 34:18
So what I love about that passage, by the way, is that so many of us in our religious traditions have been taught all of these really specific things that will get you into heaven, when you're supposed to believe and the things you're supposed to do, and especially the things you're not supposed to do. Right. Right. And what are Jesus's criteria? For for the right judgment at the end? How will you be judged? You'll be judged almost entirely on how you treated people on the margins. Yeah, people who are vulnerable. He doesn't say you need to uh, show up and have a proper understanding of this trinity. Or, you know, did you have sex before marriage or something like that? He says, What did you do with your life? And if you did not, you know, advocate for and take care of these people, then it's very clear that you never knew me in the first place. Because God has a preference for the poor for the hurting for the broken, a strong preference. I mean, you cannot read Scripture and see otherwise. Yeah, it is throughout the Hebrew Bible throughout the Christian Bible, that God has a very strong preference for the underdog for the broken for the one who does not belong in the way society has been made. And if you can't see that, and if you don't live your life in such a way that also accentuates that, then that just means you didn't know Jesus.
 
Nichole Jackson 35:56
You created him in your own image. Right. Well, Anne Lamott,
 
Zack Jackson 35:59
I love that, that she says you can safely assume you've created God in your own image when he hates the same people as you.
 
Nichole Jackson 36:06
Yeah, yeah.
 
Zack Jackson 36:08
So when, when they're suffering, when there's there's tragedy, when there's things that we can avoid, when people keep dying unnecessarily, and we keep letting them die. Because, you know, bad excuses, or our own selfishness or our own greed, or our own love of assault weapons, as it were. And we prioritize our own freedoms over literally the lives of the most vulnerable people than we show ourselves to have not known Jesus. And even those who claim to know Jesus who attend church every single week, who are the most faithful people who have Jesus bumper stickers on their car will show up in the pearly gates. And Jesus will say, you never knew me. And that's terrifying. Right?
 
Nichole Jackson 37:08
So our friend, Johnny Rasheed pastor Johnny Rasheed. We're recording this on on May 31, which is the day that his book is being released. It's a book called Jesus takes the side,
 
Zack Jackson 37:23
embracing the political demands of the gospel is the subtitle of that.
 
Nichole Jackson 37:27
Yeah. And I, I, I said to Zack several times while I read this, like, I wish he wasn't right, I wish that the demands were not so high that, that I'm responsible, not only for the things that I say and do, but the things that I don't say the things that I don't do, even for trying to find some kind of non existent third way.
 
Zack Jackson 37:53
Yeah, as if we're like creating a timetable, in that is acceptable to those who are in power enough that it would liberate those who are not. Yeah, we are taking some kind of middle third way reconciliatory stance that will hopefully bring both sides together. But in all of those, it the timetable is always set by the most resistant person in power, and not by the person who is suffering. And so we're asking the person who is being oppressed, to just stay oppressed for a little bit longer. We don't want to upset these other while we sort out the details in a way that that is easy on those people who have privilege, as if their lives haven't been made easy by privilege. And so what we're doing is perpetuating the suffering of the suffering in order to prioritize the comfort of the comfortable.
 
Nichole Jackson 38:49
Also, side note, we're gonna be interviewing pastor Johnny Rashid. Joe just so you can hear from the man himself, his convictions and where he's coming from, but I it's not an easy read. And I have in the notes like, guilty, guilty, guilty. So this is his book is not something that is meant to lift up the holy people and shame everybody else. It's like, he just wants us all to know that there is responsibility here and, and it comes from Jesus. It doesn't come from some follower of Jesus, like no, this is this is who Jesus was. This is how he taught. These were his convictions. And this is how he showed up in the world. And he told everybody you follow them. This is required of you. If you're not stirring up trouble something's you're not doing it right. Like it's gonna make a stir. Yeah.
 
Zack Jackson 39:51
You think about like, the times in in the stories of Jesus where he breaks the Sabbath, where at one point he Allah As his hungry disciples to pick some, some wheat, and another time he heals a person's withered hand on the Sabbath, and the religious leaders come to him and shame. How dare you? Yeah, right. And to us, that seems silly. That seems like okay, he's breaking religious law, he's basically you know, he's wearing jeans to church or something like that. But there is no difference between civil and religious law in first century Judea. what Jesus has done is civil disobedience, he has broken the law in order to expose the hypocrisy of those who should know better. So Jesus at this point is basically performing a sit in, he's blocking a bridge, he is doing something that is intentionally meant to draw attention to the fact that the people who are supposed to be caring for the well being of everyone are not, you know, when he when he points out, that the opulent Pharisees give all this money into the temple, and then a widow puts in her last might. And he tells his disciples that she has given more than any of them. there supposed to be a, a provision for widows, taken from the money given to the temple that is required, in the laws of Moses, that the widows be taken care of, by the ties to the temple, not the temple, then, but you know what I mean. And the the religious leaders who had totally bought in to the Roman rule, because they were then a part of that 2%, who made all the money, they were instead robbing the widow is blind. And so that that story is not one of like, Wow, she's so faithful, God's gonna give her riches and make her better. likely she goes home and starves to death, is how that story ends. And you're supposed to read that and then feel like disgusted by the Pharisees, by the religious leaders who should know better, who should do better. We should be the first ones out there. When there's tragedy, we should be the first ones lobbying for the rights of those people who don't have rights, we need to be the first ones. They're not the people who are in bed with power, and drunk on money. That's when that's why the church is dying across the West, because the church has been in bed with power for too long. And the gospel doesn't work. We're in positions of power. There's such cognitive dissonance you cannot read the words of Jesus, there's radical words of care and of equality, and of tearing down making the mountains lows, the valleys can be lifted up this radical equality and the Gospel, you cannot read that. And then also be an oppressive power. You have to do so many, backflips in order to twist the gospel to work. And it only works for so long before people realize that this is BS. And so the churches dying because the church has basically just been American exceptionalism with Jesus on the front of it, or it's been white supremacy with Jesus on the front of it. It has not been Jesus centered.
 
Nichole Jackson 43:33
So what does this have to do with all of the storm is raging in our world right now. Especially for those of us who are looking for signs of hope, who are looking to even figure out what to do or how to show up I think a lot of us are feeling helpless and angry. Furious.
 
Zack Jackson 44:05
Do you want me to answer that?
 
Nichole Jackson 44:08
Yes. No, I mean, I think who Jesus was, when he came, how he came, has everything to do with it. I God who loved us so much that he took on skin as a person on the margins, to save us, to walk with us and to show us how to do better to show us what it looks like to love our neighbor as ourselves, even when it hurts to know that even in the darkest days, which, frankly, here we find our feet. We're not alone. And he inspires us to to do the same.
 
Zack Jackson 44:59
I think there's two things As I find comfort in Christianity began as an apocalyptic religion in which they believe that Jesus was returning, you know, next Thursday, and would come and would make everything better. And so the first generation of Christians kind of didn't feel like they had to change the systems, they didn't have to change the world, because Jesus was going to come back and do all the heavy lifting. But then he didn't. So the second generation of Christians had to then figure out what it means to be a people who are reforming this world from within. And generations afterwards have, have struggled with that. And many of the church have failed and have given right into power. But there's always been a remnant, always been a reforming remnant within the church out there doing the work of Christ. And the fact that Jesus has not returned, tells me that God still has faith in us, like God still trust that we are capable of doing more than we think we are. And so there is work out there for all of us to do. And as we do that, as we try to listen, and we try to do it faithfully, because man, I'll tell you, this book with Gianni really has convicted me a lot of ways because I think of myself as somebody who tries. And I read a book like that, and I realized all the places I've still fallen short, even though I try. And I say that not from like, oh, woe is me, I'm such a word, a horrible person, but like, all right, I still have work to do, I'll probably have work to do my whole life. And that's great. That's good. Yeah, that means more is being uncovered. This is there's more to explore more, to do more to more to know more people to connect to more stories, to to understand. But in the meantime, you know, we'll fight for the rights of, of immigrants of of children who are being killed in schools of LGBTQ people who are being and how many anti trans legislations have come before state representative bodies in the past year, that's like 250 Already this year. Right. So the battle needs to continue for human dignity, you know, situations with with lead, drinking water, in places where government would rather not pour money. You know, all of the places where there are toxic waste facilities where there are factories polluting the air, these are all places in poor communities, our children are being poisoned in places because it is, it is cheaper to do that for these companies. And they know that they're not going to litigate. And so we need to be in that fight, you need to be in that battle. But in the meantime, when there is tragedy, when that strikes, I wanted to read some of the words from one of the pastors from the from the vigil, who said that we are not here to solve anything. We are not here to fix this because we can't, we're here to do two things that you do in the face of chaos, gather together to support one another, and to pray. That was no call who said that? By the way, and I thought that was brilliant. That was the best way to start. The vigil was that today is not a day for fixing things. This is not a day for pointing fingers for immediately saying whose fault this is. Today is a day to gather together to hold each other. This is the day we recognize that Christ suffered too. And Christ suffers with us as somebody who understands our suffering. And Tomorrow's the day, when we get up and we demand change. And we did you do actionable change in the midst of suffering however, we suffer together. I thought that was brilliant. Thank you for, for saying that.
 
Nichole Jackson 48:58
Well, friends, I think that's a good place to stop. We'd said that we wanted to shed some light on wonderings. And I hope that this gave you some good things to think about and to consider. But again, we don't have the easy answers. I really wish we did. But we don't. And so let's keep listening to God together and try to show up. One of the ways that we are wanting to do that is by offering some time to gather to pray. We also recognize that this community extends beyond Pottstown even if it is located in Pottstown. And so we are going to begin having morning prayer together at 6:30am. We know that's early, but we also recognize that a lot of people go to work early to drop their kids off early. We just want to offer in some space to just start the day All right. So we're gonna be meeting on zoom at 6:30am Eastern Standard Time, on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, we're going to be utilizing a resource that has meant a lot to me over the years, called Common Prayer liturgy for from ordinary radical liturgy for ordinary radicals. And it's a resource that takes you through Scripture and and song and just some prayer really offers some some prompts for prayer. So, half hour, at most 45 minutes, we're wanting to keep it to half an hour. And we invite you to join us. So the link to the the zoom, the Zoom link is will be in the show notes. It's also on our Facebook page. And everyone is welcome to join us.
 
Zack Jackson 51:00
That Facebook page by the way is facebook.com/opentablePottstown.
 
Nichole Jackson 51:07
Yes. So hope you can join us. It's not something that if you show up once, or you don't show up at the first one, you can't show up for the second one. It's it's a daily entry every single day. That every day is different. So hope you can join us for that.

Dreaming Big with David Charles

Episode 2
In this episode, Zack sat down with David Charles on the bleachers of the Pottstown Middle School football stadium. David is the founder of the STRIVE Initiative and through its “Made for Greatness” mentorship program, is a constant force for good in the middle school and community at large. Make sure you listen to the end to hear his incredible vision for the middle school, the borough’s churches, and anyone willing to believe that God is up to something good in our midst. 
 
 
https://www.facebook.com/OpenTablePottstown/
https://www.instagram.com/opentablepottstown/
https://twitter.com/opentablepotts
 
Please consider supporting this work financially as well and get a number of great perks in the process at...
https://www.patreon.com/reimaginingfaith
 
Transcript 
This transcript was automatically generated by www.otter.ai, and as such contains errors (especially when multiple people are talking). As the AI learns our voices, the transcripts will improve. We hope it is helpful even with the errors.
 
 
Zack Jackson 00:00
Welcome to the reimagining faith podcast with the Pastors Jackson. This is a podcast for seekers, dreamers and fellow sojourners who are trying to figure out what it means to be followers of Jesus in the 21st century. Before we get into today's episode, I wanted to give you a quick update on Open Table UCC and clarify a few questions I've gotten about it. After a whole lot of very complicated paperwork that I'm pretty sure I did, right. Open Table is officially registered with the state and federal governments. We've been approved by the your scientists Association of the United Church of Christ, and added into the main database of UCC churches, hurray, we now have a bank account. And within a few days after we received some grant money, we will set up a website with an online giving portal for anyone who's interested in supporting the church, or sharing the sorts of work that we're that we're hoping to be doing. During these first two years of church planting. While we're still building the foundation of this thing, Nicole and I are only taking part time salaries until the church can afford to support us. So we're both looking for part time work to support our family while we get this church off the ground. If you'd like to support us personally, during this time, you can become a patron of this podcast at patreon.com/reimagining faith. This podcast is not officially a part of the church, but kind of runs parallel to it. And any support that we can raise through the podcast will go directly to supplementing our income. So we can devote more time to the church plant and all of this wonderful content that we're hoping to create. I hope that helps to clarify a few of the questions I've received. Within a week or two, you'll be able to donate directly to the church if you'd like to. But if you want to help support our family and give us some more flexibility to provide good content for you, then you can support us on Patreon, where there are some pretty sweet perks to our planting team is meeting every other week on Sunday mornings throughout the summer. And we're hoping to begin regular worship services at the end of August or early September. If you are local and you want to help us dream this church into existence, let us know. Otherwise be on the lookout for announcements about our opening date. Now, onto the episode. In this episode, I sat down with David Charles on the bleachers of the Pottstown middle school football stadium, hence the wind and lawn mowers in the background. David is the founder of the strive initiative and through its made for greatness Mentorship Program is a constant force for good in the middle school and the community at large. I'll let him explain to you a little bit more about what he does and why he does it. But make sure you listen to the end to hear his incredible vision for the middle school, the borough's churches and for anyone willing to believe that God is up to something good in our midst. So we're here on the bleachers of a stadium at the Pottstown middle school talking with David Charles and maybe you could just start us off and tell us who you are and what you do here.
 
David Charles 03:25
My name is David Charles. I am born and raised here in Pottstown, Pennsylvania Pottstown School District. I'm an alumni of Pottstown. We're sitting here at the stadium, football Grig Memorial Field, many memories but currently I run a program called created for greatness at the Pottstown Middle School in Pottstown. We've been in the middle school since 2018. And it's a community based on site mentoring program. We bring in community adults from Pottstown and surrounding areas to connect with students once a week for about 45 minutes. Each time they connect. And it's usually during lunch. We have for lunch zones fifth through eighth and as a morning mentoring block 7:50am to 8:30am where we have mentors, community adults also come in and connect with students. And and we are mentors also connect with teachers and are in some of the classrooms and we just support students and administration.
 
Zack Jackson 04:49
What are they doing with these these adults when they come in? Are they giving lectures are they like talking one on one with
 
David Charles 04:56
they're usually one on one with students we match them mostly by interest, or, you know, I do a lot of interviewing with the mentors and the students. And we do a survey with both an interest survey with the students, and an application and a survey with the adults. And we do a little matching that way. It's not always perfect, but because I connect with the adult and the student, I just, you know, sort of use some wisdom and lots of communicating with the students to match adults with them.
 
Zack Jackson 05:31
So you got to know like everyone then in the city, right, yeah,
 
David Charles 05:35
I know, everyone. I know, pretty much I know. Yeah. There's a lot. Yeah. I'm thankful for
 
Zack Jackson 05:43
that. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it sounds like it. If you've got like students that come in, and you ask them what their interests are. And your brain then immediately goes to like, oh, well, I got to connect you with this person, I got to connect with that person. And
 
David Charles 05:55
yeah, in some way, but it's also through that survey and application from the mentor that I got to look at both, you know, and it's always it's not always matched by interest, it's more little wisdom and thinking through what could be helpful for a student. And the adult is, well, you know what I mean, I just get started. Um, actually, I saw some negative press on social media, about Pottstown middle school students, and some vandalism happening as students were walking home. And I didn't like it. I just didn't like sort of the tone of some of the adults that were commenting. And it kind of made me feel like, if they were talking about middle school students in this tone, it was almost like they were talking about me. Because I was a middle school student here. And I just that touched me, I'm like, oh, what can you do to get involved? Because that that was something that was meaningful for me, I needed people to actually step in and not point a finger. But actually do something I reached out to Mr. Steven Rodriguez, the superintendent, I said, I'm seeing all this press. I want to come in and, and do some assemblies around respect and respecting yourself and others, building trust, and I want to bring some community adults in to connect with students that are sort of pointing the finger. Let's go in. Oh, that's got an act. Okay.
 
Zack Jackson 07:38
Yeah. So like the thinking that the the adults who are out there talking trash, like get them in here. And it's harder to talk trash about somebody that you know and care about, right? You have a vested interest,
 
David Charles 07:50
vested interest, and you start to learn. Oh, yeah, there may be some things that are, you know, that are that are there some vandalism and some, some respect and behaviors that do need to change? But you got to put yourself in the mix. And you can help become part of the change? Yeah, right. Yeah, that's one on one. You know, that's, that's enough. Yeah.
 
Zack Jackson 08:17
I mean, I think I'm only 35. So it wasn't that long ago that I was in school. Sure. And even even that amount of time, I feel like the world has changed so much, that the sorts of things I dealt with, like the types of bullying I dealt with the types of pressures I dealt with, are just totally foreign to what's going on now. Right? Like, we got AOL Instant Messenger when I was in like ninth grade. I can't imagine if I was texting in second or third grade, or if you've got all these pressures on Instagram, and tick tock and whatnot. What's it like here? What are these kids dealing with?
 
David Charles 08:56
I think a lot of the students are dealing with aces, adverse childhood experiences, things in there. I would say family life trauma, all those things, and I would, I would know that from personal experience, being in Pottstown, coming from sort of a broken home, and you know, it's not all the students, but there's just the poverty level here. It's I don't know the percentage, but there is a poverty level. And, you know, it's, it's some things that students are dealing with parents are dealing with, that are not easy, and it's, you know, it's, I know it because I dealt with it. And I see it, I can feel it. I can sympathize with it. But I also there's a part of me pulling myself up and others helping me to pull myself up to go on another road and trajectory. to better my life. Yeah. So and you know, it's students are dealing with things, but these students are resilient. Yeah. And they're, they're wonderful. Like when you actually get to know them, and you invest your time, and they see you show up. The respect level changes. You know, it does change now. Now. I don't, I wouldn't say it always changes for teachers, which it needs to, right, because teachers here, this is a calling. This is not just the job. I know that it's a calling when you get up to do this every day for possibly 30 years. You got to be called to be with young people on a consistent basis. Yeah. You know what I mean? It's it's and teachers, they don't get paid? Well, they're not getting paid well, like so. So to come every day, you know, it's just and that's why I'm here. You know, it's like a dedication, like supporting students, supporting teachers, and, you know, but it is, it is the most diverse place in Pottstown.
 
Zack Jackson 11:17
Yeah, the middle school,
 
David Charles 11:18
this district, okay. It's one of the most diverse I mean, when you go in that lunch room, you will see the rainbow. It's beautiful, right? And I am constantly telling the students up like, this is the training ground. This is the place you want to be, let us help you navigate in this space. Because it's, you might not get it again.
 
Zack Jackson 11:49
Yeah, no, that's true.
 
David Charles 11:51
You might not get this Yeah. But if you look around, don't take it for granted. You know, let's work on what you see, and how to navigate and how to understand yourself to understand others as well.
 
Zack Jackson 12:05
What brings you hope, but these kids,
 
David Charles 12:08
I would say, having conversations with them, hearing some of their goals and some of their dreams. The students, you know, we did a survey like to end of 2019 going into 2020, about the career interest, over 600 survey responses. And these, most of the students now are in the high school, there's a there's some in eighth grade, but the students actually want they desire to become someone, you know, nurses, plumbers, and all kinds of things they want it, you know, they just need sort of a roadmap, and they need the community to get involved. Give them the extra unfavoured We believe in you. Even if someone at home doesn't show you at the moment or what you need. Because sometimes students are desiring parents to show up and say, I love you. I'm here. And sometimes parents don't I don't know how to give that, you know, I know from personal experience than me, my mom didn't love me, you know, but she didn't know how to love. You know, she did. She just wasn't taught that, you know, she was looking for love. Just because, you know, she was on her own since 14. And there's things that I'm sure students are dealing with, that people have no idea. Oh, absolutely. You know, that they're coming from situations where, you know, they just, they gotta continue to have adults show up. To one day, they say, I'm going to show up with you, Mr. Charles, I'm going to show up with you.
 
Zack Jackson 14:05
I wonder if there's that generational break. Sometimes when you think about the way that, like youth are perceived today, where I hear it all the time, especially in older populations, like you know, the kids have no respect for authority, no respect for their elders. And it was like, for a time for a long time. If you had held a position that it was assumed you had a certain amount of respect because you had that position right like well, there's the there's the the pastor, so we're always going to call them reverend. Yeah, public, you know, and we're not going to curse in front of them. Or, you know, this is the teacher and we talked to teachers in a certain way. But I got I'm, I'm just kind of put on my anthropology hat and sociology hat and just assume that like sometimes 60s and 70s, and that we just authority He failed so profoundly to from, you know, Nixon on down, that just lost all respect for people in authority. And it's, it's that you have to earn the respect now. It's not just granted to you like it was before. Yeah. And so you get people who walk in and assume that because of their position or because of their age, or because of whatever, that they should be spoken to, in a certain way, and children should, should assume certain things about them when, when this generation, probably generation prior to it's like, you start with them being skeptical about you, and you have to earn their trust, but when you earn it, you're there. Right? Yes, it's it's, it's deeper than it would have been when it was just assumed and given to you because you've earned it. And I kind of love that more. And maybe this is like my, my Philadelphia sports fan mind coming through, because I feel like that's how we are with our sports teams where like, you've come here and you need to work your butt off. Yeah, earn our respect. And once you do, you can you'll never buy a drink he facts. Yeah. But I love that. I love that you they are skeptical of authority, because man authority suck sometimes. And you really need to be skeptical of people out there. But you if I think if more people realized that it is on them to earn respect from other people that aren't maybe we'd be in a better
 
David Charles 16:43
place. We would I think you nailed it. i You nailed this generation, especially in the middle school. Yeah. And what I'm seeing with some of the respect and disrespect, you know what I mean? I it's something that now it does need to be earned. You know, and it's not the same. When I was growing up. At this age, I walked into the community center, the Rickett center, I mean, hat off, how you doing? Didn't want to get kicked out? No. Swearing, none of that. Totally different today. Totally different. It's a respect thing. Now it has to be earned. And you know, there's no assuming it's, it's like, the ground is neutral. And people are walking in the room, students, teachers. And there's a level of learning that curve, even for adults, to learn. How, how do we do this now, because the culture has changed. And has changed. So it's not like, well, I need that respect now on demand, no, no, no, we need to, as adults actually work together and have conversations, how do we do it?
 
Zack Jackson 18:07
Well, if we grew up in a world where it was assumed that you would have respect for people based on their position, or age or whatever, then maybe we didn't learn how to earn respect. Maybe we just assumed that it would be given to us when we were older, no matter what kind of person we are, and didn't learn that character matters. And now maybe adults need to learn that.
 
David Charles 18:31
That's exactly what I was saying. It's it's sort of a relearning sort of unprogrammed thing of what we thought with authority and respect and age. And I think it's just a time right now to also as adults go within, collectively, you know, together though, you know, and individually like, but to go within and think about some of the past where we are today. But it's it is about unifying. You know, it is truly it's, that's important. Yeah. As adults, you know, especially, I would say in this building. And in teaching period, it's, it's, you have to be on a unified front as adults in this building. When you're dealing with these students
 
Zack Jackson 19:32
as a dad, I appreciate that.
 
David Charles 19:35
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, right. Even parenting. Oh, Lord, if you are not on a unified front, those children will get into whatever they can tell they're smart. My mom said this. Well, Dad said that, well, this No, no. We stand together. Yeah, I'm gonna hold you accountable students You're not gonna go to one teacher, it's not going to happen, we're not going to give you this. No, you're going to be held accountable. We love you, we care about you. And this is what you have, you have to learn these these principles, respect, discipline, accountability, and allowing others to hold you accountable. Oh, like, like, do some help with that. Let's talk about those as our four mantras, learn that within yourself.
 
Zack Jackson 20:36
So when you were creating this program, and trying to sell it to people who would help to fund it was that did you find that to be tougher? Were people just on on board?
 
David Charles 20:51
I mean, some people were on board. But it was this was like, really strategic. And creating this, and, and, you know, connecting with Mr. Rodriguez, and his support of really understanding and being on board with the community getting more involved. And like being a part of the school and, if possible, the school day, and, and really to see what's happening. It's for me, it's been strategic, because it's been around building meaningful relationships. And that's, that gains attraction when it's meaningful. Yeah. You know, and I think some of the funders that I've connected with, through strive, and just personally, by volunteering on board, the foundation for pasta and education, that really wasn't strategic. That was, you know, we had a gentleman by the name of Mr. Jim Coram African American gentleman taught in the school district passed away, unfortunately, I think a year or so ago, he said, David, as a young black man, you need to be more involved in education in this in this district. You got to be a part. You got to understand what's happening. You got to show up. And I tell you, I wasn't really interested in sitting on any boards. But his encouragement guidance I did, I sat on foundation for pastan Education Board for six or seven years, which supports programs here at the district. And I started to learn what are the needs? How can I serve? Where am I needed? And that snowballed into relationships and building trust. And showing up and and here we are today? Yeah, right. So it's building meaningful relationships that really, I would say put us in this situation, because that's what we do with created for greatness.
 
Zack Jackson 23:13
Yeah. Right. Yeah. That that's what you have to do if
 
David Charles 23:17
the health and wellness Pottstown Area Health and Wellness Foundation has been like, just so supportive. Yeah, yes. And the Boston School District I've been like, just has been supportive. First, Presbyterian, we've gotten grants from First Presbyterian right here in Pottstown. Church here, I mean, the donations from people. I'm floored I, I'm still like, wow.
 
Zack Jackson 23:50
Like people can trust you. You're You're, you're a pillar, you've been here your whole life. If your family's been here, their whole lives, you have been your generations you are connected, you're on boards you're on, you are not going to, you know, hightail it out to the mainline at some point in the near future. And when you strike it rich or something like you are committed here so people are people know that you can be trusted. That's so important. Yeah,
 
David Charles 24:15
it is it is important. It is important. Yeah.
 
Zack Jackson 24:19
I mean, when we when Nicole and I were contemplating church planting, one of the things that was suggested to us was that we go find a, an area where there's no United Church of Christ congregations, because that way, there's no competition, which is a topic for a whole other episode. But so we looked, we drove down, you know, Westchester, and that whole area where there's not really any UCC churches, and we looked around and we thought about it, we dreamed about it, but it really just felt colonial to show up in a place where we have zero buy in Zero connections, and then start something new that that addresses a need that we think exists with no buy in from the community and then just assume that they're going to accept us there with with open arms, and we're gonna thrive there. And that just felt so wrong. Yeah. Right. And, you know, Nicola has as a lot more clout and connections here than I do yet, which I'm sure I will over the next couple of years. But so we felt really strongly that like, this is where her heart is, this is where her connections are, this is where she's already poured herself into the community. And we have so many people here, people like you who understand the needs of the community, we're we're not going to show up here and create some program that we that what we think is what everyone needs. And just assume everyone is going to come running to us. We want to partner with people who are already doing things, right. Because like, I'm now coming into this community, and I'm not from Pottstown. And I've never worked in Pottstown. I've never lived in Pottstown. I'm from Jersey. And so like, I'm feeling like, I need to come here into this city with a servant's mindset. Yep. And not as a leader. But as somebody who will show up and do the work when the people who are here, tell me what it is that needs to be done. Sure. until like, I've earned people's respect, and I can understand better the needs and the things of the community. And that's a really humbling experience. Especially, especially for someone like me, you right, I a middle class, straight white, hetero Christian, male, right, I think I check every box of like, the, if society could hand you just a little bit of privilege, they handed me just about every little piece of it. And so like unpacking that, and being like, yeah, no, I, I, I have so much unlearning to do. And so much like, unknowing that I needed to do before I can be of any use to anyone in this area. So I'm, I'm really grateful for people like you who are out here doing this stuff, you know, and I can just, I can sit back and learn from for a while. Absolutely,
 
David Charles 27:16
man. And it is all about, you know, just how we had a conversation before about you know, it's an uncomfortable face to Yeah. And that's, that's, you know, that I think that's important. We sort of need to go after those spaces, especially when you think of, I would just say Christ, like, uncomfortable. You know, I mean, you know, I lived in LA for five years lived in Germany off and on for three, I lived in Manhattan for three lives in Atlanta. I'm back in Pottstown with two new killer towers here, so And like, I love the beach. And I love nice weather. But I am cold here. You know, so is not as terrible as people think. Yeah, some people are like, oh, man, it's like, no, it's like, and as I age, I'm also I'm not always wanting to be out more like I'm, I'm actually learning and just going within a little more. It's not about me being out. I know everyone Yeah, but it's like, I'm just trying to serve and whatever way I can. And just stay focus with that. You know, and just live simple. You know, I just want to be simple. Yeah, I need my life to be simple, you know,
 
Zack Jackson 28:52
some lives simply, it was it was that a Gandhi saying that? To live simply so others can simply live? I don't know. That might not be Gandhi. That might be
 
David Charles 29:03
somebody but I get that. Yeah. Because simplicity is. Yeah, it is. It is it for me, you know, unless and I can go in and out of that at times. But that's where I found the most peace in my life to actually let go of everything that the world is like told me I need and you got to become this. It's like, because like, no. You don't have to be you don't have to do any of those things. If you trust that, if you trust what I'm saying. Who thin space,
 
Zack Jackson 29:39
then spaces. That's right. We were just talking about that before I hit record. Those places where heaven and earth are just goofy. Just a little piece of cellophane and between the two meet Yeah, yeah. So you've been overseas, you've lived in both coasts, on beautiful places and in all over the place, but you came back here. What? What what is happening here in Pottstown? Now that's got us, like really excited that that you're just rejoicing over what's going on?
 
David Charles 30:13
Well, I mean, I think the community college is doing more to like, sort of get on board with like, integrating with the community, Montgomery County Community College because the Pottstown campus there, I sit on a, an advisory council there for the Pottstown campus. And they're doing more, you know, they've been here for almost 2526 years. And they're doing more to be more a part of the community and which is good. I would say, I think the business community's doing better. Pre COVID really started to blossom. You know, I think the business community is doing better, I think it will do better. What else what I say? I also think some of the commitment of the community members showing up to different, you know, events and sort of just wearing, you know, the Pottstown proud armor and like feeling like, hey, we don't have to be like another town. You know, we are who we are, we have a grip of our own. You know, we are Pottstown it's like, which is important. You know, it's like really owning who you are. And, you know, we're, we're sitting in the stadium, I'm a Trojan, right? You know, it's like, yes, that's where we are where the trucks I think I think I'm hoping that sports change in this district a little bit, I think there's going to be some sport camps that happen, I think, I feel like some new things could spark some more cohesion with the community and the school district and sports becoming more of, you know, the family comes out. That's, that's how it was when I was young. Yeah, you know, we won a state championship here at Pottstown. And let me tell you, when you talking about a community, that was like, rolling, it was rolling as as, as one community, you know, and I think we can get back there. But there, there are still some layers that have to be peeled back, even when sports brings us together. You know, there's still some things, you know, there was some class differences here. And Pottstown for years north end or, you know, Coventry, and Eastern and, you know, it's like, we're Pottstown Hmm, that's what we need to remember. Yes. You know, it's like, let's just remember that we are Pottstown. Wood, and you are on claim your set, which is Pottstown. Yeah, you know,
 
Zack Jackson 33:12
yeah, I love that grit. That that that is something that has made me feel at home. Since the time that I've been in the orbit of Pottstown has been like, this is a really familiar grit that I'm feeling. This is like growing up in South Jersey, being around Philly, like that kind of blue collar grit, where it's like, we're going to work and we're going to get it done. We are who we are, and we love it. And flaws in all this is who we are and we're going to work to to protect it. I love it. Yeah, I love it. I can I can totally relate to that. Yeah. No pretension.
 
David Charles 33:49
No, no, no. No. And I think yeah, I think the business community also surrounded surrounding Pottstown as well. I'm really hoping to reach out to more people, CEOs, managers, directors, whatever, whatever it may be. The pharma industry, the Dana Corporation, just just more involvement in the school. More conversations, more allowing students to know what is available, right in your backyard, how to get prepared, you know, how do we help young people live simple, you know, like, like, encouraging that what does that look like so, so so, you know, Pottstown also can be that place, that people aren't graduating and just moving away? Yes. But they're, they're here, and now they're going to college at MINECO because it's it's you have dual enrollment here at Pottstown. You know, in your you can go to MINECO, Bluebell and you can get your Masters, you know, by now, it's like, we have we have Have a framework that we just have to know exist and have a map. And I think have a contentment about being here, living here, playing here, serving here and loving each other, you know,
 
Zack Jackson 35:21
our dream for this church plant is that it would be primarily a community space. And, um, that the model for church for a long time has been a gathering of Christians who also goes out and does things. We want to be a community group, like a doing things group that also has a church, right. And so we had Nicole and I had had had dreamed up like a coffee shop kind of setup where people can come and, and be and, and organize and meet and be a part of the community that we're finding more and more, the more we talk with folks who are local, and they're like, I don't know, if we need one, we might not need that a coffee shop. So let's talk about these other sorts of third gathering spaces. But the that's a work in progress. But we do definitely want to, to have some kind of storefront space, some kind of space, that that can be a community gathering place where folks can get to know each other. And when, when we brought these ideas to people, like the big response we got was, nah, not another church, not another nonprofit, can somebody please pay taxes? Yes. And so we are we are committed that when we do create whatever business this is that it is not going to be like, the church, and then the business is under the umbrella so that the business then is a nonprofit, sure, whatever, that we are very intentional, we are not going to try to massage the laws to get around paying property taxes, because we've got people on the school board or a part of the church and people on council that are part of the church, and they are all very committed to the fact that like, if you are in like a for profit business, restaurants and retail out here, like you're contributing to the community, through your tax dollars, and and your presence in the community and like places like the school, they get funded partially by, like, those businesses that are popping up. And so yeah, like, I've never been the person who's excited to pay taxes, but I kind of am like, I kind of want to start making money. In my local taxes.
 
David Charles 37:39
Absolutely. It's important. There's a level of respect for that. That comes, you know, because unfortunately, we're talking about property taxes. And, you know, with our district in this community, it's like, we're not like, spring for an area that has, you know, farm on all kinds of big businesses out there. And but you know, anybody's hearing this, come on, bring your business here, there you go. Bring your big business here, so we can, so we can, like, you know, change some of that those taxes here with the school district and just, you know, make it better for everybody buying houses or having businesses I mean, that's, you know, it's important. You know, we have the space that back near to college. So yeah, you know that we need it. It's important.
 
Zack Jackson 38:24
Yeah. Oh, there's the money of great spaces here in Palm Desert. Yeah, beautiful city, really is wonderful. Got a little bit of everything. I'm excited to bring my kids up here. That'd be great. Yeah, that'd be great. See, I mean, other thoughts about, about this beautiful city, about the work that you're doing about anything at all that we've talked about anything, you want to make sure that people take home with them and the anything that they remember?
 
David Charles 38:51
Again, when we talk about simplicity, as adults and students and like even myself, we just have to learn how to get back. We're not I wouldn't just say get back to that. But there is an unlearn there are so many things that we have learned. And we have we have been bombarded with us around the world and things we need and stuff and, and, and you know, even as a church or just as a church is people and, and people coming together, it's like sharing things, and having things like in common that that thought of sharing, growing, keeping things simple. So we all can live and take care of each other. And like be in a city where i is what I always imagined. You live in near North and you can walk down the high street. You can participate. You can patronize you can go out at rivet with my my buddy harradine spot there, you can eat at the blue elephant, you can eat at the Avenue, and then you can feel safe, walking back up to your home, maybe in North End, or down in Eastern or over in Coventry, or west or whatever. But it's like, it's just, we just got to, I think this simplicity man, having all things in common, you know, not needing so much learning to live and be content is I just, that's, that's something I am. I want to continue to live and go after. So it's upon me and, you know, you think of Christ, it's like, he was he talked to the disciples, like, don't take anything. It's like, it's like, are we going to listen to though don't think, rely on each other rely on the spirit rely with, with what's inside of you and others? And like, I that's what I want to see. I also want to see, you know, you say, I want to see the church also be the church man. Let the spirit and each body of the body be activated. Yeah. That will change a city.
 
Zack Jackson 41:28
Yeah, yes. 100%. mean, that's my you're speaking my love.
 
David Charles 41:34
Yeah. That will change a city.
 
Zack Jackson 41:38
If Christians are little Christ's as the word Christian means, then our entire world would be different.
 
David Charles 41:47
I'll leave you with one last thing that goes into that. And you're right, it would be different. We were at a it's called nexor meeting with a church for the church leaders. And that's our meeting. And we had a couple, there was 30 passengers. There it was, myself. These are heavily from Operation 143. There was Brian Hostetler, from the possum Middle School was the principal that was Carrie Brooks, who's a pastor at connections. She's been a mentor. And I think I don't know if Laura was there. But we were all in this room. And they were praying about the Middle School and the store, school district and the church. And Pastor Kerry said, she saw a vision. She said I saw in the paper Pottstown Middle School, save Pottstown. And the vision that God has given me with the middle school is that, of course the community, all the community. But the body all the churches in the whole area and beyond. And the community which the churches or community would go into that building and serve and connect with the students connect with a teacher and be present. And before you know it and you look up you got 1000 plus or more body, the members the church in that building, loving on students and the heading and we've talked about this the heading of Pottstown middle schools say as Pottstown I know because God gave me the vision he said this is how the church actually unifies and a place works together. It's not it's not one church. It's the body is in the building. And what happens you look up your you got people from all over, you know, you got First Presbyterian Yeah,
 
Zack Jackson 44:10
connection, but they're not wearing their church nametag. So it doesn't matter where they're from, you got
 
David Charles 44:15
OpenTable UCC, you got you got everybody what they're focused on the people. Yeah. And that creates the love that is needed to change that space. And I believe in our school district. We have over 3200 students almost 33 You focus on this district. You can create change, because you got parents, you got students, you got ministration and these students are going they're gonna graduate. And what are they gonna do? Are they gonna pour back into here? Are they gonna leave? Are they gonna drop out? Are they gonna what's what are We're gonna do to actually make sure that we unify and come together. Yeah. Yeah, Pottstown Middle School saves Pottstown. And that reminds me and tells me, it's the body, you know that it's like, and you know, you don't have to be in the church to be here. And you don't have to do any of that, like, you just you got to be available.
 
Zack Jackson 45:30
Yeah. And I don't want to be too critical of the, of, you know, the million churches and million Christians that are in the area as well. When I think about the things that they aren't doing, and that we aren't doing and that we aren't being because I think that so many Christians are living in a mentality of scarcity. It's not that they don't love, it's not that they don't want to help. It's not that they don't feel the call the pool to make the world a better place. It's that they are the disciples walking up to Jesus with a handful of fish and bread and they go, this is all we got. Right giving is down, people are down, we're just trying to scrape by We got nothing. We can barely make it for ourselves for a Sunday morning with our 10 people in this service trying to pay for this big building, we got nothing. How can we then dream about these big dreams, because they're there in that place? And they're allowing the scarcity to cloud their, their their dreams? I mean, if if Christians are people who worship the god of impossible things, and the God of impossible things, does impossible things that's kind of in the name. And so I just feel like what we need are examples of people who are who believe that Jesus is still multiplying bread and fish to feed the multitudes. That's it. All you need is some a couple of examples of people who don't have the great resources, the giant mega churches, and yet are still loving greatly with the simple presence that they have, and the difference that's being made. And then you get an outpouring of the spirit amongst these churches and these people and you will see the world changed when people and Christians start to believe that the God of impossible things is still here. And still working. I get it. I'm there for that dream.
 
David Charles 47:26
There you go. I'm here. I'm going right back in that building, brother. You go.
 
Zack Jackson 47:35
Wow, this is good. Yeah, your time. Thank you for your time. To come here. I love this beautiful, gorgeous. Oh, listener it is 72 degrees and sunny, not a cloud in the sky.
 
David Charles 47:48
And Amazing. Amazing. So I'm
 
Zack Jackson 47:51
sure we'll be hearing more from you in the future. Thank you today for talking with us. Yep.
 
David Charles 47:55
Thank you. All right.
 
Zack Jackson 47:58
Thank you for listening to the reimagining faith podcast. This podcast is made possible by our incredible patrons over at Patreon. In particular, I want to say a special thank you today to Deb Schwartz, as well as Steve and Gerri Jackson. You can check out all the available perks at patreon.com/reimagining Faith. Nicola and I are so grateful to be on this journey with all of you. May the God of impossible things fill you with hope for a better tomorrow. And May you go forth to make it so