You Don’t Have to Be Remarkable : Faith Eury Cho

Full-Text Transcript

Jason Daye
Hello, friends! Welcome to another insightful episode of FrontStage BackStage. I’m your host, Jason Daye, and each episode I have the privilege of sitting down with a trusted ministry leader, and together we dive into a topic to help you and pastors, and ministry leaders just like you really thrive in both life and leadership. And I am really excited about this week’s guest, Faith Eury Cho. She is an awesome Christ-follower. She is a pastor, a writer. She is one who has planted and also co-leads, along with her husband David, an incredible life-giving church, Mosaic Covenant, there in New Jersey. Her most recent book is titled Unlikely and Anointed, and she is joining us here on FrontStage BackStage. At this time, I’d like to welcome Faith Eury Cho to the show. Faith, welcome to FrontStage BackStage.

Faith Eury Cho
Jason, I’m so glad to be here. Thanks for having me.

Jason Daye
Yes, super excited about our time together. Now, Faith, you are a busy woman. Not only are you pastoring a church plant there in New Jersey, but you are a wife, you are a mom of four awesome kids, and as we’re recording this, it is summertime. And as a father of six kids, I know that summer is fun, but it also can be very chaotic with a bunch of kids. So thank you for making time to hang out with us here on FrontStage BackStage.

Faith Eury Cho
Oh, absolutely! I mean, this is a great excuse for them to be at the pool. So they’re not complaining.

Jason Daye
There you go. Awesome. Now, Faith, as I was reading through your newest book, Unlikely and Anointed, awesome book. But I’ve got to tell you, right on the front end of this book, and in this book, for those of you who are watching or listening along, this book really dives into the power of the Holy Spirit. Super awesome. But on the front end of this book, you touch on some things that, as I was reading it, I was thinking, for those of us in ministry, you touch on some things that I was like, man, we have got to dive into this because there’s some really really good stuff here that I want to get into because it’s so important for those of us in ministry. Whether you’re new into ministry or you’ve been in ministry a long time, you talk about a couple of things, a couple of freedoms actually that I was like, man, this is good stuff, and I want to spend some time on it. You talk about the freedom to be unremarkable, okay? I loved this when I read this. I was like, we have got to talk. I’ve got to talk to Faith about this. So talk to us a little bit about this. Let’s unpack this: the freedom to be unremarkable. This is huge for us in ministry because a lot of people get this wrong. Let’s say that. In ministry, we miss this. So talk to us about this idea of the freedom to be unremarkable.

Faith Eury Cho
Yeah, I think sometimes without realizing it, some of us try to be sensational, epic, awesome, appealing, if you will. Thinking that is the power to accomplish what we need to accomplish here on this earth. I mean, as a ministry leader myself, I am no stranger to strategy conversations, to branding conversations, marketing conversations, and not to say that all that is useless. It’s not. With some of it, there could be some divine wisdom. However, I think when we default to thinking that it is going to be because we’re awesome, that we get to accomplish awesome things, I think there’s something really faulty in that. The only awesome thing that I carry that will have any impact on eternity is the Holy Spirit, and I think when we fall into that mindset that we have to be remarkable, unintentionally we fall into this spiritual exceptionalism. That there are the exceptional people that are mightily used by God, while the rest of us are just called to be on the sidelines and just clap for them. I mean, that’s why we call our sons Moses, Abraham, and all these people that we feel are epic, right? But aside from the highlight moments in the Bible that we remember, recite, and preach about. I mean, these were just ordinary people who had ordinary lives. And I think if you were to really be a fly on the wall in their everyday living, there would be nothing Instagrammable about it. There would be nothing epic about it or sensational. And so I think when we realize that, it frees us from half the struggle and striving that we impose upon ourselves in order to become fruitful in ministry.

Jason Daye
Yeah. You know, it’s interesting, Faith, because we live in a time where there is so much almost pressure, even in ministry, and there’s a lot of celebrity status, even in ministry, right? You mentioned the Instagrammable moments, and there’s this comparison trap that we can find ourselves in. And what’s interesting is, all of us who feel called into ministry, we feel called into ministry because we feel called to make a difference, right? Because eternity is at stake, right? And that’s a good thing. That’s an important thing. Like, we’re giving our lives to this because Christ gave His life to this. So there’s this tension between, man, we want to help share the gospel message so that people can embrace this and their lives can be transformed. So this is a big thing. But there’s this whole balance in this. So talk to us a bit about this. How do we hold this tension of this amazing, huge, life-transforming thing, but not let it get out of balance, right?

Faith Eury Cho
Yeah, absolutely. And nothing is wrong with being hyped for kingdom work, right? But I think when we’re more hyped by the kingdom work and accomplishment than the actual presence of God, then we will get disappointed and burnt out pretty quickly, because you know, as I know, as many of the listeners will know, that there are a lot of mundane moments in ministry. There are a lot of lackluster tasks and sacrifices in ministry that could be a huge turnoff. As somebody who also had a moment that really convicted me to go into full-time church work. I know that a lot of folks, not everybody, but a lot of folks-that entered into seminary and turned to church work and start to volunteer at higher levels. We had this like Moses burning bush sort of a moment where we encountered Holy Spirit and felt this burn, this call, this sense of oh man, I’m called to the nations, or I’m called to this generation. And I’ll be honest, a lot of times those sort of words are used to really activate this generation of missionaries and the sent out ones, if you will. But when we realize, oh wait, like I’m a sent out one of the Lord, but yet I still have to clean up the office. I still have to afford gas. I still have to have uncomfortable conversations and suffer at times, right? And I think we get really turned off. And the only thing that will keep us from burnout is if we’re burning with love for Jesus. He has to be the most awesome thing in our minds. Because if the purpose of why we serve is to accomplish anything, then we’re going to quickly find reasons not to serve. But if the purpose of why we serve is because of the worth of our Lord Jesus Christ, and because of what He’s done on the cross. And if we’re burning with that love and adoration, then even when we are sweeping the sanctuary or dropping off youth group kids at their homes before 9 p.m., even those moments will feel like an honor, and even those moments, you will realize, have the anointing of the Holy Spirit on them.

Jason Daye
Hey friends, just a quick reminder that we provide a free toolkit that complements today’s conversation. You can find this for this episode and every episode at PastorServe.org/network. In the toolkit, you’ll find a number of resources, including our Ministry Leaders Growth Guide. This growth guide includes insights pulled from today’s conversation, as well as reflection questions, so you and the ministry team at your local church can dig more deeply into this topic and see how it relates to your specific ministry context. Again, you can find it at PastorServe.org/network.

Jason Daye
Yeah, I love that. In Unlikely and Anointed, when you’re talking about this freedom of the unremarkable, you use a couple of words. One word is unseen. Another word is maybe even a little more rough. It’s unwanted. So talk to us about these words: unseen and unwanted.

Faith Eury Cho
I think we have to be the opposite. Like I think we assume we have to be the opposite in order to be effective for the kingdom of God. I mean, oftentimes, when we say yes to spiritual leadership, there’s usually a hero in our hearts that is revered by many, that has a great reputation, and we could unintentionally believe that’s what we have to become in order to be effective for the kingdom of God. I guarantee you, when we all pass and we get to see Jesus face-to-face, when the Lord returns, there are going to be so many that are being rewarded that we do not even recognize, right? We may even be thinking like, who is that person? I think we think that it’s going to be people who we know today, who are highlighted or spotlighted on platforms that we assume, okay, that person is greatly used by God. But I am positive there are going to be people in heaven who we are like, where were you? You didn’t have a podcast, you didn’t write a book, you didn’t have 2 million followers on social media. Where were you? And so I think when we think about it from eternity’s perspective, I think we’ll realize so much of our hustling doesn’t really have eternal significance, and that if we truly want to be effective, technically, we have everything that we need right now, which is the Holy Spirit in us and His guiding voice.

Jason Daye
Yeah, I love that. Whenever you talk about this idea of freedom, from experiencing this freedom of being unremarkable. What is that freedom? What is the freedom that we get from that?

Faith Eury Cho
The freedom to obey, really. And really hear God’s voice purely. I wonder how much of the distractions will be out of the way if our fight to be relevant, awesome, respectable, heard, and seen is out of the way? I remember there was this one time when I was in a podcast conversation, and somebody asked Faith, as a female leader, how do you ensure that when you walk into a room that you are heard and that your voice is really heard? And that took me back for a moment because the question sounded really wholesome and actually sounded very normal, right? But when I really thought about it, I realized, wait, actually that question is potentially a great distraction because nowhere in the Great Commission, did it say, Now, go and be wanted, heard, and seen. Right? It just said simply, Go and make disciples of all nations, teaching them, baptizing them, and so on. And I think when we start to mistake the self-branding, the trying to put up a good face, or trying to be what everybody needs per se, right? And when we get into that hamster wheel, I feel like we’re distracting ourselves from the ultimate assignment.

Jason Daye
Yeah. That’s good. You also talk about this freedom of being misunderstood. So not only being unremarkable, but being misunderstood. What do you mean by the freedom to be misunderstood, as well?

Faith Eury Cho
Oh goodness! I mean, any church leader, spiritual leader, if you don’t know the pain of being misunderstood, just wait and you’ll find out, right? Just give it a minute and it’ll come around. And there’s a lot of guilt to that. I know, personally firsthand, but also just from the anecdotes that are shared amongst leaders of just the sorrow and the pain of losing people, close friends, people that you thought, We’re going to do life together, right? And you may have never gotten the chance to get it right. And this is not the topic of just reconciliation alone. There are just some people that won’t let you even get there, and there are some people that are really just determined to keep misunderstanding you. And I think sometimes we think it’s our job to make sure to right that wrong for them. That it’s our job to make sure that they do not keep misunderstanding you. But unless the Lord has genuinely called us to engage in those conversations, we are not supposed to be chasing people’s view of us. A rightful view of us. And I think when we stop managing the way people handle our name, handle our reputation, I think that really sets us free to really focus on loving people, because I think we think we’re loving people when we’re trying to manage their perspectives of us, when actually, we’re just trying to preserve our ego and our feelings at that point. And hey, I get that, and I have a lot of compassion for that. But, oftentimes, we’re distracted in those moments. Let God handle your name. Let God handle your reputation. The moment we said yes to serving Jesus, the matter of the way people see us or perceive us – that is God’s to deal with, not ours.

Jason Daye
Yeah, that’s good. That’s good, Faith. So, let me ask you this: On your journey, how did you come to develop in this? This unremarkable. This misunderstood. How did you get here? Because I’d have to imagine, maybe I’m wrong. Correct me if I’m wrong, Faith. I’d have to imagine that you didn’t start off in ministry, you and David probably didn’t start off and go, man, I’m great at being misunderstood. I’m great at being unremarkable from the get go. I mean, how did that develop? On your journey with the Holy Spirit, on your journey with God, what did God have to take you through on that journey for you to begin to understand, you know what this does look like in me?

Faith Eury Cho
Yeah. That’s a great question, and you’re right. I mean, and this was not my plan, but I went into ministry at 19 years old, so I was really young, unseasoned, immature, and basically, a lot of what I write about in this book were things that I myself had to learn to let go of in order for me to bear the fruit of the Holy Spirit. So if I really want to taste the joy, the peace, the loving kindness, and all of that, I have to let go of the ego. I have to let go of this need to be relevant. I have to let it go. And what really allowed me the grace to learn these lessons isn’t because I was so pious, but it was because I was so miserable, right? I was like, wait, you said your fruit is peace, love, patience. But I’m miserable. Why am I so miserable? And I realized, wow, I’m engaging in all these battles that I’m not called to be engaged in. I’m not called to fight some of these battles. And I had to really learn the hard way, even for myself, what to let go of and what to hold on to. Like, what’s the reward here? Is it for them to know that I’m right, or is it for God’s power to be upon me when I share His word, right? We have to know which battle to really engage in, and the enemy will always tempt us to engage in the warfare for our glorification, for our dignity, per se.

Jason Daye
Right, right. So, when it comes to the power of the Holy Spirit, which is what you are really unveiling in Unlikely and Anointed, how did you see, and what were you learning? What was God revealing to you through the Holy Spirit that helped you kind of mature into your role as a minister, so that you could really grow in ministry in these ways that you could serve more fully and experience that peace, and become more patient, and grow in that love as you served?

Faith Eury Cho
I had to do a deep dive on what I believe power is supposed to be. You know, like when we’re young, we have this very ideal, naive perspective on what power is. And we think power, in order to wield it, we have to also be powerful. We have to be awesome. We have to be capable. We have to be equipped. When you see power mentioned in the New Testament, oftentimes, is correlated with grace. It’s not correlated with our intelligence, our greatness, or our experience. A lot of the reason why people disqualify themselves is because they feel like they lack those things. And I think the great news in all of this, and I realize, wow, the Western Church is starting to go to sleep because we are discounting ourselves, disqualifying ourselves from being used by God, because we feel like we are not known. Because we don’t have the knowledge. That we don’t have this experience. All of which Holy Spirit does not need, right? The Samaritan woman was saved for like 30 seconds before she was able to evangelize to her village, right?  The Holy Spirit is the power, and we don’t wield this power; He wields us. And I think it was the many moments of feeling powerless in ministry, where I had to really go back to Scripture and figure out, Wait, where am I getting this wrong? Oh, I think I’m trying to access power by how articulate I am. I feel powerful when I’m dressed a certain way, when I’m known a certain way, when I sound a certain way. Why does that make me feel powerful? And why is it so important to God that we embrace our weakness to the point where, although Apostle Paul cried out to the Lord to take away his thorns, God wasn’t like sure, like let’s get rid of those thorns so that you could feel powerful again. But actually, he said, no, my grace is sufficient for you. My power is made perfect in your weakness. What is it about needing to make sure that we are fully aware of our authentic essence before God could truly use us? Right? I mean, there’s been so many times, and I’m sure a lot of leaders are familiar with this experience, when I would preach expecting fire to fall from the sky and just nada, right? And yet, I have moments, like I remember I started a youth pastor position when I was seven months pregnant, and this was a position that was empty for quite a bit. So a lot of parents were upset when they found that it was me that was hired. Like, what we waited a year for a youth pastor, and you hired a seven months pregnant woman, right? And I remember holding a PTA meeting, and all these dads came into the room, and they had their arms crossed, and they said, How do you expect, in your condition, to be effective in this role? And I don’t know what I thought was the right answer to that. Maybe it was hormones. Maybe it was God. But my response was just show up to Sunday service tomorrow, and you will see. Just show up, and you will see. And I don’t know what I was expecting with all that. I just said it. I had to go home, you know, and I just said it. But I remember going that following Sunday. I preached, and the Holy Spirit came upon these students. And these fathers, their children were coming to the altar. Their children were raising their hands in worship. And so they all became a part of my staff the following week. They all became my volunteers. I can’t do that by myself. I can’t do that with wit, with strength, right? I was seven months pregnant. I mean, I don’t know how other women are when they’re seven months pregnant, but I was just the waddling duck at that point, you know? But it was the Holy Spirit, and that made me realize, wait, maybe it’s not because of me. Maybe my weakness is not an offense to His power. Maybe I just need to embrace my weakness and acknowledge His power in order to truly walk in it. The times when I’ve seen God move the most mightily was when I was the most useless. And I started to really correlate that over time, which led to a lot of the revelations that I wrote in this book.

Jason Daye
At PastorServe, we love walking alongside pastors and ministry leaders just like you. If you want to learn more about how you can qualify for a complimentary coaching session with one of our trusted ministry coaches, please visit PastorServe.org/freesession. You don’t want to miss out on this opportunity. That’s PastorServe.org/freesession.

Jason Daye
Yeah, you know what I love about that, Faith, is that we should get that because we read the Bible. And throughout Scripture, again and again, God’s tries to drill that into us because example after example after example, it’s like He shows us, right? But then we, in our just humanness, I guess, we were like, no, we think we have to have it all together and have all the answers. And we’ve got to figure it all out and show our competence. But then God’s like, no, look at Scripture and all these examples of people in their weakness, people in their seven months pregnant waddling around, right? I mean, that’s what I do. I’m God. This is whom I use. It’s so awesome. I love that story. That so good. So, Unlikely and Anointed. Awesome book, demonstrating again and again how the Holy Spirit shows up through anointing us. Demonstrating God’s power in unlikely ways through us. What are some of the great lessons that you have experienced of the Holy Spirit in your own ministry that surprised you with God’s power in ways that are just reminding you that I’ve got you, I’ve got this, I can be trusted, and I’m here for you? Can you just share some of those reminders, just as a way of encouragement for us?

Faith Eury Cho
You know, the most recent, I guess it’s not that recent anymore. But the biggest reminder for me was when we were trying to church plant in 2020, and that wasn’t the original dream, right? You know, that just became what happened. We were supposed to launch in October of 2020, but we ended up launching February of 2022, and for all the reasons you would expect in 2020. And there was a time when, I mean, the worst of it was just basically, we were three weeks away from being homeless. We didn’t have much savings left in our account. It was 2020, so in my area of the metropolitan New York City area, which is northern New Jersey, it was a ghost town still, right? Not a lot of people were allowed about. Basically, we didn’t have, aside from the presence of God, we didn’t have the two other things that you need to build a church, which is money and people, right? And I literally took out my phone, put it on the desk when I was praying, and said, Jesus, I don’t have anyone left to call. I am not popular enough in this state to be able to build something like this. I have nothing. I don’t even have like the hope or the optimism for this. And if this is a test of faith, I think I’m failing. And I remember praying those sorts of prayers. Like how can you use us at this point? Because, at this point, our original launch team left because it’s COVID. I mean, what can you possibly do? It’s hard to fundraise when you don’t have any activities that you have lined up, right? And things like that. So, I mean, there were so many complications. And I remember my husband saying one day, after a time of prayer, I feel like the Lord is really calling us to do preview services, and I remember laughing, like, okay, with who and with what? Because all we had was a microphone stand in the garage with no microphone and no speaker, no nothing. That was all we had to our church, right? But I remember my husband being like, I don’t know. I just feel the Lord calling us to do this. So, we distributed and circulated all these JPEGs throughout Instagram that we made from Canva, right? Just please come to this ballroom at this hotel, and you don’t know us, but just come. We won’t hurt you. Like, that’s how it felt, you know? But a week before this preview service, a church from New York City, the pastor called my husband and said, Do you need anything for your church plant? And my husband said, We need everything.

Jason Daye
Wow!

Faith Eury Cho
And this church was closing down one of its campuses. So the next day, 2 U-hauls came, backed into our driveway, gave us about $100,000 worth of equipment, and gave us everything that we needed to run a church. We still use a lot of the equipment that we got from that church. And it just made me realize, man, I need to really trust that the Bible is true. If an entire nation can be led and fed by the presence of the Lord, then surely He knows what I need, and because He knows what I need, I am free to walk in obedience with the Holy Spirit.

Jason Daye
Wow! Wow, Faith, that’s awesome. That’s awesome. I love that. Man, this has been great, great conversation. Faith, as we’re winding down, you have the the ears and the eyes of pastors and ministry leaders. I would love to give you the opportunity just to share words of encouragement to them, men and women on the front lines of ministry. What words of encouragement would you like to leave with them?

Faith Eury Cho
That when you think of somebody to disciple and to raise up, oftentimes we don’t realize it, but we try to choose the best and the brightest. We try to choose the ones that are the most likable, the most available to us. When I would say, may we have the eyes of the Lord, and not like the eyes of any other human, and recognize the anointing in the least of these. In the ones that may not be the most popular in our church. The ones that may not always be getting these prophetic words, like your call to the nations or things like that. But may we have eyes to see as the Lord sees. Just as the Lord told Samuel, I see the things of the heart. The leaders of today, we are tasked to raise disciples of all nations, and oftentimes, we try to choose the most talented, the most useful, right? But may we have the eyes of the Lord and choose to see others the way the Lord has called us to see them.

Jason Daye
I love that. That’s awesome. That’s powerful. Unlikely and Anointed, absolutely fantastic book, Faith’s latest, and you can find links to her book, Unlikely and Anointed, in the guide, the toolkit for this episode, which you can find at PastorServe.org/network. You find that toolkit there for this episode and every episode in that toolkit. You find a ton of different resources, including the Ministry Leaders Growth Guide, and we encourage you to check that out at PastorServe.org/network. A bunch of resources. We encourage you to check that out. So please go there and find that. Faith, it’s been an absolute pleasure to have you with us. Thank you for making time once again to hang out with us on FrontStage BackStage.

Faith Eury Cho
Likewise, thanks for having me.

Jason Daye
Awesome. God bless you.

Jason Daye
Here at PastorServe, we hope you’re truly finding value through these episodes of FrontStage BackStage. If so, please consider leaving a review for us on your favorite podcast platform. These reviews help other ministry leaders and pastors just like you find the show, so they can benefit as well. Also, consider sharing this episode with a colleague or other ministry friend, and don’t forget our free toolkit, which is available at PastorServe.org/network. This is Jason Daye, encouraging you to love well, live well, and lead well.