Welcome to After the Fact and Knowing Faith many episodes where we look to take a big question

and address it in just a few minutes. Our After the Fact episodes this season are brought to you by our season sponsor, Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.

I love Midwestern's mottoological Seminary. I love

Midwestern's motto, for the church. And that resonates so deeply with the goal of knowing faith

to see a theological movement that is from and for the church. Joining us today is Dean and Sarah.

Dean is the founding and lead pastor of City Church in Tallahassee, Florida. He is a graduate

from Midwestern Baptist Theological

Seminary and the author of the Unsaived Christian, reaching cultural Christianity with the gospel.

Dean, welcome to After the Fact. Thanks for joining us.

Hey, thanks so much. It's great to be out my wife's favorite podcast. It's going to give you

points to points at home. Your wife's favorite podcast. Well, I'm simultaneously somehow honored and insulted by that.

It's your wife's favorite, but not yours. And I'll just, I'll leave it there. Well, I can't let JT's head

get too big. So that's why I can't say it's mine. No doubt about that. All right, well, listen,

here's the big question for you. You have spent time in a few seminaries. You've got some hours in. You have a passion

for the local church. I think sometimes people think seminary actually could compromise the local

church. Like it doesn't help the local church. How have you actually seen seminary? Like seminary

education, theological education at a formal level, benefit your

local church specifically. And what do you like to see from seminaries when they really say,

hey, we're for the church? What does that actually even mean? Well, what it prepared me personally?

You know, I have a huge responsibility to pastor a church, to be a shepherd, to be a teacher,

to preach the word. And so I didn't

walk in blind. I didn't learn as I went. There's certain leadership things I had to learn as I went,

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