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Episode Summary: Vision for Personal Growth with Pastor Michael Ensey
In this episode, Pastor Michael Ensey, Senior Pastor at Christian Life Center in Heath, Ohio, shares his powerful insights on developing a vision for personal growth. Drawing from his journey in ministry and leadership, including his time as General Youth President of the United Pentecostal Church, Pastor Ensey discusses key principles for fostering growth, setting purposeful goals, and handling challenges.
Key Takeaways:
1. Growth vs. Goal-Oriented Mindset
Pastor Ensey explains the importance of a growth mentality over merely hitting goals. Success lies in maximizing one’s potential, not just reaching specific milestones.
2. Aligning Actions with God’s Purpose
Ensey shares his “test of purpose,” urging listeners to align every decision with God’s purpose and avoid distractions. This alignment helps ensure all actions contribute to fulfilling a greater mission.
3. Challenges as Teachers
Reflecting on personal hardships, Ensey emphasizes that challenges and adversity are key to growth, teaching lessons of obedience and submission in our spiritual journey.
4. Value Yourself to Grow
Pastor Ensey stresses the importance of self-worth. To invest in one’s growth, it’s essential to value oneself, embrace a balanced life, and reject comparison and self-doubt.
5. Taking Action Without Delay
Ensey encourages listeners to avoid being paralyzed by preparation. Begin today, taking even small steps, to move towards your vision and purpose.
About Pastor Michael Ensey:
Pastor Ensey is an influential leader dedicated to helping others grow personally and spiritually. His book, Coffee with Anthony, offers ten life lessons on maximizing potential and leaving a lasting impact.
For more insights, visit Pastor Ensey’s website: [michaelensey.com](http://michaelensey.com).
**Mike Yates:** Today's episode, I have someone you might have heard of. His name is Pastor Michael Ensey on the show and we're going to talk about a vision for personal growth. You may have heard of him because he did spend a little time in St. Louis. Spent four years serving as general youth president. Before that, he bounced around as promotions and youth secretary. Before that, I want to give a shout out to the original, he said, Texas district, the Lufkin Texas district youth president for seven years. Assisted his dad there in Conroe, but now he's pastoring in Heath, Ohio, Christian Life Center for the last seven years. Brother Michael, you have been requested by name specifically to come on and talk to us and share. Your experiences, I give you the floor.
**Michael Ensey:** It is an honor to be on your podcast. Thank you for the work that you're doing and the ministry that you are part of and impacting the kingdom of God. It's a privilege to be with you today and I'm looking forward to this time with you.
**Mike Yates:** Awesome. And now I failed to mention beforehand. We prefer first names because Beyond the Mic with Mike. So if it doesn't matter, that's why I called you Michael, if that's okay.
**Michael Ensey:** That works with me, Mike.
**Mike Yates:** There you go. Call me Mike. All right. What's the, let's get to the brass tacks. Talk to us, brother.
**Michael Ensey:** Talking today about a vision for personal growth and you had mentioned someone had asked the question about my time serving as General Youth President there in St. Louis. It was an exciting time to be part of the Youth Division, really to be part of the United Pentecostal Church. It was an interesting time frame. My first day was January 1st, 2010. It was the first day that Dr. Bernard was General Superintendent. The organization at that time had weathered some challenges, come through a few storms, we were at a unique time and place, and I thank God for the opportunity to be there during that season. What began really in 2010-11 has been a season of growth for the organization. We've seen that in all the divisional offerings. We've seen that in participation, engagement, including Youth Congress and you specifically. Had asked me about that transition from a basketball arena to a football stadium for Youth Congress, and it was something that when I joined the division team in 2010, I wrote a list of goals, things that I just didn't Hope that we could accomplish during that time. And one of those was related to, at the time, Sheaves for Christ now moved the mission and breaking the $5 million barrier for the first time. That had never happened up until that point. We had crossed over the $4 million barrier back in 2002, 2003, and then had several years of declining offerings. And 2009 the offering was $2.9 million. And so we began to work our way toward that. In 2016, we were able to break that barrier of the 5 million Sheaves for Christ offering. Another of the goals that I'd set just for our team was for us to be able to transition Youth Congress from a basketball arena to a football stadium. And so 2011, our registration had decreased a little bit. And, we were trying to figure out what we do to move forward and to increase engagement participation in that specific event. In 2013, we felt something began to shift. We never registered more than about 11, 500 for Youth Congress at that time. Anybody could come to an evening service for free. You could just register to come to the day services. But 2013 in Louisville, something happened. registered over 16, 000 that year. And We knew something was shifting and changing and momentum was building. And so we started looking right then for, future Youth Congress venues, and we were looking at 2019 and beyond to find a football stadium. We felt like we were gonna grow to that point. So in 2015, when we opened registration. In March of that year, within the space of about 14 hours, we sold out 18,000 tickets sold out on that particular day. And, we were about two hours in. It was registration opened at midnight for some crazy reason we used to do that. Thank God we got smarter than that. Eventually changed that. It always opened at midnight and at two o'clock in the morning, I sent an email to the organization that would help us with. Negotiating with cities, signing contracts with venues, hotels, and sent communication to them at 2 o'clock in the morning and said, I know you're looking for a football stadium for 2019, but I need you to find me one for 2017 because we're going to need one sooner than we thought. And so that was the initial conversation, 2 o'clock in the morning, fired off that email. And so we've got to try to find something as soon as possible. It's almost impossible to negotiate that kind of a contract with a city and make those arrangements just two years out. But, they were able to help us find, there was basically one venue, one date that was Lucas Oil Stadium, the last week of July, which would mean a date change, not just a venue change, but a date change a little earlier. Previously would always been the first week of August. And so I was making phone calls to district superintendents who had camp meetings the last week of July. Hey, would you be willing to shift your camp meeting? I think there was seven or eight of them in order for us to have Youth Congress that week and not have a conflict with your district calendar. And they were all willing to do it. They said for it's a worthy cause to be able to make this transition to a football stadium. We went to Indianapolis, we did a tour of the city and then we had to make a presentation to the executive board because we had about 350, 000 in cancellation fees. Between the venues and the hotels that we were gonna have to pay to get out of Columbus, which is interesting. I pass from the Columbus area now, but to get out with Columbus contracts that where we were supposed to be in 2017. And so went to the executive board and said, we've got. The funds available, that we've stashed away reserve funds that could help us cover some of that. We believe that the registration increase that we'll have in a football stadium would help us cover that. And so we made that proposal. The executive board voted it through. And so we were able to make that transition. That was in May of 2015. To go ahead and sign with Indianapolis for 17 and to cancel Columbus. We then worked for the space of two years, literally all the way through the dates where we were supposed to be in Columbus, working with those venues and hotels. Several of them threatened lawsuits. They threatened us, you owe us money. We worked with them, but eventually the company that we worked with in order to help make those arrangements was able to navigate that and help us. Through that process, we didn't end up paying a single dime for any cancellation fees. So the 350, 000 ended up being completely wiped away. A minor miracle, maybe a major miracle of 350, 000 that God helped us with to navigate that. In 2017, we were able to host North American Youth Congress in Lucas Oil Stadium, downtown Indianapolis, 34, 000 registered that year and It was truly an amazing thing to, especially to be a part of the planning and execution of that event, to look around the stadium, and to see that many young people were worshiping God together, responding to preaching such a hunger for the presence of God. And, it took about a thousand volunteers to pull that off and, just. An exciting thing to be part of. 2019 grew even bigger. 37, 000. Unfortunately, 21 was taken down by COVID and Congress, but another incredible Youth Congress, this past year. And it's exciting to see continued growth in every area of the youth ministries, as well as giving to Move the mission. It's astounding to me that the goal this year is $10 million. Knowing where we came from in 2009 with a $2.9 million offering to see that continued growth to 5 million, 7 million, 9 million, and now with a goal of 10 million it's just an incredible thing to see the kingdom of God continuing to grow and to advance of the increase of his government. There shall be no end. We serve a God who is alive. He is active. And, he is a creator. And I believe that as his body, we should have that same mentality as the church, that there should be a growth mentality and a kingdom vision of increasing. And if that's going to happen, I think the only way that will occur is that individually we have to have a personal vision for that growth. So I think that's the full spectrum of who God is calling us to be.
**Mike Yates:** Absolutely. And before we parlay that, I got some questions about that process there. Is there a reason that you're avoiding the name? I know the name of the company and I don't mind saying it on the show. Is there a reason why you're avoiding the name?
**Michael Ensey:** I, there's no reason at all. It's Housing
**Mike Yates:** Authority, right?
**Michael Ensey:** It's Connections.
**Mike Yates:** Connects, Housing Connections. Yeah, Housing Connections.
**Michael Ensey:** Connections, Housing Authority.
**Mike Yates:** Yeah. Now, I appreciate you giving them credit because. From someone from my point of view, all we hear about are the horror stories of how they botched registrations. All we, we don't ever hear the things they do right. Yeah. All we hear about are the complaints and how the youth pastors, the local youth pastors wish to God that the youth division would find someone else other than Connection Housing Authority. I appreciate you giving them, I wanted you to say their name to give them credit because they need to know, we need to know the good side and the bigger picture.
**Michael Ensey:** Absolutely. And the reason that the youth division even started using them in the 1st place was because of Youth Congress 2001 in Atlanta, which is where their headquarters is. Connections housing is based in Atlanta. And when Youth Congress was there, 2001, the youth division had some hotel contracts that were going to end up costing them some money. And they appealed to connections because their local connections, they were able to help them rewrite those contracts, which is almost unheard of, but they have a lot of influence there. And so they bailed them out 2001. And from that point on, then the division began to use connections housing. And, I'll just say this concerning that since you brought up the topic, and I know the name can be a lightning rod. And yes, I had. Avoided just throwing it out there for those that like to hammer on connections. There's a lot of good that they have done behind the scenes. 2015-17 was a great example of them bailing us out, saving us a ton of money. It is an incredible process for them to go in and negotiate with the city. First, it starts with the city, and then you go to the venues and then the hotels, and it's a multi-tiered process of negotiating contracts. And you're working four plus years out. Say you want to make a change right now. It's going to be 2029 probably before you could make a change if you wanted to go with a different company. Because of the very quick transition of leadership that occurs in the youth division, that's just a reality. We understand you've got a new youth president every, well, the last 6 years, we've had 2 youth presidents, typically every 4 years. There's gonna be a change of leadership. It's a challenging thing to make that step if you were going to go a different direction. I know the youth division has worked extensively with connections for this upcoming launch of Youth Congress, hotel reservations and event registration. And I believe there's going to be an increased efficiency and improved process that everybody's going to experience this time around.
**Mike Yates:** Yeah, I appreciate that. And I'm pretty vocal. I don't mind calling a spade a spade and a flake a flake. And I needed a neighboring pastor in my section is just in ranking. Okay, you start, you know, you work with them. So, during that time, and he is helping me see behind the scenes and. So when you said that, yeah, I realized that we need to. Talk about the good side because all we see are our horror stories and we talk to our buddies and we share horror stories, but I needed my listeners to know that there's a bigger picture besides the complaints. So, that's why I want to go and bring it up and cast a positive light on that process or a better explanation. Thank you for helping me do that. Sure. Yeah, and, that 350, 000, the fact that you were willing, some people say, sometimes the expression is you took one step forward, but two steps backwards. We were willing to do that backwards. We were willing to take one step backward to take two steps forward. That's it. That's it. We did, but we didn't have to, but that's a great story. Now. I do like the vision. I want to ask a question. Maybe I'm getting ahead of it here. You had a goal. Again, I may be getting ahead of you and I don't know, but this is my chance. I'm so I'm. I'm not good at setting goals, per say, at least because I don't have a. A gauge you don't want to set a goal. That's unrealistic, but you don't want to set a goal that's too short. So the object is to set a goal that challenges you. How do you find that unrealistic, that realistic unrealistic goal? Does that make sense? How do you find that goal that inspires you, but is still obtainable?
**Michael Ensey:** Well, there is certainly a tension between the realistic and the faith dimension, there's always going to be a tension that we feel there. And I'll give you a good example because I'm feeling this and fighting this right now. We're in the middle of a capital campaign for our church. We launched a campaign earlier this year, nine-week launch of a 36 month giving season and launched a campaign to raise the funds to build our next building. And I wrestled with that when it came time to set those goals for our church, when it just came to the commitments that we were making, and there was a lot of practical evaluation that was taking place, trying to be realistic. And then find that realistic point and say, let's take a step beyond that into the impossible and set our goal there. We're not going to set our goal five steps beyond what we think is feasible that it becomes a discouraging thing. If you set a goal at 10 and you hit 3, then it's a discouragement and you feel like a failure. If you feel like we can do five and I set the goal at six or seven, and maybe we hit five and a half because we pushed ourselves, then if you went beyond your capacity in that context, then I think the goal served its purpose. And so I think you have to have a proper perspective of goals. That hitting the goal is not necessarily the win. Fulfilling potential, increasing your capacity and fulfilling potential is the win. Now, I think we can increase our capacity so that our potential is greater. And I've done a lot of thinking, praying, seeking God, talking, teaching, preaching about potential and capacity. And I think that is what we have to use as that standard for success. That the goal itself is not just hitting the goal is not necessarily success because what if your goal was too low and then hitting the goal is not really a success. So I think having a growth mentality. I heard John Maxwell talking about this 1 time and it really helped clarify this for me that. If you only have a goal mentality, then you're probably not going to reach your potential because reaching goals has a way of decreasing motivation. You hit a goal. Yes, we got it. We won. You tend to settle. You've got to have a growth mentality. And he was responding to a question about how he had remained relevant in the leadership genre from 50 plus years. How is he still doing this at 70 something years old? And he's still relevant. He's still selling millions of books. He said, because I've always had a growth mentality. And if it was just a goal-oriented mentality, you hit a goal. You're satisfied.
**Mike Yates:** You're done.
**Michael Ensey:** But if your goals are part of a growth mentality, even if you don't hit the goal, if you took a step, if you're moving in the right direction, it's still a success and you recognize there's still tomorrow. I may not have hit the goal today, but there's still tomorrow. I'm gonna recalibrate. I'm gonna take a step back, evaluate and we're gonna go after this again. But just because I hit the goal doesn't mean I've arrived. And I can settle and become complacent. I've got a growth mentality that says every day. I want to grow every day. I want to take a step and if I fall back today, I'm going to get up and we're going to get after it again tomorrow. So having those goals, I think the way I would describe it is figure out what's realistic. What can I do? What can I produce with my own ability and then set my goal beyond that so that the faith factor has to be engaged. The God dimension is where I want to go. That which is just beyond me, where faith has to get involved and God is going to have to ultimately produce it in order for me to get there.
**Mike Yates:** That's good stuff. I got, I wrote down something else, but I don't want to stop you again because I know that you had something planned to start us with. So go ahead and get it started without asking the question later.
**Michael Ensey:** All right, let's just, let's keep this train of thought going here. The Bible says in Luke chapter two, verse 52, that Jesus increased in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and with men. Now this is, I'll be honest, this is challenging for me to process. Jesus Christ we're Oneness believers. We believe that Jesus is God manifest in the flesh. It's not part of God. Jesus is not in the Godhead. The Godhead is in Jesus. The fullness of the Godhead dwells in him bodily. So here is Jesus Christ, Jehovah, manifest in human flesh, fully divine, fully human, and yet he increased in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and men. To me, this reveals that even Jesus Christ, God in human flesh, that in his humanity, he had a vision for personal growth. He had a vision to increase wisdom, His mental capacity, stature, his physical capacity, favor with God and men. This to me speaks of his EQ, his emotional intelligence, and his social capacity. Relationally.
