SPEAKER_00 0:12

Hey everyone, welcome to the Build the Church podcast, where we help you gain momentum, grow your church, and go the distance in ministry. I'm your host, Josh Roberry. Today I'm very excited to speak of Pastor Michael Murphy, who is a pastor, author, and church consultant. Michael founded Leaderscape, which is an organization that helps leaders grow their church by helping them better connect guests to their church and improve their discipleship systems. Tell me that he also served as the executive pastor of Kill Some before pastoring his own church. He's a great voice, and I know he's gonna add a lot of value in the area of connection through a principle he shares in his book, Accelerate, on the VIP team, which is a welcome team that takes care of guests in a way I've never heard anyone else talk about. I know this episode is gonna better help you connect with guests, and that means that you're gonna have more people in your church ready to take the next step. That's why I want to tell you about your team.church. Your team.church is an online spiritual gift and disc assessment that can be branded for your church that matches people to a volunteer team. It's quick and easy to set up, it syncs with Planning Center, and one of the best parts about it is it gives each volunteer their own team style and a personal portrait, which is a one-on-one personality assessment written just for them. You can check it out at your team.church. Now let's jump into our conversation with Michael. Okay, Michael, I'm so glad you're here on the podcast today. Look up to you so much. You're a general in the faith and someone that's inspired. And thank you for joining us.

SPEAKER_01 1:40

Josh, it's great to be with you. And I think you're uh you're overstating that a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 1:44

We're just uh all doing a bit. Yeah, I don't think I am. I've just enjoyed so much learning from you over the past year and being connected to you. You have a great mix of leadership strategy, strong spiritual uh emphasis and everything that you do, and you're just so much fun to be around.

SPEAKER_01 1:59

Well, honestly, none of that's surprising because we've got common roots, you know. Um Pastor Chris Hodgers is my hero, and I've learnt a lot of the basics of what we've done through Grow as part of the ARC family as well. You know, done a lot of life with the the lead team, Pastor Craig Surratt and Dino and Mark. We love all of those guys. And so to have the coming together of those worlds has just been it's a great privilege to be here with you today, Josh.

SPEAKER_00 2:26

Yeah, and that's why I'm so glad to get to share you with everyone that tunes into the podcast, because you have the same roots, you have the same railroad tracks, but they go off to the side and give people different ways of applying the same thing. And so I think a lot of people when they hear from you today, they're gonna resonate with the familiarity with it, but they're gonna be excited about the new ways to apply it. And we're really excited to talk about the VIP team, what you teach pastors in that area, and how you've done so much to help churches connect with guests. I know that's an area churches often battle with. They feel stuck, and I know that you're gonna have a great way to help them get unstuck and find some traction. But before we do, I'd love for you to just take a second to tell us a little bit about leaderscape and your heart behind it and how did that get going?

SPEAKER_01 3:09

Yeah. I won't start with I was born at an early age. We'll we'll get beyond that. I am a first generation believer. I walked into a service that uh Pastor Brian Houston was preaching at and uh came to Christ. I'd had a wild season in my life and so really buckled my seatbelt from the early days of Hillsong. My wife and I moved out with he and Bobby. Uh there were 70 people at Hillsong. And so that was our first 12 years. I became his executive pastor uh only a year or so after that. Uh and then we took over our own church on the other side of Sydney, and we just went with, you know, the Sunday-centric model. And you'll never hear me talk down a Sunday. Every Sunday is vital. You never get you never get a Sunday back again. Uh, and so there's no throwaway Sundays. But what I realized is in the first year of our pastoring our own church, you know, one of the things that God's given me is the opportunity and a love for souls. And so I would drag in the net, I'd do an order call. And that first year, from not having a lot of ever decisions for Christ in the last previous couple of years, we saw a thousand people made decisions for Jesus. And I would celebrate that. And but at the end of the year, I looked out and the same people were looking back at me. And I and I felt like a failure, to be honest. I thought, God, we have not stewarded any of these people that you've given us. And it was a real moment, actually. Uh and I realized that that God was sending us people that that were falling through the cracks. And so that started a journey. We led that church for 18 years, built a $13 million facility, and and then started leaderscape. And our our passion was to come alongside God's generals in this area of guest engagement and disciple making. I've got a conviction that God's a multiplication God. He wants everyone to double. And I know for some of you that are struggling, right? And then I wish. Everything about him is multiplication. And so what we try and do with pastors is lasso a big horizon and then help them reverse engineer that.

SPEAKER_00 5:04

Yeah, you told me something really kind of counterintuitive before we got on the call that you start with double and you work backwards from there. What does that mean?

SPEAKER_01 5:11

Yeah, I think that uh we get we get to we can get a bit seduced by uh by addition. So in other words, as long as we're up a little bit on last year, a few more bums on seats, the the the meetings are going okay, uh, you know, how's the weekend? Felt great, Sunday was awesome, God moved. And you know, I believe that's sincere, but uh sometimes it can just be rhetoric, you know. And I think God is a fundamentally disciple-making God. That's his whole burden. The last thing Jesus said before he went back to be with the Father was, go make disciples. And we know that. And if I asked, if a lineup of pastors of a hundred pastors said, Do you want to be a good disciple-making pastor? You know, it'd be a brave pastor that says no. And yet what we find is the reality is very different to the genuine heartfelt intention. In a I think a Barna research exercise, a group of pastors were asked, a couple of thousand, how many of you think you're doing a good job with disciple making? And I think 70% said, We're all good. We're doing pretty good. When asked who's got a measurable process for that, only 30%. So there's this there's this idealism gap that I believe we want the same thing, but we're just not seeing the traction that I know that every pastor wants.

SPEAKER_00 6:26

Well, I need you, I need to have you come back on the podcast and talk about discipleship. Might need to do two back-to-back episodes here because I know that's the heart of everything that you're doing.

SPEAKER_01 6:35

So you, Josh, whatever the answer is yes, whatever, whatever I can do to help.

SPEAKER_00 6:38

I appreciate that. So, yeah, and I guess like that's what I love so much about the leaderscape program, the curriculum that you do, your book Accelerate, is that when I got into it, I didn't see somebody who was just trying to offer a few quick tips to get more people in the doors. But to me, it it bled and it beat the heart of the early church to make disciples. And, you know, I know my experience at ARC, we have some really great strategies. We teach pastors to grow their church, attract killers, and things like that. But I always tell people there's a difference between the people who see exponential growth and those that don't, and it's discipleship. If you bring that expertise, you bring that to the table, you know, everything we do is just gonna help it multiply. I'd love to talk more about that, but the beginning of that is first we got to connect them to the church. And I know you work with churches all across the world. Uh you've helped some churches here in Birmingham, all across the US, from Minneapolis to all over. And I'm sure there's common themes you see. So, what is the biggest hurdle, the biggest problem you see coming up when it comes to churches not being able to connect to the church?

SPEAKER_01 7:41

I think that, first of all, if you go high level, let's get in the drone. The single greatest latent potential is how we engage guests. And we've got a little phrase for that that I believe God helped me with, and that is we don't call ever anyone a visitor. We don't call them just guests, we don't call them new people. We they are God's guests. So we have a conviction, and if you ask anyone about their journey, you'll you'll hear so many God incidences that happened. Heaven's active in the life of every individual before they not only come across the threshold of the church, but they come near one of our committed members. They are God's guests. I I got this little thought of imagine your welcome team, or you know, we'll talk a little bit about our VIP team strategy. But one of your VIP team members is at the door, Jesus rocks up and he says, I've got Bob and Kate with me here. I'd like to hand them over to you to look after. Can you make sure they're welcome today? Question, how would Bob and Kate be welcome that day? It's like, Bob, can I shine your shoes, red carpet, get this guy a coffin, whatever he wants, go wash his car. They would get royal VIP treatment. Here's my here's my conviction. That's the case for every guest that comes into the into your house. They are God's guests. So once you drill that and can get that imparted into the hearts of all of your huddle, not only your VIP team, but every one of your leaders, right there, it's a game changer.

SPEAKER_00 9:09

But that's the way it's gotta be for every guest that comes in. So just changing that perspective to God's guests is huge. When you talk about God's guests, you've created this principle that goes along with that called the VIP team to make sure everyone is treated as God's guest. So yeah, maybe uh could you define what the VIP team is and how it works?

SPEAKER_01 9:27

Absolutely. I think one of the again, if we can go high level and then into the tactics, I think there's a fundamental challenge that we have, and that is Jesus said make disciples, but I find a lot of churches let disciples. By that I mean I feel like a lot of churches it's laissez-faire. Whereas if you could see with the eye of the spirit in your foyer, there might be a whole lot of demons there. Now that might sound ridiculous and think, yeah, we cleaned them out, we prayed. What I'm saying is the enemy is not so concerned with someone putting their butt on a chair and saying amen at the right time. The enemy's very concerned when people start getting connected into not just the ecclesia, the church, but into their mission and destiny. And they start becoming disciples and disciple makers themselves. So the spiritual interference that a new person wanting to make a connection has to beat their way through. Remember, they're the least qualified to do that. A mature Christian is much, much more equipped to not only buffet the enemy away from that new God's guest, but to actually take charge. And so when we let disciples, people make a response, they fill out a card, go to the the yellow tent. If you can imagine the fight that happens, the distraction, their phone goes, someone invites them to lunch, their their alarm goes off, and they forgot they've left a roast chicken in the oven. And so I'll get to that next week, and of course they never do. And so grabbing that moment is so vital. The VIP team happened out of that little Jesus illustration. If they're God's guests, how should we look after them? What sort of red carpet should we should we give them? I contend that your welcome team, your VIP team, is as important as your worship team. Now that that communicates to many pastors. Like I said, imagine if you came into the church a little early, the lights were off, there was a single spotlight on one worship leader unplugged, sitting on the end of the stage, and that was the time that rehearsal normally happened. I think, Pastor, you'd have something to say. Excuse me, Pastor Bob, what's going on? Ah, look, couldn't get a good crew together. I just saw we'd do it unplugged. It's just me today. You would be furious. Well, maybe you would. You'd be very Christian and gracious, but you would be underneath, you'd be boiling. It's like, what the heck? What am I running here? Why aren't we as upset if we don't have one-to-one concierge for every one of God's guests that come into the house? The truth is you could spend a lot of money and have Brandon Lake, you could have, you know, Carrie Job. You could have a suite of the greatest worship leaders and have them all on one Sunday and advertise it like crazy and have your building full if you're not ready to receive those guests. You've just done your dough. You've just wasted your money. And it could be a great experience. I'm not saying it's not worthwhile, but that's why I would contend that your welcome team is as important as your worship team. And so what we've said is what would that look like to if you're anticipating and we've we've put metrics to all of this so so that it's actually not just easy to measure, but easy to manage. And so, for example, if you've got a church of, say, 300 people, then we we are believing with you for 12 guests a week. That would be 4% of that number, men, women, and children. So, so that's 12. Now, if you're expecting to connect with 12 people at 4% of your Sunday attendance, in order to get that, you probably need 8% in the room. So you probably need 20 or so, 24 that are there. If you're expecting to connect with 12 people, why would you only have two welcome team members? You say, Oh no, we got there, we got people at the door, say welcome to church. No, no, they're greeters.

SPEAKER_00 13:17

Someone might say, Well, I I don't I already have a VIP team, I have ushers and greeters. What's the difference? Yes, use a couple terms to the book.

SPEAKER_01 13:26

It's a good pickup. I think intentionality and and and purpose. First of all, a greeter, their job's done when they shake someone's hand and give them a warm smile and say, Welcome to church. Realistically. Ushers are ushing. They're doing a whole lot of other stuff. This team, we we we also we've also called them over the over the years Navy SEAL connectors or undercover angels. Because they're there by not stealth, but they don't have a, you know, Highlands or Life Church or Hillsong t-shirt with a lanyard. They're just to to the new person, they're a regular Joe Blow. They're they're just a normal congregation member, but they're part of the huddle and they are they are highly well recruited, so they're very affable, the kind of people that build trust quickly, open-faced, open-hearted, and you know, everyone's got a role in in God's church. But some it's with people, some it's behind a computer, if you know what I mean. And so uh these people are uh highly, you know, they're well recruited and they're highly trained. So they can spot a new person that might be standing there, you know, sucking on a on a on a flat white or a latte or a cappuccino, and their eyes are peeled for the door. There's a supervisor. So if you're expecting to connect with 12 guests, let's at least have a team of 10 so that we can provide these people one-to-one concierge service. Whereas a greeter, they say hi, welcome to church. An usher has a million other things that they've got to do. The only job that this VIP team has is connecting and building trust quickly with that new person.

SPEAKER_00 15:00

So once they do that, what's the guest journey from that point forward?

SPEAKER_01 15:04

Okay. So so you can imagine a a dozen or so in our little case study of of 300 people on a Sunday, say four, no, three hundred people on a Sunday, and and so they're there. And so they've to train to recognize new people, which actually is not hard. Most people walk into a new facility, uh, if they're not walking with a friend, and even if they are, they'll they'll they'll stop momentarily and they'll do this. They'll look around. They want to either look for exits or restrooms, and you, particularly with that sort of number we're talking here, it is a little more challenging. We've worked with multi-site churches in the thousands, but I'll get to that in a moment. That's just about scale, then, that you can normally recognize that those smaller numbers, who's new, who's not, you can tell by their behavior. Then the supervisor will give them a nod and that person will go up and almost bump into them. Hey, how you doing? My name's Michael. What's yours? Hey, I'm Josh. Josh, great to uh to meet you. How long have you been coming? Never, is this your first time? Because, you know, that's an obvious one. Well, actually, it's my first week. You know that, but you ask, brilliant, how did you find us? Well, my friend Ted at at work has been raving about this place, and you know, finally I've had a bit of a tough week actually, and I'm coming along. And so so we've actually scripted that kind of conversation. So we've nothing to chance, because some people who naturally are wonderfully affable and can do that on their ear, others need a little more clarity around the kind of conversation that needs to be had. And then from there you sort of say, Hey, can I get your coffee? Love to buy you one. If you've got kids, hey, let me walk you with the kids. They may not want to stay today. I want to introduce you to the best kids pastor in the country. Jolene is amazing. Uh so you walk them up, you're chatting on the way. What are you into? What do you do? You live local, blah, blah, blah. What's what's brought you here? What's going on in your world? Where do you work? So by the time you've had a little time with them, they've not just met a greeter, they've made a friend. And so this is really important. I want to emphasize a lot of churches use, you know, the VIP card. And I'm and I'm I'm all for that. You know, whether it's QR code, you know, some people's uh, you know, what's your guest strategy? Well, we have a QR code at the back of the that's just a vehicle. And or or the new person will come in and and they'll stick a card in the person's face. Can you fill this in? We want to get your details. And and I'm like, keep that away, keep that in your back pocket. You can bring that out at the end and I'll get to that. So bought them a coffee, found out how they found us. Ted, their friend, is not here this week. So you say, Hey, would you like to sit with my beautiful wife and I? We'd love to that'd be lovely. That'd be great. Trust is emerging as the walls of resistance come down. So the goal is build trust quick. The ultimate goal is that that VIP team member, one-to-one, is focused in on that person. Then toward the end of the conversation, maybe just after service, hey, it was just great to be here. There's a there's a new brunch place, you know, just just down the road. I don't know whether you're free right now. Could I buy you coffee? Actually, it reminds me of a story. I was up in northern England. This great church up there. I said to the to the guys, it was I had all of their potential VIP team members, and the guy had a thick Scottish accent. I remember this. We're we're we're in England, but he had a Scottish accent. And I said, and so you get their name and you're gonna find out who they are, how they got there, buy them a coffee, and I said, not for to go to to brunch afterwards. And he went, excuse me? Excuse me? He said, So he said, just to uh get this right, he said, you're saying, remembering we we clock on uh an hour before the service to get everything ready and so forth, have our huddle, and we do the service, and so you're saying that after the service we and he stopped himself and he said, We act like Christians. And everyone broke up laughing. He was seeing it as a roster, and he w Oh, hang on a minute. We're Christians, we're actually supposed to love people. And so we can just infuse into the hearts of all of our VIP teams just to be Christians, just to just to go out of our way for people, just to just to take the ministry of the towel, go the extra mile, and then then you'll win people to not just Jesus, but into the heart of the church, because everyone wants to have that sense of belonging.

SPEAKER_00 19:21

I think that's what the VIP team is. If you're if you have greeters, if you have ushers that are happy and are showing up, that's the first mile. The second mile is are you gonna make it personable? And earlier when you were talking about that, I kind of stopped you and interrupted you before you got to explain the connection card. So when does that uh connection card come into play?

SPEAKER_01 19:42

Honestly, I'd say right at the end. Yeah, yeah, I'd say still promote it. Language from the pulpit is very important. It's like in the back of your seat, there's a little card, and this will help you. This is not can we get your details, you know, so that we can tell you what's coming up. It's not really what we want. So this is gonna help them because what we'll help you what it will help you do is we'll simply reach out to you with one email or one conversation, whatever, you know. I I think sometimes we get a little too sensitive about about that with people. I think people will be way more put off by lack of connection and involvement than than by reaching out to them.

SPEAKER_00 20:23

I totally I totally agree with that. I think you need to offer a high touch guarantee, not a no hassle guarantee.

SPEAKER_01 20:29

Yeah, yeah. And and and you can still do a high touch, no hassle, you know. And and a little phrase that I I've encouraged people to use is we'll walk with you to the degree that you want to want us to. We'll come alongside to the degree that you feel comfortable. Because we know that this Christian life is is is not to be lived alone. We're best we're best when when we've got each other. And so so let's say the conversation advances, you you're smiling, laughing, found out a bit about each other. They've said no to the invitation afterwards, because probably 95% of them will. There'll be something on, but even the fact that you've asked and you did nothing else, Bob and Kate on the way home will look at each other and say, Can you believe that church? I didn't I didn't even think they had they made churches that friendly. Can you believe that? That he was just a regular guy. And he got us a coffee and sat with us and offered to kid take us to Prange. Can you believe that? We've found the right place, honey. We've we've found home. So toward the end of the conversation, say, Hey, could I could you spot me a number just with your phone? And if you've got an iPhone, you know, do the the phony thing together, you know. I didn't learn that the other day, so it's still a novelty for me. And and and say, I'd love to give you a call this week, see how you're going. Again, you're not talking about a cold, can you fill out the form or the card? It's a it's a warm and then once that happens, you say, Hey, our campus pastor loves to just give a personal greeting to all of those that have enjoyed us. He'll send you a little video. Would you mind if I passed your number on to him so that he could do that or to her? And so that's the segue from personal to you know privacy, the office, if you like. And and so again, it's all relational, very intentional. We do want to get their details. We do want to be able to make contact, but we don't just do it like this. We do it like like this. And and I think that that that that's also a bit of a game changer. And but it does require a bit of thorough training. A lot of people out of their awkwardness.

SPEAKER_00 22:29

And if you're listening, if you're listening instead of watching this, when he said like this, he put the connection card in in your face, and then the second this was a hug. So good pickup. Good pickup.

SPEAKER_01 22:41

If someone's awkward, it's a bit like someone who's not comfortable with sharing the gospel. They'll spray the gospel at someone, and it's not a conversation. It's not like, hey, talk to me about your spiritual philosophy. What are you into? Oh wow, that's amazing. And then that invites, what are you into? Well, you know, I I was and you give a little 90-second elevator pitch for your testimony. It's hey, you're new. And I'm poking the Kinect card into the into the camera right now. Hey, you hey, fill this out.

SPEAKER_00 23:10

I love the visuals that you've brought to this episode. I don't think I've ever had a guest uh offer so much. So you need to watch this episode.

SPEAKER_01 23:19

So but the idea is that it, you know, that it needs to be warmer, it needs to be relational, it needs to be connected.

SPEAKER_00 23:27

Yeah, I'm I made a note of that before our call because I don't want anyone to get confused that this is uh you're hassling people, right? Because you said earlier, high touch, no hassle, but in your book you call it no pressure, all warmth. And you know, and it'd be a good landing spot for us in this conversation. Why is that perspective better when you're trying to connect a new person or God's design?

SPEAKER_01 23:48

That's how God designed people, right? God God is God's design people for community. And and we feel more disconnected than ever. And so if you've got a real person with an open face and a warm heart that's interested in you, um, I think that beautifully resonates with the heart of Jesus, who came and spent thirty years on earth without doing any miracles yet, in order to um identify with us, in order to incarnate. So this this system, if you like, is the incarnation of Christ and what I think he would expect us, how he would expect us to receive someone that he's bringing into our world. We're just uh we're just asking you to receive those guests that God has already said.

SPEAKER_00 24:31

So if someone wants to take a first step with this, what's the first thing they need to do to start this process?

SPEAKER_01 24:37

Uh Michael R. Murphy is my just DM me, you know, is my Instagram handle. But we've got a really simple, very inexpensive, but very intentional membership for churches 70 people, 50 people, where they could get a curriculum that covers all of this stuff and even a monthly call to answer any questions through to those that maybe uh maybe 200 aspiring to go into 500 and a thousand, through to larger multi-site churches where they've got campus pastors, but they want to develop them, or they've got an executive team, they want to develop them. And so I'm confident that wherever you're at right now, and look, we may not be the best ones to to help you, but it it may be worth investigating. And so if you would DM me and and mention Josh and the and the podcast, Build the Church, then I will make sure that one of my head coaches that we're we're de I'm down under here. I'm Josh is in Birmingham, I'm in in Sydney, Australia, and so I'm back of the clock for some of that. But but my head coach lives up in near DC and uh we'll work out how to reach out to the Thank you, and I just knew everyone would enjoy hearing from you and getting to know you.

SPEAKER_00 25:46

So, Michael, thank you so much. And uh Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:49

Could I could I just pray? Could I could I just pray for pastors? You know, I know that many of you Josh is such a got a father's heart for for pastors. Many of you lean in, you might may not be all that interested in the the guesting yet. You might be hurting. I'm a pastor, firstly, you know, I've learnt to be a leader, but honestly, I'm I'm just a lover of people and I we consider this an absolute privilege. So let me pray, let me pray for you wherever you're at, wherever you you you're going forward or you're stuck. Heavenly Father, I just thank you for your generals. I thank you for your heart to want to help and support them. Thank you for this little contribution that I had the privilege of making with my friend here Josh this morning or today. Father, I just thank you that your hand of blessing and favor is on each one of these leaders. Father, if they're do if they're discouraged right now, if they're feeling down, if they're they're feeling the the the the sharp blade of betrayal, God, if they're if they've had a tough weekend and they're feeling the aftermath of that, Father, I pray you'd just infuse them with life and encouragement. Father, on this guest engagement piece, I pray that you'd help us to develop a conviction that you are building your church. You're sending us people, God, and and help us to to receive them with open arms and warm hearts. Father, thank you for this chance that we've had just to to to share some thoughts, to to have a conversation with those that you esteem as your generals.

SPEAKER_00 27:23

Amen. Thank you, Michael. That conversation with Michael was gold. It was so good. It was even better than I thought it would end up being, and I had high expectations for it. So hopefully you took some notes. I love what he said about treating every visitor as God's guest, as if Jesus himself had introduced them to you. There were so many great principles on there on how essential it is for us to be the church to every guest that comes into our doors. After hearing this episode, you might be wondering who'd be a good fit for the VIP team at your church. And actually, your team.church can help you with that. One of the great features about your team.church is not only does it give you a quick, easy, and fun spiritual gift and disc assessment that matches people to a team, but it also allows you to create your own teams. So you can go into your team.church and create a VIP team, write the description, and AI will build the personality profile that best matches to that. And without doing anything else, people will automatically begin matching to the VIP team at your church. A great tool that not only helps you match volunteers to teams, but the teams that are actually at your church. You can try the always free version of your team at your team.church slash disc, or you can try all of the features right now for free for 30 days at your team.church. Again, I want to thank you for joining us for this episode. We'd love it if you'd follow us on social media at buildthe.church. Give us a rating wherever you listen to podcasts. And until next time, keep building and believing strong.