Today we're thrilled to be speaking with Pastor Brandon Cooper. Pastor Brandon Cooper is the senior pastor of City View Community Church in Elmhurst, Illinois. And also the author of the texts that we'll be discussing today, a word to the wise lessons from Proverbs for young adults, published in 2011. We're coming up on a 10 year celebration for this text. Pastor Brandon Cooper, thank you so much for joining us today.
Yeah, thanks for having me. Great to be here.
Pastor, Pastor Cooper, you publish a word to the wise, when you were living in Bogota, Colombia, what brought you to Bogota?
Well, the Lord, is the short easy answer, I suppose. Yeah, our intention after seminary had not been to head out onto the mission field. We're hoping to get some local church experience. First before we really sense God's call, but the Lord by slamming quite a few doors, in in shocking ways, made it quite clear that we were supposed to be there. My wife and I. And so we went down for two and a half years. And about seven years later, we came back, as is often the case just fell in love with the the people in the ministry. And yeah, had a wonderful time. They're amazing. So what was the inspiration for this text word to the wise? You were a young man, I'm trying to do the calculation to know your age. Exactly. But I think you were 29, about when you wrote the book, and you wrote it specifically for young people. What was the inspiration for this text? Yeah, it came out of my time there in Columbia. One of the roles I had was as Bible teacher in a missionary school, though all that was primarily Colombian students in that school. And I taught through the wisdom books as one of my semesters, and I saw how relevant proverbs was to the teenage experience. And in fact, it reads like a father speaking to his probably teenage son in so many ways. And so just seeing that relevance felt like
it would be very beneficial to frame Proverbs in a way that could spark conversation among families, especially, but also, perhaps youth groups, or, in my case, a Bible class. So that we had everything arranged topically and could dig deep into the text and see just how relevant the word is to the life of a 1415 1617 year old.
And one of the things that strikes me as really cool, and not to be taken for granted, is that you somehow knew what was going on in the life of a 14 1516 year old. So I don't think you were raised in a Latin American culture. I don't think that was part of your background. But how were you able to learn what was going on in the minds of these young students?
Yeah, well, that part's really important. Whatever age you're working with, of course, you have to, quoting a different author, but you have to smell like the sheep. You have to know the flock entrusted to your care, and to understand what issues they're facing. So I think it's a huge piece of life on life ministry, which I'm a huge proponent of I think Jesus modeled for us, I think Paul modeled for us as well. And so getting deeply involved in the lives of in my case, the students at that time, was really important. In fact, there's some benefits to being a chaplain and a teacher as opposed to a pastor. I don't see them just two hours a week, but got to see them more like 3035 hours a week in different ways. Got to see them as they were going through their Monday to Friday routine. It'd be a little bit like a pastor today getting to hang out at work with some of his congregants would probably lead you to some different conversations and maybe to address some different emphases in your preaching. And that's really what came out in the book as well, knowing okay, this was a conversation I had with somebody yesterday, this was something I saw ongoing last week. Let's talk about it. Let's talk about how proverbs has already assumed the sorts of issues are gonna be happening and has shown us a better way a gospel way forward.
Pastor Randy Cooper, do I have the chronology right, that this is your first book that you've written?
Yes, that's right. First, and only in fact. Okay.
But is I was your parishioner for about three years, when I was living in the Chicago area? And one of the things that I learned about you is that you're always working on a writing project. Let's talk philosophy of writing just for a moment. When do you do your best writing work?
So I know some people are morning people and they're up nice and early, and that's the most productive hours and some people are night owls. And it's the you know, after a mouse is asleep is when they really get going. I've got about two or three good hours right in the middle of the day. And that's about it for me. So I do right in the middle of the day here, frequently in the office, because it's a little less distracting than my home, which has a lot of children in it. And so, yeah, that's, that's what I do my best work, certainly, in terms of actually writing the thought process, as I'm sure you know, that goes on all the time. Usually, our best thoughts come when we're doing something else driving something like that gardening, and that's when the idea pops into your head, but the actual writing usually right in the middle the day?
How did you learn that discipline of writing?
That's a great question. I'm not sure I've learned the discipline of writing, what I've learned is that writing requires discipline, that is probably the most important piece. And so simply acknowledging that this is not going to happen unless you roll up your sleeves and get to work, I think is a really important part of it. You know, in some ways, I learned that as a teacher, and then as a preacher, because you do have to generate content constantly. And so you have to keep working at it. But knowing that I'm going to preach a sermon most every week to then say develop a discipleship curriculum on top of that, it really will take discipline, you need to set aside time for it, I think that's an important piece is having it on the to do list, carving out time in the day to make sure that you have it is really important. And going along with that, I would say, making sure that you're carving out time for reading as well is really important. I think of all people Stephen King, who said, If you don't have time to read, you don't have time to write. And I find that's really true, because my well runs dry really quickly. But if I'm reading the great works, not just a theology or biblical expositional, that's important, but even great works of literature that really spurs my thinking, and therefore my writing along. And I do mean literature, just hearing people phrase things well, encourages me to work hard at the craft of writing, which is something I don't know that we pastors all have firmly in our heads I've written, I've read some really good content that I didn't like reading, because it was so poorly done. And I think, you know, maybe good if you read a little bit more, Faulkner, or Cormac McCarthy or something just to get a better sense of how to turn a phrase, so that these glorious trues appear more glorious, even in the way they're expressed.
So Brandon, when do you know that a piece of writing is is finished? How do you know that you're ready to move on?
I don't think I've ever finished a piece of writing. So that's a great question. Yeah, one of the challenges of publishing a book, of course, is that's it, and it quickly becomes a an artifact in time. Most of the other writing that I do like the journey curriculum, I'm constantly updating every year as we go back to it, I get to tweak it a little bit more. And I think that has hammered home for me just how unlikely it is to ever feel fully satisfied with what you've written. And I know that's true for me. So you know, I look back at a word of the wise, for example, and it's not that I see heresy or tremendously immature thoughts. But I certainly would say things a little bit differently, I would hit some things a little bit harder. I probably wouldn't spend as much time on some other things, add some nuance into the argument. Always update illustrations. That's one of the most painful things about reading an older work. So yeah, I think there's there has to be a humility there to go, you know what this isn't done, and it could be improved. And people will find fault with what I've written, and their faults that they mistakes that they see or the places where they think I could have done better. They're almost certainly correct in that. But this is what I have right now. And the Lord is calling me to move on. I need to do something else now. And so we need to hit Send at this point and get it off the desk and into publication or whatever.
Well, thank you very much for sharing some of those writing tips and your teaching skills are coming through very nicely, sir, like I'm ready to take notes on this. Okay, this this is a great structure that you're giving on these on these this advice on on how to produce writing projects. Thank you, guys. Brandon, you wrote this text word to the wise about 10 years ago and in between, you've been pastoring not just young people, but you've been pastoring adults, my wife and my family for example, and Many others. How is it different interpreting the scriptures and and bringing the sense of Scripture home to a young person? How is that perhaps different than than pastoring? And teaching the Word of God to an adult?
That's a great question. I don't know that it should be that different. Of course, the illustrations and applications will be more focused in a Sunday sermon. I'm preaching to not only a 16 year old who's sitting in the congregation, but also a 60 year old and also the mother of that 16 year old. And so I have to hit a lot of different things all at the same time. When you're writing just to young adults, your application can be more focused, your illustrations can be more focused, but I actually really enjoy writing for young people, because it forces me to explain things clearly. I can, in writing to adults, or even speaking to adults, I can make them work harder, which means I can be lazier, you have to connect the dots, okay, I've done enough work on my own. Whereas with a teenager, and you know, middle schoolers even would be reading this book, certainly, my daughter, middle schooler read it. And I want to make sure that it's clear for them. And so the reality is, that's how clear I should be all the time. So I would like to think, in terms of speaking to young people more especially in fact, I've got a few writing projects, in my head, only a few things down on paper at this point, that are even aimed at children. Because I want and driven by the fact that I have small children, I want to be able to explain the gospel to my children, I want them to be able to see the the redemptive arc of Scripture very clearly. And so I want to be able to explain it to a six year old, because if I can't explain it to a six year old, then there's a good chance that I'm not actually explaining it well to the 45 year old in my congregation. So I think speaking to young people, specifically, is a really helpful discipline to make sure that you have fully understand the subject yourself, understood the subject yourself, and then are able to communicate it clearly at a at a simplified level.
So Brandon, I'd love to talk to you about your understanding of how to interpret Scripture. Of course, this text word to the wise is an exercise in interpreting the book of Proverbs, particularly for young people. But you interpret the Word of God, every week in the sermons that you preach, and in the other lessons and curriculum that you develop. Talk to us for a minute a little bit about for you what your vision of, of interpreting scripture is, if we can start here, where did you learn to interpret the Scripture? Where did where did that vision come from, in your experience?
Well, I'm a, I'm a product of Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and attended there as a very young Christian, in fact, so I was a tabula rasa, in some ways, a clean slate, in terms of how to interpret Scripture, I hadn't learned any habits good or bad prior to that, really. So that was helpful, because of course, that's really a singular focus at Trinity and making sure that we expose it the scriptures faithfully, because we're those who've been entrusted with the gospel, and we want to steward that trust very well. So that's where I learned it, and learned the process itself. And of course, so much of the processes is getting out of the way of Scripture, so that God can speak because I don't have much to offer at all. But certainly God has plenty to offer. And so I'm simply trying to clear the way for God's word to speak into this particular context and situation, trying to draw out the central thrust of the passage as it related to the people then in there. Okay, but here's how it still relates to us in the here and now that's really the aim of exposition.
Are there a set of steps that you follow when you're interpreting scripture?
Yeah, you steps is maybe too rigid, but there certainly is a rhythm, I guess, is maybe the word I would use to interpretation. I like to be in the original languages. First, I actually write it out in the original languages, you know, double spaced, and, you know, pen and paper kind of thing. I have krans that I use. So my small children are always jealous of my set of krans just a little bit nicer than their sets of krans. So I do that and just try to start to see the connections. It's not my phrase, but in that step really trying to pay aggressive attention attention to the text. Why this why why did Paul, why did Isaiah Why did they say it in this way? Why choose this word, this construction, this logical connection between the, the sentences, because a lot of that gets obscured with familiarity. You read the Scripture a lot, you just know after Paul says this, he says this, and we stop asking why. So I really want to look as closely as I possibly can. Of course, in that observation stage, then, you know, you move into interpretation from there, we now you've got some questions you need to answer and I'll try and answer those questions on my own. But of course, I'm woefully inadequate. And so that's when you would start to turn to others for help, you know, want to stand on the shoulders of giants. So I'm pulling out the commentaries at that point. What did they say? What why this word instead of this word, you know, my knowledge of Greek is not good enough to answer that question. But what did FF Bruce have to say here, and he might have a little more expertise, and he can speak into that. And from there, I think one of the disciplines that I have, that's really challenging for me is not to think of the congregation too soon, to stay in the text first, because otherwise I can short circuit the process and jump right into Oh, this is going to preach, I can I can do this. I got three points already, without having actually finished the work of exegesis of exposition. So once I've done that, though, and I feel like I really have a handle on the text, that's when I will start to work into that. Developing the main idea for me, Tim Keller has been very helpful here. And just it's two very simple questions. But it's helped frame sermon preparation in a totally different way for me, when it's just what is the problem? And how is the gospel the solution? And that's made a huge difference for me. Okay, so there is some sort of problem here, maybe it's an external problem, a circumstantial problem, more likely, it's an internal problem. And then how does the gospel overcome that? How does it help me to respond to opposition, the way Christ would respond to opposition or whatever it may be, you know, from there, and now I'm into the points, that's the skeleton, and then you start to flesh it out with the illustrations, application, and even some of that phrasing that I talked about earlier, wanting it to be expressed in such a way that it's memorable that it's captivating, not just making sure it's accurate, although Sure, I guess that's the bottom of the pyramid, but also engaging when people walk away with maybe with a turn of phrase in their mind. I don't think anyone does that better than Piper, in some ways, you know, he would say things like pleasure is the measure of our treasure, and you go walk, I can never forget that. Because that's so well phrased. There's so much depth there that I just want to keep chewing on that. I don't ever get to that level. But that certainly is the hope.
How cool thank you so much for sharing some of those things. And if I had this right, I think your first degree was in literature in one of the things that I always benefited from when I heard your sermons in person, or now that I'm still listening to you from Germany. One of the things that I always benefited from was the just the there's a thoughtful characters, you solve the scripture passage. And I could only assume that was something that resonated with your past in studying and teaching literature is the way that you solve those texts, is so beautiful that to find Christ as the solution. If I can transition just for a moment, I'd love to talk to you about follow after ministries. So follow after.net is, is a ministry that you found it? I think that was in 2011? Is that correct?
It sounds right.
And what was what was the original charter or aim of this endeavor?
It? That's a great question. My passion? Well, really, there are two but of course, they're related passions, one is making disciples. And I mean that in that life and life, relational sort of way. And then the other is the proclamation of the gospel exposition of the Word of God. Of course, that is how we make disciples, those go hand in hand. So I envision follow after ministries and that language taken from Mark eight, where Jesus says, You got to pick up your cross and follow after me. Interestingly, it's the same word that after which doesn't usually get translated into English, it usually just says, Follow me. But that word after so key because when Jesus says to Peter in the same text, Get behind Me, Satan, that's the same word after and so it's that's where we're supposed to be is behind Jesus following after him in his footsteps. So the vision for follow after ministries was to be really an equipping resource for disciple making. And so a lot of that, of course involves expositing text, you know, providing a thoughtful, biblical resource that will hopefully lead people into a deeper understanding of God's Word. And that's the transformative element in the discipleship process. But I would prefer it if it not be a personal thing that is I don't really want people to read the blog posts or some of the resources that I put up there in isolation, I would love this to be either something that churches grab hold of, or groups within churches to make use of. So actually, the next phase of follow after, which is hopefully coming up here, even in the next few months, we're working hard behind the scenes on it. And that comes out of the discipleship curriculum, the journey that I've written here at City View, is to turn some of those units into studies, again, that an individual could use. But so much more comes from interpreting in community and having that time of confessing to one another encouraging one another admonishing one another so that groups would be able to do to get into God's word, apply God's Word, to their lives, so to be hears of it, and then doers of it. And so disciples are being made, that people are being formed, made more like Christ all the time. So that really is the vision. Of course, if there were training that could be done as well, that would be another piece of it, just very few people have taken me up on that. But I would love to encourage pastors, or small group leaders, or whatever it might be just in terms of how to get these sorts of processes built into the church. Because the church, you know, we're commissioned to make disciples. And I think we all know that I think we would all get that answer right on a multiple choice test. But as churches, we're not necessarily doing it. So it's a little bit like having a widget factory. And at the end of the production line, nobody's checking to see if they're actually widgets or not. So we often just have we do what we've always done as churches without looking back and going, but is this effective? Are we actually making disciples? Or are people just going through the motions of playing church and playing at discipleship? And so that's a big part of the division as well. But I'm just to kind of say, Can we step back and we evaluate? And are there improvements that we can make, which of course there are and always will be?
Faster, Cooper that is really exciting and inspiring to hear you talk about follow after ministries and focusing on Jesus charter for the church, which is to go and make disciples of all nations, and many of our churches and I'm speaking of all of our churches around the world, we've been so busy of late just responding to the the new requirements of COVID and to the trying to keep people safe and healthy as we congregate. Maybe discipleship has gone a little missing from our agendas. What is discipleship?
Well, that's a, that's a big question. All right. I mean, as you know, the, the word disciple comes from the word for learner pupil. And I really, apprentice is probably the right idea. And even that follow after idea, of course, is so much of it, you know, the, the rabbinical students would follow behind their rabbi, they would try and walk in his literal footsteps, to become more like Him. And I think that's really what discipleship is, is our going, I want to step where Jesus stepped. And if Jesus were walking my path right now that I put my feet down, where he put his feet down. So discipleship is a ministry then, of course, is equipping other people encouraging other people to do just that. So we define discipleship here at City View, and it is not our definition. But I can't remember where we got it from. But it's more or less, kind of these three key elements that go together to infuse the Word of God in into a genuine relationship over an extended period of time. So those three elements, the word of God, a genuine relationship, and an extended period of time, Jesus took his time with the disciples. So the analogy I always use for discipleship is actually making tea because I am an avid tea drinker. And I think that word infuse always makes me think of tea anyway. So the word of God is the tea. It's the transforming element. The relationship is the mug really, that the hot water is in and time is, of course time, when you strip away any one of those pieces. And discipleship is lost. Of course, if you take the tea away, it doesn't matter how long you let the mug and hot water sit there, it will still be hot water. That's what happens if we're not focused on the Word of God specifically, and allowing that to shape us. You take the mug away though that relationship and you just pour hot water on the counter and throw a teabag in the middle of it. What change will happen and you'll probably see a couple little brown streaks around there but it's not really going to be tea. It's going to be kind of messy. And that's what we see a lot of in our churches today because our focus is on attendance so much so long as they come in, you know maybe three or four minutes after the service starts, maybe they leave as the last chorus is going. There's no relationship there. And so they are just getting that water on the counter tea bag kind of experience. And so they're not really being made disciples little bit of change, yes, but not to the extent that we'd want to see. And of course, then the time piece as well, you know, you can dunk a tea bag and a mug of water once, and it'll, it'll be dirty water, you know, very, very weak tea. That can happen as well, of course, because we're an instant society, we like to microwave not marinate, at least here where I am, I can't speak to Germany specifically. But we got that instant feel. And so what if we could make discipleship, just a six week class and you get your certificate at the end of it, now you're a disciple. And you know, nobody would say it that cavalierly. But that really is the approach that we've taken based on the evidence of our ministries. That is what we believe it to be, as opposed to this much more organic, relational, process oriented approach to discipleship.
Amazing. Pastor Brandon, at the time of the recording this conversation, we're in the first week of January 2022. And it looks like we're going to be heading into a third year of COVID season, if I'm not mistaken. But talk to me about your hopes. Talk to me about the hopes for your church, and then also speak for a moment to your fellow pastors, what are your hopes for the churches and their pastors in 2022?
Has a great question. I think we're in Philippians. Right now, we're just starting this Sunday, in fact, so I think because I got Philippians on the brain, my hope for the church, for City View, and for the Holy Catholic Church is taken from Philippians. Early on, I think it's verse 12. Paul says, I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that what has happened to me has actually served to advance the gospel. That's my hope that the gospel would advance. And that we would have the depth of insight, as Paul prays for us just a few verses earlier, to see that that's what matters most. So yes, these circumstances have been challenging. Yes, we disagree. We may disagree with our church leaders, even in terms of the masking or the protocol, or whether we're in person or remote, and how long that all lasted. Paul's writing this when he's in chains, and he's going, you know, I probably would prefer not to be in chains. But what really matters is that the Gospels going forth. And so as long as the Gospels going forth, I'm happy, I'm joyful, which is, of course, the light motif in Philippians. And so that would be my hope that our singular focus would be magnifying Christ, by helping others to magnify Christ, which is another great definition of discipleship and exactly where Paul goes in the rest of Philippians chapter one, this is my fruitful labor that I'm going to be with you if your progress and joy in the faith. And whether I live or die. It doesn't matter, so long as Christ is exalted in my body. So whether COVID is here for another six weeks or six years, it doesn't matter, so long as Christ is exalted in my body. And that happens as I help other people exalt Christ as well.
Thank you so much, Pastor Brandon. Well, this is amazing. And, if you, dear viewer are interested in getting more, you can go to www dot follow after dotnet. And you can also subscribe to the city view the city view Community Church in Elmhurst YouTube channel and be getting their weekly sermons. Pastor Brandon, real quickly, what are some of the things that we might be hearing up in the months ahead if we subscribe and tune into what you're doing?
Well, I mentioned the one if you're on follow after, hopefully, we'll get these studies up and running along with a revision of our Lenten devotional, and hoping for an Advent devotional as well, later this year, at CityView. We're doing Philippians, which will take us up to Easter. And after that, we've got kind of an exciting topic coming up, we're going to take a hard look, and honestly kind of a positive look at the phenomenon of deconstruction and Christians deconstructing their faith and why it might actually be a good thing for us to at least consider doing some of that I won't give any more away than that, but that's where we're headed.
I want to hear you on deconstruction. I'm not going to miss that. Cool. That's a branded one of the things that we do here in what a titan fi day is. We're storm chasing as it were. We're looking around the world talking with people all over the world trying to figure out where these new opportunities for telecommunication and global telecommunication which is becoming so much more of a part of our lives, how that might produce unity or allow new forms of unity and In the Christian church, and not all the stories around the world are positive, some places there's increasing disunity. But there's a lot of new opportunity around there too. And if I can just ask you the question that we've been asking all of the contributors to this program, and that is, what would it mean for the church to be united? As Jesus prayed for the unity of the church, in Elmhurst, Illinois? Hmm,
that's a great question, and probably needs to be more of a focus for a lot of us. I think, if I could piggyback on my own Philippians answer earlier, I think that would be just a huge part of it. So much of the disunity comes from letting something other than gospel advancement, becoming our focus. And in fact, Paul's addressing that in Philippians, I mean, he's writing in part, there's an external threat, there's opposition, the Philippians are being persecuted, that's clear. But there's also an internal threat with people like you audience and Tikki feuding. So there's this unity in the church. And Paul's experiencing that in Rome as well. He's got these false preachers who are praying to really twist the knife and during Paul's imprisonment, and Paul's going, it's okay guys, because again, if the gospel is going forth, that's such good news. So I think the answer to the question would be, first of all, a gospel unity, recognizing that what unites us in Christ will always be infinitely more important than anything that could divide us such as secondary or tertiary theological issues. Certainly, what we experience here in the United States, at least the political divisions that are just irrelevant, in light of the gospel. But then the other piece, too, is having a unity of mission. You know what if we disagree about this, or this or this little thing, but the gospel is going forth, then I will continue to rejoice as Paul says, and I would continue to rejoice as well.
It's been our huge pleasure tonight to be speaking with Pastor Brandon Cooper, Senior Pastor of city new Community Church in Elmhurst, Illinois. Also the text of the book that we've been reflecting on tonight, a word to the wise lessons from Proverbs for young adults. Pastor Brandon continues to write at follow after.net and preach sermons on the city view YouTube page. Hope you have a great night. Thanks so much for joining us.