Ideas Have Consequences
Everything that we see around us is the product of ideas, of ideologies, of worldviews. That's where everything starts. Worldviews are not all the same, and the differences matter a lot. How do you judge a tree? By its fruits. How do you judge a worldview? By its physical, tangible, observable fruit. The things it produces. Ideas that are noble and true produce beauty, abundance, and human flourishing. Poisonous ideas produce ugliness. They destroy and dehumanize. It really is that simple. Welcome to Ideas Have Consequences, the podcast of Disciple Nations Alliance, where we prepare followers of Christ to better understand the true ideas that lead to human flourishing while fighting against poisonous ideas that destroy nations. Join us, and prepare your minds for action!
Ideas Have Consequences
Revival+Reformation=Discipled Nations with Teo Hayashi
It seems there are more churches and Christians globally than ever before in history. Yet, society and culture seem to be crumbling around us. Where are these believers? Today's guest, Brazilian Pastor Teofilo Hayashi, argues that this lack of Christian impact is because we've seen souls stirred and saved, but not lives reformed. The Great Commission should affect the whole of societies and nations. How do we live this out? How do we move from revival to reformation? Practically, we need to start with the basics, bringing biblical principles back into the three most influential systems in a society: family, education, and local churches. This message is challenging, inspiring, and urgent. Join us as we get practical with Pastor Teo, exploring how each of us can start discipling the nations!
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We've seen the awakening of the saints. I mean, we have mega churches, but our societies, they're not discipled yet and our cities have not gone through transformation. And that is something that I would read in reformations in Europe. And I'm thinking we haven't experienced this yet and we need it. And so that's how I kind of broke it up into three phases the awakening of the saints, the harvest of the souls and finally, the transformation of cities or nations, or reformation.
Luke Allen:Hi friends, welcome to Ideas have Consequences. The podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance. Here on this show we examine how our mission as Christians is to not only spread the gospel around the world, to all the nations, but our mission also includes to be the hands and feet of God, to transform the nations to increasingly reflect the truth, goodness and beauty of God's kingdom. Tragically, the church has largely neglected this second part of her mission and today most Christians have little influence on their surrounding cultures. Join us on this podcast as we rediscover what it means for each of us to disciple the nations and to create Christ-honoring cultures that reflect the character of the living God.
Scott Allen:Well, welcome again everybody to another episode of Ideas have Consequences. This is the podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance. I'm Scott Allen, I'm the president of the DNA and joined today by friends and team members Luke Allen, daryl Miller, and joining us from Brazil, we have Samuel Felix. Once again, samuel, it's great to see you. From Brazil. We have Samuel Felix once again, samuel, it's great to see you. And our special guest today I am really honored to introduce is Pastor Teo Hayashi. Pastor Teo is also from Brazil. He's from Sao Paulo, where he's joining us today. He's the pastor of Zion Church, which is a very influential church in Brazil. Also, he is the leader of a revival movement that's called Dunamis that is active in over 400 campuses around the world, 40 nations really significant ministry. Pastor Hayashi, it's so great to have you with us today. Thanks for joining.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Oh wow. Thank you so much, scott. It's such an honor. I am a longtime listener of your podcast, so once I received the email for the invite, I felt so honored, so I'm very happy to be here.
Scott Allen:Well, we are so honored. Before I, you know, got on the podcast today, I took some time to watch a talk that you gave just about a year ago in Nashville at a conference called Legacy, and I want to encourage all of our listeners if you're not familiar with Pastor Hayashi, you should tune in and watch that episode. You can find it on YouTube. You were singing our song. I mean, I was just stunned. You were really speaking to the heart of why we exist, our ministry at the DNA, and so that was so encouraging to me and, yeah, we'd love to get into that a little bit, but I would love to hear your story. Pastor Hayashi, you sound like a fascinating young pastor. You obviously are from Brazil. You have Japanese roots. It sounds like I don't know how many generations back that is, but I lived in Japan for a while. I love that country too.
Scott Allen:Oh, that's awesome and then you spent time in the United States. So yeah, connect all these nation dots for us. If you don't mind, I would love to hear your story. No, I love that.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:I love that. Well, my grandparents came to Brazil. They immigrated as missionaries to plant churches amongst the Japanese immigrants. So you know, maybe you guys know this, but in case some of our listeners don't, brazil has the largest population of Japanese people living outside Japan, and just in the metropolitan or the greater Sao Paulo area we're looking at 300,000. So you know, my grandparents came here. They lived in Brazil for over 50 years. They, uh, they died in brazil. They asked that they would be buried in brazil. So they really married the land. So, um, and, and my grandparents, uh, they're directly, a direct fruit from British missionaries that came to evangelize Japan. So, out of the Keswick Convention, a man by the name of Barclay Bookston began this ministry called the Japanese Evangelistic.
Scott Allen:Band. What years are we talking about here? Can you put it into context that?
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:way. The call for evangelism in Japan, in Britain, out of the Keswick Convention was 1903. And my grandparents came to know the Lord in the 30s. So they've had been doing missionary work in Japan already, these British missionaries, and as part of the Christian community that they were, the church that they were part of, they had, you know numerous times the Lord speaking to them about missions in Brazil. And so it began with medical missions.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:My grandfather was a dentist and so he got connected to medical missions in the Amazon region and while there for his first year working there with my grandma and my eldest aunt, he contracted malaria. And so they said you will not survive unless you go to Sao Paulo. And they said if we put you on a ship to go to Japan, you'll probably die before you get there. And so he came down to Sao Paulo. So Amazon, in the north part of Brazil. He came all the way down to the south in Sao Paulo and once he recovered out of the hospital, american missionaries connected to the Free Methodist Church said why would you consider planting Free Methodist Japanese churches? And so that's my origin. So my grandparents began what is today the Free Methodist Japanese-Brazilian Convention here, and my mother grew up in that. She's one out of eight kids. So all the kids grew up in the Free Methodist Church. But although she's not the youngest, she was the last one to get married. She's not the youngest, she was the last one to get married and she was the only single out of the eight kids.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:When the Free Methodist overseers coming out of Michigan at the time came to check out my grandparents' work, and when they came they said we want to give you a prize for church planting. And him, as a good Japanese man, said I don't need any prize, I'm just doing my duty. And so my mother, as a good Brazilian, born already in Brazil, said I'll take his prize. And so they said what can we do for you? And so my mom said well, I'm not married. You know, I'm graduated, I'm teaching. She was a was a teacher, she says. But I would love to do a master's in theology in a methodist university in america, but I don't have money. Would you consider a scholarship? And so my mother went to azusa pacific university at the time was azusa pacific college? Uh, this is in the early 70s and found out that they were in the midst. She landed right in the midst of a revival the Jesus People movement.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:And so that was when she began experiencing something that she did not know when she was growing up. In my grandfather's church and just her, you know, know, charismatic encounters and renewal experience brought her back to brazil when she finished her studies and my grandfather really blessed her to begin her own, uh, church or ministry. She was gathering a lot of japanese, brazilian young people around her in her meetings and it was something very independent, very informal, and my grandfather said why don't you formalize that? Begin a church? And um, uh, I, I bless what you're doing. And so that's the beginning of the church that later on, my, my father came into the picture as part of her meetings and they got married and I was born in this church that now I am pastoring. What a legacy. So that's kind of like my roots. So I tell people, you know, yeah, our roots go back to Japan, but I would say spiritually it goes back to Britain and I'm so grateful for, you know, barkley Buxton saying yes to the Great Commission. So yeah.
Scott Allen:That's great.
Darrow Miller:Wow, that's great.
Scott Allen:Well, catch us up on your journey. Then Tao Did you spend quite a bit of time in the. United States, or I was gathering that it was some time there.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Did you go to school in the States? I did go to school, but ever since we began, or my mother began, the church, she was very connected to leaders in America, so missionaries that would come through Brazil and her pastors, I would say, were Americans most of her life. And so, because of that association with American churches, my sister and I would spend our summers in the youth camps of these respective churches, and so I would just spend summers in America growing up. And then so it was natural to me that once I finished high school somebody told me hey, you know, you could get a scholarship playing soccer in America. You're not good enough to play in Brazil, why don't you try the?
Darrow Miller:US.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:So, all jokes aside, I actually ended up going out to a small private Christian school in Pennsylvania and ended up studying psychology and interrupted my studies after my sophomore year for a moment with YWAM and later on transferred to finish my studies at Liberty in Virginia. So that was kind of my time with American education and later on got connected to American churches and working as youth pastor and until I found out or I felt from the Lord a call to move back to Brazil.
Scott Allen:And I heard a little of that story. That was an African-American church, it was. You were working. Yeah that sounded good.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Durham, north Carolina, or right next to Raleigh, so the Durham-Raleigh region, yeah, and I felt, you know, I really found a home there and super connected my pastor. He's actually African. He's not African-American.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:The church was African-American, but he's from the country of Ghana and felt super connected with the community there and saw myself there for long term and I believe they had plans for me long term there as well. But one one time, praying, I just felt the Lord asked me a question Are you going after the kingdom dream or the American dream? And that really confronted me and convicted me, and it took me on a journey to really understand why was I being confronted with that question and which led me to understand it was time for me to go to Brazil and put in practice all of these things that I had read about, dreamt about, uh, prayed about, of a revival that would culminate into a reformation. So it was kind of like a test. Let's see if this really works.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:You know you're, you're in a country and of course I'm talking early 2000s. I know america is has changed so much since, but the Reformation roots in America go so deep and I would say, you know, at the time I would look at the nation of America and say, well, they've experienced Reformation, they've experienced the many revivals. I see the Brazilian Church in a very early stage compared to America and there is an awakening, but I don't think we're actually thinking or even do we have the paradigm for a reformation, and so it was a challenge that I felt the Holy Spirit put in my heart, and I'm glad I said yes to that.
Darrow Miller:Let me ask you.
Scott Allen:Yeah, that's—oh. Go ahead, daria.
Darrow Miller:Did you meet Dr Elizabeth Eumanns when you were at Liberty? Perchance, I did not meet— she was a professor there.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Yes, I know who she is. I did not meet Dr Elizabeth Eumanns at Liberty humans, uh, at liberty, I've met her as a young teenager in brazil.
Darrow Miller:Okay, because her son is married to one of our church members. Okay, oh, no, okay, yeah, japanese, brazilian yeah, that she is.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:She grew up with us here, simone.
Luke Allen:Uh, so that's how I know dr human's work, okay hi, friends, thanks again for joining us today for this episode.
Luke Allen:If you, like us, are enjoying hearing from pastor hayashi, I'd like to point your attention to his brand new podcast, the teo hayashi podcast, which is available on youtube and spotify, and it's in both English and Portuguese, which is really cool.
Luke Allen:If you also want to find him on Instagram, his handle is at Teohayashi and his ministry's handle is at Dunamis Movement. If you are new to this podcast, ideas have consequences and want to learn more about us and what we do, honestly, this discussion is a great summary of our mission, which is to equip you with a biblical worldview that transforms your life and empowers you to bring God's kingdom into your world, and by doing this, we collectively can see revival, move to reformation, which, in turn, will disciple our nations and thus the name of our ministry the Disciple Nations Alliance, or DNA for short. If you'd like to learn more about this mission and how we're practically and strategically working towards it, make sure to head over to the episode page, which is linked in the show notes, and on that page you'll find helpful first steps for how you can join us in this mission, and also on that page you can find links to where you can learn more about today's honored guest, pastor Hayashi.
Scott Allen:Thanks again for joining us here on Ideas have Consequences the podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance. Well, I want to pick up where you left off. Pastor Hayashi Teo, you were speaking of this kind of vision that you had to see Reformation, but you tied it back to revival and an awakening. Could you walk us through kind of what do you mean by those words revival, awakening, a harvest of souls and then leading to reformation? Just briefly, yes, yes. Yeah, that's really where I think our interests really are overlapping here.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:You know, I found when I came back to Brazil, scott, that when I was talking about revival and of course this is so obvious today, but at the time for me I was like, wow, maybe we're not talking about the same things. So I would say revival, and somebody would understand something totally different. I would say we need revival and they would say we have revival. And so I'm like like, actually we don't and they're like, no, actually we do. And so, you know, it took me on a journey. Maybe I need to define revival, uh, or, and of course we I think that there is no one real definition for revival, but we could agree in certain um, uh, I would say like KPIs, you know the key progress indicators. These are some signs that maybe we're on the way to revival. And I would say that, as I began studying the moves of revival in church history, they would be in my studies, I kind of in my readings. I would see it begins really in the church and it's the awakening of the saints, it's the call of Revelations 3, when Jesus is talking to the Ephesians. You know, this is what I have against you. You've left your first love, and so it's seeing the church of Jesus Christ coming back to its first love. It uh, so it's, it's seen the church of jesus christ coming back to its first love. It's um, I say you know it's a kind of a cliche, but it gets the message across its presence over program and um, when we're all about the presence of the lord and you know, of course we got programs, but I mean lunch can wait I want to, I want to stay here and when, when you have those moves of the spirit inside the church, you know it's, it's something that just brings back the fire in the heart of the believer, and so I would, I would, you know, discern that in the beginning, revival really begins with the church, the house of the Lord. It's 2 Chronicles, if my people who are called by my name, you know it'll begin with the people of God, and so after that it's only natural that you get so filled with the Holy Spirit that you are now bold to share the gospel and that'll take you to the second phase, that is, evangelism. You know it's when the church leaves the four walls of their buildings and goes into the streets and they're evangelizing, they're taking care of the poor, they're looking at the felt needs in society and they're meeting those needs. And of of course, once you start seeing the harvest of souls, you get packed out services. You have to add another service and then you start understanding I gotta plant another church. But if I plant another church I need to raise up another leader. And if I need to raise up leaders now I need a school of ministry or seminaries, and so that is the expansion of the church.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:And I would say that a lot of Brazil and also Latin America in general, we've experienced these two phases. We've seen the awakening of the saints. I mean, we have mega churches but our societies, they're not discipled yet and our cities have not gone through transformation. And that is something that I would read in reformations in Europe of John Calvin in Geneva and Luther, and I would read about these reformers, the Britain of the Wesley brothers, and I'm thinking we haven't experienced this yet and we need it. And so that's how I kind of broke it up into three phases the awakening of the saints, the harvest of the souls and finally the transformation of cities or nations or reformation. And so I am dreaming about seeing phase three.
Scott Allen:Well, so are we. Yeah, Talk more about that. What does that look like? What does reformation look like where you've seen it in church history or what you're dreaming for in Brazil?
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Yes, well, for the first time in my life, two years ago, I went to Korea, south Korea, and I was so privileged to sit with pastors there and really ask, well, tell me about the trajectory of revival in Korea. And I remember one of them. Actually, he is today pastoring what used to be young. He chose Church. He said well, when, when we began, you know, in the 50s, the prayer movement, korea was an open sewer. Korea was, you know, it was poorer than Cambodia. And he was telling me, you know, it was poorer than Cambodia. And he was telling me, you know just the scenario. He says you're walking down Seoul, downtown Seoul today, and I mean, this was not a reality 70 years ago.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:And so I really, you know, I was able to just ask a lot of questions during that week that I was there and what marked me was, you know, the work that was done in the sphere of education, the sphere of family and the sphere of church, something that I would say, when we talk about reformation, we're looking at the biblical principles, leaving the four walls of the church and hitting the infrastructure of society. And when we talk about the infrastructure, really we're talking about, you know, these spheres and, of course the marketplace. Of course I understand that, but I think that the ground, or the grassroots ground level work are these three spheres the church sphere, the education and the family sphere. And, as a confirmation, on my way back from Korea I was actually at the time living in Hawaii from Korea, I was actually at the time living in Hawaii, and so I went home and met up with Lauren Cunningham.
Scott Allen:And Lauren and I, we would go under the mission.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Exactly the year that I was living in Kona. I was so privileged to spend time with Lauren quite a bit of times and I told him this is what I saw in Korea and he told me you have to focus on those three spheres. It's long-term work, but you have to focus on these three spheres if you want to see reformation. So it's really seeing the principles of the kingdom that are so evident within a church service or in a church activity go beyond the church and into the infrastructure of society.
Scott Allen:How does that happen, though? You know? How do people that are in the church just Christians, you know shape a culture? How do they do that?
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Well, you know, I feel it begins with this is kind of funny for me, because these things I learned in your book, Daryl. So I feel like I'm being quizzed if I actually did my homework.
Scott Allen:I am, this is a quiz. This is a quiz. That's right my homework. I am. This is a quiz.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:This is a quiz, that's right.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:I feel like, for instance, when I see you know, so many Christians have a dualist mentality, a secular, a sacred mentality.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:That is very common in well, I'm speaking of Brazil here, so in our nation this is very common and I would say I've asked myself why is it that we have evangelicals or born-again Christians with a dualist mentality if it's so clear in the Word that everything we do is for the glory of God, whether in church, outside of church, everything you do you do it unto the Lord.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:But I would say it's also a little bit of the inheritance of the catholic mindset and, uh, keeping in mind that a lot of the evangelical growth in brazil and also latin america has been um, coming from the catholics or nominal catholics that actually have had an encounter with j and joined the evangelical or born-again church, protestant, and so that is an inheritance of this secular, sacred mindset. So for them to serve God, to really do God's kingdom work, it's behind a pulpit, it's going to seminary, and so a business person will think, you know, maybe I'm a second class spiritual citizen. You know, a medical doctor may think well, if I'm not being used by the Lord with supernatural healing, like I've read in the book of Acts, maybe my medicine really isn't my ministry, and that, you know, goes on to different professions. And so I feel, once we break the barrier of a dualistic mindset, we're prone to really activate the body of Christ to be the salt and light in society. So I think that's one of the big barriers there.
Darrow Miller:I would agree. I think we would totally agree with that, and that's one of the—Scott's written a book on the sacred-secular divide. That's a book that deals head-on with this. I would like to go back to what you said about Korea, because I was just at the University of the Nations this last week teaching at International Korean DTS, and what you've described of Korea in terms of its phenomenal moving from poverty to wealth is true and certainly on an infrastructure level it has grown quite amazingly. But I want to connect to lauren's words to you family, for the importance of the family, because the thing that I've recognized in the last uh bit of time is that Korea is committing cultural suicide.
Luke Allen:She's not having children.
Darrow Miller:And while the church expanded with the great revival, you can do a chart. And as the church expanded, like this, the birth rates went down like this that's right, and Korea has the lowest birth rate of any nation in the world, and it's about 0.7 children per woman, and a country's not sustainable at that level. So I just want to encourage you yes, focus on family, focus on family formation, focus on the glory of women being made in the image of God, and those things, or you could end up like Korea.
Darrow Miller:You have an incredible. You have far more potential in Brazil than Korea ever did in terms of natural resources, population, but you could end up with a country that's highly developed on one level and dying on another.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:It's so true, and you know, I think part of how we're wired as brazilians and I know samuel's here, he could agree to that we, we're passionate, we, we love to celebrate and we would like to see fast results.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:And, uh, we, we are very emotional. So when things don't go our way, it's like everything is gone, it's kaput. But if things go our way, oh, everything is perfect. And when we talk about investing in the spheres of family, I mean it takes a long time, it does, and it's a slow process that takes up, that requires patience and discipline, and so that's something that I believe is probably something we need to focus on as Brazilians and as a Brazilian church, and not only that and I'm sure you're aware of this, daryl, and the rest of the team there at DNA but for the amount of believers in Brazil and Brazil has so many believers for the amount of Brazilians that consider themselves evangelical or Protestant we don't have enough Christian education initiatives, and the discrepancy there is quite, you know, it's really I would say it becomes ridiculous, and so. So then all you have left is this false hope. If I could actually elect a Christian president, then we're going to have a discipled nation and we know that doesn't work.
Darrow Miller:This is where your emphasis on discipling the nation is so critical, because we need to disciple at the level of culture, at the level of culture. And family formation. Having children is definitely born out of a culture that is pro-life and a culture that sees the maternal as something more important than money. As Brazil grows, she will grow economically. Money will be the key and as you follow the money, you have less maternal and that becomes your death nail.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Wow, never thought about that. That's so true, interesting.
Scott Allen:You've said something, pastor Hashia, I want to pick up on and that has been my sense that you know that in Latin America, and including Brazil, there's been a kind of a revival, an awakening. You know there's rapid church growth, there's a lot of—it's been kind of amazing to see, but there hasn't been that Reformation yet. But that's something that I think we're right on the cusp of. I really feel that as well and you know you saw the Reformation happen as you were going back to. You know church history. You saw it happen in Northern Europe and in the United States, where it got past that point of happen in Northern Europe and in the United States, where it got past that point of just.
Scott Allen:You know we need to be fired up for the Lord and we need to share the gospel with our friends and we need to raise up. You know we need to plant churches and raise up institutions to train pastors and it got to the level of just wow. You know this is a whole way of understanding reality and there's these powerful ideas and principles that are in the Bible and they need to be lived out in our work. And you know in your talk that I heard you earlier you mentioned the importance of connecting work and how work is an outwork of worship. Yes, so they need to be lived out in our work. They need to be lived out in our family.
Scott Allen:Language is very important and words, biblical words, become sewn into a culture and over many years that culture begins to change and those ideas take a root in a culture such that the people in the culture, whether they're Christian or not, think they're influenced by these ideas.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Yes, yes.
Scott Allen:And that's very powerful when that happens, when you can get to that level of change in a culture but it has to be intentional. Anyways, I guess my question is do you see that revival stage—not revival, the Reformation stage—beginning to happen in Brazil? Do you see people understanding that man? This has to go out. It can't just go out in the political sphere in terms of electing a new president. It has to be lived out in our lives in a way that really changes a culture.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:What are you?
Scott Allen:seeing in Brazil with that right now.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Well, you know, in Portuguese we have a saying, which is you either learn by love or through pain, and so, pelo amor ou pela dor, that would be the phrase. I think Brazilians are kind of like those people that need to learn through pain, and we're going through a painful moment right now and where we have a very left leaning government that is very anti biblical and believes in a huge state, in a small private sector, sees the evangelical church as a threat, and I believe that is very sobering, as, and as much as it hurts me to say it, I think we need it. This, this spanking, serves us good, uh, to the extent of awakening us, or sobering, sobering us up to listen. It's not about the big events, and I'm not against the big events, we, we promote events, we, we do large gatherings, but, uh, that is not the key for a reformation because, um, I've seen a lot of youth movements and we began our, our youth movement 15 years ago with dunamis and one campus, and we started seeing so much fruit and it started growing. But, if you think about it, who was in the university 15 years ago?
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Those people today are young professionals. They have kids that are maybe, you know, under 10, between 5 and 15 years old, they're looking at hey, where do I send my kid to school? They're not thinking what's the next big conference? What's the next cool gathering and cool worship band to go to their concert? No, they're thinking where does my kid go to school? They're thinking in 10, 10 years, where will he go to university?
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Uh, so so now we're looking at hey, I have an issue here because I gotta come back from work and I gotta do homework with my kid to make sure that they're not teaching my kid an lgbtqi agenda. And so it's like unfortunately, we're at this point where, through pain of an anti-biblical agenda, we're looking at this is something that we did not do. This is a, you know, homework that we should have done when we had the winds of revival on our back, and now we're going to have to run after and try to play catch-up and so. But to answer your question, yes, we're learning through pain. We're learning that— Well, you know— yeah, I'm sorry.
Scott Allen:As you know. I mean, we're facing some pain here in the United States as well in a similar way. I think you know some pain here in the United States as well, in a similar way. I think you know, and I think part of the way I see that is that the Church didn't have a vision. It wasn't taught. You know, for whatever reason, we lost the vision of Reformation. You know, we kind of were taught hey, the end goal that we need to be seeking after is just more Christians, more churches, and that's it. There wasn't this next step of no. It needs to work its way out and become a culture, influence, a culture.
Scott Allen:That doesn't mean that other people didn't have that vision. I mean the Marxists, as you were alluding to. In both of our nations they had a vision to influence the culture and, to their credit, they played the long game and they kept after it. You know, and of course they use, you know, satanic means that we would never use. Our means are actually much more powerful, by the way, you know I don't mean to, but anyways, I think that's part of it is we just lost the vision to do that. We didn't have the vision, or we lost it, so we were on the sidelines, while other people then had an open field and they just, you know, they started shaping the nation according to their you know, demonic or whatever vision.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:That they had.
Scott Allen:And that's where we find ourselves. I don't know if— Samuel, I wonder if I—oh go ahead.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:I'm sorry, let me just add to this I don't know if you're seeing the same things that I'm seeing, but one of the things that I've noticed is, once you feel the pain of homework that has not been done in the past, we either one out of the two. We either see a church that rises up and saying, listen, we're going to disciple the nations, or let's disciple the world, or the world will disciple the church. There is no, you know, neutral point here. We have to advance. It's going to be one or the other yes, we, we need to occupy says exactly.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:There's no neutral point, so. But there's also this trend that I've been observing, that are Christians that are saying maybe our only hope is Jesus coming back. Just cry out for the second coming and let's just talk about the end you know the end days and, uh, it becomes very paralyzing. Yes, to young people that actually have a whole life ahead of them. Yes, and they're asking why would I study if jesus is coming back? That's right. Why would I get married and have kids if jesus is coming back? And why would I begin a company or, you know, a business, if he's coming back?
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:And so, besides the fact that we need to do work, one of the things that I've felt a challenge is to say listen, I don't know when Jesus is going to come back. You don't know when he's coming back. Jesus himself doesn't know when he's coming back. He says the Father knows, so whenever he comes back, may he catch us working. And so let's get to work. And so that's one of the main emphasis that I believe we're trying to trumpet over here, because we don't have any other options. We either disciple the world or the world will disciple us.
Scott Allen:That's so well said, yeah, and boy, I'm here. I'm feeling that same thing and seeing it. You know, in the same way, this kind of oh, things are getting worse and worse and in a very perverse way, you have people saying, I kind of you know, that's good, because when they get really bad, you know, then Jesus comes back and I'm thinking, gosh, this is such a failure of understanding of what our mission is. You know, it's not to sit back and let the world go to hell you know, that's not what.
Scott Allen:Jesus had in mind, you know here. So, samuel, I'd like to bring you in a little bit. You've been listening and we're talking about Brazil and education and you've got some personal stories there. Do you want to share any on that or what are your thoughts in this conversation? Just listening and learning.
Samuel Felix:That's a good way to be part of. But I'm thinking like what should we learn and what should we do as a church in order to decipher to the level of a culture? And my thought is right now we should go back to the basics of learning how to be a man and woman. That's something that sometimes we take for granted, especially in cultures. Here in Brazil, I see a lot of, you know, young adults living with their parents forever, not taking responsibilities and focusing on work and getting promoted higher education, both male and female. But the task is huge and we need the anointing of the Holy Spirit to accomplish as a church. But I really believe that we should go back to the basics and learn what the core design is of what we were created to be. Sometimes we, especially in America, we try to implement a lot of stuff into the church, new things, when we just need to look at the basics, the creational facts of how we should function. You know, as male and female, how we reflect God's image.
Darrow Miller:I think it's a very powerful thing that we should go back to Basic and powerful.
Scott Allen:But it's not often where the churches are starting, though, either. Samuel, they're starting not with questions about human nature and human identity, let's say Genesis, chapter 1 kind of questions. They're starting with Genesis 3 kinds of questions. I'm a you know things are broken. I'm a sinner, how do I, how can I be saved? Those are obviously hugely important questions, but what gets overlooked in all of that are those Genesis 1 questions.
Samuel Felix:We would say yeah, In Jesus we go back to Genesis 2, right, we take the lead as a man and we sort of, instead of becoming passive as a man, in Jesus we can become families, lead our churches. And the war against male and female in Brazil it's so strong, the enemy is working hard on every level, to the point of growing slowly inside of the church. And I'm not saying I can observe the whole thing, you know I'm limited, but from my point of view we don't talk that enough about it. How we can, you know, learn about the basics?
Scott Allen:yeah, you know, I I any comments uh from you pastor?
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Yeah, no, I think this is what Samuel is saying is very interesting because I think that there is a direct attack on the identity of male and female. He created, and really it is to bring confusion. And as confusion is brought into this dynamic, you neutralize it, neutralize it and you know it's. It's. It has nothing to do with making sure that everybody that's made their choice gets the right that every human needs or should have. It has to do with an agenda behind that and what he's saying is true.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Brazil, very similar to America, we're seeing a new generation that is living their adolescent years, in their 20s, and so there hasn't been this encouragement of be industrious, be productive, be fruitful. Maybe I would say you could sense it in my generation as millennials, that fading off. But when you look at Gen Z today, it's, it's very, you know, live, I see them live in their adolescent years, in their 20s and, of course, knowing that family is the basic unit of society. That's a way that I see goes against the discipling of nations. And so something that Daryl mentioned in passing, even in the beginning of our podcast here, was if you don't preach the dignity of women, of motherhood, eventually you'll have so much economic growth but then your downfall will be that you haven't seen this role, which is Genesis 1 in the great come in in the cultural mandate.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:You know, male and female, he created imago Dei. You don't see it and that becomes the downfall. So I see the, you know the transgender agenda attacking something that is the nevralgic point. That becomes like a domino effect, you know. And so what Samuel is saying, yes, I resonate with that as well. I really do, yeah.
Darrow Miller:Well, this is again where you go back to basics. But the basics for the church has to begin in Genesis 1, not Genesis 3.
Darrow Miller:Because, it's the last you know. You talked earlier about the sacred-secular divide. Yes, you have the Genesis 1 versus Genesis 3 divide and when the church begins with Genesis 3, you lose all the important principles and biblical worldview that you find in the first two chapters of Genesis. And this male and female, the image of God, cuts against machista culture in Brazil, namjom Yobi culture in Korea. And it's the elevation of women not to be above men but not to be below men, to be equal with men as image bearers of God, that realigns male and female for the formation of family.
Darrow Miller:And I think one of the things that Scott's written about is that as the family flourishes, the nation flourishes, because the family's the bedrock of a nation, and if the family is destroyed, the nation will crumble, and that's why I?
Darrow Miller:think what you just said is so critical? Because Satan is attacking the family, and you know so. You can have incredible economic growth in a place like Brazil probably some of the best you could ever have in the world the way you could go and at the same time lose the nation because the family is dissolving yeah, and I agree with that.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:I mean, that is so true and um. And then going back to even the question of what is revival, and beginning with the awakening of the church, you know the I read this phrase not so long ago a theologian by the name of Scott McKnight our pulpits will form or will shape our communities.
Darrow Miller:It really has to do with?
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:what are we preaching out of our pulpits?
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:That's right, you know, and you mentioned the Genesis 1 versus the Genesis 3 emphasis, and once, all we do is preach the gospel of salvation instead of the gospel of the kingdom, that's right.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:There is a deficiency there that it will show forth maybe not right off the bat, in that church service, but I mean as you raise your kids, as you teach them, as your grandkids, and so I see that maybe it would be a little bit too strong of affirmation to say we've preached the wrong gospel but we haven't preached a complete gospel, because salvation is in the complete gospel and it is genesis one. And so, um, yes, I, I really believe brazil is in a place uh, you mentioned earlier as well of the natural resources, um, the way that, even geopolitically, brazil is in a place that is very protected, is very safe, is stable. But many people would say there's so many Christians in Brazil. Yes, but what quality of gospel have we been preaching to these Christians? Because that is the key of difference. You know we have potential, but what will make the potential become reality really has to do with the message that we're trumpeting.
Darrow Miller:That's right.
Darrow Miller:Let me connect with something you said a minute ago. The pulpit is the place that is to shape the nation. And what happened in America? The school, the teacher's desk, became the thing that shaped the nation, not the pulpit, and that was by design by people who were atheists and wanted to shape the nation and they realized how powerful the pulpit was and they needed to create something that could overwhelm the pulpit, and it was the teacher's desk. So, as you said a few minutes ago, your people are asking where do we send our kids to school? Well, we need to go back to what you're describing is a vision of education that is coming out of the church, to not just educate people on Sunday morning through the pulpit, but the church taking responsibility and families taking responsibility for their education of their children is going to be part of that future.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:That's so powerful, yeah, that's so powerful, yeah, that's so powerful. And when we, when we import, unfortunately, um, when we import from the west an attractional church model of christian entertainment, yes uh, the pulpit does not do, uh, the work that it could do.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:That's right, because you're looking at, you know you need a, you need to speak or do an event. That, that is, is consumer driven and not going to be formative. Uh, to disciples of christ, to disciple nations, that's right, that's exactly right. And so, um, I, I, I really believe that true reformation begins in the church and it has to spill out into other spheres, but it begins with us looking. I've never heard this, darrell, when you talked about the pulpit versus the teacher's desk. But it's so true, and that's why there's a direct attack in the educational system to try to neutralize what's been coming off of our Sunday services. So, wow, that's awesome.
Darrow Miller:And the teacher's desk is undermining the family, now with LGBT+. I mean, that's what's being propagated in the schools, and okay. So what does that lead to? The brokenness of individuals and the brokenness of family. And what does that lead to the brokenness of individuals and the brokenness of family, and what does that lead to the dissolution of a nation.
Scott Allen:Yeah, if I could add just a little bit on this discussion about pulpit versus teacher's desk, you know there's an irony here that the—you know I have daughters that are teachers, you know, here in schools in the United States and they number one influence. You know, the current founding father of education, our systems of education and the way we think about education is a Brazilian.
Luke Allen:Did you know that? Paulo Freire, yes.
Scott Allen:Exactly yeah, he is the one who is studied. His book is the Bible of modern.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:American education? How would you relate John Dewey with Paulo Freire?
Luke Allen:That's a really good question, would you?
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:say they're coming from the same angle.
Scott Allen:Well, one thing I would say about those two is not necessarily the same. I think Paulo Freire was much more of a Marxist, whereas John Dewey, his worldview is more, you know, kind of what would you call it? Darrow it's. You know the American philosophy of pragmatism, you know, with its roots in kind of evolutionary theory, just this idea of we need to kind of create students, you know, to know how to work to fit into this big kind of machine of a growing economy, economy. But all that, what I wanted to say here, just a little bit too, is that part of the reason you had the Deweys and you had the Palo Ferreres is because the pulpit wasn't doing its job, in the sense that it wasn't, it had abandoned the, you know, the training of teachers in a distinctly biblical vision for education, for students, for the goal of education. So we abandon that space and of course then it's filled with these other philosophies and ideas. And that's what I think the Church doesn't understand. If we don't do this, somebody else is going to do it.
Darrow Miller:Well, this is where I think both Frary and Dewey what they had in common they were both atheists.
Scott Allen:They were both atheists.
Darrow Miller:That's the common denominator, that's the common denominator they wanted to disenfranchise the church, they wanted to radically change society, and both of them were working towards the undermining of the family. So that's what they have in common.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:I see.
Scott Allen:Yeah, paulo Freire, the Marxist movement right now is so powerful in our systems of education, though I mean, that's dominating and that's underneath even the LGBTQ thing, and so that comes largely from Paulo Freire and others as well. But again, yeah, if the Church isn't discipling the nation, the nation is going to disciple the Church. But again, I don't want to be too negative because I do think—here you are, pastor Hayashi, you're here with us today with this vision and you have a—you know, you're a significant voice in the Church in Brazil. How encouraging is that. I am so encouraged by that, and God must be doing something right here. You know, yeah, well.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:God is definitely doing a lot despite our limitations, but it is a burden, our limitations, but it is a burden and, of course, his grace is sufficient.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:But I think one of the key things right now that we need to look at I would say, speak of Brazil, for instance is Christian education, and I think that we're riding and not trying to go on to the on the negative uh, uh path here, but we're writing. Just something for us to realize is we, if we look at the numbers, we're looking at a country of 210 million people, and brazil, by the grace of god, is the second largest uh mission sending nation after america right now, and so there we're sending a lot of missionaries. We're forming new leaders, forming new Christians. However, we're looking at, out of 210 million, being very conservative, 75 million are saying that they are evangelicals. When they fill out the census and a new census will come out, uh, I believe, this year by the federal government um, I believe it's actually going to be over 70, 75 million, but interesting, interesting is um, interestingly enough, out of the 75 million, or 80 million, over 50% of them are under the age of 35. Wow, so young citizens and young Christians.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:And so think about this. They came to faith either by their parents, or they heard the gospel, or they heard the gospel, understanding that the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ transforms not only the personal lives but the world.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:And if they don't see the results of a transformation of the world. I've been telling my colleagues here listen, the left agenda, mainstream media, these aren't our most dangerous enemies. I mean, of course, I expect a left-leaning media to come against me. I'm expecting atheists to bash me, but what I'm not expecting are our kids to turn on us, and if we don't do something, we have a window here to show them that the gospel that I preached to you is actually the gospel that will do something about the criminality, pedophilia, corruption, will do something about, um, you know, all the the social ills that we see that are so evident, and so Brazil is poised for something amazing. Yet also, I would say, we're in a very delicate situation, and so the message that you guys are carrying is so crucial and critical for such a time as this.
Darrow Miller:Well, and let me add, Pastor Teo, to what you just said Education is so important and getting the church engaged in that process. But let me make a distinction. It may be something you already have. We don't need to create religious schools, because if there's a sacred-secular divide and people are recognizing hey, public schools. I want to get an alternative for my kids.
Darrow Miller:They will create a religious school but not a Christian school, and I think you have an understanding of the depth of the cultural change that needs to take place, and that means you're going to need to create a network of Christian schools that think biblically at the level of culture and are formed by a biblical worldview, not religious schools that are formed by the sacred-secular divide.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:No, this is very true because, even as we touch on the subject of Christian education, one of the key things and, um, these were the conversations I would have with lauren uh, but one of the key things I would ask lauren is list. Lauren, I see a cycle that I need a break, which is we need more christian schools. Okay, we need more christian schools. We don't need religious schools. All right. So we need to fund these schools. All right. So we have have Christian businessmen that will fund this and the church will fund this. Okay, but at the end of the day, I could have a curriculum, I could have an amazing infrastructure, a campus, I could have a best marketing scheme, I could have a denomination that will be encouraging their families to send their kids to this school, but when it comes to the classroom, I have no jurisdiction or control what happens in there and if my teachers have been formed by the state university or the public universities.
Darrow Miller:That's right, that's the weak link.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Exactly so. I said we need Laura help me, I need to break this cycle. How do I get teachers that are biblical in the cultural level to the point that I can get the business or the curriculum or mobilize the church? But how do we see this resurgence of biblically thinking teachers that will make their classrooms their congregations and, just like a pastor, makes sure that their service actually is pointing for the glory of God, a teacher that will actually be pointing their students to the glory of God, and so for us, really, that is one of the big question marks that we're facing right now.
Scott Allen:Well, I think— I think I need to add something here, darrell, because I think at this point in our conversation we'd be amiss if we didn't talk about the homeschool movement, which you know. I just think it's important when we're thinking about the discipleship of our children and their education. You know, part of the answer to that is parents understanding Christian parents that they have a responsibility here to be the primary disciples of their children and to ensure that the kind of education that they're receiving is genuinely Christian or genuinely biblical, you know, rooted in a biblical worldview. They can send their children to a school, but they still have their—but they can't just say, hey, now it's your job, not my job, that's not the way God designed it. It's a parent's job to do that, and I think part of the revival that's happening is the revival of, you know, not just schools but homeschooling as well, and I know that's—Sam, you're part of that in Brazil.
Scott Allen:There's a movement of Christians in Brazil that are recognizing the need we need to train our young Christians to think biblically. They can't go to these schools right now, so they're taking it on themselves. It's a growing movement, but then just recently the government I guess in Brazil said no, they're literally outlawing it. And when I hear that, I think, okay, it's kind of like we're taking direct. You know we're taking direct hits from the enemy. We're right over the target here. We're right. You know, this is kind of right where we need to be, because you know that's why they're coming after it so hard. Samuel, do you want to add anything on this discussion here?
Samuel Felix:Yeah, I think it goes back to the, you know, divided worldview, because we often think that sending our kids to school it's just learning technical stuff, which is not, it's discipling. So sometimes we Christians send our kids to a normal school, forgetting about that they're going to be discipled. If I go with my kids to the church on Sunday morning, everything is going to be fine and we need to think that education it's formation, it's, you know, forming, discipling, building foundations that points towards God and his amazing design for humanity, and sometimes you just forget about it. I heard I don't know if George mentioned that in the other podcast, but you know, vaud Balkan says if you send your kids to the emperor, don't complain when they get back to us as Romans. So it's pretty much sometimes what we do being Christians as a church. So it's bear in mind that we train up our kids to be Romans is what we're doing yeah, yeah, pretty much.
Samuel Felix:So education is not a matter of learning and teaching how to do math and language and all of that. It's discipling. It's more than that In court.
Darrow Miller:Back to the question you were raising, I think, if you look at the principled approach to education and the classical Christian education, both of these movements are training teachers. And how do you engage with one or both of those movements to train the next generation of educators? So it's not on you to figure out how to do it, because these two groups are already doing it. It's a matter of partnering with them.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:That's awesome.
Darrow Miller:The other thing and I don't think this is I used to think this is crazy to say but if you want to save your children and you want to save Brazil, pull them out of public schools. Yep, it has to be that bold, because otherwise, as Samuel says, you're going to raise Romans and not Christians.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Yeah, that's good, that's good.
Scott Allen:Well, you know we need to be wrapping our podcast up. I wish we didn't.
Luke Allen:This is just such a, I mean, I think we could talk and talk.
Scott Allen:We're just scratching the surface here. We're talking about things like education. We could easily talk about any other area or sphere, you know, where Christian thought needs to kind of influence or shape a culture. But I do want to thank you, pastor Hayashi, and I'm so thankful to God, I guess, for raising up you with the vision that you have and this incredible legacy that you have too. Wow, it's just. I love the idea that God works generationally.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Yes.
Scott Allen:And you know, and we have to have a multi-generational vision. You know, it's easy to get kind of stuck in a moment, you know, and go oh, you know, look at this, we lost the last election or whatever it is. But we're working on much longer timelines and I think you're personally your story is just an example of that and I think God is doing something amazing in Brazil right now. I really do, and I think this is part of why we're seeing such strong attacks, you know, against the church and such. You know we should expect it, but that's the kind of stuff that makes headlines, you know, and makes the news. You know, often I've often thought God's kingdom, it's the building of God's kingdom. It happens quietly and out of the limelight and you don't see it, but over time it becomes manifest, you see it.
Darrow Miller:Amen, and just the fact that we are meeting you today. It is, god is at work. Wow and he's at work powerfully.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Amen.
Darrow Miller:And as we meet you, as we meet others, as you meet others, you can begin to see that God is building up a group of people who, man, we have a whole lot in common but we've never met before. What is God doing here?
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Yes, yes, and that gets very exciting yes, well, this has been so, so for me it's such a blessing. Thank you so much for the invite. Um, I've been so encouraged by the things that you have been putting out. So, um, um, I'm sure you have so many people that are listening, and but I just wanted to say, you know, even from all the way out here in Sao Paulo, it's something that I've been so encouraged by what God's been doing through DNA. So, thank you, thank you for your work and thank you for the invite. What an honor to be here with you guys.
Scott Allen:I can't tell you what an encouragement that is to hear. Thank you so much, and I pray and hope that we can begin to work much more intentionally together.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Pastor.
Scott Allen:Hayashi for the discipling of the nations and the edification of the Church. It's an exciting time and I really do believe God's on the march and the gates of hell are not going to prevail against the Bride of Jesus Christ.
Darrow Miller:Amen. Who should I contact at your team? Next time I come to Brazil if there's a way to get together with you.
Pastor Teófilo Hayashi:Luke, I believe you've been talking to my office with Jojo. Okay, maybe we can look at that. We can have some of that discussion offline, darrell too because, I think we're all like how do we connect?
Scott Allen:What do we do? What's next?
Luke Allen:So, anyways, let's talk offline, but for our listeners.
Scott Allen:I want to thank you guys all again for listening to another episode of Ideas have Consequences, the podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance, and thank you for the passion that you have to see your nations discipled in the power of God and for the glory of Jesus Christ.
Luke Allen:Thanks again for joining us for this episode with Teo Hayashi. Again, to learn more about Pastor Hayashi, make sure to visit this episode's page, which is linked in the show notes, or you can always find that page on the homepage of our website, which is disciplenationsorg. This podcast, Ideas have Consequences, is brought to you by the Disciple Nations Alliance, which is a ministry that has worked around the world for the last 26 years, training over a million people in over 90 nations with a biblical worldview. If you'd like to learn more about our ministry, you can find us on Instagram, Facebook and YouTube, or on our website, which again is DiscipleNationsorg. Thanks again for joining us. Please share this show with a friend or leave us a rating and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you're listening, and we hope you are able to join us next week again here on Ideas have Consequences. You.
