Welcome And Podcast Purpose

Announcer 0:06

Welcome to the Leading Conversations Podcast, sponsored by the Excel Leadership Network. On each episode, JD Pearring will have conversations with church planting pastors and leaders from around the country. You can learn more about how to connect with Excel at the end of this podcast. Let's join JD now and listen in on this leading conversation.

J.D. Pearring 0:29

Welcome to another edition, another episode of the Leading Conversations Podcast with Excel Leadership Network. And today we are ecstatic, ecstatic to have the uh marvelous Max Critchfield with us on the podcast. Max, thanks for being here. I am happy to be here and I'm pleased by that alliteration.

Max Critchfield 0:51

I thought that was very nice.

Union City And Tri-Cities Life

Max Critchfield 0:53

Now you're in Union City. Is that correct? That's correct. Yeah, I live uh on the border of Union City. I live in Fremont, kind of a district that's right next to it, but I'm just a stone's throw away. Yes.

J.D. Pearring 1:07

Are you planting in Union City? That's correct. What's the Union? What's that all about? Where did that name come from?

Max Critchfield 1:16

Yeah, you know, that's interesting lore, I guess. Um this is what they call kind of the tri-cities. I was learning this actually from another pastor friend here in town, but uh this like where I live, Fremont, Newark, Union City. Um, I think what I understand was that they were voting for like all of these cities to become one to become a part of Fremont. And then maybe it was both Newark and Union City, just Union City, they backed out at the last minute and decided to stay separate and not become a part of Fremont. So Union City, I think, is a composition of several kind of small towns that formed a union and kind of came together to be one city, but there's kind of several distinct neighborhoods, like historic areas that once had distinct, like were distinct towns, but then joined together to become one.

J.D. Pearring 2:15

Wow. Okay. And and what is what's the best thing about the tri-city area?

Max Critchfield 2:22

Yeah, tri-cities. Um, well, I mean, honestly, my first thought was the food. Um it's uh it's a very diverse area with like a lot of different culture. Um, I I don't know what their metrics are, but I've seen these articles several times that have named Fremont the happiest city in America. So I'm not exactly sure what what what their dashboard is, but Fremont is one of the three cities of the Tri-Cities Fremont, Newark, Union City. And so it's it's a nice place to live. It's uh it is very diverse, and that's reflected in culture, and then as I mentioned at the beginning, in food. So basically any kind of uh food from any kind of culture, you could find it probably within 15 or 20 minutes, and it's gonna be delicious. So that's something I enjoy about it.

J.D. Pearring 3:16

And for those who aren't from California, you're what what would you say 15 miles from Oakland?

Max Critchfield 3:21

Yeah, yeah, it is. I probably it's about 30 minutes south of Oakland. Yeah.

J.D. Pearring 3:27

And how far to San Francisco, the city?

Max Critchfield 3:29

Yeah, from where I live, about 45. So yeah, you want once you're in Oakland, it's just kind of a hop over the bridge and you're there.

J.D. Pearring 3:38

Okay, good, good,

From Cultural Faith To Jesus

J.D. Pearring 3:39

good. Well, hey, tell us a story. Tell us how you came to Jesus, how you got connected.

Max Critchfield 3:45

Yeah, so I grew up in a kind of my mother was kind of culturally Catholic, so my dad white, and my mom is a mixture of Mexican and Filipino and some Hawaiian. So Mexican and Filipino, especially, those are both really kind of uh Catholic culture is a big part of that cultural identity. And so I grew up kind of attending mass every Sunday. My mom, we didn't grow up talking much about faith in our home. My dad was just kind of not non-religious, and so, but he was fine with me going to mass with my mom. So I did that throughout my whole childhood. And um, I kind of joke that I had a constant crink in my neck because at the back of the kind of the sanctuary of the Catholic Church where I grew up, there was a big clock on the back wall. And so, probably 20 times per hour service, I was looking back to see how much time was left in the service before I could go home. And um that was just that was just me from as a child. I wasn't really particularly interested in the things of God. I was I was listening to it uh regularly, but um, I was really self-interested, you know, what I wanted to do, what felt good for me. And so that was like my childhood, middle school years. I got started playing the saxophone at a young age, and I got into a garage band when I was in middle school, and all the guys were older and they were into kind of partying, drinking, and things like that. And so that was sort of my my vision for the good life was a life of pleasure, you know. And uh when I was a freshman in high school, a friend of mine invited me to a youth group, and I didn't really didn't really have that at my at my Catholic church. And uh she was like, Oh yeah, come to this thing. It was a girl I was dating at the time. It's on Wednesday nights, it's fun. Uh you should you should try. So my my parents were like, I I guess. So they took me there and it was this giant room. That was probably 200 high schoolers in this room, and um, it was filled with couches. There were no even walkways between the couches. Like they they later had to remove them all because the fire marshal deemed it unsafe. But kind of in early 2000s youth group fashion, it was just like 50 couches, and you had to crawl over them to sit down. And yeah, it was it was fun, you know. The music, the youth pastor got up there, gave a little talk, and there were a lot of people there, and it was a good time. So I was like, I'm gonna keep coming to this. And so that girl, we broke up a few months later, but I I kept going. And that summer, uh, they had a summer camp. And so I went to this camp, and you know, during that camp, they had had an altar call, you know, had just been talking about Jesus in a way really I had never thought about him before. And they said, Hey, if you wanna uh if you want to put your trust in Jesus, you know, would you stand up? And so, and so I did. And I remember just thinking that week that there's something missing, you know. I I see the joy and like freedom and peace that these people have that I don't, I feel like I don't have in my life. And so I stood up to say yes to Jesus. But the problem was that um I I didn't want to say no to anything either. You know, like I wanted Jesus, so I wanted to keep doing the stuff that I was doing. And so I tell people that kind of led to the most miserable time of my life because it was I kind of think of it as like bifurcating, you know, kind of split in half, where it was just kind of I I wanted Jesus, but I wanted to hang on to my old life too. And so I got more and more miserable, kind of keeping up, trying to keep those things together. And then uh I was a junior in high school and I was really just feeling low. Like I know this sounds dramatic, you know, but as a 16-year-old, just thinking, like, I blew it, you know, like I've I've really lied to God, I've been living this double life, and um at that point a friend invited me on another retreat. At this point, I was going to everything, you know. I was like the youth group kid, and so I was like, well, I'm gonna I'm gonna go to this one, I guess. And I went there just very low, you know, just despondent in my heart. And there wasn't there was no band, there was no speaker, there wasn't there wasn't really a particularly emotional experience from the program of the weekend. We're actually just reading a book and talking about it in look in small groups. But what kind of came over me was a sense of God saying to me, Max, that nothing's hidden from me. I've seen your hypocrisy, I've seen, you know, your double-mindedness, but I I have never stopped loving and pursuing you. In fact, I'm crazy about you, and that's why I died. I came for you. Um and I felt in that moment the love of God in a way I never had before, and in a way that transformed me completely. And so I remember that Sunday, maybe it was a holiday weekend, so maybe it was a Monday, waking up to pack up and go home. And I remember sitting on the side of my bed and just thinking something's different about me. You know, like I've I've basically raised my hand to accept Christ in every camp, you know, like rededicate my life. It's gonna stick this time. But I remember just being kind of surprised as I sat there because I felt something different in me. And I would say, maybe biblically, we would say that I was born again. And um I haven't been the same since that was almost 25 years ago. And uh that was that was the start of it all.

A Clear Call To Ministry

J.D. Pearring 9:45

Wow, that's amazing. Um was there a call to ministry that happened?

Max Critchfield 9:51

Yeah, you know, so that was that weekend, that was like maybe in February of my junior year of high school. So a year later, they did that retreat again. And by this time, like some of my youth leaders, my youth pastor could see like something was different about me, you know, like I there had been a change. And so I think my youth pastor kind of noticing that was like, hey, do you want to like, you know, share your testimony, like talk at this retreat this next year, like it was coming up. And I was like, sure. Um I had never done anything like that before. You know, I'd been in a small group and stuff, and so I started to prepare my testimony. And uh maybe my youth pastor, you might have he should have probably read it before he did it, he didn't screen it. It wasn't bad, but um, it was very honest. And so kind of on the one of the nights of this retreat, I got up and uh we had you know a big bonfire, and we were kind of singing around this fire, and then he asked me to share my story, and I did. And um it was a powerful moment for the people listening, I suppose, but even more so for me. And I remember kind of standing aside, and it was a very emotional experience, and uh a youth leader, a friend or two kind of came and put their arm around me and encouraged me. And this was up at Lake Shasta, where this retreat was. And I remember it was just a very clear night, and I could see the moon. Um it was full, it just seemed so big, like a super moon. And I remember just looking up at it, and I felt that just a sense from the Lord that uh this is what I want you to do. I I want you to minister. And um I think I was 17 at that time. And uh that was that was the start of it. So I went off to college, I went to UC Davis, and kind of as I continued to grow and as I had more of a sense of my gifting and seeing that affirmed by more people, that people kind of affirm that call to ministry, and that's what I pursued in college and and beyond. But it started kind of on the shores of Lake Shasta, just kind of looking up at the moon, and I felt the Lord place that upon me that this is what I want you to be doing.

UC Davis And Spiritual Formation

J.D. Pearring 12:25

Well, that's uh that's an amazing story. So you go to UC Davis. Um, I'm not aware that it's a Bible college. So what did you take? What did you take there? Youth ministry?

Max Critchfield 12:36

Uh yeah, yeah, that's funny. I um at that point I was not thinking, you know, Christian school or anything like that. Honestly, UC Davis was the best school that I got into. I was a pretty not a particularly inspiring student. I think I had a 3.4 GPA, which I'm quite confident would not get you into UC Davis today. Um and uh I my dad, he had gone to Berkeley, he gotten his undergrad and grad degrees at Berkeley. And so I I had applied, I even gotten a special letter of recommendation from the marching band director at Berkeley. And that was that even was not enough to save my academic prospects. So Davis was the best school I got into, but interestingly enough, it had it was also the school that my youth pastor had gone to. And um, and so he said, Hey, there's a great college ministry that you can be a part of. And um, and so I uh I went off to Davis. And I mean, those were the most significant formative spiritual years of my life were there. And in fact, my college, my college Christian fellowship was called College Life, and it was the local minute, it was the ministry of a local church there in Davis. Um, and so I just got connected in community. Uh like you said, it's not a Bible college, but I was a I was just so young and new in faith, I was like, well, what do I? I went undecided, I didn't have a major. And then after my second year, I was like, well, I really like music and I'm really into Jesus, so I'm gonna just major in music and religious studies. And so that's what I did. And actually, my professor, the person who taught the majority of kind of the Christian courses in the religious studies um department, was also like an adjunct professor at a local seminary, and he was a very eclectic kind of uh person, um, but incredible knowledge. And um, and so he taught classes on like the letters of John and Pauline theology and the gospels and uh you know, just all sorts of things. So I sort of got a seminary education at UC Davis.

J.D. Pearring 14:55

Yeah, yeah. Well, that's cool. What happened after that?

First Ministry Role In Benicia

Max Critchfield 15:00

Yeah, so I I uh I started dating a gal. We both got saved in the same ministry as high schoolers back in Fremont, and we started dating in uh my sophomore year of college. So we dated long distance. She went to Cal State Hayward, they've since renamed it Cal State East Bay because they are ashamed of Hayward, but um they never heard that she went to it, she went to Cal State Hayward, and I went to Yeah, I they're about an hour apart, so we dated long distance. So I proposed to her in the uh winter of 2007, and then I think I woke up the next day and I was like, well, if we're gonna get married, I need like a job. So um I at that point there was like the youth specialties job board was sort of the hot spot for finding a job. Um and so I posted my resume there, and I think the next day I got a call from a church that was desperate for another youth pastor. They'd been out without one for I think nine months, maybe at that point. And uh it was in Benicia, which is about halfway between Fremont and Davis in the North Bay area, North San Francisco Bay Area. And so um, yeah, had a few conversations with them, and I ended up uh going there, and I was the youth pastor there for almost nine years. In fact, there's a funny connection we've already talked about. That was New Harbor Community Church, and I think that was a church you helped to start.

J.D. Pearring 16:36

So uh yes, Lori and I came from Colorado. We parachuted into Benisha and uh started a church from complete scratch to there. Um didn't know didn't know a soul. Uh uh it was just it was like uh a crazy, it was a crazy place to go, except at the time Banisha was like the best place in the Bay Area to live. And um it was a great place to raise small kids. We loved it. So yeah, we were we started that church. Yeah, to hear that you were the youth pastor there later. That's really cool.

Max Critchfield 17:18

Yeah, Banisha is beautiful. Those were formative years for life and ministry, first years of marriage, first time in a full-time ministry role. And yeah, the person who succeeded you, uh Kelly Patchen. Um, he was my pastor. He's still the pastor there, he's been there for almost 25 years. A million years, yeah. A million years. It's been there a really long time and uh still serving faithfully. So he was my first kind of mentor in full-time ministry, and I'm just grateful for that experience.

J.D. Pearring 17:50

So wow. So you're in Benicia, and then what happened after

Returning Home And Loving The Region

J.D. Pearring 17:55

that?

Max Critchfield 17:55

Yeah, I had the chance to um come back to Fremont. And so at that point, we had our had our first child, we were pregnant with our second, and um yeah, I and this is part of a a theme that's emerged of my story, especially in the last well, my whole life, I guess, but it came into sharper focus in the last 10 years was like a growing passion and care for this particular region for the Bay Area. And uh so obviously when you start to have kids, having family nearby makes a big difference. And um I think this at this time, my wife's dad had passed away. He had uh died unexpectedly in 2011 when we were had been married just for four years, I think at that point. And so family had come in even sharper focus as something that was really important. Um and so I actually had the opportunity to come back to be the high school pastor of the group where I had become a Christian. Oh, wow. Um, yeah. So that that place that my girlfriend had invited me to when I was 14 years old, they were in a time of transition. Um, I still had a lot of friends, people I knew that went there, worked there. And so they said, Hey, um, would you be interested in in making this move? And so um, yeah, just with our second child on the way, and you know, having in-laws, grandparents close by is such a blessing and gift when you're having children. And so it it checked a lot of boxes for us and it brought us closer to family and also to a region that God has given us a heart for. So that's where we went next. Moved back to Fremont in 2016, 10 years ago now, and I was the high school pastor there for I think just over three years. Yeah.

Why Church Planting Came Into Focus

J.D. Pearring 19:56

Well, where when did the church planting bug bite you?

Max Critchfield 20:00

Yeah, well, so yeah, I was there at Bridges, and then I went on to be the college pastor at a church called Three Crosses. It's in Castro Valley, which is really kind of central East Bay. Castro Valley is kind of it's interesting because it's the largest unincorporated community in the Bay Area. I think it's the largest city that's not a city. So I think 65,000 people live in Castro Valley, but it's not actually a town. Um, it's they never incorporated to be a formal city, so it's just like kind of overseen by the county. Uh, so it's kind of a quirky, and it's also really at like the heart of the East Bay. And the East Bay, uh, yeah, for people who might be unfamiliar, like yeah, San Francisco's on the peninsula. It's like we don't call it the West Bay, but that's what it is. It's like the western side of the San Francisco Bay Area, and then Castro Valley. It's it's it can be a bit kind of gritty, you know. You have some like more urban type areas interfacing with more suburban type spots, but they're all really close together. And Castro Valley is kind of a mashup of all of that, and um, and so in going there, it felt kind of like I was getting closer to the heart of the bay. And um, I was, as I was working there, I got um, they invited me into an ordination process, and I was ordained there, I think, in 2022. And I think what dawned on me in that in working there and going through ordination was that God had really given me a heart for this region, for the East Bay area. And um, my great grandparents actually moved up here from Southern California in 1929, I think, to grow straw to grow strawberries. So, at as of the staping, you know, my family came here almost a hundred years ago to the East Bay. And so I think I'm a fifth generation resident of this place. And um I as I look around, you ask me what I like about it. I think a theology of place is really important to me. And that like this is um it's a unique calling from God to this region that's very significant and is a significant part of my life. So yeah and working at that church just a call to the region kind of came into focus a bit more that just a sense from God like I want you to be a shepherd and to advance my kingdom here in the East Bay. And so maybe two years ago had a job change and at that point was just kind of thinking okay I I have this heart for this area, for this region, and um a growing sense of like just my ministry calling. So maybe church planning is is kind of the next step for me. Like it had just it had sort of been on the back burner I the church had hosted uh that exponential conference maybe the the year before my job change. And so I had I never really grew up in churches or worked at churches that talked or thought much about church planning. And so it was that much on my radar. But I remember going to that conference and getting ordained at this church and like wow a heart for kingdom advance particularly in this area. Now I'm hearing about church planning. I'm meeting more church planters. In fact the missions arm of that church is about resourcing church planners around the world they have this global ministry where they support like hundreds or thousands of church planners in all these different countries. And so all these different kinds of little streams were coming together and um and then that's when we jumped into it.

Launching Living Hope And Building Unity

Max Critchfield 23:57

How is it going how's it going? Yeah it's um it's exciting I think somebody said that to me yesterday they're like oh yeah it's exciting and uh my wife she tells me sometimes you have a really interesting definition of exciting um so as we're talking we just uh it's been about a year we had our first we started every week worship services in September of 2025 and we had a a series of preview services starting June July August of 2025 so it's been about a year since we started meeting regularly and um it's really incredible to look around and see um just what God has done and is doing in the lives of people the ways he's drawing people to himself I have just the benefit of you know personally great support, guidance, mentorship um people who are really cheering there's this like a growing I guess you could call unity movement in the Bay Area, particularly where like a an ecosystem of kingdom-minded churches and organizations and networks are all really coming together to uh pool resources to plant churches and see kingdom advancement in a way that I've never seen in the time that I've been here. So um it's really exciting and I feel just super honored to be a part of that story.

J.D. Pearring 25:34

Well it's um it's amazing and it's just uh uh honorable that somebody from the Bay Area would want to plant in the Bay Area when we were there we'd have people come from the Midwest they'd they'd come out they'd uh go to Pier 39 have some uh have some clam chowder in a bowl drive down Lombard Street go to a Giants game and say hey I think I'm gonna plant in the Bay Area and uh it was like oh this is a different this is this is a different place than any other place. It's just so different.

Dahlia Farming And Kingdom Metaphors

Max Critchfield 26:15

Um there's uh you know I wasn't a big believer in territorial spirits till we moved back there to plant and um uh it's just uh uh it's it's great that you're there I'm so happy that you're you're planting and uh you know we're trying to help anybody that goes to the Bay Area man you got my uh vote you got my respect so keep it up hey talk about I I know you're a uh is it a dahlia guy what's the deal yeah sure flower farmer is you're a flower farmer yeah so I I wouldn't say I'm like co or bivocational that that's like my other job but it has it's a significant a passion project an outsized passion project how about we call it that um but maybe maybe 12 years ago I was at a family dinner um for Easter actually and an uncle of mine he brought these bulbs basically they call them tubers kind of like a potato is a tuber um to our dinner and he said hey I uh I grow these flowers called dahlias and he was living I don't think he wasn't married at the time I think he was living with a roommate in San Francisco and the flower of San Francisco is the dahlia and so this his roommate was a member of this dahlia society where they gather monthly they talk about growing these particular flowers of course they do there's a section there's you know there's an affinity group for everything right so um they were the original flower child uh exactly yeah so they he had these tubers in a bucket and I was like well I guess I'll take them home I was living in Venetia at that time and I did not even I didn't have a yard I didn't have uh basically any dirt I just got a few pots I put them on my patio and I planted these flowers and like I said my great great my great grandparents came here to uh farm so I I grew up kind of around agriculture I mean obviously so much of the bay land that used to be fields and orchards is now homes and you know shopping malls and all that thing like that. Um but so I grown up you know gardening and that kind of stuff my parents are into it my grandparents all that stuff and so I planted them and I watered them and they came up and I was just kind of enthralled by them. I thought they were beautiful and amazing. So I just started learning more about them and I grow I've grown more basically every year. So that first year I grew two then it was like 15 I I used I asked a congregant in the church if I could use an unused part of their yard to grow some of the flowers. So I I grew like 15 at their house and then I grew 30 and then we moved to Fremont I grew 50 in my backyard. Then I asked my neighbor who had a part of his yard he wasn't using if I could grow 300 dahlias in his yard and he said yes. So um and now we have a family farm property down in Watsonville, which is by Santa Cruz and I grow about 2000 of these dahlia plants um and we open seasonally for UPICs. I've sold them at farmers markets direct to florists I've hybridized my own varieties um it's not something that we depend on for like a source of income year to year, but it is a significant way that we kind of share beauty with people and it it has been interesting to see the intersection of the flower farming and the church planting coming together in ways that I didn't expect because when it came to like okay planting it's like well I actually know a lot about planting you know um and when we think about the teaching of Jesus you know and the teaching of the scriptures a lot of times the illustrations from which you know the scriptures draw upon to describe the dynamics of the kingdom in the spiritual life are agricultural you know so uh stay tuned for the book that was pending no um I just so I being kind of in the soil and watching things grow and all of that stuff and uh I mean I have a that's why I'm a church planner have a have a bajillion ideas and a a book called Wisdom from the field is one of my ideas that that may never come to fruition but if no you gotta you gotta do it you've got to you gotta do it.

J.D. Pearring 30:52

I'm gonna ask keep asking you about it. Okay.

Max Critchfield 30:55

And uh will you will they will dallies grow um if they grow in Venice will they grow here in uh you know elk grove in the Sacramento area you know what they they don't like oppressive heat so if it's over 90 degrees consistently they they don't grow they just survive so generally you need to have them so if Elk Grove is a little cooler I know Sacramento in the summer gets I think pretty regularly above 90 so they wouldn't be super happy there but they grow big they grow great here in the East Bay in fact there's a city called San Leandro which is on the other side of the peninsula from San Francisco and uh the dahlia is actually the official flower of that city as well. So um yeah there's a lot of places they grow well but they can't be too hot.

J.D. Pearring 31:49

Well um yeah maybe we can you know do some things to put them in the shade and stuff or uh I want to get I want to get a few bulbs from you and give it a shot. Okay. Absolutely I would be happy to share them with you.

Max Critchfield 32:03

And I'm uh I'm actually looking up here the dahlia some of these pretty cool looking so what's interesting is that I mean dahlia it's it's a gigantic umbrella that covers literally tens of thousands of different types of flowers. So they come in all sorts of colors shapes they could be the size of a quarter they could be 14 inches across they come in basically every color except brown and blue um and black although you can get pretty close with a really really dark purple so yeah I've spent almost 14 years now um learning about them growing them and it has been fun to just and I think that like when I go to you know the church planner assessment center and they ask like oh have you are you entrepreneurial like have you grown something you know and it's like well yeah I guess I kind of have uh so all right all right hey um you've been doing this for a while let's uh end with uh give us a leadership tip yeah yeah I think um man

Leadership Tip Prayer As The Work

Max Critchfield 33:17

well I think what's top of mind for me we're going through a series on on prayer in our church and I've just been reflecting on my own journey of church planting and I would say that this has been the most faith building time of my life in part because um it's been the most desperate time of my life in terms of the most meaningful things and I was just saying this last Sunday to the church like the most meaningful things that we would hope to happen here at our church only God can do. And so um I think I've just come up against that again and again in my life and church planning has particularly kind of um brought that to the forefront that maybe I could you know tweak some things and push buttons to get a gathering of people but for God to build his church that's supernatural. And um that if I only succeeded in creating a gathering but the church was not built and advanced which can happen that it would not be successful in a kingdom perspective. And so all of that to say that the importance of of prayer and praying like I've never prayed before in my life has really come to the forefront. And I appreciate I've appreciated along the church planning journey like some of the first advice I ever got was gather a group of people to start praying for you and start praying with you for the work that God wants to do through you. And um that's only deepened as I've gone through this journey. And so I think I've been guilty of seeing prayer as just kind of like the stuff I sprinkle on top of my plans. You know and I don't think that historically you know throughout my Christian life I've seen I think uh Vance Pittman says is prayer isn't what we do before the work prayer is the work. And um that's only grown for me as I've gone along this process. And there's a lot of work to do, you know, leadership development finance vision preaching leadership development you know all of those things are important. But I think so often I would just focus on those things and just pray and ask Jesus to kind of bless my plans and this journey has really turned that on its head that I've just seen more and more all of that flows from a life of prayer and just a heart that God has given me to pray. And so as far as a a leadership tip of like okay what can I you know do to see this and move forward in a meaningful way I've just been asking God would you cultivate a heart for desperate kingdom prayer and would you do that in some other people like we started found a couple on our church plant team that really has a passion for prayer. I was just praying with them one day and I just felt like a power in our in our collective prayer. And so when we finished I said hey would you guys be open to meeting with me more regularly to just pray and I mean their eyes lit up it was like they won the lottery they were so excited and so weekly for the last couple months we've been having uh I guess it's been two months now maybe a weekly prayer meeting at their house and it's been so enriching in seeing answers to prayer and just coming back to that truth that like most of the meaningful things that we will hope to see in Living Hope Church or in any place is only the work of God. And if that's true then we have to pray.

J.D. Pearring 37:04

So great great that's a really good reminder. Hey thanks for what you're doing thanks for uh all the planting that you're doing and uh for being willing to be uh you know one of the pillars in the Bay Area. So really appreciate your story. Thanks so much.

Max Critchfield 37:24

Thanks for having me. This is super fun.

Excel Network Link And Subscribe

Announcer 37:28

Thanks for joining the Leading Conversations podcast. We hope that you found it both helpful and encouraging. At Excel Leadership Network our focus is on the church planter rather than the church. If you'd like to find out more about us visit our webpage at excelnetwork.org. Don't forget to subscribe to this podcast so you don't miss any future episodes. See you next time with another leading conversation