From the Ashes: The Derek Willis Story

/in , , /by

You can find Derek Willis at the front doors of the East 96 Campus most Sunday mornings along with his beautiful wife, Abby. They’ll greet you enthusiastically with huge smiles in the church lobby. They’ll even remember your name and make you feel comfortable. Always cheerful, their three spunky daughters mingle easily with their church family. They all seem to know everyone.  

 Active, energetic, and friendly, Derek and Abby fit into their First Impressions roles quite well. They also serve as leaders in the church as Navigators, and Derek recently began serving in Student Ministry, offering his energy and wisdom to a group of sixth-grade boys.   

But just six short years ago, Derek sat in his home office looking out the window onto a beautiful spring day as sunshine poured in the window while a dark knot of depression gnawed at his mind. “It was… the most beautiful day you could ever see,” he recalled. “And I’ve got these three beautiful kids running around. A beautiful wife. This beautiful life. And all I felt was emptiness inside.”  

– – –

Derek’s struggle with depression began his freshman year of high school after suffering concussions while playing football. At the time he was diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder and began taking medication to control it. For him depression played out through mental fog punctuated with scattered and incohesive thoughts and communication. Depression “was always something in the background” of his life and “really took on a life of its own” during stress-induced depressive episodes. During major depressive episodes, he would take time off school and, later, work.  

Any time he’d try to get off medication, he would fall into another depressive episode. “I always kind of struggled with it,” he said. But he learned to deal with it, and nobody really knew the toll these episodes took on him or the effort he put into managing life. He set up his life in a way that displayed his very best qualities and talents.  

He met Abby during their time at Lamar University, and they later began dating as co-workers. The pair gravitated toward one another with natural vitality, enjoying similar interests like sports, spending time with friends, and just experiencing and enjoying life together.  

During their engagement, a co-worker, Steven Pittman, invited them to join his and his wife’s married couple’s small group. Derek and Abby were not attending church at the time, but Abby’s mother had always advised her that if she kept Christ at the center of her marriage, they could get through anything. Derek looked at the possibility from a more strategic perspective, desiring to know what a successful marriage looked like in the couples who would be in that group. They were all in.  

To Derek, the doctrine of Jesus was attractive. Derek had quite a bit of exposure to faith and an intellectual knowledge of God but not a personal relationship. Very quickly, they were both drawn into the community of small group. Derek saw real people living out real life faith, being open and vulnerable. He hadn’t had much experience with vulnerability, but he felt pulled toward it. Abby was immediately drawn in to small group because of the deep and intimate friendships gained that she didn’t have in other circles. 

The couple began attending services at Clear Creek Community Church soon after joining the Pittman’s small group, and both came to faith in 2010.   

“Derek was on fire for God,” Abby recalled. Derek had a strong desire for knowledge and felt the need to confess sins and ask forgiveness in certain relationships. They both made some radical life changes to surrender fully to God, and they grew in tremendous ways by accepting spiritual mentors into their lives. They married in 2011 and were baptized later that same year.  

 

I waited patiently for the Lord to hear me… 

 

Derek and Abby are truly one another’s closest friends. At the time, Abby was one of the few people who understood and witnessed Derek’s mental health struggles, and Derek had long ago accepted the status quo feeling on medication—himself but slightly numb. He thought, Well, this is me. I get depressed sometimes. I can’t fight it.  

Abby simply loved and cared for him through it all. And they maintained their life through it all—growth in church leadership, job changes, and the birth of three daughters. While their life wasn’t perfect, it sure looked like it was. And they were content.  

In late January of 2020, Derek called Abby on his way home early from work one day. She was staying at home with their three young children at the time and recalled his words clearly: “Abby, I think something’s wrong with me. I can’t even complete full sentences. I can’t think thoughts. Something is wrong with me.” And he repeated this one statement: “My brain is broken.” 

Looking back, Derek sees some incidents that could have led to this deep low. He’d been on back-to-back rounds of antibiotics for a bad case of strep throat earlier that winter and then been given more responsibility at work, which became highly stressful. Then one day everything culminated, and he shut down.  

Abby saw very quickly that this time was different. She took charge, setting up doctor’s appointments and taking care of everything at home.  

“I really couldn’t form thoughts,” Derek said. “She had to think for me.” For example, he couldn’t think of the simple steps it would take for him to get ready for an appointment. And they went to many appointments, seeing four psychiatrists and two neurologists among other types of health specialists.  

Daily life changed drastically for them. Derek took a leave of absence from work and eventually took short-term disability as well. A truth they’d once learned during a church series on mental health guided Abby and Derek about his treatment. This truth was to first treat the spiritual and then treat the physical. So, Derek would spend hours each day at the library meditating on God’s word, hoping that piecing together the words on the page would break through not only his mental fog, but his spiritual fog as well. He thought that if he could comprehend the words on the page, then that would fill up the void he felt inside.  

 Mostly, he was just afraid.  

“He was scared he was going to be like this for the rest of his life,” Abby recalled. “He would say, ‘I don’t think my brain is ever going to come back.’”   

“What was typical for me was seeing everything through the lens of the depression,” Derek explained. “You can’t remember when you were happy. I would say yeah, I know that when I get depressed I think like that, and I come out of it. But I really think my brain is broken, and I don’t think God is ever going to fix me.” 

But Derek wasn’t angry with God about this. He almost saw it as an eventuality because of how he saw himself: I’m not good enough, and people aren’t going to like me. 

“My idol is human approval,” he admitted. He’d worn a mask of self-sufficiency his entire life, and now it had been stripped away.  

 

…and he turned to me and heard my cry. 

 

One of the few events on their calendar they decided to keep during that season was Nav Retreat, even though Derek was scared because he was still struggling to formulate conversations with others—a task that had once come easily. He’d told very few friends what was really going on.  

He felt the spiritual low of this depression more acutely than others in the past, and he longed for God to speak to him. He felt that “joy was evading” him, and though he could intellectually agree that God loved him, he could no longer feel it. He no longer believed it.  

But during that Nav Retreat, God began softening Derek’s heart toward him again, and he began with Derek’s community.  

During one service, attendees were invited to write notes expressing gratitude to others in the congregation. 

“There was a line of guys to give Derek their card,” Abby remembered, reading from her journal at the time. “It was so beautiful. I wish Derek could see how much he means to others, how worthy he is, that God loves him, and that he is using Derek as an ambassador for Christ.”  

Derek remembered Nav Retreat as the “inflection point” God used to begin lifting him out of this depression. “That was God’s answer to my prayer,” Derek said. “He spoke to me.” This was just the starting point to understanding how much he needed authentic friendships.  

 

He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire. 

 

After several weeks at home and with short-term disability running out, Derek and Abby became worried about the future. Derek still wasn’t fully out of the depression, and his thoughts were still clouded. Just as a decision loomed, the whole world shut down because of the COVID-19 pandemic.  

Derek’s project was shut down, but he retained his job.  The very thing they’d been praying for—more time for Derek to recover—was provided in a most unexpected way, and it blew Derek and Abby away. 

 

He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along. 

 

Derek felt seen by God again, and this enabled him to focus more intently on recovery. His energy was up enough to manage time with his daughters, so they didn’t know anything was wrong. He spent his days sleeping and exercising, fueling his body with nutritious foods and supplements and realigning his medications, while also pouring more and more energy into his daily rhythms of Bible meditation and prayer, counseling and family time.  

One day, as the mental fog began to lift, he asked Abby how she was doing. Abby had been Derek’s rock, praying over him, reading Scripture to him, speaking truth into his mind and heart when he couldn’t grasp it. Truthfully, she had begun to feel distant from Derek because he was so focused on healing. But she’d been fueling herself with time in the Bible and prayer, journaling, and venting her concerns and worries to a close circle of friends.  

So, she brushed off Derek’s question, but he kept pressing. Finally, she broke down into tears with “I’m not okay!” confessing the distance she felt and the burdens she carried. But Derek was finally strong enough to take some of the weight for her, and they began a journey toward repairing their relationship.  

 

He has given me a new song to sing, 

A hymn of praise to our God. 

Many will see what he has done and be amazed.  

They will put their trust in the LORD.  

Psalm 40: 1-3 (NLT)  

 

“God’s always communicating with us,” Derek says. “He’s always exposing something in us or teaching us about ourselves. This depression is the avenue by which he grew me spiritually.”  

Derek realized that up to the time of this depressive episode, much of his spiritual life was abstract to a certain point. Even God’s love for him was abstract to a large degree.  

He understands now that God needed to guide him into a truer and more fulfilling spiritual relationship. Derek’s weak spot had been his inability to be vulnerable with others, to truly unmask his shame and allow his community to know him.  

But community is exactly where God wanted him. It was “God’s way of wiping away my shame and making his love very tangible for me,” Derek recalled.  

Through truly authentic Christian friendships, Derek was able to understand that “the way through shame is through vulnerability and confession.” Out of a desperate need for relief and healing, he began to open up, confessing his true feelings with friends he knew cared for him. As those friends met Derek with their own struggles with shame, he began to understand that he could put that mask of self-sufficiency away for good.   

 Journeying through this “dark night of the soul” brought Derek to his very lowest point. It broke him and his constant reliance on human approval. God began to address his feelings of inadequacy and shame, targeting them with a fierce love that burned through lies he had believed about himself for as long as he could remember.  

“I was very weak spiritually up to that point,” he confesses. “Fast forward [six] years later, I’m way stronger spiritually. My belief in God is affirmed and trued-up. Less abstract and more concrete. Now, I know how to fight. I know how to identify thought patterns in my head, and I know how to take those patterns captive and destroy the lies.”  

Because of his struggle, Derek believes he has a new purpose in his role as ambassador for Christ, as Abby had seen even in the midst of his depression. “God has uniquely used the pain I endured to strengthen and equip me to walk with people through struggles,” he says, “helping them to see the spiritual component, wage war on the battlefront of the mind, and fix their eyes on Jesus in the midst of their pain.”  

He connects with David in Psalm 23 as David walks through the valley of the shadow of death. “[God] leads me there and is with me the whole time. And then David says, ‘Your goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life.’ So, God’s goodness and mercy is always going after him. When hardships happen, God’s always there. He’s always working. So, I don’t ask ‘Why am I going through this? Why does it have to be me?’ It’s more like, ‘God, what do you want for me in this?’ Because I know he has a purpose.”  

Derek feels like a phoenix risen from the ashes; that everything about him has changed. His relationship with God has transformed, and he now finds rest in the fact that he is truly loved by God just as he is. 

Friendship on Foreign Soil

/in , , , /by

Meet Krissy

In the beginning of 2020, Krissy Jones found herself in a state of deep spiritual slumber. What started as a desire for rest and a pause from the busyness of life had evolved into apathy toward God and others. For a chronically busy person like Krissy, the Covid pandemic provided a great respite from people.  Seeing social obligations drop off the calendar felt like a dream come true. Covid meant she could tell people no. She could stay home and do nothing, wearing pajamas indefinitely. And like many others, she grew to love it. People required effort, but Netflix offered immediate comfort.  The problem was that living life “asleep” became a steady, insatiable habit. Even when the threat of Covid had passed, Krissy’s spiritual slumber continued.

“I had fallen asleep spiritually, worshiping the gods of pleasure and comfort,” Krissy said. Endless Netflix consumed her time.  She sought rest mostly from sources other than the Lord. On some level, she wanted God to wake her up. But on the other hand, spiritual slumber was easy. It was easier to isolate and focus on herself, convincing herself that “she needed this break.” Sure, she still had spiritual commitments: small group, band, church on Sundays, etc.  But the passion for any of these spiritual pursuits was gone; the life and love of it was missing. After all, people were difficult and hurtful and messy. After several wounds and difficulties in ministry, ice began forming around Krissy’s heart.  Deep down, she knew that chasing after her own selfish desires would never truly satisfy. She had experienced the unexplainable joy of living fully surrendered to Jesus before, and she wanted to feel it again.

Krissy decided to sign up for the 2023 Honduras mission trip, and she longed for what it promised:  a spiritual awakening.  “I wanted revival. I needed renewal,” Krissy said. She had gone to Honduras on mission trips several times before.  Each time, she had experienced a spiritual awakening, only to fall right back asleep. But something felt different about this upcoming trip.  She began to fervently pray and even express to others, “I want things to be different for me when I come back home.” In the midst of her slumber, Krissy longed for lasting spiritual awakening.

 

Meet Maria

Maria Diaz’s experience of the pandemic was quite different from Krissy’s. As an ICU nurse, Maria’s work life became heavy and all-consuming. Long work hours, sickness, and death were all around. Isolation began to fill up the spaces that were once filled with friendship. When Covid caused all church services to go online, her feeling of spiritual community disintegrated. It was as though the spiritual wind was taken out of her sails.

Maria felt painfully distanced from her church community, family, and friends. Just as wearing a physical mask helped to shield her from invisible germs that could harm her, Maria’s emotional mask also shielded the fullness of her struggles from others. By protecting her friends and loved ones from the messier parts of who she was—her fears, her sin, her vulnerabilities—she also denied them the privilege of bearing her burdens and celebrating her victories.  In the process, she deprived herself of the joy that comes with sharing the deepest parts of her soul and being loved anyway.

When the imminent threat of Covid was over and people’s lives started to look normal again, Maria was determined for things to change. She was tired of going through the motions, attending church but not fully engaging with God and others. “I longed for something more than what I was experiencing in my spiritual life,” she said. At the same time, troubles began brewing at home. She had just stepped into what turned out to be one of the hardest seasons in her family’s life. As things began to unravel at home, Maria knew she was going to need other people around her.

Toward the end of 2022, she decided to get fully re-engaged at Clear Creek. Maria wanted things to be different and decided she was going to be “all in.” As soon as she could, Maria signed herself and her husband up for a small group. They were incredibly intentional with the people in their group, inviting different members over for dinner to get to know them. They were attending church regularly, and soon, even began leading their own small group, but she wanted something more. She wanted to leave the comforts of her life and serve people on international soil. When she heard about the mission trip to Honduras, she signed herself and her husband up for the trip. She did not know anyone else on the trip except for her husband, but that didn’t bother her. She knew this would be an opportunity to build deep friendships with other members of Clear Creek, and she was ready. Maria longed to know others and be known by them, even if it meant flying to another country to do it.

 

Meet Brianna

As the clouds of the Covid pandemic began to lift, Brianna Bolling found herself firmly planted at the Clear Lake Campus. She was deeply connected to her church community, having spent several years intentionally engaging and building deep roots there. She genuinely loved the people that made up the Clear Lake Campus, and she was fully bought in to the mission of seeing unchurched people become fully devoted followers of Christ. She was leading a high school girls’ group as a student ministry navigator and loving it. Serving students in this way felt like the perfect fit, meshing both her love of discipleship and her leadership skills into a role that felt like it was made for her.

“At that time, I was spiritually thriving, constantly looking for ways to be obedient to God,” she said. Her attitude was one of ready obedience. No matter what God was going to ask of her, she already knew her answer would be “Yes.” She loved Him, and His church, and she felt spiritually alive. When she heard about the trip to Honduras, she decided to go. Not because she had a desire to travel internationally or even go on a mission trip at all, but because she wanted to be obedient to God. Brianna wondered, “How could I encourage my students or people in my small group to sign up for a mission trip if I had never been on one myself?” So, she signed up for the trip, wanting to be obedient and to completely embrace the mission of the church.

As the trip approached, her adult small group started to dissolve into chaos. Her group was full of messy, broken people trying to live in community with one another, bringing all their baggage with them. It was hard. And, as leading a small group tends to do, it shined a light on her own brokenness as well. Brianna leaned on her group guide, Rachel Fisher, as she navigated the uncharted waters of a difficult small group. Through this, Brianna started to feel a need in her life for more women who were slightly older and beyond her stage of life. She longed for mentors in the faith to walk with, share struggles with, and to challenge her to be more like Jesus. She wondered who God might bring into her life to fill that role.

 

The Trip

What happened on the trip was not totally unexpected—the team bonded quickly and intensely.  Being on foreign soil with others in the name of Christ offered a beautiful experience. They felt a heightened sense of purpose for serving others and sharing the Gospel, knowing all the time, money, and effort it took for everyone to be there. It fused them together. Testimonies were shared; lives were impacted. The love of Christ united them all.

But according to Krissy, “I was skeptical that these new friendships would last after we got back home. The relationships that are formed on short term trips typically last no longer than the duration of the trip. Eventually, the norm goes back to being the norm.”

But something felt divinely different this time. “It took me by surprise when we came home, and the people from the trip kept calling. They kept texting, kept caring, and kept extending the open hands of friendship,” Krissy said. Some of the conversations that started in Honduras spilled over to the states. There were spiritual matters left unfinished, still things left to say, still decompressing and sharing about the impact of the trip. Soon, they were inviting each other to parties and other social events.

The shared time together continued growing deeper roots between Krissy, Brianna, and Maria. The storms of life inevitably hit, but their closely developing friendships helped them stand firm in Christ. Maria’s family struggles weren’t suddenly mended. In fact, when she returned, the storm continued to rage around her. The difference was, she wasn’t walking through it alone. Suddenly there were other women there, like a safety net ready to brace her fall.

“I see God’s hand in all of it,” Maria said, “the timing of the trip and when he brought Krissy and Brianna into my life. I had no idea how difficult my life would become, but God did. He was giving me the foundation of these friendships before life got really hard so that I would have them to cling to.”

Brianna’s small group didn’t magically pull themselves together while she was away. The struggles of leading messy people toward Jesus continued to be messy. But she gained two women to listen to her, to encourage her, and to challenge her.

Krissy’s temptation toward spiritual laziness and apathy didn’t immediately disappear either. But the ice around Krissy’s heart began to melt, and the counterfeit rest she was clinging to became less appealing. In the months following the mission trip, they counseled and uplifted one another. They grieved together and sorted through the confusion of life’s heartaches together. They found themselves scheduling intentional time to hang out and continue to do life together, even in the fast paced, isolating sort of busyness that is all too common.

“God called me to give my love away, to open my house, and open my heart to friendship again,” Krissy said. “I vowed that I would no longer serve the kingdom of self and comfort, letting those desires dictate my decisions. The joy of the Lord and His community is infinitely better.”

Today, Krissy, Maria, and Brianna are still deeply connected. The  years since the trip have brought with them a torrent of unexpected challenges, including health scares, struggles with kids, and other spiritual attacks. Each one of them has endured pain, fear, joy, longing, and everything else that comes along with living. Maintaining healthy friendships with broken people is hard, even when the friendships are forged on a life-changing, gospel-centered trip. But despite busy schedules, personality differences, and different life stages, their deep, lasting love for each other remains. Although all three of them were drawn to the trip with different motivations, God, in his kindness, gave them what they all truly needed—gospel friendship.

“I thought that the trip itself might possibly get me out of my spiritual funk,” Krissy said, “but I did not realize it would be the people that did that.”

Stones of Remembrance: Ali Llewellyn’s Story

/in , , /by

Ali Llewellyn’s life looks like most people’s: normal and ordinary. On any given day, she remains busy managing two teams at NASA and co-running a consulting company doing strategy for missional organizations. She even recently co-published a book entitled What Comes Next? about Christian leadership with her friend and business partner.

It was in the middle of the ordinary, in August 2023, that Ali received a major shock: her doctor diagnosed her with cancer. Ali’s response, however, was anything but ordinary. She became determined to not let cancer slow her down.

“I wanted to put cancer in its proper place,” Ali said. “I wasn’t willing for it to be my whole story, nor even a detour. I wanted it to be just a chapter. I’m not going to let it take away the things I care about, and it doesn’t define the terms of my life.”

Despite loved ones and co-workers encouraging her to consider slowing down to let her body rest, Ali persisted in her work and in the callings God had placed in her life. Knowing deep in her soul the love, strength, and wisdom of God, she chose to continue following Him despite her life changing dramatically.

“Growing up in church, I was a dedicated over-achieving little girl who knew all the answers and did all the things,” Ali said. “Doing church is not the same as being saved, though. I ended up at a summer camp where the gospel was shared with me, and it was there that I knew that I knew that He loves me.”

Standing on the lakeshore at Camp Allen, Ali sobbed profusely as she felt the love of God wrap strongly around her. Standing there was a new daughter of God who knew she was secure in a relationship with Him. In return, she wanted to know Him, too. Upon returning home, she began to ravenously read God’s word with the knowledge of how deeply God loves her fresh in her heart.

Ali hasn’t stopped yearning to grow closer to her Father since then; nor has she returned to the “church kid” performance she embraced as a child. When she began attending Clear Creek Community Church in 2022, she dug roots into a community of friends and family. These were the very people who told her “You belong to us” and would prove pivotal in Ali’s life throughout the next few years.

One of these pivotal moments arrived one night in early 2024, the night before Ali was to start chemotherapy. “A friend brought over a giant pink shopping bag stuffed with items and gifts. It was a message of ‘Hey, sorry you’re in the club that nobody wants to be in but we’re here with you,’” Ali said.

One of the most significant items in that bag for her was a quilt with a prayer tag sewn in it, noting that it had been stitched by someone with stage 4 cancer. “I had never met her because it was just left on my porch,” Ali explained. “But it was so humbling that someone with even more advanced cancer turned around and made this for me.” For Ali, this was a gift truly needed the most the night before chemo: the reminder that God was with her and so was her church community.

Two weeks later at church, Ali was at worship – and having difficulty standing up in the service – when someone sat next to her. Miraculously, that person happened to be the anonymous quilter. They started a conversation about how that quilt served them both and prayed for each other.

“God plants those seeds of hope that will help you process and move forward in the journey,” Ali shared.

Later in the spring, another pivotal moment of community happened during an annual girls’ trip, which would involve hiking through a river gorge. Exhausted and weak from surgery, and with her short hair barely coming in, Ali wasn’t sure how the trip would go. She looked at the climb ahead and felt major doubts at being able to travel to the other side. Her friends, however, rallied around her and declared, “We’re going to do it together. No one fights alone.”

“I have a desk job, and I’m not athletic,” Ali said. “I wasn’t honestly sure if I could make it, but my friends wanted to make the climb with me and were there the whole time. At the end, I was so energized. They asked me why that was, and I just replied, ‘It was easy because we did it together.’ Things I couldn’t do before cancer, I could now do in the middle of it.”

Since her diagnosis, chemo, and surgery, Ali’s life has not radically changed like she thought it would (besides climbing a literal mountain). Her life did not stop, either, because of cancer. Her work and general life still remains the same as it was before.

“The gospel goes deeper in my own heart than I even knew,” Ali shared. “Cancer demonstrated the things I thought would end the world but didn’t. We all have a thing in our heart that says, ‘If I had to do that I’d fall apart.’ For me, it was chemo. When chemo was my only option, then it was losing my hair. When I lost my hair, I recognized God’s kindness in showing me that the things I thought would destroy me didn’t. With Him, I have everything that I need.”

Ali recognized that God used cancer to draw her closer to Him and to teach her new things. She doesn’t always understand or like the lesson itself, but she treasures it nonetheless.

God’s reminders for Ali are the reasons she hasn’t slowed down in her work or in God’s callings of her life, despite other’s pleas to do so. That’s how she climbed the mountain despite just having surgery.

“Cancer doesn’t define the terms of life. God does!” Ali said. “As long as I remember where faith belongs and don’t get freaked out along the way, there’s really nothing I can’t do. God says, ‘With Me, you can do anything.’”

To grow one’s faith, one’s perception of God must shift first. When she first received her diagnosis, and then later discovered that she has a genetic disorder that predisposes her to cancer, Ali had to change her perception of God in order to deepen her faith despite the events in her life that seemed to contrast her knowledge of God and faith.

“We live in a broken world where sin and cancer are consequences of the fall,” Ali stated. “God uses it for my good–to demonstrate to me that He is God, and I am not, and that He can be trusted. Do I believe God gave me a predisposed genetic condition for this? I don’t know. Again, God is God, and I am not. But I know this: more is within me than I knew. There’s more hope and faith in me than I knew.”

By sharing her story, Ali strives to provide comfort to those experiencing a major life change themselves or walking alongside someone experiencing a major life change, like cancer.

“If I could go back before all of this, I would tell anyone in a trial, ‘The more you can know God and know yourself is going to help you in that trial,’” Ali shared. “Read God’s word, be in a community, serve people, and worship. The more you can do that, the more you’re making a deposit in the inner man. Out of the overflow of our heart the mouth speaks. Deposit everything you can before the crisis.”

Ali also learned and valued the importance of leaning on other people in difficult times. She knows that there is no virtue in independence and that we were never made to be alone in our pain. She highlights the importance of the idea of community in the gospel itself.

“I was the first person to ask my doctor if I could drive myself to chemo,” Ali said. “I was always independent, so I didn’t like the feeling of needing help or being dependent. Whatever the crisis is, we need people. There’s something in a community response that is part of God’s intent. So, find your circle and let them help you even when you think you don’t need it.”

In an email update to her care circle, dated shortly after her diagnosis, Ali wrote: “We can’t choose our road, though; we can only choose how we walk it. So, I choose to have hope and pay attention to the lessons and the good things. I want to set up stones of remembrance so I don’t forget.”

“And those twelve stones, which they took out of the Jordan, Joshua set up at Gilgal. And he said to the people of Israel, “When your children ask their fathers in times to come, ‘What do these stones mean?’ then you shall let your children know, ‘Israel passed over this Jordan on dry ground.’ For the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan for you until you passed over, as the Lord your God did to the Red Sea, which He dried up for us until we passed over, so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty, that you may fear the Lord your God forever.”   –Joshua 4:20-24 (ESV) 

As Ali finishes up her treatments, she continues to set up stones of remembrance. She tries not to set up stones of pain, suffering, hopeless nights, or questions of why cancer is happening. Instead, she sets up stones of remembrance of who God is, what He has done for her, and what He will continue to do.

“God is not a vending machine; I don’t get to make a wish and get what I want. But I do get to know Him. When I listen and conform, what I get is Him. So, I win.”

Community: The Heartbeat of Christians

/in , , /by

In C.S. Lewis’ allegorical story, The Great Divorce, Lewis depicts Hell as a place where the inhabitants are on a never-ending expansion away from God and each other. Early in the story we get to listen in on a conversation between two residents where this phenomenon is described:

The trouble is that they’re so quarrelsome. As soon as anyone arrives he settles in some street. Before he’s been there twenty-four hours he quarrels with his neighbor. Before the week is over he’s quarreled so badly that he decides to move.

The conversation continues by describing people as eventually moving further and further apart until they are “astronomical distances” from each other, every now and then moving further still away from God and neighbor.

This is such an apt picture of the culture we live in.

Our society is so quick to separate people into cliques and tribes based on any number of socially constructed categories, and this is exacerbated by a runaway individualism which continues to sort and separate until each person becomes a tribe of one, having no sense of belonging anywhere or with anyone. We continue to move further and further away from each other until we are so far apart it seems there can be no return.

Christians must be different. The Apostle Paul wrote in his letter to the Galatian church that, “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus,” (Gal. 3:28). To the Corinthian church he wrote, “For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body – Jews or Greeks, slaves or free – and all were made to drink of one Spirit,” (1 Cor. 12:12-13). Christians of course are still individuals with various cultures and languages, but we are individuals unified, placed into communion with each other, through the work of Jesus.

You see, entering into community is a requirement of becoming a Christian. We are baptized into community, into the body of Christ. To fully participate in the call of faith, to become a fully devoted follower of Jesus, requires us to not only move towards Jesus, but also to move towards others as Jesus did.

The practices of regularly worshipping together, taking the Lord’s Supper together, serving together, participating in small group together, caring for our neighbors together – these communal activities will, through the Holy Spirit’s help, begin to move us outward towards God and neighbor, eventually culminating in what theologian Scot McKnight calls a “fellowship of differents.” Revelation 7 describes it this way, “After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb,” (Rev. 7:9).

Let’s pray that God ignites and fans the flame of community in our hearts, inspiring us to love God, his church, and our unchurched neighbors, building a stronger church because of this love. Amen.

210: Friends Forever – The Wesleys and Cardens Guide to Friendship

/in , /by

Friendships can be difficult to maintain or even find as an adult, but how about a friendship that has lasted 30 years?

In this episode, Tiffany Ravedutti sits down with Bruce and Susan Wesley and Mark and Lisa Carden to celebrate and learn from their decades-long friendship.

The Michael Jeffrey Story

/in , , , , /by

“My small group is a safe place to ask my questions and I can honestly say it’s changed my life!”

Here is the full story of Michael Jeffrey’s small group experience.

Check out more information on small groups at clearcreek.org/smallgroups.

The Sidman Story

/in , , , , , /by

Ross and Alana Sidman have been small group Navigators at Clear Creek for years, living on mission, and inviting others to church all while walking their dog.

The Abby Steele Story

/in , , , , /by

Small group is a place you can come as you are, without fear of judgment, and be met with authenticity and acceptance.

Here is the story of Abby Steele’s small group experience.

Check out more information on small groups at clearcreek.org/smallgroups.

The Josh Yahoudy Story (Full)

/in , , , , , /by

Being in community in small group is where we believe that you will experience the greatest spiritual growth. It’s in small group that we are able to ask our questions, be vulnerable and honest with each other, care for each other, and encourage each other as we pursue God together.

Here is the full story of Josh Yahoudy’s small group experience.

Check out more information on small groups at clearcreek.org/smallgroups

 

4 Ways to Host on a Budget

/in , , , , , /by

What does it mean to be hospitable?

I think for many people the idea of being hospitable means we must be able to craft a beautiful meal and have a picture-perfect home that could be featured on HGTV.

When that’s our standard it’s easy to see why so many people are hesitant to open their homes and host people.

The truth is, hospitality has very little to do with the food or the state of your home. There are no set rules for what this is supposed to look like. We’re simply called to love the people in front of us with what God has given us, be it little or much.

So, what if it’s little?

I know many of us truly desire to serve people in our homes but are working with tight budgets that can make the whole idea feel stressful.

If that’s you don’t worry! There are inexpensive and practical ways to welcome people into your home without breaking your budget.

Here are four budget-friendly ideas that can easily aid you as a host:

1. Make a Plan

Being hospitable isn’t something that happens automatically, it’s something you must choose to be intentional about. I’m not a natural planner, but I’ve come to learn that if I don’t plan to spend intentional time with friends and neighbors, it will never happen. Our schedule will fill up or we will be “too tired,” when the time comes.

A few years ago, my husband and I sat down and made a list of the people we hoped to share a meal with that year. We looked at our calendar to see what nights of the week we routinely had available and committed to keep those nights open, dedicating one night a week to inviting someone to share a meal with us. Planning ahead helped us create regular rhythms of hospitality in our home, and also helped in budgeting time and resources accordingly. 

2. Allow Others to Contribute

One of the first things people tend to ask when someone has invited them to their home is “what can I bring?” Often we respond with “Nothing! Just bring yourself!”

That may seem like the most hospitable way to respond, but, by not allowing others to contribute, you are putting more of the burden on yourself while also denying your guests an opportunity to serve you. Simply let guests, who offer, bring something you know they can easily go grab at the store. If you are planning to have a larger group of people over, share the cost by planning a meal in which everyone can easily contribute. Make a list of all the things people can bring to complete the meal.

Remember, the whole point of the meal is not just eating, but creating an opportunity to spend time with people you love. When you allow others to contribute, not only will it cost you less, but it will save you time, and everyone sharing the meal will be blessed.

3. Be Prepared for the Unexpected

While many opportunities to be hospitable are centered around a planned meal, there can be times that demand spontaneity. You could get a phone call from a friend who just needs to come over and talk, or a neighbor may stop by for a quick chat. Maybe it’s a hot day and you notice your mail carrier would benefit from a cold bottle of water, or perhaps your house is the hub for all the neighbor kids, which means they will probably eat all your food too. It’s good to be prepared for little moments like these with small things on hand to offer.

It could be as simple as keeping your fridge stocked with bottles of water, having extra coffee on hand, or stashing break and bake cookie dough in the freezer just in case.

I also always include one meal I know will feed more than just my family of five. The weeks we don’t end up having people over we get good leftovers. But if we do host, we know there is a meal in the refrigerator ready to share. It’s a win-win all around!

4. Be Yourself

Our lives and homes don’t have to be in perfect order to invite others in. If you wait until everything is just right, you will likely wait forever.

When people see that you have unfinished dishes and dirty laundry in your house and you ordered take out instead of cooking, they aren’t going to judge you, and they aren’t going to wish they hadn’t come over.

Instead, they’ll breathe a sigh of relief knowing you are a real person, just like them. In fact, when you’re truly yourself and let people into your life (your REAL life), it dissipates a lot of pressure and allows for genuine community to flourish.

Being a good host does not mean you need to pay someone to clean your house within an inch of perfection or that you should spend a week’s grocery budget on fine wine and a lavish meal.

When you let go of what the world (and Pinterest) tells you your home should look like and just be who you are — who God created you to be — then your table will begin to look more and more like Jesus’ table which was never so much about the table, but rather who sat around it.

 

So, here’s the moral of the story: you can do this!

And I hope you will!

In the end, few people will remember the quality of that cup of coffee or how perfectly put together your house was. What they won’t forget is the way you opened your doors, welcomed them into your home, and nourished their souls.