take one year off from church .” That sounds like a crazy thing to say , but I ’ ve been married to my wife long enough to know that when she says , “ God told me something …” that it ’ s because God told her something ! She looked straight at me and said , “ You ’ ve been paid to be a Christian since you were fifteen years old . He told me you need to take one year off and just figure out who Jesus is again .” So , I did . My last day at the Stone was December 31 st of 2017 , and I took a year off and we didn ’ t go to church .
During that time , I was reading a book called The Forgotten Ways by Alan Hirsch . My wife , who is more Godly than me , was reading The New Testament , and we just started having conversations about what the church looks like in The Book of Acts . Acts 2:42 says , “ Those that were of the way devoted themselves to the breaking of bread , the teaching of the apostles under prayer ”. And she said , “ Why can ’ t we just do that ? Why can ’ t we just eat a meal together and read the Bible together and pray for each other ?” There are then two places in Acts where it mentions Solomon ’ s Portico , and she asked me what Solomon ’ s Portico was and I said I had no idea . So , she looked it up and we started researching it together , and Solomon ’ s Portico was actually the porch outside of the temple .
You had all of these Jewish people who are putting their faith in Jesus , and they still want to get together and have community , but they can ’ t go in the temple anymore because what they ’ re preaching is heresy to the Jews . So , they would still go to church , but they would just stay outside on the porch . And that ’ s where all the crazy stuff started happening , where people were dragging their sick out into the street so Peter ’ s shadow will fall on them and they are healed . All of those early miracles happened right outside the doors of the church . So , my wife asked if I would start praying with her for Solomon ’ s Portico , and I asked , “ What do you mean by that ?” She said , “ something outside of the walls of the traditional church where believers want to get together and eat a meal , pray for each other , read the word together , and a group of believers who still believe that God does miracles .” So that ’ s what we started praying for , and when I was reading in my Bible and I got to Solomon ’ s Portico there was a little asterisk there and it said , “ The Kings Porch ”. Anyway , it was a long story , but Janet and I opened up our doors and called our little house church KingsPorch .
[ WM ] I would love to talk about KingsPorch . I am excited and fascinated in reading of your thoughts on tithing and where the money should go . Tell us about the church and the rationale behind it ?
[ Jesse ] I am fully aware of the scriptures where Paul talks about that a worker is worth his wages and not to muzzle the ox while on the threshing floor . I understand that there is a Biblical justification for paying full-time pastors . I understand that , so I ’ m not saying it ’ s not Biblical . What I am saying is that , throughout history everything is on a pendulum , and in the world we now live in , the pendulum has swung so far that there are guys who are getting rich and famous off of Gospel . I don ’ t believe that is what that Scripture is about . So , what we ’ re doing is swinging the pendulum all the way back the other way , where nobody can get paid . Probably in the middle is correct . I think for a generation we ’ re going to have to swing it back the other way to course correct . When we read in Acts it says that people were selling fields and bringing the money and putting it at the Apostles ’ feet , and the Apostles would distribute it amongst everyone . And there is one statement in Acts that is crazy , it says , “ And there was not a need among them .”
That ’ s what we ’ re trying to do , KingsPorch is a legal entity so people can tithe to it , but nobody gets paid . You ’ ll hear me talk a lot about elevating the priesthood of the believer , we tell people , “ You are the priest , so it ’ s your