Beautiful, Disappointing, Hopeful - Drew Hyun

00:00 - Speaker 1 When an opportunity came for us to co-purchase this property as well as to have it be a vision for the city, yes, I had a heart and a vision to kind of open our doors so that various ministries and organizations could benefit from it. My wife, as a volunteer. She has spearheaded all the renovations and the operations of the building and, of course, you know, come up with a plan so that it could be accessible to so many nonprofits and churches here in the city. So I'm very deeply indebted to her for that. There's a lot of great work happening here, but then, like there's flooding down in the basement, it's me and her basically mopping out a flooded basement, spending hours cleaning up, and, of course, we've had wonderful people in our church community who have volunteered their time and energy as well, which has been wonderful. So beauty and disappointment, it's part of it all. 00:48 - Speaker 3 Welcome to Faithly Stories, the podcast that brings you inspiring tales from conversations with church leaders as they navigate the peaks and valleys of their faith journeys through their ministry work and everyday life. Join us as we delve into their challenges, moments of encouragement and answered prayers. The Faithly Stories podcast is brought to you by Faithly, an online community committed to empowering church leaders, pastors, staff and volunteers. Learn more at faithlyco. Get ready to be uplifted and inspired as we unveil the heart of faith through stories from the front lines of ministry. On the Faithly Stories podcast. 01:30 - Speaker 2 So, drew, thank you so much for being on the podcast. I really appreciate it. You were a guest preacher at my church's retreat, like 10 years ago. Yes, I don't know if you remember that yeah, I totally remember. So for me to be interviewing you now with your new book having just been out, it's like a really surreal full circle experience for me. So it's a real privilege, it's a real honor and I'm just really glad to be talking to you. So, thank you, oh, thank you. 01:56 - Speaker 1 Well, the honor is all mine and thank you for all the work that you and Faithfully do for pastors and leaders around the world. 02:03 - Speaker 2 Yeah, it's been a lot of fun. We've learned a lot, we've grown a lot in the past couple of years, but there's still so much more to do. So thanks for being a part of that. I felt that in reading your new book that I learned so much about your personal journey. Have you been sharing it along the way, or was this the first time you really brought people into what you've been through personally? 02:30 - Speaker 1 Yeah, I've shared different bits and pieces of it, and I wanted to share my story mostly because I think when most people meet me initially, especially if they're not part of a church, they'll usually assume oh, you grew up because you grew up in a church, that's why you're a Christian. 02:39 And I often tell them well, hold on, it's actually the opposite, I'm a Christian despite growing up in the church. And in the book I also share a bit of my story with my father, who later on in life, when I was about in middle school, that's when he decided to actually make this turn into vocational ministry and that was a really hard turn for me and our family. Um, and it was, that was a really hard turn for me and our family. Uh, mostly because, like from who my dad would project to be, especially as, like, a preacher and then later on as an author and a very well-known figure within Korea, and what we experienced at home, um, the, the violence and the pain and the feeling of unsafety, like all of that led us to have a lot of doubts about Christian faith. And so I often tell people it's not because I grew up going to church and the fact that my dad is a pastor that I'm a Christian today. It's actually despite growing up in a church and my father being a pastor. Wow. 03:46 - Speaker 2 Well, I was really blown away by your vulnerability and sharing all of that in print and inviting the world into that pain that you've healed from. But we're all still healing from stuff, right? So you do say in the book that you and your dad are in a great place, like you're so grateful for your relationship with him today. Um, but you had to tell him that you were going to write all of this, right, like what was that conversation like? 04:14 - Speaker 1 oh, it was incredibly painful. Well, especially because in korean culture there certainly is it's a shame and honor culture, and so my father being a first generation Korean immigrant to this country, um, as well as having a significant platform in Korea as a minister and an author, um, I was really scared and, uh, I I shared quite a bit about my own journey with my dad, and my dad and I have been through a lot. And uh, yeah, later on in the book I talk about, in the chapter on grieving, I talk about my own journey of grief, forgiveness, the transformation from anger, wrath, retaliatory kind of, uh, vengeance towards grieving and hopefully expanding in love. And, like you mentioned, my dad and I we have the best relationship we've ever had, which is kind of surreal to say. And a lot of that is, I think, just a lot of work that's been done behind the scenes. But yeah, it was definitely scary to bring that to him. 05:24 And I remember, after I wrote the first draft and I sent it to my brothers and I said, hey, guys, I have three brothers. And I said, hey, I'm going to share this in this book that I'm writing. What do you think? And, by the way, I'm going to float it to dad just to get his okay, and they were. They were a little bit um taken because they didn't quite know how my father would react as well and um. But when I wrote it to him he surprisingly was very open and um, he said I wish I was a better dad when you were younger. Wow, and like to get that message from him. It's just it goes against all that I had experienced from him as a child and the way that I thought he would have responded. But I think that goes to show kind of the work around forgiveness, mutuality, love and grieving. That's been done in our own lives and journeys. But for sure it was nerve-wracking when I was going to send it to him. 06:32 - Speaker 2 Wow. So I mean, I'm a mother, I've got a seven, five and two-year-old, yes, and I would like to think I'm really patient, but I lose it on my kids sometimes. And if one of my kids were to later in life say, mom, I'm going to write about this time where you got really mad at me, like you know, and I'm not, like you know, in the shame and honor culture, so I can only imagine like the amount of healing and grace and redemption that has happened in your relationship with your father and in his life. It's really, it's really powerful. 07:03 So recently we had Pastor Adam Durson on the podcast and he talked about a failed succession at his family's church that led to seven years of not speaking with his father. That led to, after seven years, reconciliation. So I guess I'm just wondering if you have thoughts on that, thoughts on family brokenness and ministry in particular. 07:25 - Speaker 1 If you have thoughts on that, thoughts on family brokenness and ministry in particular. Yeah, I mean I—and obviously I can only speak from my own experience and having also been through a succession process as well prior to us starting Hope. First, on the front of family dynamics, yeah, I think there's something about ministry that if we're not careful, especially in the vocation of ministry, it's so easy to present like a public face versus what's happening in private. And of course, we see this in the Pharisees and the religious leaders of Jesus' day and how that continued kind of hypocrisy can continue. 08:06 And so I think and now being a pastor myself, so you know, granted, like having this whole journey with my own dad and how choosing to go into vocational ministry, and like you also not being the perfect parent Sorry, not like that I know you're pretty much familiar with that no, it's okay. 08:25 - Speaker 2 I think it's fair to say. 08:28 - Speaker 1 But I think walking the line of having an authentic kind of spirituality, both in public and in private, I think is one of the hardest tasks, and yet it's what Jesus constantly calls us to. I think the Sermon on the Mount gets that kind of uh, like a certain fabric of spirituality that goes beyond the public, facing do's and don'ts, projected images of what's right and wrong and that sort of thing. And so so I think on one hand, it makes sense that Satan and the enemy would want to do whatever Satan would want to do to disrupt families, to destroy ministries, hopefully as grounded, humble, pursuant after God and the right things as possible. And so, you know, I work with an organization called Emotionally Healthy Discipleship, and so much of our ministry is around that. 09:38 How do we have integrity? And you know the word integrity it comes from, it's the same as the root word integer, so like a whole number, so like a wholeness. How do we live with a certain kind of wholeness? And so I think that in itself is one of the biggest challenges and calls and invitations of our day for ministry leaders. And at the same time, succession brings about a whole otherher wave of like challenges, deep work that needs to be done for it to be done well, and so yeah. So I could talk a whole lot about succession as well, but yeah, that's I really. 10:22 - Speaker 2 I love what you shared about the family dynamic and about your public versus your private self, about bringing those two things together. I think that's something that, whether people are ministry or not, I think that's something that we all sort of work towards and need to mature into. You talked in the book about claiming the faith that you grew up in in undergrad at Berkeley. Was that also the moment you knew you would be going into ministry? 10:46 - Speaker 1 The church that we grew up in had this awful church split, and then my father was a minister, but our home life was so far from what I thought would be an ideal picture of like Christian love. 10:58 But the youth group that we were part of, we just met some tremendous youth leaders, people that we always wanted to be like. 11:05 So I remember, actually, in my youth days, there were constantly invitations for anyone that was interested in like vocational ministry, and so I remember thinking, oh, if ever I were to do something, initially I wanted to be a teacher, but then I thought I think I'd want to do this. But then, after those high school years, and now here I am in college and I'm really wrestling, and I was taking classes on Bible as literature and on religious studies and studying various different religions, and during that time, at that point, I was just wrestling with my faith. And once I made that decision, though, to follow Jesus, that, despite the pain of my past, believing that Jesus was true and compelling and worth following, it was shortly thereafter that I realized I loved, while I was a student at Berkeley, I just loved ministry, I loved people, I loved inviting people into a deeper relationship with Jesus, and so it was. I can't remember when, but it was shortly thereafter that I was like I think I would like to do this vocationally. 12:13 - Speaker 2 Wow. So we've interviewed a lot of pastors and ministry leaders on this podcast and I've lost count of the number of people who said it was really my youth pastor, my youth pastor and the youth leaders. I mean it really it's incredible. It's just, it's really striking. Like the impact, right, like people look at the lead pastor. Right, there's so much focus on the lead pastor, but the youth pastor is like planting these seeds for the next generation of ministry. Did you work in youth when you entered ministry? Is that where you started? 12:49 - Speaker 1 You know I. So I started as an intern at New Life Fellowship in Queens and I think I I was doing everything from setting up for mom's groups, volunteer tearing for our kids ministry, going on youth retreats. I was doing just about everything that an intern would do and I loved it, um, so, yeah, so my most and I did, interestingly enough, I did when I was in high school. I would volunteer with some of the middle schoolers back in California and then, when I was in New York and working at New Life as an intern, I really was able to experience what ministry was like to various different demographics, which was so great and so, yeah, so that was. That was such a rich um learning time for me, working with various different age groups kids, youth but I was never the youth pastor. I was an intern who then went into becoming like a community pastor, becoming like a teaching pastor and that sort of thing Cool. 13:47 - Speaker 2 So you grew up in LA, yep, now you've been in New York city for 25 years. I think it's safe to say you're a New Yorker. 13:53 - Speaker 1 Absolutely. I hope so, so why New? 13:55 - Speaker 2 York. What brought you to New York? 13:57 - Speaker 1 Well, I mean, I loved I just loved the energy of the city. I love the grittiness of the city, um, and Los Angeles, and I love LA and I have two brothers that still live there and I love visiting LA. But LA and I used to just think the world of LA, I just thought LA was where I wanted to be. But I visited New York for the first time the summer between my junior and senior year, in the summer of 2000,. And I just remember coming to New York City and being like there is no place like New York and the diversity, the energy, like I mentioned, the grittiness. 14:43 There's something about LA where I don't know and I know this sounds kind of weird but there's a certain safety there that I felt living in LA and it's not like I lived in the best neighborhood or anything, it was basically. But there's a certain kind of protective way that I could go about life and community that I can't do so here in New York. Like every single part of New York, I'm interacting with both the beauty of the city as well as the brokenness of the city and the people that I'm rubbing shoulders with on the subway or that I'm walking around with, whether it's in the various boroughs of the city. There's just such a beautiful story and collision of stories that I love about the city and then, of course, just believing that God was working here. So it is a bit surreal to say that I've lived most of my life here in New York as opposed to in California where I grew up, but I definitely love New York City. I've changed my sports allegiance teams, which my brothers give me a whole lot of dirt about, but anyhow. 15:58 - Speaker 2 So you talk about the beauty and the brokenness and you talk about being like amidst all of that. I think for most New Yorkers, something that you hear people talk about all the time is like their apartment. Right, People are always looking for an apartment. They just moved or they're looking to move. There's always something that they wish for in their apartment and for most people it's about escaping that tension of the beauty and the brokenness, having a place to retreat to. But you've done the opposite of that. You live here at the hub, which you've set up to be your home, as well as this ministry center that welcomes all into it. I just see so much beauty in it. I'm so encouraged by it. 16:39 - Speaker 1 Can you talk a little bit about why the hug? Yeah, and so the building here, which is our church, co-owns this building and we live here in a parsonage space and, honestly, most credit goes to my wife and, honestly, most credit goes to my wife she was the one that had a vision for this building. 16:57 I had a vision for just having a space. As you know, kind of ministry in New York is so difficult and so costly, and so when an opportunity came for us to co-purchase this as well as to have it be a vision for the city, um, yes, I had a heart and a vision to kind of open our doors so that various ministries and organizations could benefit from it. Um, but my wife was. She was the one who was able to execute all of it and was able to make this vision kind of become a reality. We do love living here. 17:39 I know that, and a lot of that is my wife. As a volunteer, she has spearheaded all the renovations and the operations of the building and and, of course, you know, come up with a plan so that it could be accessible to so many nonprofits and purchase here in the city. So I'm very deeply indebted to her for that. And at the same time, like anything in life, it's beautiful and disappointing. So there's a lot of great work happening here, but then like, oh, you know, when there were there's flooding down in the basement, it's me and her basically mopping up um, you know, a flooded basement and, uh, spending hours cleaning up. And, of course, we've had wonderful people in our church community who have volunteered their time and energy as well, which has been wonderful. 18:23 - Speaker 2 So, but beauty and disappointment, it's part of it all what a picture of what it looks like to serve the kingdom right beauty, but also mopping up the basement. Yeah, yeah, it's just. It comes along with the territory and ministry. 18:36 - Speaker 1 Yeah. 18:37 - Speaker 2 So, Drew, you're a pastor to pastors. You've been a pastor here for two and a half decades, but you're also well known here as a pastor to pastors. Can you tell me, in 25 years of ministry here, how has it changed? How has ministering to people in New York City changed? 19:01 - Speaker 1 The people who started churches and have been pastoring here since the 80s and 90s. I give them much props Because they really paved the way for us and we stand on their shoulders, and obviously the generations before that, other ones. But I really say because in the 80s and 90s people were leaving the city and so in many ways, like being staying in the city or moving to the city to start churches and ministries, it like. I just give so much respect to the pastors and leaders who have done that Because they were doing it when the city wasn't cool. In fact the city was dangerous. It was seen as this place that God had forsaken and yet they moved in. 19:44 I feel like being a pastor. I've come into this kind of golden age in New York City where the city's cool. I mean even post-COVID. I mean sure there's been a blip. I mean I came right before 9 11 and you know much was made about the demise of New York after 9 11, but the city became really this incredibly um urban hotspot, globally influential, continue to be globally influential. Then of course, covid happens and then again the rumors were that New York would meet its demise. But um, new York is like this, really attractive, um, world changing kind of city and so in many ways, like um, I just feel so honored to be here and and at the same time I also, you know, uh think that the prior generation had it much tougher. So, but with that said, I think there's dynamics of the city that will always make an issue hard. The exorbitant costs, the discomfort, um, I mean those alone just make it really difficult to be here. And I think for ministers that are coming here, I hope that they come Actually, one friend he mentioned. 21:03 He said you know, the way to survive ministry in New York is you almost have to move here with the mentality of an immigrant. And it was interesting for him to say that because he said, as an immigrant, what I do is I move here but I don't like I bought a one-way ticket and I'm not going to go anywhere else. And he said, if I don't come with it, that mentality like I've left some place as a deep desire to plant roots here and to raise a family here, then it's going to be really hard. 21:34 I don't know when the difficulties of the city come like I'll easily want to split from this place. What I found in New York that's different from other cities is there is a certain kind of camaraderie that comes from all of our backs are against one. None of us feel like we're flourishing here, you know, so we kind of need each other, which again makes this a place that I want to do ministry and be in the trenches with others here. 21:58 - Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah. So I've spoken to some pastors who have moved into the city or who have an eye towards the city, who have a dream about the city, and I get the sense in talking to these pastors that they sense that the Lord wants to write a new story, especially in the city. Do you get that sense? 22:17 - Speaker 1 Yeah, no, absolutely. 22:19 And I think I mean I see the threads, I think, having been here so long, like obviously my spiritual father was Pete Scazzaro Cazaro and kind of the deep work that Pete did and that New Life Fellowship represents, which is really the convergence of so many different streams of Christian tradition. 22:41 There's this justice strongly committed to the scriptures, strongly valuing justice and mercy, a dependence, a conscious dependence on the Holy Spirit, as well as this integration of emotional health and contemplative spirituality. 22:57 Like, in many ways, like I see that convergence that's happening in the city, I see the legacy of someone like Tim Keller and Redeemer and they're kind of the generous spirit to look to want to hopefully catalyze a movement of churches in the city and just the humble disposition that Tim carried. And so now I think that the friendship that exists within different pastors here in the city I think is really again standing on the shoulders of folks like Tim and Pete and others and hopefully the way that we do ministry is with integrity, authenticity and a real connectivity and teamwork that just kind of has a non-competitive posture to it. So that's my hope of what's brewing and what I think is brewing. But I do think there's been a conscious dependence on the Spirit to move in radical ways, and so I feel so excited to be in the city at this time, and I feel so grateful for these forerunners who have gone before us. 24:07 - Speaker 2 Yeah, that's really beautiful. So, Drew, you've mentioned emotionally healthy discipleship a couple of times in Pete's Gazero and before we started taping, you shared with me that you're taking on a new role there. Can you talk a little bit about that? 24:21 - Speaker 1 Left New Life Fellowship in 2011, started Hope in 2012,. And then Pete and I, over these 24 years now we've known each other and worked very closely with each other Shaded Emotion, Healthy Discipleship. Which Emotion Healthy Discipleship? When we use that phrase, it simply means a discipleship that goes beneath the surface and that values a slowed down spirituality. And so, and after I left New Life, I would regularly write him an email and I would say, pete, first I'm sorry. I would say I'm sorry for not listening more intently to the things you have to say, because I was swimming in the waters like I couldn't see how important it was. And then I would write thank you, thank you, because there's no way I'd be where I am as a pastor without him, his influence, as well as some of the pain of church planting. And so my wife and I like the kind of marriage we have, the kind of family we have and hopefully, the kind of grounded rootedness we have, I hope is really due to his discipleship him and Jerry Scazzaro, and so that whole journey has led me. 25:52 I so deeply value emotional health and discipleship. I really think that, especially for New York City and even for movement, because most of the time, people often bifurcate mission and health and they think you can't have both. But I really think that the pathway towards greater mission, especially citywide, is emotionally healthy discipleship. So all that to say, yeah, I'm walking into a succession with Pete now around emotional, healthy discipleship, so I'll be stepping in. Currently I'm the executive director I don't know what my title is going to be, but Pete's moving into a founder mentor role, which I'm very excited about. So we'll still be working together. I'll just kind of be sliding into a role while still leading Hope Church. It's very important for me to really I love being a pastor, and so I think valuing both being able to be a local church pastor who's also involved in discipleship and involved in hopefully wanting to embody a culture of emotional discipleship and mission is really important to me. 26:59 - Speaker 2 Wow. So how long and maybe you guys haven't discussed this yet, but how long do you think this transition will take? 27:08 - Speaker 1 Well, yeah, in October we're having Actually, this will be the first time that I'm sharing this publicly, but in October we're going to be doing a Passing the Torch kind of evening at New Life Fellowship, where Rich Valotis, who's a dear friend, he will also be there and Pete, and we'll be inviting different folks to this a night of celebrating not only the ministry of Pete and Jerry Scazzaro, but also of looking to the future of emotional, healthy discipleship globally. 27:37 - Speaker 2 Yeah, Looking ahead once you sort of fully take the mantle, are there dreams that you already have? Of taking it to different countries or in different directions, or offering more. 27:50 - Speaker 1 Yeah, right now there is a global footprint that Emotionally Healthy Discipleship has One of our biggest calls right now and it's part of the transition actually, because we're moving from founder where Pete was, and Pete was so instrumental in the content that really shaped the values of emotional healthy discipleship and in many ways, the content whether it's a podcast, the courses that have been created, the books and resources, um but we're actually moving towards content to now, um different levels of church engagement. We're inviting churches and pastors and leaders into deeper levels of community and coaching, and so there's actually two different levels of churches that we're introducing. So while there were course churches, now we're inviting churches to go deeper because we're really asking the question like, how do we go beyond? You know, most people they're like, oh yeah, we're healthy because we're running this course. So we've read the book, but we're like no, that's, that's not enough. 28:50 Um, there's actually ways in which we can begin to embody a culture, and how do we do that so that at every level of the church, whether it's in kids ministry or youth ministry or the elder board, there's a certain level of emotional health. That kind of runs through how we go about things, and so that's kind of the future is how do we come alongside churches? 29:12 - Speaker 2 to go deeper into that conversation, so, drew, let's take it back to your book. Who were you thinking of when you wrote this book? 29:19 - Speaker 1 Yeah, I was thinking of. You know, as a pastor, I often get asked by people like what is christianity about? Or I get asked by some of our parishioners like what can I recommend to my friend or my co-worker who doesn't isn't a christian? And so normally whenever I'm asked that question, I think of three categories, like first, I'm like, is this person kind of an intellectual type who wants evidence and like? And then I think of authors like tim keller and cs lewis and I'll recommend mere christianity or the reason for god or there's. 29:54 You know, depending on the person, I'll kind of think, oh, they'll probably really benefit from like a memoir or like a testimonial kind of book. Um, I think of authors like Anne Lamott and who I find just so compelling and so. Or the third category is like, oh, maybe it's someone who's like interested in learning about the basics of what Christians believe, like you know. And then I think of books like John Stott's book, basic Christianity. And so, you know, as I was thinking about, like gosh, I would really love to write a book that gave a reason for faith, that connected to people's everyday experiences and that was written in colloquial, everyday language. 30:38 So the book Beautiful, disappointing, hopeful, how Gratitude, grief and Grace Reflect the Christian story is really. It was my attempt to write in three simple, memorable words what is the Christian story about. And so for anyone who was new to faith, they would be able to hear the Christian story is about beautiful, disappointing and hopeful, and that it really is a frame for how Christians view life, and hopeful, and that it really is a frame for how christians view life, and for christians, hopefully, it becomes a resource to say like, hey, this, this is what we believe. Can you believe in a world that's beautiful, disappointing, but hopeful? And um? So my hope was really. I was writing it for our church, thinking through people who are exploring faith, or people that want to journey with someone else when it comes to faith. 31:27 - Speaker 2 After I read the book and I kept looking back at the title I thought, wow, that doesn't just describe the Christian life in a macro way. It describes all the micro aspects of our life, like marriage, like your career, like your day. I mean, it encapsulates it all. It's macro and micro, which is what I loved about it. 31:50 - Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah, and in some ways I want people to kind of live life with a certain expectation for beauty and a certain expectation for disappointment and a certain expectation, at least from a Christian worldview, for hope and a certain expectation at least from a Christian worldview, for hope, and I think that I mean kind of like what you said, like people, you know, single people who want to get married, like hey, marriage is beautiful and disappointing, yeah, and hopefully hopeful and for any season of life. This new job that we think is going to be the magic bullet, or the church community that we think, oh, this is the best. The reality is Christian community, and me, as a pastor, I will hopefully do things that will elicit gratitude but also a lot of grief, but hopefully that we this can be a frame for how we view the world, how hopefully we can be a people of gratitude, grief and grace, and so that really is a desire. 32:54 - Speaker 2 Well, thank you for the book, drew. I mean. So I read the book and I felt like you could look at the book as written for someone who was exploring the faith. But it was helpful to me and I'm a ministry leader and it gave me tools for apologetics. It gave me words and language for the questions that we all encounter in our ministry from people who are trying to figure it out and make sense of it all. 33:22 - Speaker 1 Yeah. 33:23 - Speaker 2 Yeah, so thank you for that. Well, thank you, drew. It really has been such a privilege to be able to talk to you and talk about your new book. Thank you very much. 33:31 - Speaker 3 Thank you for tuning in to the Faithly Stories podcast. We pray this episode gave you the encouragement you needed to continue on your journey. The Faithly Stories podcast is brought to you by Faithly, an online community committed to empowering church leaders, pastors, staff and volunteers. The Faithly digital platform offers innovative and practical tools and resources to enhance connection, foster collaboration and promote growth within the church and ministry space. Remember to subscribe, rate and review our podcast to help reach more listeners like you. Stay tuned for more uplifting tales from the front lines of ministry on the Faithly Podcast. Stay bold, stay faithful and never underestimate the power of your own story.