The Pastorate Podcast

The Pastorate’s Lead Pastor Fellowship
Emotionally Healthy Discipleship
Hope Church NYC
Beautiful, Disappointing, Hopeful by Drew Hyun
A Grace Disguised by Dr. Jerry Sittser
Water from a Deep Well by Dr. Jerry Sittser
The Pastorate Conference
The Pastorate's City Meetups
The Pastorate Pastors Retreat

Episode Notes
Today’s episode is part three of our summer series exploring our pastoral formation cohorts here at The Pastorate. This episode features Drew Hyun and Dr. Jerry Sittser, profiling their time spent with last year’s cohort of The Lead Pastor Fellowship. 
Drew Hyun is the Lead Pastor of Hope Church NYC and Executive Director of Emotionally Healthy Discipleship. Drew shares the unpolished version of his own story: growing up a pastor's kid in a Korean immigrant church that split twice before he hit middle school, watching his father go from a harsh, at times violent man at home to a celebrated Christian author and speaker in Korea, and the gap that opened up between his own public ministry persona and a private life marked by hidden addiction and unprocessed rage. He traces how a chance internship exposed him to Pete Scazzero's "iceberg" picture of discipleship, the ten percent above the surface and ninety percent buried beneath it, and how that encounter became the seed of emotionally healthy discipleship in his own life. Drew confesses that it's entirely possible to do ministry for God without God, and that the deepest work of leadership is letting Jesus into the deepest and darkest parts of our hearts. 
Following Drew, Dr. Jerry Sittser, Professor Emeritus of Theology and Senior Fellow at Whitworth University, teaches on pastoral care through irreversible loss, the kind that permanently changes the landscape of a life. Drawing on his own experience, losing his wife, mother, and daughter in a single car accident, Dr. Sittser rejects the idea of "stages of grief" and other neat recovery paradigms in favor of learning to carry loss for good, being transformed rather than finding resolution. He offers pastors concrete counsel: resist rushing to answers, know which biblical text fits which moment, help people ritualize mourning instead of just enduring it, and help them build a community of people who can shoulder their burdens.
In this episode you'll hear:
Drew's story of growing up a pastor's kid inside two church splits, including a church fistfight that the LAPD had to break up,
An exploration of the phrase: "Jesus may live in your heart, but Grandpa lives in your bones,"
Why it's entirely possible to do ministry for God without God, even while seeing real spiritual fruit,
Pete Scazzero's iceberg image and how it became the seed of a discipleship model that goes beneath the surface,
Dr. Sittser's own story of catastrophic loss, and why he rejects "stages of grief" in favor of integration and transformation,
How to discern when to speak and when to sit in silence with someone carrying irreversible loss,
Practical postures for walking with people through suffering. 

Partners
We couldn't do the work we do at The Pastorate without your generous support. We invite you to pray, share, and give towards seeding a hope-filled future for the Canadian church.
If you are seeking ways to guide your congregation into the next step of their faith journey, we welcome you to explore the Canadian Bible Society’s Ministry Toolkit. The Ministry Toolkit is designed to help your church or ministry deliver online or in-person Bible-based programs for the special audiences you may serve.

Show Notes
Learn More about The Emerging Leaders Lab
Coastline Church
The Pastorate Conference
The Pastorate's City Meetups
The Pastorate Pastors Retreat

Episode Notes
On today's episode Jordan sits down with Laura Liira, campus pastor of Coastline Church West Shore on Vancouver Island and participant in the 2025-2026 class of The Emerging Leaders Lab. Laura was born in Victoria into a nominal Catholic home, and was reintroduced to Christianity though her teenage years. During a gap year in London England, she encountered Jesus in a new way and committed to serve him for the rest of her life. Laura’s story is one marked by saying yes to whatever service opportunity was in front of her. She talks honestly about God-given dreams and the time they take to mature, and the journey from church intern to Campus Pastor.
In the back half of the conversation Laura and Jordan turn to her year in the Emerging Leaders Lab, where she was the only woman in a cohort of male pastors with Keith Taylor as her guide. Laura reflects on how that band of brothers received her, prayed over her, and still meets together in a monthly rhythm. She reflects on women in ministry across the Canadian church landscape, the grit of pastoring a mobile church that sets up and tears down a middle school gym every Sunday, and she shares about what is filling her with hope right now.
In this episode you'll hear:
How a gap year in London, meant for partying, became the year Laura met Jesus,
How saying yes to the next thing in front of you is a simple act of obedience that can open doors to opportunity,
The dreams she buried with her husband and how God dug them up in his own timing,
Being the only woman in a cohort of male pastors, and the "red rose" word that welcomed her in,
The unique challenges of a mobile church,
Why the fire she sees in young people across Canada has her so full of hope.
Laura's story is a reminder that the most formative work in ministry rarely happens on a stage, but that it often happens in obedient acts of showing up and saying yes to what's in front of you. We trust this conversation will encourage you right where you are.

Partners
We couldn’t do the work we do at The Pastorate without your generous support. We invite you to pray, share, and ⁠give⁠ towards seeding a hope-filled future for the Canadian church.
Contact John Wright at Generis for help cultivating a culture of generosity in your church.

Show Notes
Learn More about The Emerging Leaders Lab
Glenn Packiam’s The Resilient Pastor
Mark Buchanan’s What is Left of The Night
Give to our $30,000 Match Campaign
The Pastorate Conference
The Pastorate's City Meetups
The Pastorate Pastors Retreat
Episode Notes
This summer, we're taking you inside the two pastoral formation cohorts at the heart of The Pastorate: the Emerging Leaders Lab and the Lead Pastor Fellowship. Over four episodes, we're sharing the best teaching from this past year’s Lab and Fellowship and sitting down with participants from both programs to hear what an intentional season of formation actually does in the life of a pastor. This is the first episode of our four part series, replaying some of the best moments from last year’s Emerging Leaders Lab.
The Emerging Leaders Lab just wrapped up its third year and kicked off its fourth year. In the 2025-2026 cohort, 24 pastors gathered monthly on Zoom to sit under the teaching of a remarkable lineup of guest teachers, and to do the thing you rarely get to do with someone you've only read or listened to: ask their questions, out loud and in real time. Each guest came to teach around one of the eight formation areas that shape the Lab, covering everything from calling and community to character and craft. In this episode, our team pulled together the moments the cohort named as most impactful.
In this episode you’ll hear from:
Glenn Packiam on why pastors need a constellation of relationships and the diverse voices every pastor needs around them: rulers, peers, sages, healers, and friends.
Carey Nieuwhof on burning out in the middle of a decade of explosive growth, finding your line, and how this generation of pastors can finish differently.
Helen Burns on why balance is a misaligned goal, what to anchor to instead, and the confession she keeps hearing from pastors: my soul is so tired.
Jason Ballard on the difference between the friends you play with and the deep friends who know your shadow side, say the hard thing, and have to be pursued on purpose.
Lance Odegard on why you can't know your calling until you know your design, blind spots and the true self, and the game-changing leadership question: how do you experience me?
Mark Buchanan on the difference between who you're called to be and what you're called to do, and why the calling on your life can't be revoked.
With thanks to the many other voices who contributed to the Lab this past year, including Darrell Johnson, Chris Price, Mark Peters, Milissa Ewing, and Preston Pouteaux.
Partners
Would you consider giving to our summer match campaign? Every donation in June will be matched by a generous donor up to $30,000.
If you are seeking ways to guide your congregation into the next step of their faith journey, we welcome you to explore the Canadian Bible Society’s Ministry Toolkit. The Ministry Toolkit is designed to help your church or ministry deliver online or in-person Bible-based programs for the special audiences you may serve.

Show Notes
The Pastorate Conference
Give to our $30,000 June Match Campaign
Mark Clark’s Website
Village Church Website
Bayside Church Website
The Mark Clark Podcast
The Problem of Life by Mark Clark
The Pastorate's City Meetups
The Pastorate Pastors Retreat
Episode Description
In today's conversation, Jason sits down with Mark Clark, the pastor who planted Village Church in British Columbia, and now the Global Senior Pastor at Bayside Church in California. Mark’s story includes an atheist upbringing in Ontario, a late-teen conversion, a dream of becoming an academic at Oxford, and a call to plant a church in one of the most secular corners of North America. What began with sixteen people in his living room grew into one of the fastest-growing churches in Canada, and Mark reflects with both gratitude and candor on the road that took him there.
Jason and Mark talk about the patience that shaped their early ministry years, waiting for the right time, the right people, and the right season to plant churches. Mark opens up his convictions around preaching, describing how he learned to speak to the skeptic and the lifelong believer in the same room, and why he refuses to choose between reaching the lost and discipling the found. He's also honest about the cost of leading through rapid growth, including the burnout seasons that left him preaching dizzy and gripping the pulpit to stay upright.
The conversation also turns to what it meant to leave the church he founded and entrust it to leaders he loves, and the insecurity that keeps many leaders from transitioning. Drawing on Zechariah 10, he candidly describes his calling as making warhorses out of sheep, a vision he holds with both conviction and a winsome humility
In this episode you'll hear:
How an atheist kid from Ontario became a church planter in one of Canada's most secular cities,
Why patience, the right time, people, and season, mattered more than urgency in the plant,
How to preach to the skeptic and the lifelong believer in the same room,
What the burnout seasons cost Mark, and the team decision that reshaped his preaching,
Why he left the church he founded, and what it's been like to watch it flourish under new leadership,
How Zechariah 10 reframed his calling around raising and releasing the next generation of leaders.
Partners
Would you consider giving to our summer match campaign? Every donation in June will be matched by a generous donor up to $30,000.
Generis has created a Pastorate-exclusive Generosity Cohort. Over one year, eight pastors leading churches with annual budgets under $1 million will journey together, coached by Jon Wright, who will help develop a customized generosity plan for their church. Because it’s cohort-based and designed for Canadian pastors, it offers a more affordable option than 1on1 coaching. This cohort launches in July 2026 and is limited to eight pastors. If this sounds like it could serve you and your church, you can reach out to Jon Wright here.

Show Notes
Give to our $30,000 Match Campaign
Contact Josh from The Pastorate to Give on Behalf of Your Church
Contact Jon Wright from Generis
Enter to Win 1 of 5 copies of All Things Together
Heath’s Website
Buy All Things Together
Episode Description
On today's episode we welcome Heath Hardesty, Lead Pastor of Valley Community Church in Pleasanton, California, and author of All Things Together: How Apprenticeship to Jesus Is the Way of Flourishing in a Fragmented World. Heath's journey into pastoral ministry began as a plumber's apprentice and eventually grew into an apprenticeship of a different kind, one where he learned to follow the call of Jesus and eventually to shepherd a local church.
This conversation traces Heath's story, from studying literature and theology, playing in bands, and apprenticing under his plumber father, before a moment of encounter through the Scripture stirred his heart toward a life in the pastorate. Jason and Heath explore Heath’s book All Things Together which offers a vision of Christian apprenticeship built on union, abiding, obeying, and imaging and they discuss why imagination shapes the way we inhabit the world, the role of story in a fragmented age, and what it means to re-inhabit reality in the way of Jesus.
In this episode you'll hear:
Heath's journey from a plumber's truck and a music career to the pastorate, 
How a moment under a sink, holding an orange-painted wrench like his father, became his inspiration for All Things Together, 
Why apprenticeship to Jesus is the essence of being human, not an optional "side quest" for mature Christians,
What disintegration looks like in our culture and in our souls, and why our age acts as an amplifier of fragmentation,
The role of story and imagination in helping people re-inhabit reality in the way of Jesus,
Why "technique" and efficiency are at odds with being stewards of the mysteries of God,
How the greatest gift a pastor brings to a congregation may simply be the person they are becoming.
For every pastor learning the slow craft of shepherding, this conversation offers a frame for the work, and a reminder that you, too, are an apprentice. May it encourage you wherever you're serving.