Experts: Recent Episodes
Hope Renewed Podcast
67- The Bomb of Forced Exit - Monty HarringtonMonty Harrington joins Tom and Sean to talk about the aftermath of forced exit because of a new lead pastor. Monty, the events coordinator for Renovare, shares a little about the Renovare Pastor's Retreat in Colorado Springs.Monty HarringtonMonty is the Events Coordinator and Social Media Manager at Renovaré. He has helped Renovaré manage events off and on for the last 20 years. He and his wife Kelly have three daughters, one dog, and own an unreasonable amount of books.
Show NotesFirst Love: A Renovaré Retreat for PastorsApril 24-27, 2023 · Colorado Springs
In Episode 45 we talked with Chuck DeGroat about Narcissistic Pastors
Transcript of Monty Harrington InterviewComing Soon
65 - The Sacred Journey - Joe Chambers and Jeremy FryeJoe Chambers and Jeremy Frye join Tom and Sean to talk about their Sacred Journey Retreats and how they bless ministry families. These free retreats, at the base of Mt. Princeton in Buena Vista, Colorado, are offered every year and focus on learning to rest in our belovedness in Christ. Show notes will be available on hoperenewedpodcast.comJoe ChambersJoe Chambers is the pastor of Mountain Heights Baptist Church and, along with his wife, he hosts the Sacred Journey Retreats in his home at the base of Mt. Princeton in beautiful Buena Vista, Colorado.
Joe says, "I don’t believe anyone remembers and applies anything apart from stories. Therefore I am always looking for and seeing stories in all of life. The greatest story ever told is the riches-to-rags story of Jesus Christ becoming a man, living a perfect life and dying on a cross so that an old sinner like me can know that I am forgiven, loved and never alone. I believe I have been put here to tell people that God is not mad at them and to show them the way Home."
Joe lives in Buena Vista, Colorado.
Jeremy FryeJeremy Frye is a spiritual director, supervisor, retreat leader, and Director of Sacred Community for Anam Cara Ministries. One of his deepest joys is companioning people on their journey toward living into and out of their belovedness. His vocational pilgrimage began with serving for 20 years in full-time pastoral ministry in the local church, which has given him a profound understanding of and compassion for those whose personal spirituality and professional contexts converge (sometimes easily and sometimes causing great distress). He is deeply acquainted with grief and loss as well as the good but difficult work of the disordering and reordering of one’s faith. Jeremy has completed a certificate in Soul Care from the Soul Care Institute, through Fuller Seminary, a 2-year apprenticeship in spiritual direction through Anam Cara, and is currently enrolled in the Companioning Center’s program for Supervision Training. Jeremy lives with his wife, two children, one dog, six chickens, and whoever else needs a place to rest their head at An Téarmann (Gaelic for the refuge), their home in East Nashville, Tennessee.
Show Notes and LinksSacred Journey Retreats:
- Contact Joe - joseph.o.chambers@gmail.com
- Contact Jeremy - jeremy@anamcara.com
An earlier episode: Episode 28 - A Journey Into the Wilderness with Joe Chambers
The Soul Care Institute
Anam Cara Ministries
Crossroads Counseling of the Rockies
Mountain Heights Baptist Church
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyn_3680rdYTranscript of the interview with Joe Chambers and Jeremy FryeJeremy Frye 00:01
One of the big things that we focus on is learning to recognize and rest in our own belovedness, that we are the beloved of God. And when we can learn to rest in that space, then everything else, you know, then then the load, the yoke is easy, the burden is light.
Joe Chambers 00:23
Welcome to Hope Renewed, helping you find new hope when ministry leaves you hopeless. The Hope Renewed podcast is brought to you by PIR Ministries. Here are your hosts, Tom Jameson and Sean Nemecek.
Tom Jameson 00:42
Today, we are glad to have good friends, Joe Chambers and Jeremy Frye. With us here on Hope Renewed. Joe and Jeremy, welcome.
Jeremy Frye 00:50
Thanks. It's good to be here.
Joe Chambers
It is wonderful to be here.
Tom Jameson 00:54
Joe, we've had you on the podcast before and just a fascinating time to hear your story. So, Jeremy, tell us a little bit about yourself, your spiritual journey, and your ministry journey.
Jeremy Frye 01:06
Yeah, you bet. I was raised in the church, my parents, I tell people I started going to church nine months before I was born. My parents came, went to the church that they were married in, I grew up in that church. I started serving in that church with my mom and Sunday school when I was you know, 13 or 14 years old. Since the call into ministry, in middle school, and then that ended up leading me down a path towards going to Bible college. And while I was in Bible college, served at my home church as the, as the worship leader. I had a band and so my church thought it wise to ask my 17 year old self with all of my 16 year old friends to lead worship for the church. And we did for several years, and then served at another small church, following that sort of multiple year internship before moving to Colorado, and served in Colorado for 18 years as a pastor and in the same church there. And my spiritual journey has sort of taken me a lot of different places. I am a denominational mutt as they say. I had a grand I had a grandmother who was raised Pentecostal and was a Pentecostal worship leader and part of that sort of movement for a long time and a mom who was raised in the Baptist church and I grew up in the Christian church, Church of Christ movement and then served in a Baptist church for a lot of years. And so my kind of all over the place denomination really and, and have experienced a lot of really good things from all those different spaces and, and also, you know, experienced kind of the difficulties of those different spaces as well. But my spiritual journey really has led me to. . . seven or eight years ago now, really began to explore my own faith journey and, and started to think, Well, man, if this is all there is this sort of constant serving this constant being engaged with all of the all the boxes that have to be ticked to serve to serve in sort of traditional pastoral ministry. If this is all there is this. I don't know. I don't know if I can. I don't know if I can keep doing this. This doesn't seem sustainable to me. I had a daughter at the time that that was four, and a just had a brand new baby boy. And life was getting real hectic. And so and I wasn't slowing down and life wasn't slowing down. And I, I just kind of came to this place where I knew that I needed to, to do some more internal work. Not because I was feeling like I was headed down a path that was necessarily bad. I wasn't in, I didn't feel like. . . I just didn't feel like life wasn't working. I just felt like I couldn't handle it anymore. It wasn't sustainable for me. And that led me down a kind of a path towards what what does it look like to care for my own soul so that I can better care for the soul of souls of others. The people that I lead and the people that I work with and which is how I met Joe, through some of that work, we were serving on a ministry, I don't know, a board together and started realizing we kind of shared some some heart and some you know, thoughts around a lot of different things and and just started talking. . .
Joe Chambers 05:00
We were snarky together. We were making fun of the whole process and being bad.
Jeremy Frye 05:09
That's true. We were. That that happened. But, and we also had, had recognized through some conversation that that we were on some similar journeys, when it came to, to just what does it mean to be to enter to be be a pastor, and be be a sole care provider, as one who has really done their own work and has done the deep work to take care of their own soul? You know, and growing up in a space where the idea of, you know, self-care was selfish, you know, that was a change for me and something but something I knew I needed. And so I and so that exploration kind of got me connected to Joe. And then as we had sort of experienced this for ourselves, just realized, man, we we would this this is needed in, in the world that we operate in, and how do we how do we then offer this and care for others? So
Tom Jameson 06:10
What would you say that was more a journey of recapturing your faith or diving deeper into your faith?
Jeremy Frye 06:17
Yeah, it was that. It was both. There were pieces that I felt like I was losing. And there were pieces that I felt like I needed to lose. And some pieces that I felt like I had held on to out of fear, and held on to out of like, well, if it's if it's if this isn't it, then what is it? But and some of that was learning to let that go and to recognize that there was then a sort of deeper experience a deeper journey that to be gone on.
Sean Nemecek 06:50
So Amy, and I had the privilege of being with both of you this summer at one of your Sacred Journey retreats. It was wonderful. I'm curious to hear the story. We've heard a little bit from Jeremy but just the bigger story of how these sacred journey retreats got started.
Joe Chambers 07:09
Well, I guess I'll, I'll start with it. This. My wife and I have for years wanted to, we thought we thought we wanted to have a bed and breakfast for ministers. And when we retired, we thought that would be attorney we'd like to go down. But when I'm when we move back to Colorado, which is both she and I's home state, we reconnected with friends that I've known since 1987. And Mike and Carolyn, and who happened to be Jeremy's mother in law and father in law. And but Mike and Carolyn and Lynette and I had been friends for years. And so we just started talking one day and thought, You know what, this station in our life, we're both at that time, late 50s. We thought this would be a good time for us to give back to the generation that is following in terms of ministry, and we dreamed up the idea of having a retreat. And the four of us were going to host it in his home in Breckenridge and then some one one retreat would be in our home and Buena Vista, both very beautiful places, kind of resort places, places where people might want to come and as we were dreaming this up and thinking about it. One day I said to Mike, I said, What makes you and I think that anyone's going to want to come here what two broken down old retreads like you and I have to say, and this is what Mike said, because we live in a beautiful place. And he's right about. I mean, who wouldn't want to come to a home at the base of Mount Princeton for our retreat? Who wouldn't want to come to a home in Breckenridge where every bathroom in the house has a bedroom? I mean, this is Mike built the house. So it was just a beautiful kind of beginning. And the more we talked about it one day, we were dreaming up you know, somebody one of the guys said, Well, that was helping Mike What are we gonna call this retreat, we just call it a retreat, or we're going to call it? And I went Soul Care retreat. No, that didn't work and I said something else and then I looked on my bookshelves look for a title and suddenly Frederick Buechners book, The Sacred Journey was right there at eye level on my bookshelf behind me. And I went how about The Sacred Journey and in unison, all of them said, That's it. And so that's how the title of our retreat came from Frederick beginners book title. And the more of them Mike and Carolyn, Lynette and I, we just love doing it together. And then along the way, Jeremy went through the Soul Care Institute and Jeremy now had started having those conversations that Jeremy referred to, and we would, I think have To the first one or second one, Jeremy, I can't remember we invited Jeremy to participate. And Jeremy and I just started to work. It just seemed like we work well together. Kind of like in a jazz ensemble. When you're in a good jazz ensemble. I mean, I’m told, I don't play an instrument, but they can almost anticipate where the other person's going. And they can, they can riff off of one another. And Jeremy and I started doing that together. And it became pretty clear that this was turning into Joe and Jeremy's retreat, not Joe and Mike's retreat, and that transition occurred organically and naturally, and with the blessing of everyone. And then then Jeremy, so Jeremy, and I started doing these retreats together along with my wife. I think we've, we've finished our last or ninth one last week. And so we've done at least seven together. So that's kind of how it started.
Tom Jameson 11:02
And we're going to delve into a little bit more of what the retreat entails. But you both also serve pastors in unique ways outside of the retreat setting. Just briefly, tell us tell us about your ministry. And what are you seeing in the lives of pastors? What trends are you noticing?
Joe Chambers 11:22
Well, I, I work with a counseling center here in my, in my town, Crossroads Counseling of the Rockies, and it's a Christian counseling center. And about the beginning of COVID I was invited to be a part of that as a pastoral presence. And so, folks have been coming to this particular counseling center since 2001, from all over the country, many of them ministry leaders. And so Pete Kuyper was the Co-Founder of the ministry, asked me to come alongside and provide soul care. And he felt like that many of the pastors that come there, while he is a Christian therapist, a Christian therapist does not know what it's like to sit in a board meeting when the board kind of turns on a pastor. Or he doesn't know necessarily what it's like to be caught up in some of the politics, internal politics, of church and all the unique things, the isolation, the loneliness, the grind of ministry. And so having a seasoned pastor come alongside and be a pastoral voice and to operate, and kind of work on the interior life of the, of the folks that come for the counseling intensive, seemed like a good fit. So we started doing it, and it's worked really well. So the therapist, at the current, at the counseling center work on the clinical side of things, the pathologies that are involved in what causes people issues, and I work on their, the contemplative life, and let's talk about your prayer life, and how do you engage in the Scriptures? And how do you care for your own soul? And what's going on inside? How do you hear God? All of those kinds of questions. So we've been doing that since the spring of 2020. And my goodness, that has opened up all kinds of opportunities for follow up soul care sessions from folks that have come through here. And then invitations to go present some of the soul care work and teachings that we do to some churches, staffs. So from Bakersfield, California, all the way to Orlando, Florida, we've done kind of work with staff from some of these larger churches. I've been to one in Nashville and the largest church in Nashville. So that's how I've got involved in and, and so I do a lot of soul care sessions away from the counseling center and just affecting. . . The hour right before we started this conversation. I was on a zoom call with a pastor from Orlando, Florida, and did some soul care with him. So that's, that's how I got involved in what I do.
Jeremy Frye 14:17
Yeah, and for me, after serving for 20 years as a pastor, I transitioned from full time pastoral ministry in the church to really serving. I went through some, a lot of training have become a spiritual director, and a lot of the work that I do is with pastors and ministry leaders, a lot of the directories that I meet with our pastors and ministry leaders, we come alongside people from all different spaces, not just ministry spaces in the organization that I work with, but we definitely, I definitely have a lot of work, do a lot of work with pastors and what I seem to, what I'm finding is that pastors are just really tired. And they're, you know, worn out and exhausted, burned out on religion, stressed about the fallout of COVID still, you know. Joe, and I've had conversation that we don't really feel like COVID, the fallout of COVID is over, especially for pastors and ministry leaders. There's just a lot of, you know, as things get back to normal, whatever that means, that there's just a lot of, of stuff that's going to need to be processed moving forward. And so, and I'm seeing that in my spiritual direction practice that there are a lot of pastors that are just kind of, floundering isn't the right word, but definitely trying to sort of figure out navigate what a new normal looks like, and what does it mean for them. And, and although a lot of people in the, through COVID ended up in a space where they were sort of, in a forced sabbatical for a long period of time, a lot of pastors really had to step it up and learn how to do stuff online and learn how to care for people remotely and learn how to, you know, and so, you know, I know that that the beginning of COVID, I was still working in a church and my hours work did not decrease when COVID started, they increased significantly. And that, you know, it took its toll. And I think it's taken its toll on a lot of pastors.
Joe Chambers 16:26
Yeah, I'm seeing what I what I've feel is happening is that now that a semblance of normal has come, that it's almost as pastors can step back a little bit and take a deep breath, and feel like okay, is this normal? But then suddenly, all of the and dealt with trauma is starting to surface, because pastures through COVID, we're in a lose-lose situation. If you have tried to comply with the Health Department requirements, there were people that were upset with you. If you chose not to comply, there were people who were upset with you. It's one of the first times in my maybe the first time ever for me, since 1984, being in ministry, where you were in a situation where you were going to lose no matter what decision you made. And it wasn't going to be a small loss, it was it was going to be a huge loss. And, I think that got put on a shelf for a lot of ministry leaders, especially pastors. And then when the relief and the urgency of the moment kind of past now that stuff on the shelf is starting to come off the shelf, and, and surfacing. And that's where that's where the work starts to begin. And God can do some deep work when that stuff starts to surface. But they all we all I should say we all need guides, we need companions for the journey, when we have to start dealing with that stuff coming off the shelf. And that's where my ministry and soul care and Jeremy's ministry and spiritual direction comes into play. That's where I have a spiritual director that has helped me process. I have colleagues and friends that have been my companions and have helped me and that's extraordinarily important. And we recognize that not every ministry leader has that not every pastor has that. So ,we try to position ourselves to be that if they so reach out and choose.
Sean Nemecek 18:42
I imagine that many of the people who come to the sacred journey retreats are these weary, burned out tired people. So, that brings up the question Who should attend a sacred journey retreat? Who should not attend a sacred journey retreat?
Joe Chambers 19:00
Okay, let me answer the question about who should not. If a person does not like Eugene Peterson and is hostile towards Eugene Peterson, who thinks Eugene Peterson has done great damage to church, that's probably a person that's not going to feel very welcome in my home. My protective nature is coming out. So, other than that, that's my only caveat. You don't have to love him, but don't not like him. But anybody, so we've had missionaries, we've had therapists. And sometimes they come with their spouse, sometimes they come without. So, it doesn't . . . in ministry leaders and the thing we. . . it doesn't it's not a . . . It's free to the ministry participants. It's not free. So, we don't charge anything for these. And we want this to be an experience of grace and compassion. There are some parts of our retreat that we really feel powerful about, especially in the rhythms of how we approach those retreats. And Jeremy could probably speak to that pretty well.
Jeremy Frye 20:25
Yeah, I think the one of the things in the reason that I think, basically anyone would benefit from one of our retreats, except that the person who does accepted doesn't like Eugene, is that really what we are, what we tell people at the beginning of our retreat is that this really is a retreat, I think, oftentimes, you go to a retreat, and what that really is, is some sort of workshop where you're really sitting in a in a room all day and taking notes and doing a lot of things. And although we do have some teaching, art, we try to keep that sort of measured, and that it is not, it doesn't fill up the day, we provide a lot of space we want we provide a lot of room for conversation and a lot of space for rest, a lot of space for refreshment. Really encourage people we've even we even tell people at the beginning of the retreat, like we're going to be offering some teaching times. But if what you need while you're here is to just go take a nap or to go for a walk, do that. We think that what we're teaching has value. But we also understand that the reason you're here is to, is to experience rest in a way that you maybe haven't experienced in a long time. And that means that we prepare really great food for people and we make we make a lot of room for people to pull us aside and say hey, can we talk for a few minutes, and sit on the on the deck and just have conversations. And so, these the slowing down, I think is one of the big things that we offer. We encourage people to turn off their phones. And you know, a lot of times it's pastors that are there. So, we encourage them like during the during your break time, don't be writing your sermon for Sunday. Like don't do those things. Slow down with us. You know, and then we invite people into some different practices throughout the week that that are really invitations to a different way of maybe entering back in. We talk about different ways of engaging with Scripture, we talk about what it looks like to rest at different phases of life. One of the things that I think Joe and I bring together is that we are in different phases of life and ministry, Joe is an empty nester and me in the thick of, you know, having little kids at home, and what does it look like for someone in Joe's phase of life to stop and to take a break and to rest on a regular basis to enter into a Sabbath space every week? And then what does that look like for me because we ministered to people in both spaces. And people, so people who have little ones at home and people who are at the you know, towards the end of their ministry career. And we offer we offer this retreat to people in all of those spaces. And so, one of the things that we're able to do is say, look, we know that this looks different, depending on where you are in life. And we and it can be done. It can be a little a different a different way of being is possible.
Joe Chambers 23:29
Yeah, so we practice the. . . we for many of them we teach Lectio Divina, we teach the prayer of examine, and we offer and we encourage Nap-tio Davina in the afternoons. . .
Tom Jameson 23:46
(laughing) The divine nap
Joe Chambers 23:48
That's right, the divine sleep. But those practices, for some, are new. They have not experienced Lectio, they've not experienced the power of examine, or centering prayer— the contemplative life. And so, for many of them, they have been so focused on caring, and running the machinery of a church, and caring for the others they have. These ancient paths are unfamiliar to them. We our theme verse for our retreat is Jeremiah 6:16. Talks about the Lord thus says the Lord. And I’m not gonna quote it right . . .
Jeremy Frye 24:26
Stand at the crossroads and look, look for the ancient paths. . .
Joe Chambers 24:30
. . . for the ancient paths and walk in them and you will find you will find rest for your soul. So we introduced that as these are the ancient paths. They're well worn by the poets and the pilgrims and the saints, but have maybe overgrown over the last few 100 years in modern life. They the whole idea of actually practicing Sabbath Keeping. I will ask ministry leaders, how's your Sabbath Keeping? And they will look at me and say, well, you know, COVID was tough. It's a tough season for us, but it's a better than it used to be. But then I often will say, well, so, you know, that's in the 10 commandments, right? Yeah, I know, but it's a tough season. And then I'll say, so how's, how's the adultery going? No one ever says, well, this is a tough season, it’s high stress. (laughter) I’m cutting back, it's not as bad as it used to be. And I've seen that murder and stealing. So, you can if you're giving yourself a pass on Sabbath Keeping, that you wouldn't do that with the others. And it is meant to be funny, but it's also meant to show the gravitas, or the lack of gravitas that we give back.
Jeremy Frye 25:52
And it's so interesting, because if you look through the commandments, especially when Moses reintroduces them in Deuteronomy, he spends the most when, he spends the most time on Sabbath, the explanation of why it's celebrated, you know, he gives more time to that than anything else in in the, in the text. And so, it's really just an interesting thing that we have minimized it so much. And so even part of our practice, we gather on Friday evening, and I, I introduce every, to every group, a Sabbath liturgy that we do in our home, that just invites people to stop and there's something about saying, we're going to, we're going to take some time to, to mark the beginning of this time that we're stopping. And then as we close our retreat, we do a sort of, it's in the Hebrew community it's called of Havdalah, it's the closing of the Sabbath time together. And it's a way to sort of gather the gifts of the Sabbath. And we and so we introduced both of those practices, because we've, we really believe that it's, it's so it's a missing piece in so many pastors lives. And at the same time, it's so vital for, for our, just our ability to to stay connected in our, in our, just for our own souls, we need that stopping. So it's we've really emphasized that in our retreats,
Joe Chambers 27:28
let me tell you this quick story from our retreat that happened last week. Up in Portland, Oregon, we did our first off site retreat, and it was in it was in the state of Washington. Yeah, but we blended in Portland. But anyway, it was about sixteen folks there. And when we did the Havdalah exercise, and we in that we asked what was illuminating for you what was what reminded you the aroma of Christ and what was intoxicating to you, because there's a fruit of the of the vine there and practice that we do. Which was Welches, just by the way, just to let you know, it’s grape juice. Just in case any Southern Baptists are listening. Because this was a Southern Baptist group, to be honest. But one of the things that we when we did that, and Jeremy and I both were so pleased with this is that of the of all of the things that was said probably over 50%, the things that was treasured, was not the teaching, it was the space for rest. To me that, that spoke volumes. And we both walked away thinking that that was the best. One of the best compliments we've ever received was the space for rest and silence. Jeremy is famous for starting our retreats by saying, Joe and I are very comfortable with long periods of silence. And I usually say, you will not be comfortable, but we are. And what was commented on was the silence and the space for rest was one of the most illuminating things for them.
Tom Jameson 29:18
It just it sounds like you know, as you've delved into this pattern, in offering these retreats that at the heart of it is this desire to create a conviction and all of us about the need for and the ways to experience rest, experience soul rest, and to learn about those, you know, to wait for the Lord, as you mentioned Jeremiah, and I was thinking of Psalm 62. You know, my soul finds rest in God alone and having a conviction. I mean, is that fair to say that that would be the primary focus of your retreat.
Joe Chambers 30:00
100% Yeah, rest for your soul and learning to care for your soul, so that I can care for others. And learning to care for your soul, even if you don't care for others. I mean, if learning to care for yourself, loving your neighbor. . . I often will ask this question of myself, Jesus said, love your neighbor as you love yourself. And I've often turned that and said, Would my neighbor experienced the Agape love of God based on how well I love myself? And the answer is no. I mean, I am hard on myself, often I'm my worst critic, I do not give the Agape love of God to Joe. And if I, if I gave that volume of love to my neighbor, my neighbor would never know God. So, I take it very seriously, that caring for my soul is the best way for me to care for others. Because it will flow from an over it will come from an overflow of Agape, in my soul to my neighbor, or to my congregant, or to my wife. But it has to start, I can't give away something that I do not own or do not possess.
Tom Jameson 31:12
And that kind of takes that away from the argument that says, well, this is all about navel gazing, and just, you know, self-gratification. And . . .
Joe Chambers 31:21
I haven't seen, I haven't seen mine navel in a long time! Um, COVID. But, yeah, I mean, this, that's not the point, the point is not about, if my, I think I saw a Fred Buechner or save this, at the end of the day, the real test of your, of your Christianity is how well you love others. And if my soul care does not cause me to love others, more deeply, more, more selflessly, more like Christ loved, if my sole care isn't doing that, if my faith walk isn't doing that, I'm doing it wrong. The summum bonam of all our life is to love others with the love of Christ. And if my faith is not creating that in the relationships immediately close to me and those radiating out from that, then I'm doing it wrong. It's just not right. So, I the test for me is how well do I love others? How well do I solve conflict? How well do I engage the people that are very hard to do,
Jeremy Frye 32:28
And that really speaks to sort of the, it's not a different theme, but it is sort of how we get to this place of rest, which is. . . One of the big things that we focus on, is learning to recognize and rest in our own belovedness. That we are the beloved of God. And when we can learn to rest in that space, then everything else, you know, then then the load because the yoke is easy, the burden is light, right? When we can recognize that before anything else. I'm the Beloved, if I can sit with that, and rest in that, that, that just opens up space in my own life in a way that that just doing more and that serving more and proving, you know, proving that I can that I can love people well, just doesn't do, right, that redoubling of my effort. You know, one of the things that that, you know, we've Joe and I have talked about is that no one, we are both busy in a lot of ways. But we're busy without being hurried. And I think and some of that really is rooted in when you can rest in the reality of your belovedness in God that no matter what else happens, the truest thing about you is that you are the beloved. Man, there's just a way to you can breathe, differently. And I think I think what has been true for many pastors and was true for me is that I wanted other people to believe that. But I don't know that I believed it for myself for a lot of my ministry, I have met with pastors who have made that very statement to me. And I think that's true for everyone. I just don't, man, I just don't know about myself. If it's an end. So how do we really teach it? How do we how do we help the people that we have been charged with as pastors to care for the souls of to know and to rest in their belovedness if that's not settled in our own hearts, and so that's a piece that we that's another piece that we really focus on, but that really is still an invitation to rest.
Joe Chambers 34:47
And I read Can I read for you? This is a little awkward because Sean's wonderful wife, Amy, is a beautiful poet. But I wrote a little poem In a text that I wouldn't say went viral, but a lot of people really glommed on to, can I read it for you to hear? I don't know why I asked because I'm going to read it anyway. (laughter) So I just texted this to a couple of friends and they just loved it. And But anyway, this is what it says I'm no poet. But here we go.
My Deepest Truth
Before my first sin,
Before a single star or
a subatomic particle
was ever spoken into being,
I existed in the mind of God
as his beloved.
Before I was a sinner
I was a son.
That's the deepest truth about me.
Deeper than my sin
is my belovedness.
It's the deepest truth about me
because it was the first truth about me
and the last.
I posted that on Twitter, and a man I've never met, he said, Pastor Joe, I'm 65 years old. And I have never felt like I was the beloved of God, I'm going to ponder what you just posted. And hopefully it'll sink in. And I just went, Okay, that's why we do what we do.
Jeremy Frye 36:25
And that has been the experience of many of the people who attend, you know, we got a letter last week from a gentleman he in his 80s. It was at our retreat, who wrote us a letter at the end of the retreat and just said, I came to this retreat, not knowing what to expect, what I for sure didn't expect that I was going to encounter a God who loved me the way that you guys have helped me see this, that and just talks about, you know, I didn't know how impoverished my soul was, until I came here. And you guys helped me see that I am the beloved of God.
Sean Nemecek 37:07
There are so many pastors who enter into ministry, because they're looking for people to love them. And they're trying to love others while loathing themselves, rather than loving themselves. And this message that Joe, I think you've joked that this is the one sermon you preach over and over again, the life of the Beloved. This message is, is really what these pastors need to hear and, and not just hear it, but experience it and see it lived out in your lives. And so, this leads us into what are you trying to teach people? What will people learn at the sacred journey retreat? You have certain plans, for them, that you take them through. What are those things that you're teaching?
Joe Chambers 37:59
Well, we begin by teaching about how we move through our life, there are some stages of faith development that we walk folks through, and we call it the river of faith. And we move through, when a person becomes aware of God, and then they enter into a disciple or learning life, and then they move into a productive life. But inevitably, there is waterfalls and rapids that cause their lives to come undone. And so, we describe those, those experiences. And then we talk about what happens after the waterfall. And the beauty of life after a waterfall experience where maybe your, your faith, it goes into crisis mode, or your life falls apart, or any number of traumatic things can happen. But after the waterfall, there's also a beautiful time of looking inside me and learning and reevaluating things, and coming to terms with the new reality that there's more than just coming to faith in God and learning about God and then getting plugged into the machinery of production in the Evangelical world. And then we talked about going down the river further and you start to think about how I can help others how can I reach out how can I be a guide? How can I love others well, and bring them along, and then the last part of that particular teaching, and we talked about living a life of love and loving everyone loving them with the love of God. And so that's one of the things, we also really began to talk about the identity piece. And Jeremy does an incredible work with some of the practices that can open up some space so that we can continue to hear the voice of God. When it comes to the beloved being called the beloved and he can talk about that particular part. We call it the rule for life or rule of life.
Jeremy Frye 40:03
Yeah, so we will definitely, after we talk about identity and talk about just this recognition of, of our belovedness, that that, we begin to then talk about some practices and the recognition that those practices are not ins in and of themselves, I think oftentimes, when people begin to first explore the concept of a rule for life, or the concept of spiritual practices, the practices sort of become, oh, that's, if I do the practices, that's, that's going to fix things for me. And the reality, one of the things that we talked about and really emphasize is that the practices are not, they're not a silver bullet, they don't fix anything. All the practices do, is make space in our lives to hear the voice that calls us beloved, because we need to be reminded of that. And so, it's not the practices, you know, reading your Bible more is not the answer to a life that is, is, is full and, and whole. Encountering Jesus is that, right? And so, the practices are simply ways that we make space to have an encounter with God on a regular basis.
Joe Chambers 41:12
Which includes engaging in the scriptures on a daily basis.
Jeremy Frye 41:15
Absolutely. But the, but the, when the when we look at it, and we recognize that our understanding, why we're engaging in that, is so that we might have an encounter with Jesus so that we might hear the voice that calls us beloved, then the motivation for that is completely different. You know, our, our, our engagement with scripture probably slows down a lot. You know, we talk in most of our retreats about, you know, the, our tendency to be like, oh, I'm gonna read through the Bible in a year. You know, and, and Joe and I, neither one will come out and say, like, don't do that, but,
Joe Chambers 41:52
But I roll my eyes.
Jeremy Frye 41:56
You know, but what does it look like to slow down and allow the text to read us and to really speak to us in ways that we don't slow down enough to listen to, for most of our lives, we talk about Sabbath keeping, we talk about prayer practices, we talk about the importance of companions for the journey, you know, that I am of the opinion. And this is not just because I'm a spiritual director, I am of the opinion that every pastor ought to have someone in their lives that is not connected to their work, that they can go and sit with someone that is safe, because there are so few safe places for pastors. And when we're having to deal with and unpack and sort through our own crisis of faith, our own the struggles that we're dealing with, to have someone who doesn't care about our denomination, who doesn't care about how big our churches who doesn't care, you know, that could not care less for any of that. But it's just present to us to listen with us to how the Holy Spirit is working in our lives. We believe that is of absolute importance for pastors, and everyone else. But I think for pastors, it is it's such a vital piece of our sort of building a rule for life, that we have a safe space, where we can sit and process our own journey. And so we talk about those practices. That's part of what we do in our retreats, and then we and then we move on and begin to talk about,
Joe Chambers 43:29
We talk about trying to figure out our purpose, our significance. My dad, my dad, did he when I became a pastor in 1984, he called me and he said, Joe, you're gonna have to discover the gospel according to Joe. And I was 26. I went, I don't even know what that means. And he said, well, you don't get to make up a gospel. But just like there's a gospel, according to Matthew and the Gospel, according to Mark, Luke, and John, all said the same gospel but said it in different ways. You're going to have to discover the gospel according to Joe. And I was 26 at the time and I was clueless. I now do understand. He was saying, I have to find my unique voice. What is my sermon? Sean, you chided me a bit about what is what is the one? What is the one thing what is it about you, that draws people into longing for being the beloved? What is it about you that points people to God? What spiritual gifts? What talents? What? What do you bring into this that is so unique to you, that others experience the aroma of Christ? How and another way of thinking about it is, I believe the longer I walk with Jesus, the more I'll talk with a Galilean accent. That there's just something about he's, he's been with the man from Galilee. I can tell and I want to I want to I want that. So we spend a goodly amount of time trying to help folks kind of parse and we tell our stories, how we've come to understand that Jeremy tells his I tell mine, what, why we're on the planet. And that's, that's a huge part of what we believe is important. Because when you can figure out the Gospel according to Sean, then you stay in that lane, you don't have to do more than you, then God's shaped you and gifted you to do you know exactly your place in the orchestra. Don't try to play somebody else's chair. I mixed the metaphors all over the place on that one, didn’t I?
Sean Nemecek 45:43
The freedom and the ease that comes from knowing your shape, your ministry, your calling, your gospel is so amazing. It keeps us from trying to check all those boxes that Jeremy was talking about earlier.
Jeremy Frye 46:01
And it's what's beautiful about that, too, is that one of the things we really talk about is how it's not. Often, our vocation may be a part of that unique way that we've been called to be in the world. But when it really comes down to it, our significance isn't doesn't require a particular job. You know, I think for so many pastors, our identity is so enmeshed with our work, with our call so to speak, that we don't know how to disentangle those two things. And so when we, you know, when something happens in our lives, where it maybe I can't be in ministry anymore, maybe that's because of some personal failure, maybe it's because I, you know, a health problem or something like that, we get to a place where we go, Oh, I'm, you know, who am I, if I can't be a pastor at a church? And the reality is, is that our significance is not our job.
Joe Chambers 47:07
It transcends what we get paid to do. And so I know what that is for me. And Jeremy understands what that is for him. And what we have learned is that if I if I step out of the pastorate, I'm still going to do what I've been put on the planet to do it, it's in my, it's in my soul. And it's the way I express my belovedness to this world. And it'll happen if I'm a Walmart greeter. It'll happen if I'm a pastor. And so all of those things are super, as you mentioned Sean, freeing, I mean, you just don't feel the pressure to perform and to achieve. And yet achievement happens, stuff happens, people are drawn to someone who is a non-anxious presence, because they're not trying to validate their existence with ego stuff. And I think that's, that's our goal in the sacred journey.
Tom Jameson 48:07
And you know, this, this whole battle that that an individual have, who's a pastor against the pastoral persona? It's, it's tough to set that aside. I mean, how have you seen that when pastors come to the sacred journey? And are maybe struggling with disassociating their value their identity with their vocation? Are there particular things that you found are helpful to share with them or ways to address that?
Joe Chambers 48:46
Yeah, it's, it's, I have come to believe that there are two things that will move people towards what we're trying to describe. And one of those is pain. Pain pushes us towards living a life of belovedness and expressing that in unique ways to the world. Pain will force us push us that way, or beauty will pull us, beauty will compel us. And I don't have to. . . I don't have to create the pain for the participants in our retreat, they often come there with their own pain. What we try to show is that, that pain is the friend that nobody wants, that pain can be the place of deep awareness and deep discovery. And then, so we just let life do that. Life has a way of creating its own waterfall. But we also try, what Jeremy and I try to really do, is paint a vision of a future. That life is so beautiful, there is an abundant life, Jesus said there was, and to create that and to share that in the stories that we tell of our own journey, and to and to point to the new heavens and the new earth, that are talked about in Revelation 21. And to really try to articulate a beautiful future, from a good and beautiful God. And hopefully that beauty will pull people into that understanding that they are not what they do. They are bigger than that. They are, they're deeper than that.
Jeremy Frye 50:31
I think the truth is that everything that we do is really drawing people into, the whole retreat, is really designed to help people begin to disassemble that. That way of being in that way of thinking about pastoral ministry, I, you know, at our last retreat, I there's an analogy that has been really present to me for a long time. When I was called into ministry, I thought, you know, I was called into ministry and an era when what that meant was that you could be a pastor or a missionary. And so, you know, I stepped in, and I jumped into ministry, and I, and, and I struggled my whole life with some of that, because what “Pastor” means for most people is something more like a CEO. There's this role that is, doesn't look very pastoral, it looks like a bunch of responsibilities that aren't Shepherd responsibilities. And a few years ago, I was, I was thinking a lot about that, and my own sort of journey of, of recognizing that God has called me and God has called me to be a shepherd. But that didn't necessarily mean that I had to be serving in a local church in the way that in the sort of traditional way that I that I thought it meant. And the story of David came to mind. When David goes to the valley to talk to his brothers to bring some lunch to his brothers. And he finds out that the Goliath has been taunting the Israelites and, and he says, you know, this isn't okay, like, we need to take care of this, you know. And Saul, Saul says, Yeah, you go do that, right. And then he says, but here, put on my armor, put to take my armor and put on my armor. And David gets kind of gets in this armor and goes, this is not me. You know, I'm a shepherd, I need the tools of a shepherd to do what I'm going to do, not the tools of a king. And what I realized for me, and I think what is true for a lot of people who are called to be pastors, is that they have spent a lot of their lives in what I refer to as ill-fitting armor, because they've been told that to be a pastor is this list of things, that that really doesn't connect to the shepherd-heart that God has given them to shepherd people. And yet, the invitation of the sacred journey is to say, you've been called to be a shepherd. What does it mean, to step out of the armor, to stop trying to be a king, and to and to be a shepherd. And that's really been, I think, I think that's part of the invitation of the sacred journey; to live into what God really has called you to be as a shepherd, and not try to be something that you're not.
Sean Nemecek 53:35
So just, as we're talking, I'm thinking, there might be some pastors who are out there saying, This sounds wonderful, it sounds great. It sounds a little bit too good to be true. I just, I just want to say it's not. Really what you guys are describing is exactly what Amy and I experienced when we were there. The Sacred Journey is a ministry of presence. You guys just provide a calm, welcoming and Christ-like presence to everyone who's there. And you do it not just through teaching, not just through, you know, good food. But there's other things that go on during the sacred journey. Could you just, I know you've hit on them a little bit, but can you touch on those just once more? What happens besides teaching besides eating?
Joe Chambers 54:29
Well, sleep, rest. We My home is at the base of Princeton, Mount Princeton, 14,000 foot mountain and so folks have gone for walks. They experienced that. We also have at the end of the day, right before the great silence. We call it the great silence at night. We have listening groups, and Jeremy and another person who works with our with our ministry called, her name is, Sandy. It will lead in group spiritual direction, which is new for a lot of folks that haven't experienced something like that. And we have the ladies meet in one place and the guys will meet someplace else. And Jeremy leads in that group spiritual direction for the guys and Sandy leads for the ladies. And I go to bed because I'm an old guy. So those are those are some other things. But the walks the sitting and just being we have a hammock people. Oh, and cornhole! And Amy won, I think. So. . . (laughter) Yeah. So that's what I'm thinking of. Jeremy?
Jeremy Frye 55:44
Yeah, just lots of spaciousness, lots of room for conversations. We make ourselves available during those times of just of rest to say, Hey, if you just want to have a conversation, we're available for that. But you're right, Sean, a lot of it is just a ministry of presence that we want. We want to be available to you, or unavailable as much as you need us to be.
Joe Chambers 56:06
A ministry of absence is also. . . (laughter) Can I tell you two quick stories that, that blew us away. We did a retreat. I want to say it was maybe a year or two years ago, I can't remember. This couple came and they had a new baby. I think it was just learning to walk in that right, Jeremy? (Yeah.) And so they we normally say no kids, because we're just not set up for that. Right. But she said, most she sleeps all the time. So and I'm thinking that's usually means no. But they brought their little one, and the little one did sleep the whole time. But when we had meals, the little one just kind of walked around. And and then of course, we had some grandparents there that just love that little one there. But the compliment that was shared at the Havdalah was this. What we loved about being in this home, was that every day felt like Thanksgiving. And when she said that, I mean, my wife started tears in her eyes. And I had a little bit of leakage in my eyes. Because we just think, you know, the best part of Thanksgiving is that there was good food. There was good fellowship, there was just a sense of welcome. And man, that was the highest compliment. Wasn’t my teachings. It wasn't, you know, it wasn't necessarily the food, it was the, it was the atmosphere. And we love that. The other compliment that I wanted to share with you as weird when I was doing some soul care with an Episcopal priest, and he looked at me after our time together and he said, How did he put it? He said, Joe, Pastor Joe, I'm gonna have to change my opinion about Southern Baptist after having spent a week with you. And I said, I wouldn't do that. You should not judge Southern Baptists, by me, I'm an outlier. What we also find and you said, you mentioned this, Sean, that is it too good to be true. We also know, we know, we know that we invite people to live the way that we have discovered to live. Not everybody wants to live that way, or is ready to live that way. And to hold that loosely in our hands is also a spiritual discipline that Jeremy and I have had to work on. We are I would call ourselves evangelists for the contemplative life. And like all evangelists, you share the good news, but not everybody responds to it. And we have we have to come to terms with that's okay or maybe not yet.
Sean Nemecek 58:54
So, if someone wanted to learn more about your sacred journey retreats, how could they do that? How could they sign up for one?
Joe Chambers 59:02
Well, I'm sure you're gonna have show notes. What we could do is we have a website and we'll leave that with you. We also can, they can reach out to us through our email addresses and we can leave that in the show notes for you also. But it's first come first served we can only handle it our home. Most all of the retreats happen in my home by the way we we can't hold everybody in our our home but we have cabins or yeah just gonna call them cabins or people have mother in law homes or you know, extra rooms and they're really nice. I mean, I think the home use you and Amy stayed in, Sean, was really nice. Steve and Cindy Blondes’ place and so we provide really nice places for folks to stay that are around 10 minute drive from our from our house. Then we come to our house for the meals and for the teaching times and then folks can go back to their space. But it's first come first serve, we can only handle about four couples, five at the most. They don't have to be couples and sometimes the guys can folks will come without their spouse. But that's about the limit on our space in Buena Vista. We can do larger like we did last week. There were 16 there, but it was at a conference center. So, I would say, email would be the best way. And we'll leave you that email addresses and website. And it's free.
Tom Jameson 1:00:34
Which is amazing to consider. And we'll be sure to include access to your other ministries, your soul care and counseling in the spiritual direction so that folks can get in touch with you. We like to end our podcast by giving our guests an opportunity to answer a question we ask every time and so I'll ask Jeremy, I'll ask you to answer this first. And then Joe, what words of hope would you like to offer to our listeners today?
Jeremy Frye 1:01:08
Hmm. You know, I think the words of hope that I would offer are simply that there is another way to live. The rat race that you've been in. It doesn't have to be that way. There's another way to live.
Joe Chambers 1:01:25
I guess I would say to quote on the Makrina Whittaker. Oh, God helped me to believe the truth about myself, no matter how beautiful it is. The deepest truth about everybody is that you're the beloved of God. So just relax.
Sean Nemecek 1:01:42
Guys, I want to just thank you so much for first, allowing Amy and I to come and be part of one of these Sacred Journeys. It was one of the highlights of our summer. Joe, thank you again for being the voice for our intro and outro on Hope Renewed. You've upped our quality level quite a bit there with that, but also thank you both for taking your time and being generous with us today.
Tom Jameson 1:02:09
Jeremy, I want to thank you for being the softer side of the pair. (laughter)
Joe Chambers 1:02:16
We're gonna change the name of our retreat to good cop and bad cop retreat. (laughter)
Tom Jameson 1:02:22
And we want to thank our listeners as well. You can access our podcasts and leave comments at hoperenewedpodcast.com We would love it if you would do that. And it is our prayer that your hope is continually renewed as you fix your eyes on Jesus.
Joe Chambers 1:02:40
Thank you for joining us on Hope Renewed. Please, help us reach more pastors by sharing this episode with your friends. If you enjoy this podcast rate and review us on Apple podcasts, Google, or Spotify or your favorite platform for receiving podcasts. Thank you. This means the world to us. The Hope Renewed podcast is brought to you by PIR ministries. At PIR, we partner with God and the church in the work of pastoral renewal and restoration. Pastors, our goal is to help you cultivate new hope for healthy life and ministry. We do this by building relationships. We train both pastors and churches to promote a culture of ministry health. If you've experienced a forced exit from ministry, we provide a process of restoration for you and your family. We also have proven resources and tools to assist you in the challenges of ministry life. To contact us, or to learn more about PIR visit PIRministries.org
62 - Healing Your Story - Kim and Rob Hock Kim and Rob Hock join Tom and Sean to talk about how they found hope in the darkest times in ministry. Kim shares about her counseling ministry and how she is using story work to help men and women heal.
About Rob Rob Hock is the senior pastor at Southport Presbyterian Church in Indianapolis, IN. He has served in ministry since coming to Christ in the early 90's and has been at Southport Pres since 2012. He has an MDiv from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.
https://southportpres.org/
About Kim Kim Hock has 20 years of experience working with adults, children and adolescents in diverse settings. She has also had the privilege of walking with many individuals through life's valleys and mountains, witnessing transformation in brokenness.
Kim is most passionate about encouraging others to live embodied and free. She specializes in helping women heal from sexual trauma and recover from spiritual abuse and purity culture. Her hope is to always provide space for people to be who they are without judgement. Through her unique vision, Kim sees the world in pictures and seeks to find ways to ask questions with the goal of seeing others well.
She began her work as a story facilitator while completing her Masters in Counseling. She trained and earned a certification in Narrative-focused Trauma Care through The Allender Center in Seattle. She also holds a certification in Soul Care from The Soul Care Institute.
Kim spends much or her time with her husband and four children. She enjoys traveling, reading, and dining. She feels the most invigorated and free in nature and enjoys driving her Jeep with the top down.
Virtual Story Groups
Contact Kim Hock (info below) to learn more about her Virtual Story Groups.
Virtual story group for pastors:
10 week session
Virtual Story group for ministry spouses:
10 week session
In-person Intensive Weekend of Story
For ministry wives only
Next offering:December 2-4Location: Shepherd's Gate Inn, Martinsville, INAll meals and lodging includedReduced cost: $500 per person
Kimberly Hock, LMHCA, NCCUnder the supervision ofPatricia Anderson, MA, LCSW
(509)237-8504
http://www.kimberlyehock.comhttps://www.facebook.com/kimberlyehockhttps://www.instagram.com/kimberly_e_hock/
Transcript of Interview with Rob and Kim Hock This transcript was produced automatically by Otter.ai. So, it will contain some errors.
00:00
I'd have really one of the darkest seasons I've ever been in a ministry and had a friend of mine say you had the smell of death on you. And my wife's responses you guys felt like that for a while.
Joe Chambers 00:14
Welcome to hope renewed helping you find new hope when ministry leaves you hopeless. The hope renewed podcast is brought to you by PIR ministries. Here are your hosts, Tom Jameson and Sean Nemecek.
Tom Jameson 00:35
Kim and Rob Hoch, welcome
to hope renewed.
00:38
Thanks. Happy to be here.
Sean Nemecek 00:39
Yeah. Welcome, guys. All right. So we want to jump into this conversation and just ask you first to start by introducing yourself a little bit to our listeners and tell us a little bit about your ministry journey.
00:50
So Rob Hoch, born and raised, Midwest spent my childhood split between St. Louis area and Dallas, Texas Land and milk and honey was the son of the son of a farmer. And spent years in Texas ended up coming to Christ during college and went to a&m, Texas a&m, and then started a ministry in Houston. Where and that's where Kimmy and I. And that wasn't the first time we met, we actually met at a&m, but our friend groups sort of overlapped. And so we just knew of one another, get married, ended up, stepping into Gordon Conwell, and then had been in pastoral ministry. Ever since. So married, we have four children, the oldest is 24, the youngest is 17, almost 18. middle two are 21 and 20. And so we've got one graduated marrieds. We have an in law, we've got a dog, you know, who own the backyard and a fence. So
Tom Jameson 02:04
it sounds like the Midwest.
02:06
Yeah, yeah. And my call him like my, in some ways, my stepping into ministry is very normal in other ways. That normal, normal and that, you know, coming out of college, just began to felt the sense that the Lord was calling me to ministry. And in Texas at that point, if you were a young man who loved Jesus, everybody wanted to go to seminary ministry. And so their counsel was don't go into some don't go to seminary, seminary and ministry and the Lord wants you there. That's the whole point you and I worked really hard not to go into ministry, and the Lord was really determined to put me in ministry. So and my journey was, you know, as a youth director for a couple of years and when seminarian came out of that, and served the church as an associate in the DC area, got to experience 911 in DC we had, if you remember the sniper, that was our neighborhood, and had a couple other fairly significant traumas in the community. ended up serving a small church as a solo pastor on Central Washington, halfway between Spokane and Seattle. It's a close community about seven to 10,000 and then ended up coming here
03:21
to people there.
03:23
Right. The mule died, Honey, we're home. And then we had been here, southside of Indy for about 10 years, and I say, so in some ways, it's very normal. Otherwise, it's abnormal. And then I came to Christ as an adult. And so I really show up primarily for the lens of an outsider. I didn't grow up in the church, some relationships, a Roman Catholic context. Most of that did not feel good as a child. I've come to appreciate a little more as I've grown older. And so in many ways, it's abnormal in that I don't have deep heritage. My family does not historically know Jesus. Some of them have come to know Jesus sense but so yeah, all right, honey. Yeah,
04:22
I'm kaun married to rob. Same Poor kid. Same dog.
Tom Jameson 04:30
Like can you put the ring on the dog right next to each other?
04:34
Hello, Hill. Appreciate that. Yeah, I came to faith in high school. I did not grow up at the church background at all either. And that, really, probably, I would say in a sense godless, like there is no connection in my home, but through the For young life actually in high school, I came to faith and my journey in ministry was started with young life. And all through college I worked at a young life camp every summer backpacking, guiding backpacking trips to the mountains in Colorado, which is super fun and of course my in my mind that that was ministry and that's what my life was going to look like. I think we've been backpacking one I thought for sure the husband I was gonna marry was going to own a camp and camp ministry was going to be the way for me and we ended up admitted in at Gordon Conwell on faith, both of us got accepted. And we're planning on attending Gordon Conwell, and on the drive there, in a big new hall, we decided that I would, I would continue my teaching career, and he would attend school. And so although I did attend along the way, I think, because I listened to a lot of papers, and that's where my theological training is rubs papers. Yeah, then really family became a ministry. And I had never quite felt called to pastoral ministry. In fact, I remember where we were sitting and, and the conversation in our little blue Subaru. When Rob told me that he was he felt he sent a calling into petrol ministry. And I thought, I don't think. And that's, I think that along the way, you know, three churches, lots of different ministries, lots of ways that I have been involved, and I and my family has been involved, involved, I think, all that time, I was honing in on my skill of people, reader. And so what's interesting is that my story lends a little bit to really falling right into some misconceptions of pastoral ministry. In fact, that was taught in my home, a lot of focus was on appearance, and not seeing what was going on behind closed doors. And so entering in as the wife of a pastor, even though I didn't know the ins and outs of a church, there was, there's the beast of appearance and the Beast of secrecy. And so that I just kind of was able to feed the beast a little bit. But that's, that's what I knew. So that's kind of how I ended up showing up in that role. But through the years to also, knowing that my skill of reading people and listening to people was really what my time was preparing for.
Tom Jameson 08:03
That's such a important point that you bring up that, you know, we often talk about pastors having misconception about ministry, you know, when they they're answering the call, but a pastor spouse, a pastor's family also has to deal with the same kind of conceptions or understandings. And there is that sense that it's not just the pastor that's being called to ministry, it's it's the whole family, if it's a family or a couple, the couple itself. So both of you are engaged in active ministry. So and we're going to dive into that and learn more about what the specific ministry roles that you're filling look like. But just in general, now that we've kind of cast this pall over ministry, what do you love about ministry? What is it that just really kind of makes your heart sing when when you you consider the opportunities and the giftedness and directions that God has called you to?
09:07
I would call myself a lover of people. And I've always been a lover of people. And I've always been an adventurer. So what I've loved about ministry is walking along by people in their stories, and in their adventures. And part of so when I say I love people, I just, I am always blown away by people and their creativity and their wit. And the way they look at things and the way they say things. I often find myself, my kids. Show me send me Tik Tok all the time, and I'm just in awe all the time. Like how do people think of these things? And so I think I'm constantly an audit of others. So to me, ministry is seeing people and experiencing life with them. And I love letting them know that they're not alone. So, with being a lover of people and an adventure, I feel like I'm always on a journey with them. And I thought of when I was thinking about this question I thought of, I don't know if you guys have read hind feet in high places. It's an old allegory of faith. And the character's name is Micah frayed. And as she goes on her journey, she has two companions with her all the time and their sorrow and suffering. And she doesn't necessarily like her, her companion of sorrow and suffering, she doesn't understand their presence until the end. And I don't see myself necessarily a sorrow or a suffering, per se, but I do some I see myself as a companion along the way, a companion that's present for the journey, and always enabled to be there to always remember the stories of path and remember the future of people propelling and moving forward. And so I love that part of ministry.
10:59
And for the record, Kimmy has never called me either sorrow or suffering. So we made the companion
Tom Jameson 11:06
answer what she would call you.
11:11
Yeah, and I love that that can be one of things that's really fun about Kimmy she's just so curious about folks, and she just has this ability to see people really well, which is fun. And then she just asked questions, and lets folks just be discovered, and help folks discover themselves. So what I love about ministry is Melusine folks walk through the process of transformation. And I love folks coming to a greater understanding of their image bearing what it looks like to flourish and thrive and to lean into wholeness that God has spoken this great picture over us about who we're designed to be. And ministry for me is, it's an opportunity to invite folks into exploring that story. What does God have for them? How has he made them both with this speaking and creation, but even in the sum total of all their experiences? Right? So you know, I say said earlier, my, my journey and ministry, in some ways is normal. In other ways, it was abnormal, there's a part of me that I could argue I've been prepared for ministry since I was two years old. Because the home I grew up in the role that I filled, my job was to set aside my desires and to meet other people's needs and tell lots of stories to that would from a childhood that would reveal how my parents have raised me to pay attention to others set aside my desires, that others may be cared for and could flourish, right. So I've been prepared for this. And so for ministry, for me, the thing that's really fun, is to watch folks begin to discover who they are, and to find freedom to step into the fullness of them. So and you know, so preaching like it to do that, and preaching because didn't teaching get to that and pastoral counseling, and I get to do that even in leading the team. So it's a multi staff, church I'm at and so leading the team and even an organization. How do you, how do you calendar together and how to get right, it's, it's all of that, for me just sits under that category? Of what does it look like for us to invest in the community? Those in and those outside the community are awesome. And then of course, you know, how do I invest in the staff, right, the team?
Sean Nemecek 13:45
So I'm guessing ministry hasn't all been, you know, puppies and roses and wonderful rainbows. That maybe seminarians think it's gonna be like, when we first stepped into the call in some of the darkest times of ministry, how did you to maintain hope in Christ?
14:09
But yeah, I mean, we've had some really dark days. I some of that is the days get darker. Some of that's the context we're in some of that is just work we hadn't done, again, the son of the son of a farmer and so forth, you just work harder. And once that just actually further drove me into places of despair. You know, so I'd say, you know, there were lots of dark days where I don't know that I had much hope in Christ. And in God's grace, I'm son, the son of a farmer, and you just wake up the next day and you just go back at it, which is not a recommendation. But it was part of the reality and I think so like, I think The way I that I would their voice I do different. In some of that is, you know, I stepped into soccer as to to Shawn, where you and I met out of really one of the darkest seasons I've ever been in a ministry and had a friend of mine say you had the smell of death on you? And my wife's responses. Yeah, I smelled like that for a while. I was deeply offended, what do you mean? And in this service to come combination of not doing good work, not caring for myself not having good rhythms that are sacred and life giving. And some of it as well was, was being driven into isolation. And feeling like I'm alone. And I'm the first one to ever experience any of these things. And, and only to discover that I'm not the first one to experience these things. And that these things, when you're a community can be held well. And even when darkness and despair invite me to walk away from Sacred rhythms, learning how to hang on to the shreds and tatters of it. With the hope that the next time, there's more that you're hanging on to that would be healthy rhythms in the midst of hardness,
16:33
I would say many of our dark times were didn't have to be so dark.
Sean Nemecek 16:41
Yeah, say more about that camera. What do you mean, they didn't have to be so dark? Well, I
16:47
think, again, you know, I was in this perpetual cycle of closing the door and appearing. Okay. Right. And so, and that's all I knew. And so and when Rob's dead, you know, being pushed more and more into isolation, when I think the irony of that, though, one of the men I've tried to train under Dan allander, he does, we're meant for relationships. And we, we all know that right? Were meant created for relationships. And yet we are harmed in relationships. And the only way to heal is in relationship. But when we get harmed in relationships, we think that that we need to do is get away from relationships, and isolate more. And that's a that's a dangerous, dark place. And so when darkness or darkness of the soul, or the darkest times, as you said, they come and they do come and make sure we say they're plural, right? It's a bit like being in a really dark room and all the furnitures been moved in here, that our tendency is to sit in the corner and stay and isolate. And eventually, it'll get light or something or I don't know, or we get up and we start bumping around. But we need someone we need people to help us out. We're meant to navigate this life with others. And I think ministry tends to tell us differently, somewhere along the way, and that we're supposed to do it alone. And when the reality is that there's very few safe spaces when you're in ministry or safe people to get help us out of those dark times. But we need the connection, if we're going to continue. If we're going to stop that narrative, we are alone, and we're not going to make it so I would say hope in the dark time now very different than hope in the dark time years ago. And the places that we've been and so now I'm in a rhythm of, I have people and I know who those people are. And no matter how ridiculous or silly or burdensome or annoying I feel. I reach out and I let those people know where I'm at and what I need. Because I know I can get back in my own story and my own narrative and remain there.
Tom Jameson 19:21
So the trick is being able to kind of interrupt that cycle that we kind of naturally go to this cycle of isolating. And I we just we find it so much that those involved in ministry pastors, ministry leaders and counselors just struggle with the very thing that you're talking about remaining connected, having the good friends, the ones that you can pour your soil what's what have you found to be the key to that? How do you create those connections and maintain those connections so you have them when when you're in those two workplaces?
20:01
Well, I thought I did have them. I don't think I did. So like it. I thought, oh, yeah, I have friends, I have a friend, I have friends, I can call on distance, or I can, but I don't know that it necessarily. I think it goes against everything in me to make sure I am connected in a very deep way consistently with people. I, I have learned I have to have a therapist, I have learned I have to have a group that I attend. Because that is where I'm safe. And that's where I get to show up. However I show up. And so when the thing I have, I have people now there are people within my church that I'm good friends with, there are people that I can go to. So that's not unknown or unheard of. I, I realized I need I need an army. I don't need a few people, I need an army. I need an army. I need the people who are gonna hold up my arms when the battle is on. So that there's any hope for it to win. And I also need the people fighting on my behalf. So I need that army and haven't always had that. And so it's very deliberate, intentional. Building
21:22
that in you know, because ministry in some ways, but the bus nature is really complex. Right. And Kimmy, you're talking to Kim, he spent some time with him, by the way. Oh, Kim. Sorry. I know there's Kimmy. But in the professional world, her name is Kim. So Kim spent some time at a sort of Presbyterian at our at Prestbury, which is regional collection of churches, if you're not sure what that is that we connect together for mutual benefit. And in God building right? Doing some training on how churches can better care for pastoral families, spouses and their kids. Right? It really should be. It would be ministry families. And one things that you were pulling out was just how isolated this right because as a ministry spouse, I don't have a pastor or church and and just a complexity about the churches, our community and yet it's not our community. Right as in ministry. I don't, I don't I'm not cut from the cloth that you can't have good friends inside the church. I but I am aware that it just creates tremendous complexity. Relationships are just different.
Tom Jameson 22:47
So how have you navigated that? Right?
22:50
Um, well, mostly not well.
Tom Jameson 22:57
So honestly, that's one way.
23:01
Yeah. I tend to, to I probably could benefit from an army, I tend to not need an army, I think it's just my rhythm. I tend to have a couple of really close folks who know me and have access and freedom to speak into life, and almost all those are actually pastors. And
23:33
in our church now,
23:35
yeah, and they're and, and there's a couple of those who are in the church. And I just think one. There just creates a lot of some sensitivities when, when it's a place around any complexity and ministry, which so rarely has happened. And so there's there's certain things that I probably couldn't bring to them that would be relational in nature in the church, just because it's just not fair to ask them to carry that. But I've got other folks that can bring that that too. And what they may just simply know is there's some, there's some difficulty right now in relationships in the church or decision making or whatever, right. But I do think it I think he is right, and that we aren't designed to do that life alone, man, think about Genesis Gatsby's Christian in the beginning, right. And it's good, it's good, it's good, it's good creates Adam, and he says, not good. And so then Eve gets created and, and at least part of the implication from that is that there was something more that Adam needed than simply the presence of God. God was there Adam and God. Right. And yet God knew that Adam I needed a Help me, okay. Which now I feel compelled to geek out. And that word is most often used for God, it's not a, you know, I'll just move on, you know, create create a spiral right to be in relationship with one another. And so we're not designed to be alone. And at times in ministry, we we can give up relationships outside of the church, or even inside the church. And, and some of those, you know, Kimmy in her story of work that she's been that she's done, and that she leads, it actually invites really deep. LIFE GIVING relationships because it requires honesty, and then invites, invite folks to hold honesty.
Sean Nemecek 25:54
So you brought up attending soul care, that was one of my delights to get to meet both of you. We were in the same cohort together. And we all brought our own baggage to soul care. And we've had a gym and Kayleen Dirksen on the podcast. So out of your experience in soul care. How did that impact you? What? What did you notice? Change from learning to care for your soul?
26:24
Yeah, like I think so. I'm the one that came with the smell of death. And, you know, I should probably apologize. I write a letter to everyone. October. I'm so sorry, how it shows up?
Tom Jameson 26:38
Are you kidding? You made everybody feel so good about themselves?
Sean Nemecek 26:42
Don't think you're the only one
26:45
person I know. Yeah, like when I think about soul care, the thing that was really impactful for me, the content was good, right. And I resonated with a number of the folks that came in, and a number of the books like The Brennan Manning, stuff was just so good to me. Or good for me. And the time to check the group was fantastic. But you know, he's from my tribe, and so uses the language that I would use. And so it felt very familiar and translated really well. But I think the biggest thing for me was the expectation of the sacred rhythms. I think that was the thing that was the that brought life back. And it's the thing that brings life is the slow work of God across time, be impatient, and learning to be okay. With where the Lord has you even if you want to be someplace else, and that he's got your worries, gotcha. And so the question is, how do you show up? And how do you begin to notice and ask the question, Lord, what are you? What are you doing? What are you doing? Because I I'm not sure. And and so that was probably the thing that was most significant for me, relationships, great. But I came and so cash was hidden or made out. So in the end, so yeah, it was real life given to me,
28:24
I would say, I'd already begun a lot of soul work before soul care. And so we're starting that two year time. So SilkAir actually ended up being like, very confirming to me of what I was already in, and it kind of enhanced, there was no buy in, of why be there or what was happening, like I already had the buy in because I was already not in the same way. But I was already in these rhythms of soul adjustment and care. And I think the impact that had the biggest impact, I would say, is on our marriage. If there were videos of us coming on the first week, and then over two years to the last week, you would have seen, I mean, like, I don't know that Robin, I could even stand being in the same room.
29:21
I don't really. You have always been.
29:27
Yeah, so I was there was a lot of incongruence before we went because I was already doing a lot of work towards my health and goodness. And and that was causing disruption in our marriage that was causing an incongruence. And so the impact was that then we were both kind of speaking some of the same language and we're both kind of starting to look at how to attend to our soul differently. And then that became more congruent.
30:02
And that's one of the realities. And of course, we either know what sometimes one of the terms, but we also know the experience of family system, right. And when when Kimmy had begun doing work, she then was showing up differently in relationships and the rules were changing. But I knew I was still trying to live on the old rules. Here's how we resolve conflict. Here's how we make decisions. Here's how we speak to one another. And when I give you this look, it means it's time for you to be quiet, not keep talking. And when you give me this, look, I know what I'm supposed to do, I'm supposed to leave the room, right? Minute, like we have these rules. But as well as Kimmy began to pursue health and began to navigate through her story, that create disruption because you show up different and it's one of the things I think, to grab a hold of is, is that will happen in relationships is whether spouse or friends, that is, one begins to grow healthy. That naturally has an impact on relationships, that will be disruptive. And that disruptions good and life giving except that won't always feel good and life giving. And so yeah, those first days, I wasn't in good places, and, and there was wobble in our relationship.
Tom Jameson 31:32
It has your experience been that you've seen that in, in ministry? Marriages in those relationships that incongruence and kind of at the heart of that question is, gosh, is it ministry that causes that incongruence?
31:48
I see it all over the place.
31:50
Yeah. I agree. I mean, it. I don't think ministry attracts in congruence. I think it just exists, I think it's the world we live in invites us to, to join relationships like that, to be incongruent.
Sean Nemecek 32:07
I think in some ways it exposes, it exposes our incongruence in many ways that that other relationships won't experience.
32:16
Yeah, yeah, this is a pressure and intensity about relationships and ministry, when you're in vocational ministry that and there's a there's a public nature to relationships. So it's more difficult to hide
32:32
the uniqueness of ministry in relation and those marriage relationships or any relationships is, is what Rob just said, there's, there's almost a demand to hide. And, and there's got to be a fight against that.
Tom Jameson 32:47
Right, you've already mentioned the beast of appearance, the beast of secrecy, and, and how those in ministry and other professions just gets heightened. Through you know, false expectations or false perceptions of who we're supposed to be when we're in the ministry. We're supposed to be perfect, or we're supposed to know everything, or we're not supposed to have any flaws. And and the more that gets squelched and pushed down, the greater pressure, creates in, in, in relationships, as you say, since we're made for relationship.
33:23
And so what's it look like to to invite community of faith, A church, to be able to engage and healthier relationships with their ministry staff, and at which has been a lot of what Kimmy and I have been Kim, and I've been thinking across years and began to invite the church we're serving South WordPress and into healthier rhythms and it's been disruptive.
Tom Jameson 33:53
That whole ministry is messy. thing. And Kim, you you have a specific focus in your ministry and your counseling ministry. Tell us a little bit about that. And particularly, what are the words curious and be brave and be free mean to you?
34:11
Yeah, I love that because rather than so let me just say, I'm going to be a little expansive in the fact that I think counseling is just one of the tools I carry in my tool belt is definitely become more of my profession at this point. And so I do have a counseling business in which I see clients. I see clients individually, I see clients in groups. I also hold intensive weekend. But what I would say is, when I started therapy for myself years ago, I experienced care in a way that was unlike anything I've ever experienced. And there was a rhythm I was In a family in which my role in the family was to make sure everyone remains happy. And I was able to do that, with my gregarious personality with my, my adventurous spirit, my humor, my playfulness. And so in that, that was a place of meat constantly having to give myself away, a little care for me. So when I was experiencing in therapy, something of this chair, it was something I couldn't get enough of like, and then I felt like I couldn't keep it for myself. And so I decided to go ahead and get my Master's in mental health counseling, and pursue license. And alongside that, I began to discover my story and become really curious about my story. And I had to have a mental amount of courage. So I think that the words be curious, be brave and brief three. There is no freedom without curiosity and bravery. And, to me, the opposite of curiosity, is judgment. And I live decades, under judgment of others, and more importantly, under the judgment of myself, the stepping into my story with curiosity, that stepping out of my own bondage of judgment. So it was counseling. And what I do is it's unique, because alongside getting my degree, I was also at the same time being trained at a place called the Islander center. And so I became specifically trained to do a work, a trauma focused modality of therapy. And I feel like I like Rob said, He's been training in training of a being a pastor since he was two. And I've been in the training of being a therapist and doing story work with people that probably two or four before because I learned how to read people really well, I had to learn how to read in order to make them happy in order to respond and do the job I was supposed to be doing in the family, whether it was a good job or not, it was the role that I played in my family system. And so I became quite vigilant and aware of everyone around me and what was going on with them and how I could respond to them. And so that's how, that's what I say, when I'm counseling that it's a little piece of what I do. I feel like it's been what I've been doing for a long time, it just hasn't always looked like it does now where I can sit face to face with people or with groups of people and hear their stories.
Tom Jameson 37:58
Who do you tend to serve? A lot.
38:03
I tend to serve with curious if I am really opening open to serving most anyone and who was drawn to the work that I do is usually women, women who have been through something, some sort of crisis, or who have tried lots of things or feel really stuck in what they're in and can't get out. I I serve a lot of people with sexual trauma. And that's a, I think, a unique calling. I think I I stand in a really specific place that I straddle the church world in the non church world, and I think I'm safe for both. And so it's interesting to see I do see a lot of people who have church background, but I also see a lot of people who don't have any church background. Yeah,
38:57
yeah. And Kim sits in this place where she, she's an admin, she's, she's remarkable. She is really good. And just fantastic as a therapist.
39:11
I'm not his therapist, by the way.
39:16
There was a day and she's really good. And she's really good theology, which I don't like him. So 27 years of pastoral ministry, I have not found a lot of folks that are really good therapists that do have really good theology. It's really difficult to find someone that has both of those skill sets and any and and camis able to Kim's able to really sit in both those worlds and hold those well and, and really has a desire to see folks with at least one things you've said in the past is desire. See folks who are in churches and even have experienced harm in in churches. receive care Right and restoration out of that. Is that fair to say that?
40:06
Yeah, I think I'm definitely drawn to those who have been hurt within the church
Sean Nemecek 40:11
is speaking of that. It's, it's kind of been my observation and working with pastors and their families that a lot of pastors in ministry, families experience trauma. Some of that comes from the Ministry itself. Some of its being exposed to the trauma of others. Sometimes we bring that with us into ministry. And, and it can actually be the reason why we go into ministry. But why is it important for pastors and their spouses to to engage with our trauma counselor? If they've faced those things?
40:47
Yeah. So let me take crack at it. And,
40:50
and then I'll sleep it up now.
40:53
Yeah, that's right. We all step into, it doesn't matter if you're on vacation this year or not. We have these, these experiences. And I tend to use the word harm because I think folks hear trauma, and they go all like, technical and like, you know, what does that mean? Exactly. And so I just I attendees were harm. And we had these stories from our childhood where we were harmed. And what happens is we, we re experience those kinds of harm moments later on. And so and so I told the story, you know, I learned at a very young age, I have two experiences, I can tell you very specifically where I had a precious item, as child, you know, this is something I loved, right? And one out of just playing with it, and the other out of a moment of frustration, I broke the item. And my dad was actually there when I broke him, and my dad cursed me. And he didn't say I curse you, Rob, but he named me is dangerous. And so when I go, when I went into ministry, I went the ministry with the understanding that I was dangerous to people, and I was going to harm them. And so I couldn't be me, I had to hide me, and suppress my unique calling and my unique design, so that I can ensure I would never harm anyone. So then you preach a sermon and somebody would like the sermon because they don't like the sermon. And and then I'm thrown off in the great darkness because I brought them harm, or I counsel them and they don't like with the counseling goes. And so then in mind, the impact of that is just traumatic, right? Okay, little T traumatic, maybe big treat traumatic, right. And so we these harm stories is when we're children show up over and over and over again, and it keeps us from rising into being all that God had designed us to be. So, you know, as we address those, like, they don't go away. I mean, I and yet, I'm aware that it's not true. I, I'm not harmful, right? The gospel is offensive, let's be honest, right? Because what the Gospel says, I'm no better than and you can kind of fill in the blank for whoever it is, you think is the worst person in the world. Right? Why No, in the gutter, if that's the person, the guy on the street corner, asking for help, like, an addict, like I don't, whatever he knows better than. And the Gospel says it's true about me. And the gospel also says God's grace is big enough, right? To cover that, to deal with that brokenness. And I don't want to add a fence to the Gospels are already offensive. And so understanding my story and understanding my harm, helps me have a better ability to lean into the gospel. Right. Living does speak about it, to introduce others to it and not hesitate. Right, because I could hesitate I don't want to say this because it will thin them and then therefore that would be really bad. The problem is the gospel sometimes is offensive. Into a keep me from actually rising into full gifting. Alright, baby soup it up.
44:35
Yeah, well, look, just firstly, I think everybody should be in therapy and trauma therapy, not just patches and stuff. But I think for sure. Yeah. Rob said and I agree with you, Sean that we do. We experience harm all the time. We experience trauma all the time. Not all the time, but enough and One thing I've been taught is trauma begets trauma. Any current crises or trauma you're in, is going to expose and reveal any past trauma or crises that we've had so many people don't think they have had trauma, or have spent much of their time comparing how bad how bad others trauma is, in comparison to their so clearly, you know, I don't my recent trauma, and so we dismiss our own trauma, and that lock that away, lock this inside of us and our begin, our bodies begin to hold it. And then something happens in our life that we can't control which will, right and we have no capacity to hold it. There's no space to hold it. And it's just going to expose everything beneath it, that got locked inside and spilled all over everything. So. So I believe pastors and or ministry, families, for sure, are experiencing trauma, not only are they experiencing theirs, but many other people's and they're holding all of it. And that's a level of stress that is just naturally going to expose whether or not you've dealt with your story. And because anytime we're under stress, so are our trauma stories, our stories of childhood, shape, our fears, and our passion, and then those fears and passions that shape who we become and how we show up in relationships and in the world. And so if those fears and mean, there's no doubt about it, those things are there. And sometimes we think we've dealt with them. And oh, they're kind of again, but anytime we're on a level of stress, it's going to expose all of that. And so, for me for ministry, it was a perpetuation of one I, you know, I could read my violent father really well. And I could read everyone else really well, I was hyper aware, I've already said that needed to keep everyone happy. And so I was really good at painting those beasts, and I was also taught really well how to deceive and not be a truth teller, because of in a home that silence and or gaslighting are things that were true. Were told to me that they weren't true. And things that weren't true. Were told to me they were true. So it's constant disorientation, right. And ministry then put me in this place and perpetuating that narrative. So when we would hit rock bottom, or we had a crisis in our church, or even within our nuclear family, because we have four kids, so there's going to be crisis. I, my job was to attain the peace and keep it all secret. And I'd be so disoriented. And so any current job trauma, I would face began to expose patterns and rhythms that I had learned for most of my life. And I couldn't understand why I was still running in circles, just trying to make everyone happy and losing all of meaning in the process. And there was no way for me to navigate. And I'd get lost in those places. And so I think we need people to walk alongside us and help us see those things. And I think ministry, leaders and spouses being in trauma therapy is important because we all have it.
Tom Jameson 48:43
And you're both talking about stories. This is what you mean by story work, right? Yeah. It's a little bit more about that, because it's a true, yeah,
48:52
I could talk a long time about story work. I have what Robin I will call the boring clinical Anthro what story work and then I can kind of give you some more to it. So I would say story work is the processing the process is a modality of therapy, right? It's a process of identifying and speaking, our own stories of pain and harm in in safe places, for the purpose of repair and healing and restoration. So it's really telling stories of our childhood, where we've experienced harm, and bring care and repair to those very deep old wounds. When we experience harm. We are often they're harmful because we were often not surrounded by care or response or words, or soothing or anything in response to it. And so then we bring in, we buy into this false narrative and defense mechanisms to protect us from more harm. And story work is different. In the sense it's different than other therapy because I don't tell people how to think differently to change their patterns or how to behave differently, which will change your thinking. Like, that's a lot of what talk therapy can tend to do. And there are 1000s of modalities of therapy. And so many of them are brilliant. And I use many of them. I use a lot of different approaches in my work. But the driving force is definitely story work. And so Rob's told the story of how he had the narrative that he's dangerous, and he breaks things. And it was being it's what he was named. And it was a story of, and he didn't say it, but it was a story of a red bike that he had when he was sick. I love that it wasn't his crew. It wasn't until he was in a group, a Story Group and read it to the group. And let others bear witness that he he didn't understand the message and the name that was given to him decades ago. And then that main net main mean, then began to shape how he saw the world, and direct how all the other new narratives were happening. That that was that began to be what shaped all of that. And so he actually had to have other people bear witness and care for that moment, when he was harmed. And story work brings clarity and care where wounds need to be cared for, and they heal. But there was there's no freedom and no healing without actually entering the pain of the wound. And I told the story of my home, I brought a lot of delight, the situation. And having an unpredictable and violent father, and knowing his violence my whole life. I did not know it. I didn't not know that that was about that. That was my role the way my father was. I'd been to counseling and learned about the ways that I coped. It's not like I didn't know those. But then when I started telling the story, writing them and reading them about my home and how I brought to light, but I was able to understand this the full truth of what was going on. Because I think as a child, I didn't have all truths. But as adult look into the story, they see some truths that I'm unable to see. Yeah, I think Rob and I had went and had coffee this morning, and I had I had a pumpkin scone with the white chocolate. And I could tell you guys all about how that's gone was and it was pretty spectacular. And how it tasted and how crispy it was on the outside and, and I how I ate it with my coffee. But then unless you and you might be able to experience some of that. But unless you actually were there and eating the scone as well. You don't have a full sense of what it was like. And so that's how I feel like three work is I feel like I I tried to put words around it and give language to it and help people but it's so hard to, to understand unless you experience it. I'm happy to come back and do a story with you. Then you can experience it. And that would be pretty awesome. Yeah.
53:15
Yeah. And to be clear, what she means is you would bring a story of harm, and she would read your story in front of everybody. And it would be Laureus and fantastic. And like like as a kid, he says and here's one things fun is now that Kim and I both have discovered some of these roles in our home. There's always more discovery right? As you refine it and grow and understanding and health right. And we know some of these places of our of our story, then then, like our marriage has gotten richer, because we can notice each other and how each other responding and reacting we can have a better understanding of how something lands on one another even like so I'll tell you the experience. I so came out with teaching essential class like it was early this year, maybe February, March and we had a gunner congregation passed out now he does about four or five times a year. I don't I don't think he eats like breakfast. Church. Worship. Yeah, that's not the school during worship, he passes out. And, and again, you know, it's four times a year this happens and so I've gotten used to it and I watch when I'm preaching, you know, okay, they okay. But and they would never want to have attention drawn like medically had been checked out like Okay, right. Well had a new staff person who was noticed this and didn't know the story. And so, you know, as you know, I'm preaching and she stopped says, Is there a pastor in the house?
55:03
Is there a doctor in the house? It? Sorry? Is there a doctor, a doctor in
55:07
the house and calls 911. And the fire department shows up and they come in, but like, I mean, it was worship that word like it was crazy. And it's the kind of thing like in, you know, ministry, like, you know, you can't not acknowledge what's going on. And so, but I stepped in Sunday school, and I'm just jacked up like I am just. And again, right. So my story is harm I harm people. And so, you know, this classroom teaching and some videos in it. And so we show this video and I leaned over to Kim and I say, Hey, man, I'm just jacked up and she goes, what happens? I tell her the story of this guy passes out in the fire department, you know? And she goes, Well, what did you do? Do? I didn't do anything? I didn't cause it. It's just like, No, I mean, how did you respond to it? So much story shows up like, what are you accusing me of? Like, I was just preaching, I did no harm to the guy in and so and Kimmy Oh, no, no, no, no, no, like, because that's a, that would be our natural reaction for me. But Kimmy knows that. And so when I respond, she knows where that comes from. And then is able to, to hear better to respond and kindness, to put words on? No, I'm not accusing you of harming anyone. I was actually curious, how did you respond to that? What did you
Tom Jameson 56:35
do? But your story influenced how you heard which Oh, my
56:39
God, oh, yeah, I thought she was saying, how did that harm the guy
56:43
years ago, that would have caused a lot of friction with us. And now we can, I can be really curious. I can know, you know, because he knows his story in a way that now he can communicate to me and I can know his story. And vice versa,
Tom Jameson 57:00
I guess I'm just so struck, you know, thinking about the gospel, and the power of the gospel, tied with this work of, I think of it as tilling the soil, the telling of our stories of the digging down, and the loosening of the clay and the solidness to really understand what's down there, and how important it is to do that work. So that the gospel can reach the very depths of who we are. You know, I lived so many years of my life with a wall with a secret room behind it, you know, and the gospel couldn't penetrate, I wouldn't let the gospel penetrate that now, of course, the Lord knew all that was there. And so in his kindness, he ripped the wall down and ripped my life apart. But that's the goodness of God, right? And how, how important it is to be open to that. And it's hard, and it's scary, and it takes work, and it takes safety, someone who can walk with you, someone who will be there with you, when it all comes out. So that the gospel can fully, deeply richly be applied to the very depths of who we are. There's no resurrection without
58:19
Yeah, first.
Sean Nemecek 58:21
So we like to end every podcast with the same question. What words of hope would you each like to offer pastors and their families,
58:30
I would just say you're not alone. And to find places of connection. There's some there's a we've already talked about the strange, unwritten, unspoken rule somewhere that seems to shape our inner soul that we can't, we can't be connected and and that's the very place that we need to be connected. So I would say, find those places of connection, and you're not alone.
58:59
So I guess what I did to that is, trust the slow work of God. A lot of times to grow discouraged, because we just don't, we're not seeing the change in ourselves or others that we want. Or God tends to move slow. But he moves. And so when you find yourself in the spots where things don't seem to be working and you seem frustrated, the Lord moves, he just moves slowly, sometimes and trust that he has you where he would have to be.
Sean Nemecek 59:26
Thank you so much for your generosity and coming and your vulnerability and sharing so much. Thanks for coming on. Hope renewed.
59:33
It's been fun. Appreciate it, guys.
59:35
Yeah, thank you guys.
Tom Jameson 59:36
We want to thank our listeners, we encourage you to reach out to us at our website hope Renu podcast.com We'd love to hear your comments and interact with you there. It is our prayer that the God of hope will fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him.
Joe Chambers 59:52
Thank you for joining us on hope renew. Please help us reach more pastors by sharing this episode with your friends. If you enjoy this podcast rate and review us on Apple podcasts, Google or Spotify or your favorite platform for receiving podcasts, thank you. This means the world to us. The hope renewed podcast is brought to you by PIR ministries. at PIR, we partner with God and the church in the work of pastoral renewal and restoration. Pastors. Our goal is to help you cultivate new hope for healthy life and ministry. We do this by building relationships. We trained both pastors and churches to promote a culture of ministry health. If you've experienced a forced exit from ministry, we provide a process of restoration for you and your family. We also have proven resources and tools to assist you in the challenges of ministry life to contact us, or to learn more about the IR visit PIR ministries.org
Brad Hoefs Brad Hoefs, founder of Fresh Hope for Mental Health joins the guys to talk about how pastors can find help for their mental health needs. Brad speaks of his own battle with being bipolar and shares how his painful story has become a source of healing for many pastors. In this episode, pastors will find Fresh Hope for their struggles.
Brad is the author of Fresh Hope: Living Well in Spite of a Mental Health Diagnosis (2013).
Show Notes: To learn more about Brad Hoefs and Healing the Heart Wounds of Ministry visit Fresh Hope for Mental Health.
Fresh Hope for Mental Health: https://freshhope.us/
Contact Brad Hoefs: pastorbrad@freshhope.us
Brad Hoefs interview Transcript: Brad Hoefs 00:00
Pastors have all kinds of wounds that are not seen wounds. But if you don't have the skills or the toolset to clean those wounds out, it can do you in. I always say this pastors, please deal with your pain. Because if you don't deal with your pain, your pain will deal with you.
Joe Chambers 00:23
Welcome to Hope Renewed helping you find new hope when ministry leaves you hopeless. The Hope Renewed podcast is brought to you by PIR Ministries. Here are your hosts, Tom Jameson and Sean Nemecek.
Tom Jameson 00:39
Well, our guest today on Hope Renewed is Brad Hoefs of Fresh Hope for Mental Health. Brad, welcome to Hope Renewed.
Brad Hoefs 00:48
Hi, thank you. Thank you. Great to be with you guys. And great to meet you.
Tom Jameson 00:53
We're excited to make this connection and to hear a little bit about your journey. What inspired you to start fresh hope for mental health. And just tell us a little bit about your story.
Brad Hoefs 01:05
In 1995, I was pastoring, the 13th fastest growing church in North America. And I was going to town. I had never had a down day I never had a problem. But I was a pusher and a driver and I could go to the hotel and I could lock myself up and do more work in three days than you know most people could do in six months. And everybody just thought I was really creative. And the church had gone from about 800 in worship to about 3000. And we had relocated and all the stuff well through it all I was getting sicker, had a manic episode that landed me in trouble with the law. And it all became public. And so long story short, a church started out of that, um, process. A group of people from the former church said we want to love you in care for you; provided a safe place for me to get better along with my family; gave me an 18% pay raise in the process. And I got better. But I didn't get super better. I didn't get . . . I got like, coping better. I could cope but I wasn't thriving. And I certainly didn't have any passion about ministry anymore. I felt like I was broken merchandise. I was a cracked pot that was too cracked up, you know. And so, I ended up accidentally messing up my medicine and I relapsed seven years later ended up in the hospital. And I said I've got to figure out how to live with this In spite of this, I gotta figure out how to do life. I had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, and I had no clue that I had it or anything. My dad had it, but I just didn't know that it was possible to be, you know, genetically. And so, anyway, when I relapsed I then after getting out of the hospital, I started going to some groups, and I was very unhappy with the groups, I found myself support groups, because I found myself getting worse, it was unhealthy. And all I found was complaining and negativity. And they were ruminating constantly, every week, no movement, and you find that in a fair amount of mental health support groups. And so I knew intuitively something was wrong. I started complaining, I'm a German Lutheran and I started complaining to my doctor, (we do that very well). (Laughter). And so, I complained long enough that he said, why don't you start the group that you want to attend, and that started Fresh Hope because I started that group sooner or later and he was willing to help me. And lo and behold, people were looking for hope-centered, hope-directed groups, mental health support groups, and we have tenets, wrote tenants that we combine both the loved ones as well as those with a diagnosis. And so, we help churches start those groups. And then the ministry has just grown into a number of different areas. And right now we're in about 17 countries, people attend from 17 different countries. We're definitely all in English, all in Spanish. And then also it's been translated into Japanese, Chinese, French and three languages in India. And I never set out to do any of that. But I could tell you this and Never had any passion about ministry, until Fresh Hope. And, and within Fresh Hope I realized that I used to be so braggadocious about, you know, what I was doing in ministry, how fast the church was growing and all of that. And today, the sweet spot is me telling my awful story. That becomes a liquid gold for the kingdom of God, if you will. And yeah, I never would have guessed that. You know, and I used to think this was plan B, you know that I had screwed up God's plan A for me. And the reality is that it's all Plan A, it's all part of it.
Tom Jameson 05:46
Yeah, what a what a powerful picture of how God redeems our brokenness for his glory and the pouring out of grace comes out of that. And how too often we go into ministry, because of our plan A and we were missing God's perfect plan. I'm not even going to call a Plan A. it's just The Plan. Which, counter intuitively, is found in our humbling ourselves or, if by God's grace, we are being humbled so that his grace can be made known in our lives,
Brad Hoefs 06:32
I would have never guessed that me telling my most vulnerable broken horrible point. The point that which, in my humaneness, I would want to keep quiet and never tell, again — never think on it, again — becomes this all empowering story for other people. Like, story after story, especially with some pastors who have been through hell and back. And they needed somebody who got through it, to say to them, you can keep going, God can redeem this. There's no unredeemable situations, never ever.
Tom Jameson 07:21
Yeah, wow. And I think we want to delve into a little bit of the whole perspective of mental health and church and ministry because of course, (sarcasm) every pastor wants to tell their deepest, darkest secret and be broken in front of the world. (Laughter, Brad says “NO”) But, I'm captured by this idea, you know, kind of at the start of Fresh Hope for Mental Health of looking for something different than what was being offered. Why is it important to follow this hope-centered, hope-directed, or Christ-centered approach to mental health, recovery and wellness, do you think?
Brad Hoefs 08:00
Yeah, several years ago, the leaders of HHS, that administration in Washington, DC, and SAMSA invited nine of us that do faith combined mental health stuff. And they know that things are not good within what's happening from a mental health perspective in our country. They know there's an element that we have that that needs to be part of mental health recovery. But therapists don't trust pastors, pastors don't trust therapists, usually. And it becomes problematic. Well, anyway, through it, I just spoke on hope. And I explained to them that there's these 25 years of clinical research on hope, and it is incredible research, but just very simple things like hope can be borrowed, hope can be shared, and they know it to be true. But if you take wishful thinking, hope, you know, hope that encourages people, but it's still not sure and certain. But if you infuse faith into hope—a man's hope—if you take Christ's hope, and you put that in there, you now have sure and certain hope. And the ability to speak that into somebody's life who is suicidal plays a different role than wishful thinking. And Matt Stanford has said this for years Dr. Matt, Stanford, you guys may know him, but he has said for years that the church needs to understand that the greatest territory, if you will, for evangelism is doing something about mental health within the church. And see, when I was trained at the seminary in St. Louis, I was trained that pastors did pastoral counseling, therapists do therapeutic counseling, don't mix them. You're not a therapist. Okay, got that. But that's one side of the coin. And if, if the, that's the clinical side, and yeah, the church should let the clinicians do that. But if somebody such as myself, who has bipolar only does the clinical side, we end up having learned helplessness, because we have to depend on the doctors and the medicine. Well, how do I recover, in spite of it? And that's the flip side, and that's where the church belongs. That's where the church has this army of hope that can come in and come alongside people and help them, you know, and offer hope. And helping people process their pain, helping them be able to move from hopelessness to hope we have a thing we call hope coaching, which churches are beginning to implement within their ministries. And the hope coaching is just we took all that research and infused it with hope, or infused it with faith, and boom, you can have short conversations with people who are hopeless, don't have to have a mental health issue, and begin to see a way forward.
Sean Nemecek 11:37
It's interesting to me that you described this church that formed and gave you space to heal. And you're talking now about the importance of healing within a community of faith. How does this idea of hope and being in community connect,
Brad Hoefs 12:01
First Corinthians 13, ends with and now these three remain faith, hope, and love. We understand faith and love are shared and community, right? Hope is the same way. Hope really functions the same way that love and faith functions. And I think we human beings don't understand that. And so the way that hope is discovered. . . Hopelessness, very simply put, is when people don't see a way forward, and hope is when you see a way forward. So, what happens is when the Lord says, Bear one another's burdens, and that which we have walked through, you know, I'm paraphrasing scripture, but that which we've walked through, then we can help others through. And that's why it's needed in the community. If you try to be hopeful, if you're hopeless, whether you have a clinical depression or not, you know, you could be hopeless, just from anxiety and be worn out and frustrated. None of. . . I used to think that just Lutherans had those problems in ministry. (Laughter) But I found out that even charismatics have those issues in ministry. You know, well, anyway, even if you're hopeless in that, if you try to be hopeful yourself, it many times is not enough. It's just not enough. And someone else's story of how God got them through becomes your survival guide. And your, something you can hold on to, to show you the next step forward.
Sean Nemecek 13:47
That's so important. And sometimes churches struggle in facing mental health crisis in their communities. What are some of the obstacles that you see for churches there?
Brad Hoefs 13:58
Yes, one really big one—liability. They all are afraid of, they would rather have a bunch of drunks come in and have a meeting, and druggies have a meeting, than to have crazy people come into their church and have a meeting. When in fact, it's no different than the liability is there. Yeah, there's always liabilities and doing ministry. But, for instance, Fresh Hope offers fresh hope mental health groups, it's peer to peer and we train the facilitators. We do all the work, we provide all the materials, if there's issues we're available, Blah blah blah blah blah. We've been doing this for 15 years and haven't had any horrific stories. I've had a few interesting stories, but needless to say, it's no more than any other kind of than having AA in your church. And so there's this fear, and it's very, the Christian church is very risk adverse. But you know, so much of it as is with pastors, when there's a pastoral problem, it becomes a legal thing. And the legalities are guiding us, as opposed to the heart for people, you know. And so I find the biggest obstacle is helping pastors and church leaders understand that it's no more, there's no more liability than letting any other group in, you know. And yeah, it's, it's interesting, can something bad happened? Well, something bad can happen it when you're having a prayer group, you know. So that's the number one issue. And then secondly, this division that they see that where there's this solid rock wall that cannot be penetrated between the clinical and the ministry side of things, when in fact, that wall needs to be taken down. We see, like, for instance, one of my colleagues on our staff, she just trained 24, pastors in India, on how to help people with mental health issues, you know, and we don't see that kind of receptiveness in the United States. We see it in other countries, because they don't have that, that legal, and that wall.
Sean Nemecek 16:39
So, it's kind of like we're trying to protect the institution rather than healing the hurting and we've kind of gotten off course a little bit there.
Brad Hoefs 16:47
Exactly. Exactly. And there is a, there is a way to help the hurting, and minimize and not, you know what I'm saying? Yeah, we, in fact, we started fresh hope. And we said, every Fresh Hope group has to be sponsored by a church. Recently, we redid that, and we revisited with professionals and with attorneys as well as with, and we now say, Fresh Hope, can be started by anyone who, you know, fits our requirements for facilitators is trained by us, we will be over that group so to speak, they the leaders can be responsible to us, and it can be hosted by a church or it can host it in a public place.
Sean Nemecek 17:43
So those are some of the challenges that churches face. What challenges do pastors and ministry leaders personally face as it relates to mental health and wellness?
Brad Hoefs 17:53
Well, first of all, I think pastors, many times have gotten into ministry and believe that they probably have their lives together more than they do. It's a lie we tell ourselves, you know. A lot of us use other things to cover up the pains and the difficulties. I suspect most seminaries are not teaching resiliency, they're not teaching and equipping pastors to learn how to process their pain. And there's plenty of emotional pain that comes from ministry. I think of pastors like this, they’re first responders, period. Where, you know, I can't tell you the times I've been there either when somebody died, or there was a tragedy or something, and I had to take the news to them. I had to work through it, or the time I had to baptize a baby who was blue coded. And then the minute I baptize the baby, everybody left, and there I was with the baby and the baby was dying. And I, I got so upset with myself later that I didn't hold the baby, I should have held the baby. So there's those traumatic things that happen. Plus we have a lot of compound/complex, second-hand trauma that comes on us, and then all the crappy things people do to you and ministry, and issues and all of that. And then there's our own family stuff, marriages suffer. And so with fresh hope we started a thing called and we've just done a few of them. But it's an intensive like to day, um, two and a half day intensive retreat, in which both the spouse and the pastor is there or church leaders where they can process their pain and we give them the tools. It's not teaching In them, the tools, we actually empower them by using the tools there. And they learn from that perspective. And it's called Healing the Heart Wounds of Ministry. And I can tell you this, we took, we took all of, not all of my staff, but many of my staff, in fresh hope for mental health, are trained in trauma healing, out of the trauma healing Institute, out of the American Bible Society. And years ago, missionaries were trying to evangelize people in Africa, and it was not going well. And nothing was happening. And finally, they realized that the people had so much trauma, they weren't really able to even take the gospel in, there was so much pain. And you know, it's like this, if, if you have a physical wound, and you don't tend to it, it can be life threatening. And pastors have all kinds of wounds that are not seen wounds. But if you don't have the skills or the toolset to clean those wounds out, it can do you in. And I always say this, Pastor, Please deal with your pain. Because if you don't deal with your pain, your pain will deal with you. And that's what happened to me. I wasn't dealing with my pain. I wanted God to take care of it. But I wanted to do it in a vacuum because I felt like if I tell somebody, all this crazy stuff I'm doing, they're gonna think I'm crazy.
Tom Jameson 21:44
So there's a shame component to that..
Brad Hoefs 21:49
Yes. Yeah, if you've never heard of the soul of shame, the book, Soul of Shame.
Sean Nemecek 21:53
Yeah. Curt Thompson. Yeah.
Tom Jameson 21:54
Yeah. And it seems like there that's all around the issue of mental health, this atmosphere of shame. And then that, I guess, within the church particularly, creates a stigma in regard to mental health. You know, crassly saying, you know, well, good Christians don't have mental health issues. Right? You can’t be a good Christian, and have mental health issues.
Brad Hoefs 22:21
And if that's the case, why are the statistics for mental health, the same of the church, just as all other statistics, I would say that one of the things so we base this, this healing the heart wounds, on the same way that trauma is approached through the healing groups, trauma healing groups. And, wow, we've done a few of these and the response has been incredible. Because the spouse is going through it at the same time the pastor is, and then there's a point at which we bring them together. And they, they go home with skills and abilities that are not any rocket science kind of things. But saying to people, if you want to last, the difficulties if you want to stay in ministry, and be happy. . . because the statistics right now Barna has come out with some statistics that are frightening, really, and I've heard others where almost 48% (I don't know what I don't have all of the percentages memorized). But of pastor's want to quit or trying to figure out how to get out of ministry, or what can I do instead of ministry. And I know I got so that at towards the end before I went full time into Fresh Hope, I got so I was having problems preaching. And I'd never had that problem before in my life where I just wanted to go and clobber everybody over the head, in the message, with the law. You go into hell, if you don't straighten up, you know, I just didn't want to give the good news.
Sean Nemecek 24:08
So seminaries don't teach us how to process our pain. You know, there's lots of pastors out there who are experiencing grief or shame or anxiety, and they just don't have the tools to process it. What are some of the trends that you're seeing among pastors with regards to mental health?
Brad Hoefs 24:27
Well, I think we have a higher rate in the clergy of depression and anxiety and addictive behaviors than in the average. And it's seen as one of the most complex professions. And what I'm seeing are a lot of pastors hurting and trying to do it alone. They're almost like dogs that have wounds and then they go off into the corner. And, you know, they don't reach out for help. And I was exactly that way, today I'm not. But yeah, so but the trends that I'm seeing are that the younger guys are much more willing to get together and talk and process. And if you want to, if you want to heal from the heart, the heart wounds of ministry, you have to be able to talk in safe spaces and just process it. Processing it simply means talking it out. That's why we go to talk therapy with a therapist, or why we go to support groups. God made us that way. It's communal, it's it, we need each other.
Tom Jameson 25:46
I think that's such a huge key that too easily is forgotten for pastors and church leaders, ministry leaders, that for whatever reason, we believe that either we should have our act together, right? So we don't have that need to talk it out. Or, you know, who in the world does a pastor talk to? So, yeah, how can church leaders navigate the pressures and expectations, especially what they find just within their congregations?
Brad Hoefs 26:26
Well, I think personally, first, if a pastor wants to help the hurting in his church, he needs to help himself first. It's like being on a plane with, you know, they say, if you have traveling with a child, put your own oxygen mask on first. Pastors have to talk about it from the pulpit means getting help, it means being open with someone, if it's a therapist, great. One of the things pastors have to understand is that theologically, you can have talked to the Lord, spiritually, you've talked to him, you know what the answer is, you know that with your head, but your heart is hurting. And it's okay, you can have both those things. At the same time, you can know that it's resolved, God has this. But I'm worried where you have to process the worry, you have to process the hurt, whether it's with a therapist, or find a safe group of pastors, or come to something like we have with Healing the Heart Wounds of Ministry, but whatever you do, don't try to do it alone. That is where the enemy wins. If he can isolate you, he will tell you sooner or later, you will start believing you're the only one. And then you'll start feeling like there's something really wrong with me but I'm afraid to tell. I've got this monster I'm living with and pretty soon you feel like you are the monster, that's Satan. And so don't do it alone. And then I think when you become emotionally, more healthy, we never get to a point of perfect mental health. But when you get to a point of being open and transparent, you're going to help your people, you're probably going to be more compassionate, you're going to speak about it more easily. It's going to open up the church as a safe space for people to really, you know, in the meantime, we'd love to come and help anybody start fresh hope groups where you know, 50% of your people in a church are dealing with mental health, they either have a diagnosis, or there's people who are trying to stay sane, while they love those of us with a diagnosis.
Tom Jameson 28:46
Yeah, it just it seems that it takes a lot of courage. It takes maturity, a great deal of humility, to be able to be transparent. I want to dip back into your story a little bit if we can. So you know, how, how was that willingness to be transparent with others, a help for your healing.
Brad Hoefs 29:14
The reality is that all these things you guys have just listed that you need to have in order to be vulnerable and, and get the help. I had none of them. I was extremely gifted. I'm gifted really strongly in certain areas. You would not want me as your church administrator, though. I can't, you know, I'm like passed gas in the air when it comes to that. It's just a mess. The reality is that I had none of those things. And yet I was pleading with God to help me but I wasn't going for help. And I should have gone for help. If I would have gone for help, I don't think what happened would have happened. And I think it would have, it would be so different. But I didn't. And I didn't have the character to hold my gifts. I did not have the resiliency in ministry. So I, the Lord knew I had to crash and burn. And it was in such a public way where it was on the news in the news in the newspaper, that I had to deal with it. And I would encourage pastors don't wait that long. You know, don't wait until it's so bad that, that you're just a train wreck waiting to happen. But even if a train wreck happens, I'm living proof. My story is living proof that there is hope. And, you know, pastures that are hurting, they need to know you're not alone. You're really not alone. And we need each other. I think we just need to be able to talk, when I am able to talk with people about what's going on in my life. You know what, I can manage it. Because I've let the steam out. But you know, I've been heard.
Tom Jameson 31:24
Tell us a little bit more about this initiative, Fresh Hope for Pastors, that your ministry is taking.
Brad Hoefs 31:29
Yes, if people are interested in it, our goal is through Healing the Heart Wounds of Ministry that sooner or later safe groups are formed out of that. Where there becomes cohort, you know, cohort groups or affinity groups where pastors, even if it's three or four people, that just can get together on a regular basis and talk and, and process ministry. And so, it's what we do at Fresh Hope we really do peer to peer support. And so, we're just doing it with pastors and not because they have a mental health issue. It's, well they do mental health challenges, yes, but not a diagnosis. It's more emotional and spiritual health and taking care of yourself, and providing that for spouses also. So, we have the healing the heart wounds, process that people can go through. And then also, after that groups, that that are safe places and spaces where you can actually deal with your pain.
Sean Nemecek 32:39
That's great. Can you just kind of break down some practical steps that leaders can take, whether they're facing anxiety, or depression or other mental health issues? How can they focus on their personal well being, and lead their congregations?
Brad Hoefs 32:57
What I would say is, the first thing is, is go to somebody that you can talk to, whether that's a therapist, or you have a you have somebody that you really trust and belief can help you. Or who's been there, maybe it's a retired pastor or a close friend or whatever. But find someone go to a coach, there are people that are out there as pastoral coaches, you know, I did some life coaching with someone a friend, and boy, I'll tell you what, it helped me get more focused on who I am and what I'm supposed to be doing. You know, instead of playing games on my phone. And so, that you're getting a place or find a group. But whatever you do, do not wait. And if you are depressed, take the medicine, it's no big deal. For heaven's sake, what pastors need to understand is, the brain is just like every other organ in our body and when it doesn't function, right, we're not going to be, you know. So, if you had liver problems, or if you had kidney issues, or you had diabetes or whatever, and you had a broken leg, you go to the doctor. The medicine will just, hopefully, help your brain get back to its right chemical levels, so you can be in your right mind. Don't be ashamed of it, Pastor. It is no big deal. You know, the majority of us are, well, I can tell you this, everybody's broken. And if you don't think you're broken, let me come live with you for 24 hours. I have the spiritual gift of triggering people. (Laughter) We’ll figure out what your issues are.
Sean Nemecek 35:05
Oh, that's so funny. Brad, I think one of the things that I'm hearing is a theme in your story and in the pastors that I coach through burnout, is that when a pastor takes the time to find real healing for their heart, they end up being a better leader and a better pastor on the other side. Absolutely. They're, they're more connected with the love of God, and more open to speak about God's love. So, what can we as a church or as the Christian church do to better support our pastors and ministry leaders in this area?
Brad Hoefs 35:50
I think if, first of all, if, let's say you're a leader, a lay leader in the church, give your pastor a sabbatical. Give him time away with his family, give him time away by himself. Encourage him, allow him to go to places that are gonna really help him deal with the things that need to be dealt with. Encourage him to process it, and it no matter who you are, whether you're a leader or not, just keep saying to him, Pastor, I love you, I want you around for a long time. Please take good care of yourself, please, please, please take good care of yourself. I think simple things like that, you know, can make a world of difference for for pastors. And if you're on a board of directors, or your elders, or whatever the governmental structures in the church, see to it that you require the pastor, to take sabbatical to do certain things. It doesn't need to be a conference on how to take care of yourself. Go to one in which they're going to help you take care of yourself, they're going to lead you and guide you to ways of doing that.
Tom Jameson 37:17
So more of the experiential, practical, and I love your encouragement for churches to recognize the need for rhythm in the life of a pastor and ministry leader. Of course, in life about every follower of Christ, we should be incorporating that. But so important for us for pastors and ministry leaders to model that and to live into that. How else, you you've mentioned sabbaticals, and this idea of rhythm; being well connected with others with whom you can speak openly and vulnerably; anything else to just kind of nurture good mental health for pastors and ministry leaders,
Brad Hoefs 38:02
I think it's imperative for the pastor to stay very connected with his spouse, and to be able to find healthy ways to really nurture that relationship. And because many times the spouse is picking up on things long before the pastor does. Pastors, that pastor is many times trying to preach his way out of it, when in fact, the spouse is feeling lonely, and, you know, feels like the church is the woman in the mirror, whatever. So, I think it's just important for you to nurture that relationship with your spouse. Because there's probably one of the safest places that you should have or might have to really talk. But you know, I hate to have broken my life got. I would not wish it on anyone. I and I, oh, say I don't want to walk through any of that again and anything other than that I probably will have to walk through I don't know. But my life has never been better. And I don't mean that in a professional sense at all. I mean, that I don't, ministry was my idol. And I don't bow down to that idol of. . . if everything went away today, I'm happy with who I am and I love my wife, and we love our grandchildren, and we love life. And we enjoy it. And so it could all go away tomorrow and that's not my identity. You know.
Sean Nemecek 39:51
How do financial issues play into the mental health of a pastor?
Brad Hoefs 39:57
That's really a good question. It's insightful. Well, yeah, if the love of money is based, you know, Scripture says the love of money is the root of all evil? Well, I could tell you the lack of money is at the root of a lot of emotional issues for people. And it's hard to go about doing ministry when you're trying to figure out how to navigate financially. So, I think ministries, churches need to be extremely generous with their pastors financially—as financially generous as they can be—within reason. I mean, that provides. . . it's like with Maslow's hierarchy of needs, you can't take care of some of the more intellectual, spiritual and all of that, if very fundamental needs of how you're going to feed your family or pay the rent. And yes, it plays a role in it. And as significant, I would say, that's core to, you know, if you're worrying about house and food, and things like that, how in the world can you be handling the trauma and the drama and the stuff of ministry? And do it effectively? I think we're fooling ourselves if we think that's all. You know, I think Jesus would be the only one who could handle all that.
Tom Jameson 41:37
He did a fair job of it didn't.
Brad Hoefs 41:40
Yeah, but I'm not him. And I'm not trying to be. And I can't be.
Tom Jameson 41:47
Well, and not to make light of that either. Is the sense that Jesus understood where his source of well-being was found, and was continually connected to that.
Brad Hoefs 42:02
Yes, yeah. And, you know, one of the things that I would say that Jesus did is he got away from the crowds. And I think he probably did that on a regular basis. And I teach people in fresh hope, almost everything is mindfulness, we need to pay attention to what's going on inside of ourselves, we need to pay attention to when our brain accidentally is on its own, what are we thinking about. And we need to learn how to take captive our thinking. Our brains have a default setting. And it's not a good default setting. And we need to change that default setting. And we need to really focus our brains, we need to train our brains to think on these things. And you can actually change your brain chemistry, neuroscience proves that, by decluttering or disconnecting all the ruminating at all that. And there are simple ways of doing that. And when I started doing those things, I was shocked at how my thinking changed.
Sean Nemecek 43:23
Yeah, I've had the same experience with mindfulness. It's been an incredibly powerful tool for me. But I would like to return back to just something you mentioned earlier, we talked about different types of trauma that pastors experienced post-traumatic stress, I think we're all familiar, is connected to a single traumatic event. But you also mentioned complex, traumatic stress. Can you describe what that is,
Brad Hoefs 43:51
Trauma is when the brain kind of shuts down and can't process what's happened. And then it gets stored in a place of the brain where there, it's in the flight and fight area. And it there's usually no words for it. So, when I think about all the stuff I had, that I experienced, along with families, because I had empathy I felt with them. So that's all getting stored up, right. It's suddenly I think of compound and complex as being it's layers of it could be just small things, but it's layers of it. And the times where your brain just can't, you know, and when there's enough of that and you haven't worked through it, it becomes huge. Then the other part that I did not mention and we really need to say something about his grief. Pastors need to grieve. When somebody rejects you or leaves the church and just ghost you. You’ve gotta grieve that. And you can't just say, Oh, well. There's very few people who cannot care about that. There. And then I would be worried about them and their empathy, and ministry, you know. And, and so, but there's also the grief work that we need to do when good things happen. You know, when our second child was born, I had a little grief afterwards because life was easier and then you have a baby, and it's not as easy. And so you adjust, and then it's okay. But there's grief involved, even in good things. And I didn't know that prior to crashing and burning. I had I had a lot of compound and complex grief, from moving a church taking it from a traditional setting to going into a manufacturing plant, you know, and I had to process some of that.
Tom Jameson 46:04
So sometimes we talk about death by a thousand paper cuts, you know. You mentioned that layering, and just how much of a reality that is, and how easy it is for a pastor to say, well, it's not that big of a deal. But the hope of what I hear in you saying is that if, if we're disciplined, if we're faithful, if we're wise enough to just be talking about these things, be processing them out, just making sure that that we. . . I'm just, I'm reflecting on my own story, and how some layers of grief just got unattended, and really drove some very poor decisions on my part. Sure.
Brad Hoefs 46:52
Because if you don't, if you don't deal with your pain, your pain deals with you. Yeah. And what it will require is, if you're not going to process it, it will tell you, you've got to cover up. If the pain is so great, you find ways or ways make it go away, even if it's momentarily. And the other thing that happens in a ministry is I could attend to what I was doing right when I was doing it, but the minute there was free time or there was downtime, I had to turn to a world that was my own, because I didn't want to deal with what was going on within me. So, it required a lot of driving it required a lot of and it's like, that's not the kind of self-care that will help us process.
Tom Jameson 47:48
Right. So self-care is good, but it's hard. I mean, it's work that needs to. . .
Brad Hoefs 47:54
Yeah, but you know what, it's a lot easier to do then the other stuff I was doing?
Tom Jameson 48:04
Well, as, as we talk about all these things, I am very mindful that there may be someone who's listening who is deeply pained in their life and considering things that might be harmful to themselves to others. And we want to acknowledge that. If you are listening, and if you are struggling, there is hope, there is help. Brad, how would you direct someone who might be in some very, very dark places at this moment.
Brad Hoefs 48:37
If you're in a very, very dark place, and you are even feeling suicidal, you need to reach out to somebody. And if nothing else, you need to call 988. You know, and talk to someone immediately. It if you are in a place of addictions or darkness or covering up your pain, by behaviors that you know could do you in, so to speak. We also become kind of professionally suicidal that way, and taking risks that are going to hurt you and hurt the people you love. You need to reach out to ministries that deal with those kinds of things. I'm sure you guys talk about that on a regular basis. And now if you're not in a deep and dark place, but you know that you've. . . most people are not. . . they don't go into ministry, having all the ability to deal with all they're going to have to handle. We just don't come that way, but you can get equipped you can learn. And if you don't want to get to those deep, dark places, attend things like Healing the Heart Wounds of Ministry or other things such as that resiliency groups and cohorts and things like that, to keep yourself out of those dark places. But Pastor I'm telling you, if you're in that dark place, and and what you are fearful of the most is the crash and burn, then for God and your family get help. If it had not been for the people who came around us and loved us. You know, the longer you wait to get help, the more the pain is going to drive you. And I, you know, call, email me.
Tom Jameson 50:44
Yeah. How can people get in touch with your ministry, Brad?
Brad Hoefs 50:50
Yeah, PastorBrad@freshhope.us They can go to freshhope.us. It's kind of a big, complicated website. So don't give up on us. But talk to Jason, Jason@freshhope.us. And But Pastor, I want you to know you are not alone. You need to know there is great hope, and that the Lord loves you. And he saw fit, call you into ministry. And he'd love to see fit to keep you in ministry. But don't stand in his way. Because he loves you enough to let you crash and burn.
Sean Nemecek 51:30
So, Brad, do you have any final words of hope that you want to give to pastors and ministry leaders who are in need of encouragement today?
Brad Hoefs 51:37
Yeah, I think the bottom line is I was very good at giving hope to other people before my situation. And I was very loving and kind to them, but I was not to myself. And I think the fact that if you have troubles really receiving your own, I don't think we forgive ourselves. I think we have to learn how to live in the forgiveness of Christ. If you're not able to experience that live in that, that's a key that has profoundly changed my life.
Sean Nemecek 52:17
Well, Brad Hoefs, we just want to thank you so much for your openness and your willingness to share your story and your generosity to help hurting pastors. Thank you for being renewed.
Brad Hoefs 52:28
Well, thank you for having me. Thank you.
Tom Jameson 52:31
It's been great to have you on and we thank our listeners we'd love to hear your thoughts on our conversation, you can go to our new web page, hoperenewedpodcast.com Leave your comments and thoughts there. It is our prayer that the God of hope will fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him.
Joe Chambers 52:53
Thank you for joining us on Hope Renewed. Please, help us reach more pastors by sharing this episode with your friends. If you enjoy this podcast, rate and review us on Apple podcasts, Google or Spotify or your favorite platform for receiving podcasts. Thank you, this means the world to us. The Hope Renewed podcast is brought to you by PIR Ministries. At PIR, we partner with God and the church in the work of pastoral renewal and restoration. Pastors, our goal is to help you cultivate new hope for healthy life and ministry. We do this by building relationships. We train both pastors and churches to promote a culture of ministry health. If you've experienced a forced exit from ministry, we provide a process of restoration for you and your family. We also have proven resources and tools to assist you in the challenges of ministry life to contact us, or to learn more about PIR visit PIRministries.org
Navigating pastoral transitions is challenging even in the best of circumstances. Having perspective, guidance, encouragement and help can make all the difference in not only where you're going, but how well you'll get there. In this episode of Hope Renewed, Matt Steen of PIR ministry partner Chemistry Staffing sits down with us to talk about the realities of pastoral transition and how to best find your way through them.
RESOURCES
Chemistry Staffing Website
Finding hope to address ministry pain is challenging. For women in ministry - or married to those who are - it can be especially so. Finding a place of understanding, safety and healing can be elusive. That's why we're so excited to share in this episode of Hope Renewed a powerful conversation we had with Kristen Joy, founder of The Ministry Wife Coach. Her deeply informed and passionate approach to resourcing women in ministry provides a much needed place of hope for those impacted by the confusion, pain and even trauma of ministry exits. Her story of finding grace in the midst of woundedness gives a strong foundation of leading others to healing.
Resources Kristen's Website
Shepherding shepherds. Caring for wounded leaders. Walking with pastors and their families. Partnering to bring healing. These all reflect the depth of the mission of PIR. We invite you to sit down with us as we talk with pastor, minister to ministers and PIR Board Member Tim Johnson. He shares some creative and helpful ways by which pastors can facilitate healthy ministry/personal lives and find strength for the long haul.
As always we invite you to check out our resources at PIR Ministries' website.
The Soul Care Institute (https://www.soulcareinstitute.com/) is a six-retreat journey spread over two years where participants learn to care for their own souls. Sean interviewed the Soul Care Institute president Kaylene Derksen and her husband Jimm (who serves a s Vice President of the Institute). The talked about how pastors are often so busy caring for others that they neglect to care for their own souls. The Soul Care Institute experience is an ideal way for pastors to find safety, friendships, and healing as they learn soul care.
When a car's wheels are out of alignment, it can create a domino effect of issues which could ultimately result in a crash. So it is in life, and perhaps more so in ministry. Inattention to our soul's alignment can be the fundamental issue that expresses itself in ever increasing difficulties. We sit down with pastor and ministry coach John Opalewski, whose story is one of the wheels coming off, but finding new hope and strength through alignment with God's truth and purposes.
Resources
Find all of John's materials at Converge Coaching
Good health in any aspect of our lives requires Attention and Intention. It just doesn't happen, it must be pursued and practiced. This is especially true in ministry because there is an enemy - of our souls and of our ministry - who would have us weak, ineffective and irrelevant. How we cultivate our ministry health is as important as the ministry we seek to do! In this episode of Hope Renewed, we talk with Bryan Moak of Converge, and glean some crucial insights from how his work in the Mid-America District is helping to strengthen the Church and her leaders, providing hope to weary and worn warriors.
To see what Converge Mid-America is doing to strengthen the church and her leaders, visit:
https://convergemidamerica.org/strengthen/
What we often find in ministry life is that the circumstances and challenges we face aren't necessarily ones for which our training has prepared us. Having someone who can offer perspective, encouragement, guidance and perhaps a little advice is a HUGE help! Even for the "normal" work of ministry and leadership, a "seasoned and reasoned" voice - what we call a "Thinking Partner" - can be an invaluable asset for pastors and ministry leaders. I this episode we talk with Rev. Anne Horton and her coach Gail Goolsby, ACC about the unique dynamics and benefits of Clergy Coaching. They let us "peek inside" their well established and road-tested relationship and glean some of the insights of just what this type of partnership is, and why it works so well for those in ministry life.
Important Links for this episode:
PIR Clergy Coaching Gail Goolsby's Website
If you’re in pastoral or ministry leadership, the church needs you to be healthy. Research shows there are certain keys to cultivating a sustainable, sacrificial yet fulfilling ministry and a key among them is Resilience. How do you seek resilience in ministry as a pastor or ministry leader? What does self-care look like when a pandemic has disrupted everything you do? How do you care for all of the needs out there and also take care of yourself? In this sacrificial calling, how might the cross and our union with Christ point a way forward? In this episode we sit down with Darrell Yoder, Instructor of Christian Ministries and Director of the Pirsig Fellowship and Talking Points Conferences at Grand Rapids Theological Seminary. He introduces us to significant resources that can encourage and equip you for Resilience in Ministry.
Link to the Talking Points resources on Resilience in Ministry: www.cornerstone.edu/resilience/
RESILIENCE: FINDING WHOLENESS IN MINISTRY BY WAY OF THE CROSS