Speaker 0 00:04 Hi and welcome to that makes total sense. The podcast where we talk about faith, finance and everyday life in a way that makes total sense. I'm your host Alexis BU city. On this podcast you'll hear the personal stories of friends I'll be interviewing who are doing familiar things in new and innovative ways. We'll answer questions specifically about money and our relationship with it and we'll explore faith and Bible teaching together. In all of these. It's not about changing our convictions as much as it is about messing with our methods. We'll have a lot of moments here together where we pause and say that makes total sense.
Speaker 0 00:44 Hi, I'm Alexis <inaudible> and welcome to that makes total sense. Thank you so much for joining us. Today is part two of our two-part episodes, interviews with Nathan Wilbur. So first of all, I just want to tell you if you missed part one, go back and listen to that. It was so good. Nathan told us about all about growing up in his home with Paul Wilbur as his dad and what that looked like with Paul's, um, business and public ministry. And just growing up in that home. And today Nathan is going to tell us about what he is doing, where God has taken him in his ministry. Nathan is the director of Wilbur ministries, which as you can guess is a family business, a family ministry. And then Nathan also takes us a little bit beyond that and what he's doing with his church celebration church in Florida. So like I said, if you missed part one, go back and listen. Um, but you can totally start here with part two. I hope you enjoy it today. Nathan Wilbur. Hello everybody. We are back at that makes total sense. And I'm Alexis B city. I say we're back because this is our second episode with Nathan Wilbur. Hey Nathan. Thanks for coming back. This isn't back to the future, right? This is not that to the future. I feel like in our last episode we kind of went back to the future with all of our talks about cassettes and VHS. I mean preach right? I think along the eighties
Speaker 1 02:23 is it just me or are we constantly like bringing back old decades? And I'm like, that was in fashion like way back when. And kids today are like, this is what I'm wearing. I'm like, okay,
Speaker 0 02:34 you see this is a problem. I have a friend of mine who, you know, it's kind of like used to be my babysitter somehow turns into my friend and I love it, but she's like 22 and so I'm like, okay, here's the thing, I can't wear that because I wore that already when I was 12 and so I can't, I can just, I can't do it. There's something me, I'm like, for me, one of the things is like women are wearing overalls and I'm like, I love you and you're like, very keep it. I cannot do that because I've already done, I've already done it, been there and done that. I love it. You girls look very cute, but it will probably not be me this week. So yeah. So I feel like we went back to the future. We do not have to go back to the beach. We can be, we can live in the now, man. So let's live in the now. So Nathan is, um, recording artist Paul Wilbur's son, which we covered last time. So if you haven't heard it, go back and get the last episode. But Nathan, um, also like your day job is director of Wilbur ministries. So what does that look like? What does that mean? Because you know, not everybody is involved in, in some sort of ministry capacity like that. So what does that even, what does that mean?
Speaker 1 03:55 Yeah, so the name of the ministry is Wilbur ministries because it's Wilbur's ministry.
Speaker 0 04:06 Good name
Speaker 1 04:07 started all of this. Um, as Paul Wilbur ministries, you know, if you listen to the first podcast, and I highly suggest that you do, um, you'll know that we, we moved from Maryland to Chicago and um, the, the move after Chicago was we moved to Colorado to kind of fulfill this calling that my dad's carried with them for over 40 years. And, um, we started the ministry as Paul Wilbur ministries cause it was just my dad, he started it and my brother's bedroom, he moves my brother into my bedroom. So as kids, you know, uh, my brother and I are best friends. Um, today and back then there's a little rivalry, right? You know, older brother, younger brother, but we loved each other. Um, and being in the same room as, you know, like whatever.
Speaker 0 05:04 Right? And we've got two brothers who share a room in this house so we know
Speaker 1 05:09 and, but we grew too, you know, you grow out of that. But my dad put a map on the wall and just had an empty calendar and God said the calls are going to come. And he literally sat a phone on the desk and waited for the phone to ring. And amazingly it did. So we do know that.
Speaker 0 05:33 What kind of faith is that?
Speaker 1 05:36 I mean, when God tells you to do something and you do it and you obey, sometimes it seems pretty wild and farfetched, but he always fulfills what he promises. And my dad has toured all over the world. I believe it's over 70 nations. I never want to overstate anything. I'm always a leading many to the salvation of Jesus wherever he goes. And um, it, it developed more into Wilbur ministries. We call it 2.0 because I work full time for the ministry. My beautiful wife, uh, Malky works full time for the ministry. My brother works full time for the ministry and my mom works in the ministry. See, am I leaving anyone out? My dog, my German shepherd works for me. He's the guard dog. Um, but it's literally the entire family works together. And thankfully we all still love each other at the end of the day. But yes, uh, I was given the title of director, uh, because during one of our board meetings, one of the board members listed out all my job titles and he said, you basically run the ship.
Speaker 1 06:57 I said, that's a good analogy. Yeah. I think I, I run everything. And when I started this job back in 2005, I was handed the computer and the files and we had an office. The church was very gracious to us, gave us free space. I'm very grateful to, uh, pastor Steve and Jacksonville, Florida for being, um, so good to us. He gave us as much room as we wanted as well. And, you know, we had one room with all of my dad's products, which is quite a bit, um, from all his recordings and another room filled with stuff that he's gathered from the nations, which has all kinds of things, uh, and another room, uh, where we had offices and it just slowly grew. But you know, it was me in an office and my dad was traveling and I, I couldn't really do road managing and office managing at the same time.
Speaker 1 07:57 So I had to kind of choose one, but I was putting, uh, probably 16 hour days is not probably underestimating. And then, you know, you go home, you have dinner and it doesn't end, um, with dinner. And I was single so I had a lot of time on my hands. Uh, when I first started in 2005 and that's what I did. I, I spent all the time developing and working of the ministry with my dad and I had, I ran every aspect of it from the partner program to, um, making phone calls and booking events and putting together the hotels, the airfares, setting the product ahead of time, making sure the volunteers are ready to go. I mean, it was just everything. And one of our board members was like, you need the title of director. And if anybody knows me, I'm not a person that titles, I mean if I wanted to be technical it would be pastor Nathan ruled.
Speaker 1 08:56 But I don't go by that at all. I just, I'm an, I'm in ministry. I enjoy it. It's, it's a lifestyle to me. This is my life and I enjoy it. And I've been, I'm directing a Wilbur ministries since 2005 and starting. Um, I want to say when we moved to Jacksonville, uh, 22 years ago, um, my dad was still trying to find the home for this Friday Shabbat table expression. There's a few key words that you'll probably hear me use a lot and it's because it's, they've been with me for over 30 years because I've heard my dad always speak about this kingdom expression and what he kind of felt like it was. So we had a service, we connected with, uh, pastor Paul zinc, uh, new life Christian fellowship. Shout out to my homies at and we just, it was like a great kid that's in great connection at first sight. And pastor Paul welcomed us in a Jacksonville and it was truly a God calling God, told my dad, moved to Jacksonville and connect with your family again. And we have, it's been an amazing, um, experience reconnecting with my uncle and my, my cousins and just the fellowship that we have with our family. That was really the reason that we moved to Jacksonville and it made a lot of sense after we made the, the change. But
Speaker 1 10:45 when we came here, um, you know, pastor palsy said, Paul, the Mike's on the stage when you're home come and sing. And we were good friends with them for a long time and still are to this day. And they had this idea, pastor Paul zinc was like, you know, Paul, I've got a piece of land I'd really like you to maybe have a messianic congregation. Maybe we do something together. What does this look like? My dad's like, funny you should say that. Um, there's something about, you know, gathering the community together on Shabbat and celebrating together. I don't know, maybe there's something to this. And so after praying and talking there we, there was a, excuse me, a group or I mean a service that we called alloheim and it means to life. And we would meet on a Friday night, the first Friday of every month, but only the first Friday.
Speaker 1 11:41 And the idea was the first Friday of every month you kind of do a kind of demonstrate, uh, what does Shabbat service kind of looks like. But then you take this to your home, you do it in your house with your family, invite friends if you want, you know, make this, make it fun. But we're only going to gather the first Friday of every month and a couple of years had passed and we were still doing it over there. And I think it just became evident like maybe we should take a break because there was a lot kind of going on in the city at the time and with our ministry. Um, and we just felt like maybe it was time to hit the pause button. So I was just focusing again on Wilbur ministries 2.0 and God placed it on my heart. He was, he told me, gather a few friends together, honor the Shabbat and fellowship and that's all he told me.
Speaker 1 12:43 So I, I made a few calls and we had a group that just gathered together. And before you knew it, we had probably over 30, I think it gripped about 30 to 40 people. I didn't preach. We just came together. We opened, um, and we actually had it in our office. We had an office that we made into a conference room. Um, we had very nice offices over off of, uh, Deerwood and we would just get together, celebrate Shabbat together, and we just lived laugh. Everyone would bring a meal and we would just fellowship together and someone said, Hey, when someone gonna preach during this thing, are you going to start doing that? And I said, no, it's just, this is what it's all about. Like he just, I felt he just wanted us to gather. And, um, a long story short, my brother started going to a church in town, uh, called celebration church in Jacksonville, Florida was pastor Stovall and Kerri Weems. Shout out to my, my homies.
Speaker 1 13:54 All my flirted peeps. Yeah, I think it's so awesome because I, I'm cutting myself off here, but there's a group and it's called Jack's United or, yeah, Jackson United. I think it's right name Jackson Jackson unite. And there's three churches and sometimes four that come together and we do, um, times of worship and fellowship together and it's new life Christian fellowship. It's celebration church and it's, um, a Redeemer church from Panavia. And we've, we have relationships and connections with all these churches and thought, man, this is so cool. It seemed that the body of Messiah coming together to worship and not getting hung up on their denominational, um, flags that they have with the door. Okay. So I digressed with that and my brother and his wife, Shay Wilbur, uh, started to go into celebration church and Shay was getting, Shay has always had it on her heart. This is my sister in law, um, to be here.
Speaker 0 15:05 People might know who Shay is. Can I just say like there are a few, there are a few people out there who know Shea, who knows who Shea Wilber is and this is all part of the family now. This is Wilbur ministries.
Speaker 1 15:17 Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think we're at three now. I think we're at
Speaker 0 15:22 3.0 yes. You got the update.
Speaker 1 15:24 Shay has got the favor of the Lord and she, she got into television and it just kind of really got to the point where she needed to go to Los Angeles if she was really going to pursue television. Cause that's kind of where you have to be. So you know, my brother and my sister in law moved out there, uh, much to my sugar and it was a very tough time and I'm not, I'm not going to cry and I'm not going to get a book shuttle on your podcast. I have a, I have a dear friend, her name is chatty and she has a podcast that's called, um, I cry in corners and so everything with her is crying. We always joke around about crying when we get together. But I won't,
Speaker 0 16:11 do we need to change the name just for this episode? Native cries and chorus. No, that's good. It goes from you sharing a room and being a little irritated too. Yeah, it's good for us to know that as you grow the sibling relationship.
Speaker 1 16:28 So they, they moved out there and it's always been on Shay's heart to be involved in the worship team and it didn't really work out, um, for her at new life. So they, she felt, you know, I want to find a place where I can be involved in worship and, you know, kind of plug in and I'm doing television and she, you know, media is, is her good. So I for, I don't really remember exactly how, but they just, they landed at celebration church and my brother and I had actually always visited since celebration church started way back in a gymnasium. Um, it's kind of funny actually. And when they, then they moved to, um, the UNF theater and then, you know, then they moved to the, a place called Midtown where they had their offices and then now it's called the arena. Wow. And I thought it was interesting.
Speaker 1 17:25 I've been in Jacksonville 22 years and faithfully going to new life, but I always visited and went to celebration church during all the different phases that they, but I just find that like a spiritual hysterical, God always knows where he has you going. Right. And, and people come longer path for a reason. And I just, I find it ever so interesting that the roads have always crisscrossed. But Sharon Shay got very involved in the worship and the media department. And so my family wanted to stay together because we didn't want to be going to two different places. And my dad, the character that he has went to pastor zinc with very sobering time because we're very close with the zinc family. We love them, very dear family. And in fact, one of them, one of the sons is Nathan, and he's, I think a year older than I am. And we look very similar. In fact, we went to high school together and someone would go, Hey, Nathan. And be like, Hey, Oh, no, no, you, Nathan, you Nathan. So it's really kind of funny.
Speaker 1 18:47 Um, and can I tell one other story? Yeah. So there's me, Nathan. There was Nathan zinc and then there was another Nathan and we were all standing around together at church. And this, um, pretty girl walks up to us and she's trying to, uh, she's trying to meet my friend's brother, who's Brandon, who leads worship at new life. And so she goes, Hey, my name's so-and-so and you know, what's your name? And Nathan Zeke goes, I'm Nathan. And then I said, Nathan goes, I'm Nathan. And she's like, you guys are messing with me. No, we're not. We all pulled out our driver's license and showed her we were an interest in. She did end up meeting my friend, Nathan's brother Brandon, and they're happily married today and Brandon leads worship at new life and it's a great guy. Anyway, um,
Speaker 3 19:53 so we <inaudible>
Speaker 1 19:54 we made this move to celebration church and my dad went to pastor zinc and, you know, told him the whole spiel, which is story Yiddish. Um, not really, but he shared with pastor zinc that he felt, you know, to keep the family together, that we were going to be all going over to celebration and it kinda hugged it out. And pastor Zinke says, I completely understand, but I think, you know, to his credit, you know, the, the friendship never, never went away just because we didn't go to his church there, you know, there's still dinner dinners that we get together with the zincs and, um, we bump into each other all the time and catch up. And you know, there's sometimes in Israel, which is really funny stories, but it's just, there's something to be said about covenant, which is of the kingdom. And I know that's another preaching topic, but all through my dad's life, he's, he's always been a person of covenant and he's never wanted to do anything outside of that.
Speaker 1 21:04 So he never felt, Oh, God's cognitive, this, I'm going to leave and do this. Now. He's always done things with the right heart and the right attitude. And I've always paid attention. And as hard as it is sometimes, you know, you have to go up to someone and confront them about something. It's not, it's not easy, but it's covenant and you do it in a loving way. And pastor zinc released us to go to celebration church and, um, there's just, it's been, it's been an amazing journey. Um, because then my dad met with pastor Stovall and pastor Carey. Um, and this, um, this goes back to, I think it goes back to about, uh, six years when they actually met. But we had been going to the church about a year before that. So we've been at celebration about a total of eight years now. Uh, seven, sorry, seven years. And, and pastor stove. I remember him, you know, he, he met with my dad and he said, you know, Paul, there's something about the Jewish people. I want to bless the Jewish people. Um, I know there's something to Israel. I just don't know what it is. I don't know how, um, to do that. And so my dad said, well, I do.
Speaker 1 22:25 So if I can be a blessing in any way, you know, kind of, you know, here's my number, call me. Well, there was somebody on staff at the church who, who knew my dad and my family for a very long time. In fact, she used to handle a lot of our book keeping her CPA. And, uh, the Stewart family has been very close with us. And, uh, Lisa used to handle all of our, um, like I said, our bookkeeping and, and she, she always known of our family and she was really excited. She was always, I think, kind of hoping that we would, uh, come to celebration and connect because that's where, you know, she, um, her and her family attend. So it was kind of like a reconnecting, excuse me, my voice is starting to go. Hopefully it comes back. There we go. And, and they, and this idea came, what if, what if we let Paul do a service, do a Shabbat
Speaker 0 23:39 who's driving?
Speaker 1 23:47 Oh, it's seriously, you can hear that. Yeah. That's when I know to pause and restart. Sorry. Cause know your husband so Seth can make the cut. So this idea came up and um, pastor Lisa Stewart was, um, a big proponent of it and, and pastor Stovall was involved in, in, in the decision of it, obviously, but to bring us on staff and to do a service, what service they didn't quite know yet, but to, to do something on a Friday night and, you know, gather the city together. And I really felt impressed. And this is kind of where, um, I, I don't want anyone to say that I, I'm kind of speaking about myself because I don't like talking about myself. It's not something that I go around doing. But this is kind of where Nathan Wilbur started stepping out from under Paul Wilbur's, uh, recognition. You say that being, being in a household with someone who's done many albums, has sold over millions on VHS and CD, which are now on DVD and digital download and YouTube.
Speaker 1 25:14 Do you want to do search for it? Um, you know, Paul Wilbur is a name that I was always kind of like, that's my dad. I'm Nathan Wilbur. What do I do? Um, I'm his son. So it was kind of like saying Nathan Wilbur, the son of Paul Wilbur. Like, Oh, this is Nathan's. This is Nathan Paulson. Oh, Paulson, hi. Nice to meet you. But this is where things started changing in me. And, and I started getting ideas. I said, dad, what if we meet or meeting on first Friday of every month and we're meeting in a, in a church? I said, what if, um, it's not a messianic congregation, but what if we named it like first Friday because it's, it's kind of like a, a millennial twist to things. My dad's like, Oh, first Friday, only on the fruit. I like it. And so I started developing, um, the, the program with my dad, I, we started working on the process. What is it going to look like? You know, well, it's not a messianic congregation, but it's going to have, um, some elements of it and what does it look like? And it really started forming into what I kind of call a movement and I'll, I'll get to that in a minute. And so we started doing, uh, first Fridays. My Ted was on staff at the church and, uh, pastor Stovall just didn't quite know what to do with us, which he did tell us to our face,
Speaker 0 26:54 great leader P S to have a couple of people on your staff who have the experience that you guys do and just be like, I don't really even know. I mean, what, what incredible leadership, you know, just to be like, Hey, I trust, I trust God in you to do whatever it is you're called to do. Right.
Speaker 1 27:12 And pastor Stovall completely to his credit, trusted and believe that, uh, and what we did in the message, and I'm sure it helped because Lisa, you know, the relationship that we had with the Stewart family, you know, her and Tarik Rayland speak on our behalf to say they're not weird,
Speaker 0 27:33 right?
Speaker 1 27:34 Not strange. They don't walk around. I'm saying weird things and doing weird activities. They're Jewish believers. Uh, they're Jewish and believe in Jesus, but you know, they, they speak or they, they understand Hebrew and dah, dah, dah, dah. But they're cool people. We like them.
Speaker 0 27:52 Right? Nice. It's good to have somebody for, again,
Speaker 1 27:56 for the Jew first,
Speaker 0 27:59 great.
Speaker 1 28:00 Oh, but also to the nation. So anyway, we developed this relationship and the church started taking the change in their direction and started developing multi campuses. Uh, today I believe the celebration church has over 20,000 on, um, a couple in a couple of different countries altogether. And, uh, they can was like, we want Wilbur ministries to be the caretakers of a first Friday and, um, we're going to still has you for free. There's no charge on the building, but you know, we need you to come up with the volunteers and everything else. And so that kind of, you know, up to that point, celebration was such a huge blessing to us and they still are huge blessing to us. I don't want to take away from that. But, um, they weren't providing the live streaming, uh, the volunteers for ushering a childcare, but they were saying, you know, we're not going to charge you for the building or anything, which is still, some people realize that that's a huge, huge thing just in itself. Pastor Stovall would walk by, tell people that worked with us, don't mess with the Jews. They're God's people.
Speaker 0 29:29 No.
Speaker 1 29:30 So we came together as a family and earnestly sought God's will. And we felt that we were to take this on as a family, uh, ministry of first Friday to gather the community, to celebrate Shabbat and to honor God because God said in Genesis all the way back in the beginning, he said, uh, you know, he created the, he created everything and then on the sixth day he rested and he set it apart and it's to remain Holy for anyone who calls upon the name of the Lord. I think it's a universal theme that we honor and celebrate what God the father honors and what he sets as a precedent. And so not to get too much preaching into what comes later down the pipe, but we started building first Friday, me and my dad and my family together and bringing in vault and God brought volunteers.
Speaker 1 30:35 It's really amazing that everything that we thought, how are we going to sustain this thing? How are we going to be able to keep this going? I mean, it's like you're starting from square one, but if you build it, they will come to field of dreams, theme, you know, the movie. Um, some, some the audience might have to YouTube that as well. Fill the dreams that Kevin Costner actor and the theme of the movie is if you build it, they will come. And so we built, um, with God's help, we built this blueprint and as you know, unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain that that tried to create and literally they came. So we built it and people just start coming from all over. They're from so many different denominations, so many different walks of life, um, races. Um, it's just been, uh, an amazing thing to see what God has done.
Speaker 1 31:47 And the reason I say movement as opposed to first Friday, the service is friends of ours from all over the nations have started grabbing onto it and they do first Fridays in their homes all over the world. And to tell you how that blesses me, because I feel like first Friday touches on the heart of God. God is bringing together a family and that family is Jew and it's a gen ed Gentiles and it's a kingdom. God has a kingdom. Jesus came speaking about a kingdom matter religion. Jesus didn't come to build, uh, any type of religious, uh, anything. He came speaking about the kingdom of his father. And in that kingdom is only two people, groups, Jews and Gentiles. And we're supposed to get it
Speaker 0 32:46 is everybody else. Yep.
Speaker 1 32:48 And we're supposed to get along and we're supposed to be big brother, little brother. Yet sometimes we may fight, fight and argue, but we're supposed to major on those things that are the most important, which is supposed to be Jesus. And some of the things that would separate us and, and cause issues. Uh, I think it's, it's best to put those aside at the pride aside and love one another because our love for each other is supposed to be the testimony of the kingdom. And so we've seen this first Friday movement sprouting up all over and people doing Shabbat services in their home. They watched the services in their house and they'll invite friends over. I've had people telling me they do first Friday parties every month on a projector screen. That's amazing. It's just wild to think it's like coming full circle. You know, it's, it's the element of my dad doing the worship and he's preaching and now it's also me coming up from underneath him under his loins as it were. And I've grabbed the vision that my dad had and, um, and I'm, I'm carrying the Baton. I'm, I'm not, he hasn't folly handed it off to me. I'm not saying that one one bit. My dad still has plenty of steam in him. In fact, I told him, I said, you better outdo Moses buddy. That's what I did.
Speaker 0 34:19 Yeah.
Speaker 1 34:20 But there is a blessing that comes from the older generation to the younger and there is a passing of the Baton and there is a working together and,
Speaker 0 34:31 and it's, it's, I, I just want to add onto that because, um, you know, a lot of what I do kind of in my, in my day job and sometimes even on the podcast to talk about money, but it's like, you know, that that leads to like inheritance and legacy. Right. And I feel like that's something we think about with money. It's like, Oh, will you pass on so that your kids, your kids have something, they have this inheritance but more and more and more in the past few years, I feel like God has been teaching me that this legacy, this inheritance is spiritual, right? So it's like you're Paul will percent you. You don't have to start from zero, like hit the knowledge that that God has in put in your dad about him and about faith and about what that journey looks like in ministry and all of that stuff.
Speaker 0 35:20 You get to inherit some of that for your ministry and so you don't have to start at ground zero and your, your kids don't start where you started when you were a kid. Right? Like they get to start where you leave off and I think that that's like a really, I just think it's a beautiful picture that yeah, like there is some of that Baton handing but it's, you're not starting from ground zero. You're not starting from square one. And I think that's how God intends it to be for us is that, is that this is supposed to be built on top of something. Right. This is not just foundational forever, like we're supposed to be building and building on top of something.
Speaker 1 36:05 <inaudible> yeah. And, and part of that building happened on, uh, Passover. Uh, about a year ago, pastor Stovall asked my dad to do a good Friday, as he called it, um, a Jewish night. My, my pastor, he'll tell you, he'll tell you in his own words, he is the Gentile and Gentiles. He says, I will Gentile up the entire
Speaker 0 36:34 <inaudible> Testament.
Speaker 1 36:37 He said, I'll do the good Friday thing, the Gentile thing. And Paul, you come in and do the Jewish thing because it fall, it fell on the same night. And yeah,
Speaker 0 36:45 it did last year. Yeah.
Speaker 1 36:48 So my dad came to do quote his thing and he asked pastor to lead everyone into a community communion, which we would call kiddish, uh, on Shabbat. But for Passover, there's a special kiddish that you do and you're breaking it with matzah bread and juice wine. And so our, um, our pastor got up to lead the communion and he just froze. And I was sitting in the front row watching my pastor who was never short on words and is never one to shy away from, um, speaking and sharing about what's on his heart to just completely frozen. In fact, the security was so concerned they thought he might be having a seizure or something and they started a rumbling around. And so from my point of view, I couldn't figure out what was going on, but my dad was up there. He had just finished doing a full Passover demonstration for an audience that may never have heard of Passover, knew a Passover was, um, it was beautifully done and about 20 minutes. And you can actually see, uh, just the demonstration of the Passover that my dad had on our YouTube channel of Paul Wilbur ministries. But it was almost like a moment in time where everything just stopped and nobody knew what happened. And then, um, he became emotionally, um,
Speaker 1 38:38 he just became very emotional. He started like crying and then my dad is standing to the size, I quiet is going on here and this is, this is on a very important weekend. And the church, I mean this is Easter weekend, good Friday. And because of the size of our church, um, there's three services, there was always good Friday and then there would be services on Saturday night because he couldn't just do them on Sunday because Sunday was overflow. I mean, you had three services on Sunday and still couldn't fit everyone. So he would break it up to Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Um, because people, you know, that usually go to church, uh, we'll go twice a year, Easter and Christmas. So, and so from our point of view, I couldn't figure out what was going on because our pastor was so emotional and my dad was standing right next to pastor Stovall and he couldn't figure out what was going on because we're just, you know, it's not, we're not used to seeing this type of expression. Uh, my, my dad, uh, had to end up doing the, um, quote communion. And after this service, you know, we all went to the back. Pastor Stovall literally left from the stage to go to his backroom and
Speaker 1 40:05 we found out that Jesus showed up. I mean, I don't really know how else to say it. And then, um, the next day it was all over the news. It was in different Christian online sites and I couldn't believe it literally said Jesus came to church. And I'm like, Oh my goodness, this is happening here. And I say that with all sincerity because you know, people can say, I've met Jesus and but where is the, where's the change? I don't see how you can meet the savior, the one who came to save, um, you know, to the Jew first and also to the nations to, to bring this family together and not have a change of heart and mind. And that's exactly what has happened at celebration church. Our pastor was very involved in church structures and systems. He actually built a lot of them for Ark, for the art community.
Speaker 1 41:10 That's arc, which is a very large community of churches. And a lot of them are. Some of the big names that you would send me, your audience would probably recognize right away. And there's a lot that could have changed. You know, my pastor could have said this was an amazing experience that I had with, but you know what, um, that kind of thing doesn't sell very well. And so I'm just going to go back to the structures of man, right? You know, sometimes I feel like we can be a little too critical, but it specifically says in scripture that it's the traditions of man that can make the word of God to no effect. That goes same. It goes the same for the, the church community as it also can go, uh, for the Jewish community. So when people start pointing fingers, will you do something this way?
Speaker 1 42:06 This is how we do it. Where, right? I think we need to be very careful and it's very important to take an attitude of humbleness, uh, when we, when we kind of speak to these things. But my pastor to his credit, um, said no, this visitation that I had, I, I'm still putting it together. I'm not quite sure all that occurred that he said that when my dad handed him the piece of Motsa, he said that my dad's voice changed. And he heard that a Hebrew and a different voice that he had never heard. He said, I know Paul's voice. We've spoken together. I know what he sounds like. He said this voice changed. And he said, as he was looking at the Bret, he said, when he was staring at the bread, he said he looked over to his left and Jesus was standing right next to him.
Speaker 1 43:12 And what was Jesus doing? What he should be doing? He was giving the, the Passover Seder and in front of the host, he, Oh, he doesn't know who was all at, um, the tables in front of him. He thinks it could be, um, the disciples and the host of heaven or something. But he was like, am I back when Jesus did this? Is this like, this is his disciples and everything? And he said he realized it wasn't because as he looked out there was more and he said as he looked out, he saw like Jesus was doing this almost on like a mountain kind of thing. He said it was interesting and um, the more you dig into the visitation that, uh, pastor Stovall had, the more you realize how authentic and true it is because the things that he's written down and shared with me, um, quite a bit of it is just there is no other way that what he experienced there couldn't have been from the Lord because it's very pinpointed accurate to almost aware.
Speaker 1 44:28 It's like Jesus in front of the heavenly hosts is like celebrating Passover on Passover. Why? Because it's a continual feast, right? You said, God, the father said you will do this feast continually and doesn't it make sense that for eternity we're always going to remember the sacrifice that Jesus, Yeshua did for us and there's always going to be Passover cause we're always going to be celebrating his feast. It's his holiday and things at the church have never been the same. There is a whole new sense that when we come together as a church body, uh, as, uh, as the believers and we're taking the elements and doing quote communion, I like to call it kiddish. When we're doing that, we are separating ourselves from the world. We're coming to God's table, we're coming to the table of the father, we're celebrating together as a family. The sacrifice, Jesus, his body and his blood and his atonement. And there's um, a whole new sense of what is baptism about. You don't, you don't just come to to service now and get saved on Sunday and then walk out and then you sign up for baptisms later. No, you go outside and you just dunk.
Speaker 0 46:01 Yes, it's so good.
Speaker 1 46:04 That's the demonstration. Does baptism save you? No. No declaration that Jesus is your Messiah. That statement in faith, that is, that that is what saves. But a lifestyle change happens and the beginning of that is going to go under the water and coming back out. And then to the, to my Jewish audience, you'll know that those are mixes. Mic, the bass that you, you know, like John the Baptist when he was out in the desert and he was quote baptizing people. But the Hebrew thinking and the term that you could Google is Nick. And so everything has completely
Speaker 1 46:54 uh, changed. And um, my pastor, we brought him to Israel. Okay, I'm going to have to be careful cause I'm going to start getting emotional again because a lot of this stuff just plays, I feel like and too, the heart of God and what he has. But we brought our, we brought pastor Stovall with us to Israel on a tour last year and it, it rocked our worlds that we realized that we went full circle that at the Passover Jesus displayed himself before. Um, Jesus appeared before pastor Stovall. And immediately pastor Stovall said, ha, I need to make changes in my church to meet this kingdom expression. The kingdom of God is Jew and Gentile. That's, that's his, that's his new battle cry. It's a kingdom and it's Jew and Gentile. That's his new battle cry. And that expression is not what we were doing. So we're changing our expression to lineup with the kingdom.
Speaker 1 48:04 And it is been revolutionary in art in our church. And this is what's really shook us. So it started in Passover and things slowly started changing and pastors preaching and sharing on the feast of the Lord and <inaudible> and everything. And here we are full circle at feast of Tabernacles, celebrating the feast of Tabernacles together in Jerusalem. We came full circle and ended with the Tabernacles in Jerusalem with Jesus said, you know, when he returns, the nations are going to come and celebrate him at the feast of Tabernacles in Jerusalem. And things have just continued to get better and better. And you know, our, our relationship between the, the Weems household and the, and the Wilbur household that had just become really strong. You know, there's, there's very few people that you need. And this goes back to what we've talked about on our first podcast to where the person that you, you see on the stage is also the person that, um, you kinda hang with.
Speaker 1 49:24 And I really enjoy hanging with, uh, pastor Stovall and it's the person that you see on the stage. He's, he's dynamic preacher. I mean, he's probably one of the best preachers. Uh, you'll hear when you, when you hear him speaking, you feel like energized and you feel the presence of the Lord speaking through him. But it's also a, um, a genuineness of character. And it's the same when he's on, we're traveling together. And, um, when we're ministering together with my dad, it's been a true honor and blessing to see, um, pastor Stovall and, and my dad ministering together and we were in Israel for a conference and he, he didn't want to be a speaker. He just wanted to pastor Stovall just wanted to kind of show up and, and be a part of it and get fed. But can I tell you that the revelation that was getting imparted to him that he had to share was kind of a, a mind for the Jewish believers that were in the room?
Speaker 4 50:44 Mmm.
Speaker 1 50:46 It was things they had never heard before. Specifically from a, a very prominent, a Gentile pastor who's very, he'll, he'll tell you I'm the Gentile of Gentile, but he was standing in front of a room of the nations. I mean, we had China, Korea, we had Europe. We had, I think we had most of the continents covered and represented there in that room. And he stood up there and he, and he said, pastor Stovall said, you know, he says, my heart feels a little heavy right now because I feel like our Jewish brothers put out a feast for us. They set the table for us. He said, we came to the table and we celebrated. Communion was one another. We celebrated the body and blood of Jesus. And he said, I feel like if us to come as the nations and just take from the table and eat and leave and not bless, he says, I would be the biggest slap in Jesus's face that we could ever do.
Speaker 1 52:05 Wow. And I looked around and friends that I have, who are Jewish believers who are in Israelis, I don't think there was a dry eye in that room. They had never heard that kind of talk ever. And it was a very sobering moment. Everyone literally got up from their seats. I mean, they, they were finding money in their pocket, whatever they could to start blessing the Jewish believers in the land who usually get overlooked by the way, and just start pouring and blessing and crying on shoulders. And it turned into such a moment of what, not what can I get, but what can I give? And so I just, I see that what happened in Passover to pastor Stovall wasn't just something that happened and that he's going to write a book and maybe get famous for a moment in time and you know, that'll be it.
Speaker 1 53:11 It's like a blip I like a little, a little bleep on, but this is something that happened on Passover and is growing and growing and growing and growing and being coming. Something, excuse me, of this kingdom expression, uh, that my dad has been praying and has seen for over 40 years of his, of his life and being his son to be a part of this and to share in the expression of first Friday which is housed under a celebration church and they're now, um, promoting it to the, to the city and also to the church to show up. It's been, it's been an amazing journey.
Speaker 0 53:59 This is, this is so great and that story that, thank you for sharing that. This story is amazing. It reminds me, I want to, I want to mention a couple of things before we, before we sign off on this one. Cause this has just been so good and rich, but we talked offline a little bit about, um, Seth and me and how we say this is just a mystery. We don't really know, but we know God has called us to love on the Jewish people. He's called us to love Israel. And I wanted to share this with you. I feel like our listeners can benefit, but I kind of like, just want to share this with you, like as a friend. But, um, when Seth took his first trip to Israel in 2002, he was in graduate school and I didn't go with them, but he went with a small group of our friends.
Speaker 0 54:42 And so, because we were in college and he came back and he shared with our, with our ministry, they had kind of a like, you know, what'd you do over the summer? Kind of people who did mission trips, kinda came and gave testimonies and, and so he sat on a stool on the stage, you know, and, and shared with our, um, with our ministry about his first trip. And I will never forget this. Um, we weren't married yet and my very best friend had gone with him on this trip and she told me, she said, Lexi, he, I watched Seth change on this trip and it wasn't, you know, a visitation of visible visitation, like your pastor habit. She said, I watched him change on this trip. They were there for four weeks. And, um, and she was like, I don't know what happened, but I watched him change.
Speaker 0 55:30 And so we, um, he's, he's up and he's up at the front. And of course, this is in the context of being kind of in your early twenties, you know, and he says, he says, you know, when you're, when you're dating someone or when you're friends with someone, but, but you meet them at school and he says, but, and you realize you like them and you get to know them and you think they're great. And he said, but you know what happens when you get to go home with them for the weekend and you meet their family and you kind of get this greater context of what's happening in their life and where they came from. And you kind of see, you kind of see these interactions and you see this and you have a, a greater understanding of who they are. And, and you start to, to love them in a different way because you've seen where they come from and you've seen their family.
Speaker 0 56:19 And he said, I'm here to tell you on this trip to Israel this summer. He said, I met Jesus family there and he just said, I love him right. In a different way because I met his family, right. And I think it changed his, it transformed his love for Jesus. It, it gave him a love for the Jewish people and for Israel and for the land of Israel that he didn't have before because it was like going home, right? Like he was visiting home with this, this guy that he'd been friends with him so long and it was so powerful and it really didn't change him. Like I didn't go on the trip and I saw him before and I saw him after I bought this guy. He even looks different. Like this guy is, he is different than he was before. And, um, and then I'm like, I, we don't really have much time left, but I'm like about the first Friday, um, Seth had maybe seen you on Instagram or something and he was like, Hey, I don't even know what this is about.
Speaker 0 57:18 So, so I start looking up on the celebration website, like what is this? What does this first Friday? Because we have celebrated Shabbat in our home for a long time. And um, you know, we're not always super formal with candles and things like that, but we usually, I mean, I don't know on any given Friday we could have a number of people, different random people over at our house for dinner or some, you know, super close to us. I'm just, Hey, a neighbor down the street or whatever. But, um, when I saw kind of the, um, pamphlet, maybe that celebration is using, it struck me because, and this may or may not be accurate, but I felt like I saw it like all of this, it's, it's not kind of like you're saying, there's nothing wrong with the tradition, but this celebration, Shabbat celebration they're trying to get people to do is based on Jesus.
Speaker 0 58:08 It's like Lord's prayer. It's like all completely focused on Jesus. And I think when you're saying we have this family that come together, Jews and Gentiles, I mean it's, it's wild. It's a miracle that they can come together, but it's through Jesus that we get to. Absolutely. And so I loved that you guys are doing that, but that the promotion of it and the understanding of even rest for crying out loud is Jesus, right? It's not in this tradition or that tradition or are you Jewish or are you Gentile or whatever. It's like everything is focused and it's on Jesus. And I just thought that was so incredibly beautiful and powerful and what an amazing picture you guys have with that service and with that movement I'm with you with at that first Friday.
Speaker 1 58:55 I think if we get our sites off of who is the Lord of the Sabbath, who is Jesus, then you've lost everything. Yeah. Because again, you start getting into the eye mentality and the me, what is it in for I or me, you know, our, our culture, um, has really gotten into the, you know, there's the I phone, there's the, um, the, the me, how can I get things to, to fit around my schedule. But when we take our time out to say, you know what, the most important thing right now, no, the most important person right now is Jesus. Right? And bringing my family around the table and realizing that there is a specific day that God called us to do that on it's Friday night in your home with your family. And sometimes yes, bring in friends and family, but you're honoring him. That's what it's all about.
Speaker 1 59:57 And people get so caught up into the legal Allity of things that they lose the what the specific intent was. And then you have people that say, Oh, it's not a specific day. You just do it whenever you want to know. God was so specific. Imagine if God wasn't specific with us and put our arms where they're located, we would have problems. I mean, I'm being serious, right? If God, God was very intentional when he created us, God was very intentional when he created the earth and he was very specific where he placed the sun, the moon, and the stars. So how can we discredit the day that he set apart and called Holy and call it? Nothing else but anything else. It totally undoes it. It's almost us as the humans trying to tell God and put him in his place. And how dare we ever, ever do that.
Speaker 1 00:59 I mean, it's almost like we don't think something works out properly onto this calendar. So therefore let's slide things around how we want them to. But God was very intentional with the day that he took off. And you know what? We have a great time as a family. Friday night comes my wife lights the candles, we do kiddish communion and I pray over my, my wife, I bless her, I pray over my son and I bless him. And then they lay their hands and they blessed daddy. And then we sit down and we eat and we laugh and we go watch a movie together. We hang out, we spend time with one another that's honoring God, that's honoring Jesus, that's honoring each other as a family. And if we can just put down things that would try to, and I know I'm speaking to, um, an audience right now that, um, is not the messianic, and I know I'm speaking to him as in a group and to some of those listeners who may not be, but if, if we can just put aside and say, what is it that God wants?
Speaker 1 02:14 It is a specific day. And then if I can speak to my, my brothers and sisters and, and say that, you know, that that have grown up with celebrating Shabbat and maybe you don't do it anymore, maybe you pulled away because it got too legalistics in your home. I would just encourage you, you know, bring, bring the presence of God into your home. Give him a chance when, what other day, what other time do you set aside for the Lord to come and inhabit your home and give him a place to bring healing and restoration to your home. I challenge you to give him the, the place that is his due and what he wants is to come and to meet with you and your family and to bring a healing that there needs to be healing and restoration of relationships and everything else. We are having so many testimonies of marriages being healed and I'm talking about on the brink of divorce with lawyers involved and papers signed and so forth and those being ripped up in marriages being restored and miraculous healings that nobody, the doctors have one prognosis, diagnosis and pills written out for something and then that person is going back completely made whole and the doctor's shaking their heads like we don't know what's happening.
Speaker 1 03:37 People are making a place for God to be who he is in their homes and he is showing up and he is demonstrating himself in a way that we had never seen before. And that is what excites me, that we are connecting with heaven. Heaven is so close to us there, it's almost a breath away. You know the apostle Paul said, we are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses. How close do we really feel that heaven is? And if we open our homes and prepare a table for him, he's going to show up. Cause that's who, that's who we are honoring. And that's what it's all about.
Speaker 0 04:19 That's so good. That's so good. Nathan, thank you so much for being with us two times. Not just one time, two times. I love it so much and tell us where we didn't do this the first time, but I'll put it in the show notes. Tell us where we can get a hold of you. Like where can we see what Wilbur ministries <inaudible> is doing. Okay. Yeah,
Speaker 1 04:40 I'm happy to. So, uh, our website is Wilbur ministries.com. It's w I L B U R M, I N, I S T R, I E s.com Wilbur ministries.com. And we're on, um, YouTube under Paul Wilbur ministries. We have a YouTube channel where we, um, share our first Friday services and um, my dad's music, it's kind of the hub where all of our digital media life is housed. And I'm also on Instagram. You can find my dad, Paul Wilbur there, or, uh, Nathan Wilbur on there. And it's just a great way to connect. You know, I find social media can be used for two ways and um, I think the greatest part of it is, is just enlarging the community, uh, the body of Messiah, uh, worldwide and hopefully using it for the good rather than the other.
Speaker 0 05:38 That's right. That's right. No, it's good to have your furnish says if you're not making friends on social media, you're not using it the right way. So my gosh, it's so good. It's so good. Thank you again, ne. We appreciate it so much and um, yeah, I'm hoping that we'll have more people, uh, connecting with you guys through those channels.
Speaker 1 05:56 Thank you.
Speaker 0 05:57 Thanks. So thank you again so much for listening. Don't forget to subscribe so you won't miss an episode. Share the link with your friends. You can visit
[email protected]. And until next time, this is Alexis B SETI, remembering to do well for ourselves so we can do good for others.
Speaker 2 06:19 <inaudible>.
