Intro Episode | S7

We'll get a folks welcome to the Awakened Network podcast. I'm John Tyson, lead

pastor of Church of the City in New York and I'm joined by Sam Gibson who leads

Prey NYC in New York City. Thanks for joining us in this podcast. We're going to be

talking about prayer, revival, awakening and what it looks like to seek God for

another move of the Holy Spirit in our time. It's great to have you with us.

Well welcome back to another season of the Awakened Network podcast, John Tyson

here. Sam Gibson here. And who do we have here? Zach Meerkriebs. Folks, we have

Zach Meerkriebs. What a great bloke Zach is. And he has come to join us for the

Awakened Network podcast. Sam, why don't you give a little backstory about Chad

and then Zach and how we find ourselves in this room in this moment recording

this season. Yeah, so you guys know Chad is one of our dear friends, still one of

our dear friends, but unfortunately Chad's dad passed away or this year and Chad's

dad led a very large ministry called Becoming Love Ministries. You should check

it out. And so very unexpectedly, unfortunately, Chad was dealing with his

dad passing away and then also the board voted to hand his dad's ministry over

to him. And so basically overnight, Chad went from being a dad with a church

with a prayer movement to also overseeing this international ministry. And so

Chad had the conversation with us, like man and guys, I love the Awakened Network

about this life, but I just can't do all these things right now. And so we kind

of had to take a pause from what we were doing and just a recalibration. And

throughout those conversations, we have been developing a friendship with our

good friend Zach here. And things just kind of lined up well. So folks, just to

say this, I talked to Chad yesterday on the phone, still good friends, we stay

in contact all the time, still partly Awakened Network family in a lot of ways.

But Chad was just like, man, I've really got to throttle this down because I need

to focus in on where I'm at. And Sam Lewis Obispo, the slow life, which is

awesome. And so really over the past year, we've been developing this friendship,

had a little bit of travel time with the Awakened Network in Australia with

Zach, and kind of just figuring out what this friendship is. And so you guys are

getting ready to meet a dear friend of ours, who also has a huge heart for

revival and awakening. And as a matter of fact, been a part of one. I mean, you've

read the most this in history, but this guy actually got a real time

education and stewarting and outpouring move of God. So that's our good friend,

Zach Mirkriebe. So Chad, love you mate, miss you.

Zach, welcome to the game.

Honored.

Can you just for the folks who may not know which I doubt there's many of those,

just tell us a little bit about yourself, your personal testimony, your back

story. And then how you found yourself caught up in a little bit of a glory

portal in the Asbury Awakening. Yeah. So the greatest honor of my life has

been married to Kristen. Everyone calls her KP. We have three daughters,

Eden, Esther and Mercy. We live in Lexington, Kentucky. My story is one of

finding Jesus late in high school after growing up in a Jewish home.

The Jewish home also hid level brokenness that led to me longing for lots

of things. And that would met in Jesus. So yeah, Gamel after Christ in high

school, felt immediately called to ministry church planning. I would never

have thought myself of a revival awakening person, but I had met Jesus and

I'm a big fan of that. So I've been in church ministry, church planning,

global missions moved into leadership formation. And in that season, I missed

pasturing. So I volunteered at Asbury as a soccer coach. I was a goalkeeping

coach at Asbury. And spoke in a chapel service on February 8, 2023. And by the

grace of God and all sorts of ingredients, some known and some probably will

never know. God decided to descend and enthrone himself and a little chapel in

Kentucky. And I found myself in one of those driving seats and being a little

share my heart and pastor these students. And since we've gotten to do a lot

of life together and ministry together. And just really honored to be a part of

this conversation. Yeah, I think what's interesting is people don't know this,

but it's actually we drive down to Asbury. We catch like day five through eight

make the trip and it was coming back from Asbury that we had the idea that

we need to start the waking network. Because we remember to see how, you know,

from outside in when the world descended upon a place. And, you know,

everyone wanted to see what God was doing. But they also brought a lot of

their own stuff in there. And it was so evident to us. We've talked about this

before on own episodes. It like, you know, God comes where he's wanted. And he

does what he wants when he gets there. Like you can't take your thing and put it

under the glory of God. Like he's like, he's not sharing it. And we were talking

about, I mean, I don't mean for me, it's like, we actually need like a bunch of

friends on the earth who have like shared language, shared heart. They're like,

if this happens in New York City, that we can call like, hey, if you're, you know,

come in to come help us, that it's not like coming, you know, bring your

thing, but there's a shared heart shared language. And that's really what

Berkeley Waking Network. One of the things I love about Zach, there's many

things, but you are in many ways, not what people expect for a revival leader.

In terms of your persona, how you carry yourself, many of those things that people,

you know, like, I think a lot of times people think revival, they're like, oh, God,

they're just like psychotic intent yelling, you know, like working themselves up,

you're not like that. But when you study the kinds of people that God does use,

you're actually the exact kind of person that God uses. So the above the surface

kind of stuff, I think is often perplexing the people. The more I get to know you,

the below the surface stuff is the exact kind of thing that God uses. I'm not even

talking about things like has good character. I'm talking about like humility and

ever since humility, just hunger for the person of Jesus,

heart for people that don't know Jesus, but at a visceral level of depth, a

soul level of depth. So I'm looking forward, no matter what you've heard about,

revivals in history or the Asbury revival, those sorts of things, the person,

the person that God chose to sort of crack the door open for other people to come in,

has got some stuff to share. And I'm looking forward to hearing from you this season.

And we wanted to do a season in particular about the role of leadership in the church and

revival. What I love about this is we're going to be able to offer, I think, some very different

perspective. You've had wide experience as a soccer coach, college soccer goalkeeping coach,

plus church planner, plus church staff member. Sam, you have been on staff at one of the largest

churches in America. You've had experience as a senior leader and a campus pastor. I've been

involved in church planting. I've, I've pasted a mega church and a house church, like a very,

very small church. So got a lot of different perspective here to talk about. I can't wait for

this to get out because leadership is one of those topics that I think people have a lot of

hesitation about. It's one of those things that people are confused about. It seems like there's

so many scandals. So I think this is going to be a good season. Anything else you want to say about

our friend, Zach here? Yeah, I think just personally, let's talk about Zach. I know he just,

he loves this. So yeah, we're talking about Zach, but I think we're the greatest gifts.

I recorded this on my phone. I mean, we've talked about this before, but you know,

my experience at Asbury, recognizing, oh, this is disaster relief. I've been here before,

but even on the back end of, I mean, I don't think I might have shaken your hand at Asbury.

If we just have chatting with you at Asbury, yeah. But it's really, we connected in an event in

North Carolina a few months afterwards. And what actually gave me a heart for Zach was hearing

the level of spiritual warfare. He was personally facing in his family's faces, actually his daughter.

Now, remember, just as an intercessor, he was telling me just some things that was happening with

his, his daughter basically experiencing like true demonic attack. And it's, I believe it's

actually a conversation with birth, though, there is no revival without resistance. Yes, it's true.

I remember something in me, and I think if you know, you're carrying an intercessor calling,

you have this, like, I always live a life of prayer, but then I have what I call something in me

breaks. And it's kind of like a breaking moment. I just, like, I don't remember, he's telling me

this tour in the hall in North Carolina. He's like crying, talking about his daughter. And I just

remember, I became very holding it in was at this point, but I mean, it's like five, six.

And I just remember, like, Satan musk his hand off this girl. Like, I just like, I refuse to live

in a world in which like the adversary can put his hand on this child because of what, like,

the father's leading this outpouring, like this thing happens. It gave literally, I think Asbury

was the cloud, the size of a man's fist. There's been this like growing crowd and everyone's like,

how are you kind of crazy? And that's like, hey, the cloud, the size of a man's fist here,

rain is on the way. It's time to get ready. And I think just the, the benefit has been in walking

with you with all that really the pain behind the scenes. And like, I think we have this, like,

souped up view of what we're asking for. It's like this, this wonderful, like, oh, it's just

to be great. And it's like, I mean, conversation with you sometimes, I wish this had never happened

because it would have cost me. And so I feel like I just have, I remember seeing their friends,

like, why am I for this time of history? It just happened to be good friends. I mean,

I was actually calling my best friends, just processing through a lot of the pain, just like what

has happened on the back end of that. And it's just been such a, like, I feel like I've been

getting a PhD in, like, the, what we're asking God to do. And the price associated with it,

but then also just being in the transformers who's actually seen it done it. So just,

can I add one comment on that? I think one thing that's interesting, you know, I believe in the

provenance of God, you know, as do all Christians, but the provenance of God is, is it's such a

fascinating thing because when it's happening, it doesn't feel like provenance, it just feels like

your life. And it's not till a couple years later that you're like, oh my gosh, that was,

that was God getting us ready. One of the things you shared when we did the Awakened Network

Tour in Australia, by the way, how great was that? So that was so much fun. Also, I think the

most tired I've ever been coming off of that trip. That was a lot. I was like, gosh, I think I,

I walked in after that trip and my assistant Danielle said, what did you do to it? I got

openly rebuked. I was pulled in private to the room by your assistant and openly rebuked

you can never do that to John again. I'll take some of my wife the whole time. I'm like, these

people are in the next level. And I thought, you know what'd be great. Let's do it again this

month. We're going back. Even though what I loved about hanging out with you and some of the

things you were sharing at our time in Australia is you had done your doctoral work on vessels

who can contain Kairos moments. Basically, what kind of people does God use in outpouring levels?

Can you just share just a little bit about that? Don't unpack all wisdom.

Just because Zach started working that two years before you actually stewarded a Kairos

more of a time. So I just love the preparation of God in that. It's provenance. You're working

on something that, yeah, it was also, you know, last night, turning in some emails just to

finalize everything. And my dissertation is titled Strength in My Frame, discovering the

core characteristics and best practices of leaders that steward Kairos moments while maintaining

or advancing gospel presence. So this concept of the interior life, core characteristics,

best practices, the exterior practicals, guys and girls that can steward a spiritual crisis

while not retreating the gospel. So some people can steward Kairos moments and then they blow up

their life and the gospel retreats in their city or in their families. We need it to be maintained

or advanced. So yeah, two years before I was very, we start that and it's been delayed a little

while because I'm sure that granted you an extension. But I do want to just say one thing. One,

thank you guys so much for your kindness. And I think we'll get here in this conversation. But

I just want to testify to Lord and encourage anyone who's listening that day four of the outpouring,

they had given me an office above his auditorium. And there was times where I would go and just

curl up in there and nap or cry. And there was a day that I was crying out to Lord and the Lord said,

I'm going to send you brothers. And a testimony of the rest of the outpouring was someone had

arrived every day, whether I knew them or didn't, that were uniquely marked as an encouragement to

me. Probably the two most encouraging people that I've been able to kind of have more formal

friendship partnership has been these two men. And you know, whatever part I get in a wake and

network, it is that very thing. It is you're not alone. He is sending brothers and sisters.

You're not alone. You're not nuts. There is big brothers, big sisters, spiritual

fathers, mothers to say, hey, don't grow weary and doing good from due time. We'll report

we so if you don't lose heart. And got and this is this table is a testimony of that for me.

And I think a huge heart of a waking network is not just content creation on podcasts,

but to start sowing into more tables like this one. Absolutely. That tell you like you're not nuts.

The cost is very high. I'm really sorry. I'm going to go to war for your daughter.

I'll answer the call when you need to confess something. And that's freaking go.

Sounds fun. And that's what this season's about.

Well, in all honesty, when we were in Australia, I was like, gosh, if we had just recorded our

conversations in the A, B and B's, that would have been, I think it would have been a blessing to

many because I think behind the scenes so much of it is just friendship. It's people you can

count on. It's people who have the same heart and who are passionate about the same things.

And also people that love great steak. We had so much. We should vlog March.

And that's what you see another season. I'm going to be like a freaking Gen Z Tik Toker.

Yeah, well, I think, you know, this is a good segue into what we want to talk about,

it kind of set up this season is just this idea of, and you know, as you were experiencing,

and we've been in space for a long time, Johnny referenced it, but really feel the burden of,

hey, we need to have a conversation about leadership because what it feels like, I think,

intentionally or unintentionally, I feel like there's almost like the adversaries having a

little moment here where I'm watching and I intersect with all these tribes where it's like

the revival, prayer, awakening crowd. And there's like the church leadership or like the

marketplace sod. And it feels like there's like this growing divide that feels very unnecessary to

me where you've got like, oh, we're all about not only unnecessary, but dangerous, dangerous.

I completely agree. It's like, and you hear these things where I think people are almost rejecting

leadership. And it's like, hey, well, leadership's a spiritual gift given by God. Like this is,

I think we need that in the body of Christ that we need to, and maybe there's some things how we

frame that I wasn't awakening leader. Look like how do you store these spaces? How do you

tend to the interior life? How do you like deal with the exterior world? But you know, from your

vantage points, you guys, like, what have you guys seen as a part of this? Like there's just

language I've noticed in the body of Christ. And almost every season we do is based on,

have these conversations I'm noticing people rejecting the principle of leadership or church

leaders are having a really hard time embracing this because honestly, and I'm one of these people,

like prayer, prayer, prayer people have weaponized like their walks with God against leaders.

I talk about this all the time. The intercessors need to be a gift, but they can easily become an

accuser if I'm not careful. I mean, so when the shadow sides of my own life, I'm like, when you

guys are thinking about church leadership in the context of revival and awakening, like what are some

the gaps you're seeing right now in the body of Christ? Well, we hope to address in this season.

The first thing I want to say is I understand why people are cynical. I mean, we were talking

before we started this episode just about another Christian leader that's fallen one of my heroes,

and I was like, are you kidding? How is this? This feels impossible to me, but then it feels almost

inevitable because it just seems to be happening everywhere. No tradition is safe. You've got

reform, cessationists, and Pentecostal hyper faith, and everything in between. The enemy, I think,

is just having a field there. I understand people's cynicism about people in authority. I understand

people's disillusionment. I understand people's pain. For a lot of folks, the heart just can't

take another scandal. I think I'm just going to step back, and I'm just going to withdraw

from the concept of other spiritual authority, or I'm going to view every leader with suspicion.

I want to start by saying, I understand the instinct for that. I have felt that myself.

I've felt that I've had multiple of my direct mentors below their lives up and it

grieves me and breaks my heart. Number one, I understand the instinct. Number two, I would say,

though, Ron Walbert, who we were talking about earlier, who's just joined our team, he

has this little phrase. I've sort of meditated it on for years. He says, the antidote for abuse

is not misuse or nonuse. It's proper use. Whenever we're hurt, we tend to always overreact.

He says, the goal of health is figuring out what is the biblical vision, call, and standards,

and aiming for that. Again, I've got a lot of mercy, a lot of compassion for people who

over-correct out of a desire, either to reform or out of pain. I think one of the healthy things

that is key to leadership is showing what the biblical standard is, and there's a lot to talk

about what the biblical standard of leadership is. We've got to get back to having a

theologically informed, historically proven vision of that. That's really good. How is she exact?

Yeah, two things that really just piggyback on what you're saying, John, is one, I think the fear,

even I think we felt at Asbury, and I want to be really careful and please

rebuke me. You got to. To not just keep on talking about Asbury, but I think out of fear,

in response, we have an anti-identity instead of identity. I grew up in a broken home,

so as I look at my daughters and say, just don't be like that. Just don't be like that. There's

not life there. That's really good. But when I look at the biblical standard of fathering,

then you know, like golfers, don't hit the rough. Don't hit the rough and you hit it in the

rough. So we need to get rid of the anti-identity that awakening leadership, revival leadership,

ultimately my next point is leadership. Let's just say leadership. Shouldn't be, we can't do

this. We can't do that. We can't do that. There's so much identifiers, the offensive,

the positive that we could spend our time on, and then we won't be crippled by the

anti-deniu. And then that next thing is, by the grace of God, God made me like nerd out on

leadership and nerd out on the character of Christ, Philippians 2, and Paul's response,

Philippians 3. Ultimately, I think a lot of us as leaders could just go to Galatians 5 and be like,

do you have the fruits of the spirit? Let's just start there. If you don't have the fruits of the

spirit, you're probably going to be a pain. There is biblical standards of leadership that I think

is what's required to lead. And sometimes that's lead under an outpouring. Sometimes that's leading

and drought. Sometimes that's leading in grief. Sometimes that's leading a mega church. Sometimes

that's leading a small little prayer room. Faithfully, it's leadership. That's right. And it requires

the same thing. So I think even to carefully approach, you know, you might come to this conversation

because you need awakening, revival, glossary language. And we hope we can do that. But ultimately,

this, like this conversation is on leadership. And that will benefit whatever you've been

entrusted with. There's that beautiful verse. Remember your leaders who spoke the word of God

to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life, imitate their faith. So what a vision,

you got to remember, like, look back. There are people who have a legacy of faithfulness to God

and a fruitful life. And then the word that's used there, imitate their faith, imitate how they

trusted God and work that in your own leadership. So we're going to have a whole season discussing

what it means to do that verse, to remember, to observe, to learn how to imitate, to become the

leaders that we think are needed for this moment. So looking forward to this, this is going to be a blast.

And one click note as we kind of close this down, just you hit this. And I'm John,

I'll have you speak on this in later episodes about, you know, you talk often as leaders about

the myth of neutrality. And I just think it's important to note because I think what people often

do, you talk about anti identifiers, it's like someone right now you're listening and going,

I'm not a leader. And I just want to say this, John Maxwell, who's a, you know, he defines leadership

as influence. And so I don't care if you're a single mom, I don't care. Like we're not talking to

business leaders, we're not talking to just church leaders. Like we're talking about people that you,

if you have influence with God in the secret place, you therefore have influence with man. Like

that's my heart is, I mean, this is a whole story about young Donald and the Hebrides with my

favorite stories. But I just want to say this, if you're like started listening to this, it's like,

oh, this season is probably not for me. I just want to tell you this is for you. This is, you know,

you can steward the atmosphere of influence that God has given you, even if it's just with your kids,

even if it's just in your neighborhood, that we in this hour need leaders that were, you know,

image bear Christ in their leadership. It's the need of our not just for awakening, but just for

what we were, you know, in society. And so I just want to say, do not isolate yourself. Do not,

like, like, this is not for you. If you are listening to this, this is for you,

providentially lean in this season. We really beautiful as we kind of talk through on this

framing about the inner life of a leader. So that is actually my just praying for our listeners,

we close this episode down. Yep. So Jesus, we just pray for the mom in the drop off line,

the pastor in their office, the brand new hire, whoever we first just plead the blood over their

minds and their opinions around leadership. We cancel any lie that has subdued their leadership.

I pray that you would activate leaders, consecrate leaders, even through a podcast,

even through a radio, air pods, whatever it is that you would flow out and over these leaders.

Jesus, we pray a blessing over these conversations that you would help us only speak what you've

designed for us to speak. And we pray that anything that's just whimsome, whew, humor,

good thought would fall to the ground like dust, be forgotten. But anything from you Holy

Spirit revelation through your word, revelation from the secret place, anything that would help

the listeners formation in the advancement of the kingdom and preparation for what you might do.

We pray that we would find fertile soil in their hearts. Jesus, we love you.

You're the prize, you're the purpose, and we enthrone you in our hearts. Jesus name. Amen.

We hope you enjoyed this episode of the Awakened Network podcast. We hope this blesses you and

encourage you wherever you are in your walk. We also want to invite you to do some other resources

for you as the leaders you seek to carry this out in your daily life. You can go to Awakened Network.com.

We host one day's for leaders. We have those coming up this coming year. We also offer something

called the Awakened Network memberships. We have people from all over the world that are part of

this community who are cultivating a life with God together. It's got key notes. All these things

you can find out more about on Awakened Network.com. If this episode is blessed, we invite you to share

this with friends and encourage people along the way.