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It seems that many believers are experiencing church homelessness. Church homelessness often occurs because of church hurt, spiritual abuse, the abuse of power, unfaithful leaders, and many other negative experiences in the church. Others find it challenging to find a safe place to worship when they move to other sites. It seems that church homelessness is becoming more and more pervasive. Photo by Daniel Tseng on Unsplash I want to make sure I start this blog by saying that there are no perfect churches. There will always be imperfections in the ministries, the leadership, the culture, and the people. However, a church was created to be a community that is a safe place for people to be nurtured and discipled. It's where Christians gather to learn about God, affirm one another's gifts, and use those gifts to serve others. Imperfections in the church should not come in the form of bullying, intimidation, slander, secrecy, and abuse of power. I think these churches are places you should stay away from and leave. The purpose of the church is to transform you into Christ. However, there must be a Christlike culture. If the culture is not Christlike, eventually, you become like that culture. Beware. Below you will find eight tips to guide you in choosing a church. This list is not exhaustive nor is it based on priority; it is just a few tips to consider. Tip #1 - Pray You cannot find a church without talking with the Lord. Jesus clearly said, "Apart from me, you can do nothing." (John 15:5). Pray daily about where God would lead you to grow as a disciple. Prayer is not just talking; spend time listening in silence and reading scripture. This will nurture your Spirit of discernment so that when you start visiting churches, you will be more sensitive to the Holy Spirit's guidance. Tip #2 - Do Not Select a Church Based on the Sunday Morning Worship Service I believe this is where many Christian disciples have made a mistake. They attend a church; the worship seems Spirit-filled, and the preaching is powerful and even biblical, so when the invitation to discipleship or membership is extended, a person joins the church without hesitation. A person should not join a church based on the Sunday Morning Worship Service. The Sunday morning worship services are just one of the components for selecting a church, but there are other vital components for choosing a church that is a safe place for you to grow into spiritual maturity. Attending church is more than just listening to a sermon or singing songs. It should connect you with other people and be a community where you can grow into a spiritually mature disciple. Therefore, choosing a church cannot be solely based on the Sunday morning worship, you must see if you can connect with others and find out what their process is for growing disciples. Tip #3 - Engage in the Ministry Activities This is important. Take some time to attend the ministry activities where you can observe how ministry is carried out, who the leaders are of those activities, and how people engage with one another. Suppose you go to multiple ministry activities and see the same people leading various ministries. In that case, this is something to note; either the church does not have many people serving, or leadership could only be selecting certain people to serve. While engaging in ministry activities, be discerning and listen to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Tip #4 - Talk with The Members of the Church I am a true introvert; I am not a person who is motivated to go to places where I will meet strangers and start a conversation. I do not like a superficial conversation, but I know that asking the deep things about life is not the best way to start a conversation with a stranger either, so when I am talking with someone at a church, I ask them to tell me their story about how they came to the church. I also ask them what they enjoy about the church and what things they would change or like to see done better. If people share what they enjoy, but no one shares what they would like to change, this could indicate an unwillingness to tell the truth or fear of telling the truth about the church. When you are talking with a person, don't just pay attention to the words that are being said; also pay attention to what is not being said, body language, etc.; these can all be queues that confirm it is the church where God is leading you, or that it is not the church where God is leading you. Tip #5 - Talk with The Leaders of the Church Read Tip # 4 for ideas on talking with the Deacons, Trustees, Elders, lay leaders, and staff. When talking with the leaders, you can ask about the leadership structure, how they would describe the church's culture, how leaders are selected, and whether or not there is regular leadership training. The church risks having spiritually immature leaders if leaders are not trained regularly. Spiritually immature leaders can fall prey to abuse of power. Remember to listen to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Tip #4 - What is the policy or protocol that protects membership and others from a leader who abuses their power? This is very important. Talk with some Deacons, Trustees, Elders, and lay leaders. It is essential to ask questions about the accountability of leadership. Questions like, "Who does a person go to if they have a problem/conflict with leadership, such as the Pastor, Deacon, Trustee, Elder, etc.?" If there is no policy or protocol for protecting the membership and others from an abusive leader, then that church can fall prey to abuse of power from leadership or already has fallen prey to an abusive leader. Ask about the protocol or process for accountability of leadership. Where there is no accountability, there is no protection for a person who has been harmed by a leader or someone in the congregation. Continue to pray as you discern what is revealed when you ask these questions. Tip #6 - Meet with The Pastor We live in a time when some Pastors are treated like celebrities. They are unreachable. Ask for a meeting with the Pastor. If you cannot meet with the Pastor, this gives you insight into the church's culture. Jesus always made himself available. If you are attending a Mega Church and it seems unrealistic to ask for a meeting with the Pastor, find out if they offer a reception where people can meet the Pastor. This is an area where you would need to discern your level of comfort and acceptance. If you can meet with the Pastor, go back to utilize tips #5 & #4. Tip #8 - Biblically Sound Preaching & Teaching Make attending ministry activities where the Bible is preached and taught the priority. Always take your Bible and a journal or notepad. Take notes. Ask yourself what style of preaching inspires you to grow. What kind of teaching motivates you to learn more? Don't make the person preaching or teaching the final authority on what the scriptures are being taught mean. If you have a question about a text, pray and study it for yourself, discern for yourself what God is saying through the text, then ask questions about the text. That person will either confirm what you've learned or give you a new perspective. When a person only relies on a preacher or a teacher to explain and expound on what a scriptural text means, they put themselves in a position to be misled and risk being harmed by the abuse of power. People can use scripture to make it say whatever they want; without discernment and without knowing how to rightly divide the Word of God for yourself, you can become easily misled. Study the Word for yourself. Tip #7 - How Would You Describe the Culture of the Church? After following tips #1-#7, you have had the opportunity to experience the church's culture. How would you describe it? Is it open, truthful, warm, and loving, does there seems to be secrecy, fear, weariness, frustration, etc.? Listen to God's direction as you discern the church's culture. Finding a church home can be difficult in some places; however, with these tips, my prayer is that God will lead you to a church that is a safe place for you to get connected in the community and grow into spiritual maturity. Get the PDF of this Article Here

I have always had the dream of using my gifts in the local church. One of my primary reasons for going to seminary was that I would take what I learned back to a local church and help to nurture and develop believers to become more spiritually mature. I had waited half my life to serve in a local church where my gifts were accepted (I am 55). Then it happened. I went to a church's website to find the time of services and discovered a career tab, that revealed my dream "job". My eyes watered; that "job" description was written just for me. I applied. I got the "job," and within the first ninety days, I had preached a sermon, taught Bible Study (people started returning), led a workshop for teachers (people wanted more), and met some of the most loving congregants that I had ever met in a church. I received positive responses for everything I did. To God Be the Glory! I was tearing up or crying every day because of the pure joy of serving God's people and the love and acceptance I had experienced. However, my tears of joy were flowing parallel to my tears of sadness because I had discovered that although the church where I served had a charge to love God and to love people, there was a culture that did not make this a priority. This was confirmed on Sunday, April 2, 2023, when I was sharing with a close friend, who is a licensed mental health professional, and prayer warrior/intercessor, about some of the experiences I was having at work, and she responded, "You know that what you are describing is a toxic work environment right? Don't underestimate the effects of a toxic work environment on your mental health." On April 7th, 2023, Good Friday, I fell trying to step over a doggie gate. I broke my femur and had to have emergency surgery which resulted in a complete left hip replacement. Four weeks after my surgery, it became even more evident that the culture was conflicting with my values of empathy, compassion, and love. I had suspected that I was working in a corporate culture and not a ministry culture, and it became more and more evident. I had lost all trust and started experiencing the physiological reaction of fight or flight whenever I had to engage with certain people. It wasn't about a fear of someone causing me physical harm; it was the fear of being provoked for the purpose of causing me to respond in what would cause me to be perceived as a person who was difficult to work with or someone who was not who I had presented myself to be. I felt they were trying to create evidence and create a narrative that would present me in a negative way. I felt they wanted me to quit. I did not want to get ensnared by their trap. I didn't feel that I had an advocate. On May 23, 2023, I went to my doctor about it; my blood pressure was 133/88; I had not had any issues with high blood pressure prior to working on this job. After praying, having a discussion with my doctor, seeing a mental health professional, and talking with my leadership coach and some wise friends, I discerned that I needed to resign to preserve my mental health so that my physical health would not be hindered. After submitting a work-from-home plan on May 19th and it getting approved, I began working from home on May 22, 2023 however, I was still led to resign on May 24, 2023. When I texted my close friend, the mental health professional, prayer warrior, and intercessor, that I resigned, her text back to me was, "I am both sorry about how it ended, but also glad that it ended. Your health was literally at stake". Confirmation. My tears of joy had turned into tears from a broken heart. My dream had been deferred. Some may think, "Well, Joycelyn, you didn't need your job, so you could resign." The truth is, that I did need my job, but I need my mental and my physical health more, so I had to resign and trust God to provide during this season when I am not working. He can do it! If you are someone who has found yourself working in ministry, but the culture where you work is stressful. I pray that you will have the courage to speak up for yourself. If you fear retaliation, then I pray you have the courage to resign. It is not worth your mental and physical health. Stressful work environments cause mental health problems and physical illness. Do not forget to check out the Resource page and the Home page.

This is written by: Alice Fryling (see more about her below). I received this article my first year of seminary. It is a real treasure of a read. No really is a complete sentence and sometimes the most spiritual thing you can say. Photo: Photo by cottonbro: https://www.pexels.com/photo/brown-paper-with-handwritten-text-3826681/ If I were a prophet, in the Old Testament tradition, I would put on my long robes, gather a crowd, and call out, “God says ‘No!’” I would lean over and point my finger at the distraught pastor who cannot bear the burdens of her congregation, and I would say, “Let’s go.” I would look at the harried mother hurrying from the office to the day care center to a PTA meeting, and I would say, “Don’t go!” And I would grab the tired executive who was all week on a trip, came home to kiss the children, and is now on his way to the church baseball league, and I would put my face close to his and say, “Slow down!” Indeed, there are prophets in our day who are saying just that. Richard Foster in Freedom of Simplicity calls Christians to a life of simply doing what God wants, rather than being pushed and pulled by inward and outward demands. He quotes Thomas Kelly, “We have seen and known some people who seem to have found (a) deep center of Living, where the fretful calls of life are integrated, where no, as well as yes, can be said with confidence.” Foster describes that confidence as simplicity. It could also be a more difficult act of obedience than saying yes. When I say no to a good idea for the sake of a better idea or activity, I am acknowledging that I am a creature rather than a creator. I cannot do everything that comes before me. Even good ideas, if they are not the will of God for me, can become the vehicles of pride, sin, fatigue, and depression. Rather than take responsibility for these symptoms of imbalance, we often blame God for our busy lives. How many times have we heard, “Oh, I am just so busy (doing good deeds, Christian services, and fulfilling spiritual obligations).” I suspect that our busyness stems from complications we have brought into our lives (our homes, social and political clubs, gardens, even some employment). But even if we could prove our busyness is only doing “God’s work,” it is blasphemous to imply that our loving Father wants us to do more than He has equipped us to do. Common to the lifestyles is a “bless-this-mess” syndrome. It goes like this. I see a need. Or I have an idea. Or someone taps me for a project. Without carefully evaluating the request for my time, I say yes because I like to help people, I like to be creative, and I don’t like to let people down. Then when the going gets rough, I ask God to bless me anyhow. “Please help me to make it. Take care of my health, my family, even my prayer life so I can make it through this crisis.” In other words, “Please, Lord, bless this mess.” Everyone gets into predicaments like that occasionally. But when one crisis bumps into another, we need to stop and see what God wants for us. How can I hear the still small voice of God when I don’t even have time to pray? How can the breeze of the Holy Spirit sweep into my life when I am stirring up endless dust storms on my own? Frequently these predicaments arise because we fail to acknowledge that in saying yes to one activity, we are pre-forced to say no to another. We simply cannot do two things at once. This is clear in Paul’s famous “Macedonian call” (Acts 16:6-10), which has been used at hundreds of missionary conferences to spur people on to service. While I would never discourage someone from following a true Macedonian call, it is interesting to note that twice Paul was told to say no, before he was told to go. “The Holy Spirit forbade him” to speak the word in Asia, and then “did not allow” them to go into Bithynia. If Paul had not said no to Asia and Bithynia, he might never have ended up in Macedonia. By saying yes to Macedonia, he was saying no to anywhere else at the time. This may sound like simple mathematics. But consider the subtlety of one practical example. If I say yes to leading a Bible study, that study may take an hour to prepare and an hour to present. And if I want to befriend the people in the study, it may take another two to three hours to present. I may be very eager to do this, but if I do a good job, there will also be an emotional and spiritual drain, so that another hour or two of restoration is involved. So, my Bible study is from 9-10a.m. once a week means that I must say no to at least six hours worth of other activities. Many of us will say yes to leading such Bible studies. But if we do, we may need to say no to other things—building the addition on our house, enlarging our garden, or even advancing at work. Or, we may decide we need to say no to the Bible study in order to give our time to something else. The issue is not just whether we want to do something or whether we are gifted to do it. While these things are important, the primary issue is whether or not it is God’s will for us at the time.Does this sound obvious? It is only so on paper. In order to say no to something we want to do, we almost always have to let go of something we value. Peter, in Acts 10, went through a reorientation of values when God told him to go meet Cornelius, a Gentile. Peter said, “No, Lord, I have never….” When God tells us to slow down, we might say, “No, Lord, I have never turned down on a call to serve. I have always been a busy person. I believe God is telling some of us that we need to let go of the value we place on service, availability and busyness, and take up the value God places on quietness, trust and peace. Recently, I have had to let go of the high value I place on being available to friends. I do not love my friends any less, but when I try to befriend too many people at once, I find I don’t have the physical and emotional capacity I need. If I will not give up part of what I value, I end up giving up something I value even more. I become so enervated that I have little to offer any friends, my husband, my children or my Lord. This “giving-up” is a very painful process. It is a dying to myself. I really feel good saying yes to requests for my time and talent. But that immediate reward soon tarnishes if I am expending my energies on things God has not called me to do. Our unwillingness to say no may be a modern form of idolatry. We enthrone our own desires, our pride, and the lure of appearing busy. It may be that we still feel that we must prove ourselves to God by doing good works. Perhaps it is just too painful to sit down alone and face our limitations. We need to be ruthless if we find ourselves always too busy, too tired, or too discouraged. In the name of the Christian witness or service, we may have abdicated our responsibility to consider what opportunities are God’s will for us, and what ones pull us away from higher priorities. The author of Hebrews spoke strongly to those who fail to enter the rest of God. “For the good news came to them: but the message which they heard did not benefit them, because it did not meet with faith in the hearer” (Heb. 4:2). The good news God gives us about our lifestyle is that “in returning and rest you shall be saved; and in quietness and in trust shall be your strength” (Is. 30:15). “It is in vain that you rise up early, to go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved in sleep” (Ps. 127:2). “God is not a God of confusion but of peace” (I Cor. 14:33). If we fail to experience peace, order and quiet in our lives, it is our fault, not God’s. A life of peace and simplicity is not a life of leisure and self-gratification. If that is our goal, we “ask wrongly, to spend it on our own passions” (Jas. 4:3). If we find leisure and gratification in our lives, they are gifts from our loving Father, to refresh us and enable us to fulfill His calling. It is clear in Ephesians that God has good works planned for each of us to do. In our busy, complex culture, we need to pray for the courage to do only those good works. It takes courage to be simple. Sometimes, it is embarrassing because we misunderstood. Always it takes the glory away from ourselves and gives it to the Father. Discerning between what is the will of God and what is not is the critical issue. Much has been written about how to know the will of God. Perhaps something should be said about how to know what the will of God is not. I would like to suggest five symptoms of the lifestyle, which may mean that the will of God is not being done. (1) If your inner life is seldom joyful, seldom peaceful, seldom ordered, then you are not living in accordance with Scripture. (2) Your children, those who look to you for emotional and spiritual support are frequently lonely, discourage or disappointed, it may be that you are not available to be used by God in their lives. (3) If, as you consider an activity, you feel overwhelmed emotionally or experience physical signs of stress (stomach tightening, extreme fatigue, headaches), you need to STOP and ask God quietly if this is His will for you. Not all that God wants us to do is easy, but we are taught to test the spirits (I John 4:1), and it may be that God will use physical and emotional signs to indicate a false spirit prompting us to do something. (4) If you are too busy to pray about an activity, you are too busy. (5) If you are too busy to handle an occasional interruption or emergency, you are too busy. Have you ever wondered why prison interrupted Paul’s ministry? Perhaps God used it to slow down Paul so that he would write letters to the churches. “A man’s mind plans his ways, but the Lord directs his steps” (Prov. 16:9). If your schedule is so tight you cannot meet the unexpected with confidence, then you are too busy. Crisis, stomach pains and unhappy… the best ways to learn God’s will. I find that virtually every day of my life there is more to do than time to do it. Not everyone is like that, but for those of us who are, we need to figure out how to choose between what is God’s will for us and what is not. One day I made a list of my expectations for a given week. Then I listed the numbers of hours I had at my disposal. My expectations exceeded reality by almost ten hours! That means that I was expecting to do ten hours of activities which were not God’s will for me. What a sobering, painful conclusion. But what freedom it brought to come to the Lord and say, “What is it that you don’t want me to do?” It is God’s gift to us to be able to work hard, every day, in His service, and not live with a sense of unfulfilled expectations. One of the reasons we have so much difficulty experiencing this gift is that we have taught ourselves to live in crisis. A crisis may motivate us to action more than a desire to please God. How much better to come to Him freely, and frequently, motivated by a desire to do His will rather than survive a crisis. In this regard, I know of no adequate substitute for the daily quiet time. Because of my tendency to want to do more than I can, I desperately need to be confronted with God’s thought in Scripture each day, and to be very quiet before Him as I sort out His will. If my days seem to be more than I can bear, I dare not leave my devotions until there is a sense of order and peace. Perhaps I need to go through the pain of giving up an outdated value, a selfish desire, or a pressure I feel from some source other than God. “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in my heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matt.11: 28-29). May God give us the grace to willingly live with the yoke we have acknowledged, to find rest, to find simplicity, to find His will only for our lives. Alice Fryling, former Intervarsity staff worker in Maryland and the Boston Area, counsels and speaks to married couples with her husband Robert, Intervarsity’s Director of Human Services and Strategic Planning. Their new book, Handbook for Married Couples, will be released in August through Intervarsity Press. Copies from HIS magazine.

Ezekiel 34 is my go-to passage of scripture when I think about spiritual leadership. I like the Message Version verses 1-6, God's Message came to me: "Son of man prophesy against the shepherd-leaders of Israel. Yes, prophesy! Tell those shepherds, "God, the Master, says: Doom to you shepherds of Israel, feeding your own mouths! Aren't shepherds supposed to feed sheep? You drink the milk, you make clothes from the wool, you roast the lambs, but you don't feed the sheep. You don't build up the weak ones, don't heal the sick, don't doctor the injured, don't go after the strays, don't look for the lost. You bully and badger them. And now they're scattered every which way because there was no shepherd- scattered and easy pickings for wolves and coyotes. Scattered-my sheep!- exposed and vulnerable across mountains and hills. My sheep scattered all over the world, and no one out looking for them! God's message to Ezekiel spells out the role of spiritual leaders; feed the sheep, build up the weak, heal the sick, doctor the injured, go after the strays, look for the lost. When spiritual leaders who are also disciples fail to feed the sheep, build up the weak ones, heal the sick, doctor the injured, go after the strays and look for the lost, those who are a part of the flock scatter, and they fall prey to the wolves. The wolves are leaders whose agenda is their own and who use the “sheep” to elevate themselves rather than become a co laborer with them for the purpose of being an expression of God’s love in the world for the glory of God. I am hearing horror stories from people who are scattered, they are struggling to find churches where they feel safe and cared for when they are hungry, weak, sick, injured, have gone astray, and are lost. Many have experienced spiritual abuse and although they will not leave God, they contemplate every Sunday morning whether they will even return to “a” four wall church. For them, the safest church is a church they can attend thru the various online platforms. In doing so, they can fall prey to itching ears trying to find messages that speak only to what they want to hear rather than what they need to hear. Being away from a faith community dulls spiritual discernment and opens the door for the wolf to come in and devour those who are scattered. As spiritual leaders we must take a pause daily and ask God to reveal to us to whom we are being invited to shepherd the disciples and the unchurched. We can ask ourselves these questions: 1. Who needs to be fed? 2. Who needs to be built up? 3. Who needs to be healed from their sickness? 4. Who is injured? 5. Who has strayed? 6. Who is lost? Then change the who to how? In doing so it will help you to be more sensitive to the Spirit's guidance. How do we get the answers to these questions? We must have conversations. We must practice the art of listening (this happens when we listen to understand first, not to share what we know), and we must be willing to be transparent with our own stories. Through those conversations the Spirit will reveal to us what the person needs. Then exchange contact info. Make yourself available for phone calls, texts, coffee, lunch. This is shepherding. THEN check in with those people and see how they are doing. This is the call of spiritual leadership. Have you ever experienced a time when someone sent you a text and just said, "Checking in with you, how are things going?" How did it make you feel? It's one of the most loving and compassionate things we can do. We may not be the ones to meet the needs, however as leaders we should know where we can take someone to get their needs met, or who we can take them to for their needs to be met. But we should always be a connection for that person. When we as spiritual leaders are caring for the hungry, the weak, the sick, the injured, those who have strayed and the lost we are being disciples. We are caring for disciples and we are caring for those who have not yet received this incredible gift of grace. This is also discipleship. When we are doing this well, those who are a part of the faith communities where we lead don’t scatter, and those who need a safe place to grow will return, grow, and become disciples who care for others. Let’s look for the scattered, some are inside and outside of the four walled church. We can do it..together!

This is one of my greatest ah-ha moments. I lived most of my life trying to “balance” being a wife, mother, minister etc., and I never felt that it was achievable. I always felt like having a balanced life was an uphill battle that I could never win. And I discovered that I was right when I read the book, The ONE Thing by Gary Keller and Jay Papasan. I was set free from the bondage of trying to have a balanced life when I read the following words written by the authors, “If you think of balance as the middle, then out of balance is when you’re away from it. Get too far away from the middle and you’re living at the extremes. The problem with living in the middle is that it prevents you from making extraordinary time commitments to anything. In your effort to attend to all things, everything gets shortchanged, and nothing gets its due. Sometimes this can be okay and sometimes not. Knowing when to pursue the middle and when to pursue the extremes is in essence the true beginning of wisdom. Extraordinary results are achieved by this negotiation with your time.” Did you just do an exhale when you read the words, “knowing when to pursue the middle and when to pursue the extremes is in essence the true beginning of wisdom”? The writers go on to say that “the magic”, I would say the “flow” happens at the extremes, not in the middle therefore we should replace the word balance with “counterbalance”, because when we have been running down the rabbit hole of trying to live a balanced life what we were really doing was trying to prioritize. However, you cannot prioritize and be balanced at the same time, because to prioritize one thing, another “priority” will have to wait, or be left undone. Keller and Papasan also say that “Leaving some things undone is a necessary tradeoff for extraordinary results”. Those words set me free! The balanced life is a lie. Trying to balance anything is a lie. Even Jesus says, “no one can serve two masters, you will love one and hate the other.” (Matthew 6:24). Yes, I know that contextually he was talking about money, however the principle transfers to this idea of a balanced life. To attempt to have a balanced life is like having two masters therefore when we counterbalance, we are better able to master our time and our priorities. They use the ballerina as the perfect example. When a ballerina is on her toes, she is not balancing on both toes, that’s an illusion, what she is doing is counterbalancing they describe it this way, “When the ballerina poses en pointe, she can appear weightless, floating on air, the very idea of balance and grace. A closer look would reveal her toe shoes vibrating rapidly, making minute adjustments for balance. Counterbalancing done well gives the illusion of balance.” So, when you see someone who appears to be balancing all their responsibilities well, what you are really seeing is a person who knows how to counterbalance well. I will conclude this blog with these words from the authors, “Leaving some things undone is a necessary tradeoff for extraordinary results." "But you can’t leave everything undone, and that’s where counterbalancing comes in. The idea of counterbalancing is that you never go so far that you can’t find your way back or stay so long that there is nothing waiting for you when you return.” Stop trying to live the balanced life and start living the counterbalanced life in doing so, you will experience the weightlessness and the grace of mastering one priority at a time. Sidenote: If you look closely in the picture above you will see the ballerina's front toe is not touching the floor, however it doesn't appear that way at first glance. That's counterbalancing done well. All quotes are taken from: Keller, Gary; Keller, Gary; Papasan, Jay; Papasan, Jay. The ONE Thing (p. 74- 80). Bard Press. Kindle Edition.

I am so grateful that I had the opportunity to learn Spiritual Leadership Inc.’s (SLI) generative change methodology while I was in seminary. I was invited to be a coach for SLI; however, I couldn’t join the SLI team as a coach due to circumstances beyond my control. However, I did have the privilege of being taught the SLI methodology in seminary. There is no doubt in my mind that the churches that committed to SLI’s methodology for the purpose of fostering transformation, developing spiritual leaders, and establishing processes that bear fruit were able to be sustained during the pandemic. SLI’s methodology is based on what is called L3, Loving, Learning and Leading. It’s the process in which an SLI coach journeys with the leaders in a church that have a commitment to grow spiritually mature disciples. A covenant group is created, and that group enters a journey that results in SLI’s vision and mission being fulfilled. See SLI’s vision and mission below: Vision: Joining Jesus in His revolution to transform leaders, communities, and the world. Mission: Discover, develop, and deploy passionate spiritual leaders & teams for the transformation of churches, organizations, and communities. Values: · Developing spiritual leaders who model community that loves, learns, and leads together. · Creating environments that foster transformation · Establishing processes that bear fruit. I am not sharing this information with you as a commercial for SLI, I am sharing it because I want you to know that creating environments that foster transformation is happening in other spaces where churches, organizations and communities need transformation. SLI’s methodology has been proven to work based on biblical principles. This methodology is what ignited my soul for fostering transformation in the church. Through SLI’s methodology I discovered that there is a plan and there is a process for developing spiritual leaders and establishing processes that bear fruit. If you are the leader of a struggling church, let’s begin the journey of fostering transformation in the congregation where you lead. You and your leaders will receive tools that will sustain your congregation thru its present challenges and for the next generation. Let’s get started….together….we can do it!

Church growth isn’t about increasing the number of people in a congregation it’s about cultivating spiritual maturity. Spiritual maturity is cultivated when leaders of churches become intentional about church assimilation. Church assimilation provides an internal accountability structure for making disciples. Every church should have an assimilation Pastor/Director/Leader, whose primary responsibility is to show every person who enters the doors of the church and/or participates in outreach activities the path to become spiritually mature. This is done through making personal connections and by tracking where each person is involved within the assimilation process towards spiritual maturity. Assimilation is a tool that aids the church in being good stewards over the lives that show up. Knowing where people are on the path will help leaders and members maximize relationships. I believe God the Father has an assimilation process. Before the foundation of the world God had a plan for how he was going to bring about redemption. There are scriptures that indicated that He knew us before we even came to exist in this world (Eph. 1:4) and He created a path for us to be redeemed. He was intentional. He was strategic. Scripture says that the Father knows us, he knows our sitting and our rising (Psalm 139:2), and the very numbers of hair on our heads (Luke 12:7), our names are written on the palm of His hand (Isaiah 49:16). The Father is keeping track of us and as He keeps track of us, He is guiding us along our spiritual journey. I believe it is just as important for there to be a leader in the church who does the same. The church must be strategic and intentional about assimilation. There must be a process for making disciples. Jesus had a process. His process? Go. Teach. Baptize. Go. Teach. Baptize. Etc., I think you get my point. Assimilation creates an intentionality about making connections with people who enter the doors and bringing them into the community of faith where they can grow and help to disciple others. If you are not sure if assimilation is for your church. Do an experiment. Be intentional about assimilation use an assimilation process for a year and see if lives are transformed. You can always stop if it’s not bearing fruit. But if it bears fruit, then your church will be impacting the Kingdom and impacting the world!

This blogpost is inspired by a text I received from a woman this morning @ 6:33 am. I was compelled to write this, this morning. Much love to you sister. My heart is with you. I’ve often wondered what it feels like for my gifts and calling to be immediately accepted with joy and excitement. I know that if I were to say, “I am a singer (which I am – but It’s not my season to be singing) I would love to sing in the choir or on the praise team”, they would make room for my singing gift. And I am absolutely sure that if I said, “My heart is for the next generation (which it is) I want to serve in the children’s ministry, or with the youth, there is no doubt the response would be with enthusiasm, “well after the background check”, come join us! Or if I said, “I love to cook”, I would be introduced to the person over the kitchen and if aprons were handed out, I would receive one. And there is no doubt that if I said, “my gift is hospitality, I want to be a greeter or an usher” that I would be greeted with open arms and handed a name tag and assigned a section where I could help someone find their seat. When I share with Pastors and leaders that I have graduated from seminary, I have a Masters in Spiritual Formation and one in Christian leadership and then I go on to say that my heart is for designing disciple making processes and developing leaders to become spiritually mature rarely is the response, “I want you on our team!” I have tried waiting before disclosing my experiences and education so that I don’t appear “prideful or arrogant”, and I have tried sharing about my seminary training and my heart for making disciples almost immediately so that it doesn’t appear that I am just “sitting on my gifts” and although there may be a bit of conversation, it has been very rare that I have been invited to the table. As a matter of fact, one Pastor said, “I’m just trying to figure out where you fit.” Another one said, “How are you going to do those things and handle your responsibilities as a wife and mother?” Another one said, “The reason you make people nervous when you come to church is because you are a prophet.” And one Pastor wanted to meet with me behind closed doors to hear my ideas, but he wanted to be the one to execute them publicly this was before I was a consultant. And then, there are male children in elementary, middle, and high school who can freely use their gifts in a church where women cannot, simply because they are male. These children are preaching, teaching and being ordained while adult women must sit in pews and recite, “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.” John 15:18. There is the story of an African American seminary graduate who had been serving in a “white” congregation while attending seminary. When she expressed that she had a heart for racial reconciliation and shared her ideas about what was needed not only in the world, but in that church to make African Americans like herself feel welcomed and not invisible, she was not seen, nor heard. As a matter of fact, what she experienced was a lead Pastor responding as someone who was a racist. The place where she should have felt safe, was not a safe place for her. She had to shake the dust off her feet and take her gift(s) of leadership, shepherding, teaching, and her heart to plant a multiracial church with her. “And Jesus was able to do very little miracles there because of their lack of faith.” (Matthew 13:58). I am starting to wonder if the "four walled" church is a new mission field, where those of us who are called, who have believed the message that we are to “go and make disciples”, and who are rejected, must use the same strategies we use to reach the unchurched, inside the church. Why? Because just like the unchurched what we have to say, and what we have to offer will not be easily accepted within the four walls of the church. What I have found is that these experiences generally happen to women. So, it's the message that isn’t accepted because of the gender of the messenger. And so many women are finding themselves within the four walls of the church reciting the scripture from John 15:18 to overcome their feelings of rejection, “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” Therefore, it's necessary to cultivate transformative environments within the four walls of the church. so the church will be a safe place for everyone, a place where there is a kingdom-centered disciple- making process, innovative teams are formed, and it is a community where everyone has a sense of belonging. Without those key components, the church will become a new mission field and it will not be a safe place for the unbeliever or the Christian disciple. Let's make sure the church is safe today and in the future. We can do it!

On July 31[a] of my thirtieth year,[b] while I was with the Judean exiles beside the Kebar River in Babylon, the heavens were opened and I saw visions of God. Ezekiel 1:1 More than 20 years ago I was sitting in my car waiting to take a young woman to a Narcotics Anonymous meeting. I had brought her a Bible from home to give to her because she said she didn't have one. I had selected the New Living Translation because I thought it would be easier for her to read and understand. While waiting, I asked the Lord a question you may have asked, "Lord, are you calling me into ministry? Are you calling me to preach?" And the thought came to my mind, "Turn to Ezekiel 1:1 and all of chapter two." When I read the first line of Ezekiel 1:1, I froze. I had never seen a specific date written in scripture before. But what made the date so significant was that it was the date of my birthday and I was in my 30's. There was no doubt that God's answer to my question was, "Yes." It's July 31st, 2023, and I am 55 years old today and the call continues to compel me. It has been true to it's instructions. I have been sent to numerous "Israel's" (Ezekiel 2:3) where they have refused to listen to anything I had to say, neither my words, nor my presence had any value. I have had the experience of feeling like an exile. There were some days, I stood firm and other times I have become discouraged seeing Matthew 13:58, "And he did not do many miracles there because of their lack of faith." become their reality. It has grieved my soul. I have had to shake the dust off of my feet leaving numerous places,, yet in spite of it all, I knew that God was with me. Even though I've had some difficult times, I've had some incredible moments, like having the opportunity to baptize a woman who accepted Christ, hearing the testimony of women who discovered that they are deeply loved by God, meeting Pastors and leaders who have a sincere heart about being a disciple and making disciples, being able to facilitate a formative spirituality retreats to women because they wanted to have an encounter with the Divine Forming Mystery, - (Father, Son & Holy Spirit. The Father who formed them, the son who reformed them and the Holy Spirit who transforms them). Traveling overseas to spread the gospel, mentoring women, interceding on behalf of others, seeing prayers answered. I have indeed experienced some incredible times of joy in my 55 years of living out this call that was placed on my life before I was even born. Every year, I reflect on this compelling call, and every year I say, "Yes Lord."

What keeps me up at night is a deep sorrow that makes me long to help the institutional church be healthy. I have been praying and fasting for the institutional church for a very long time. This morning the Lord revealed something to me as I was drifting back to sleep. I had listened to part of a message about the church needing to be awakened. And the Lord said to me as I drifted off to sleep. Some churches can’t be awakened because they have C.O.V.I.D. (Consistently Overlooking Vital indicators of the Death (the disempowered, the depressed, the discouraged, the disenfranchised, the disillusioned and a lack of depth of teaching and preaching styles that penetrates and transforms hearts for the purpose of making disciples.).” Some churches just aren't safe. To overcome C.O.V.I.D* the church (body of believers) must C.A.R.E thru: o Helping one another discover and live out their Calling, o Creating a community of Accountability, o Spending time discerning the voice of God thru intentional reflection and Retreats o Empowering the people to lead In doing so the local church will experience the C.U.R.E. thru o Open and honest Conversation about what God is speaking to them, and their experiences within that body, o Unity without conformity (is it okay to respectfully disagree without being called a Jezebel or rebellious? Or to respectfully say no if asked to do something by a leader)? o Repentance for not recognizing the vital indicators o A willingness to become Equipped. When churches overcome C.O.V.I.D*, it will thrive and impact the Kingdom and lives will be transformed. Let’s make the church safe again. *Consistently Overlooking the Vital Indicators of Death