In On Purpose: Finding God’s Voice in Your Passion, authors Magrey deVega, Sam McGlothlin, Jevon Caldwell-Gross, and Susan Robb help us see God's purpose for our lives, how to open ourselves to God's voice, and how to take the first or next step to follow God's call. Reading this book and exploring life choices alongside others, individuals will learn how to channel their passions, hear God’s voice, and live the life they were meant to live.
To support reading in a group, resources include a full leader’s guide and DVD with four teaching sessions.
Watch this promo to learn more about this study. Additional components include:
The BTS Center is a private foundation in Portland, Maine, building on the legacy of the former Bangor Theological Seminary.
Today The BTS Center seeks to catalyze spiritual imagination, with enduring wisdom, for transformative faith leadership by offering theologically grounded programs of continuing education and spiritual formation, including workshops and retreats, learning cohorts, public conversations, and projects of applied research.
Join the BTS Center on a journey of discovery and exploration at the intersection of spiritual leadership and ecological imagination.
Spiritual Discernment Toolkit: How to hear from God
The process of discernment—hearing from God—is a spiritual practice, a means by which we grow in our faith and relationship with God. Here are a few ways that you might step into, or “try on,” discernment.
Discover the Ten Year Plan in this interview between Tim Ferriss and Debbie Millman. (The Ten Year Plan exercise is from 1:30-1:40.) Traci Smith highly recommends the interview and the author's cards and a step-by-step GUIDE.
Based on their discussion with Clara King about lay-led ministry Faith+Lead decided to dedicate an entire Q&A episode to address them.
In this listener-inspired episode, Rev. Dr. Dwight Zscheile, Rev. Dr. Terri Elton, and Dr. Alicia Granholm dive into the shift from clergy-led to lay-led ministry models, tackling audience questions head-on and exploring the implications of this change for churches like yours.
Lessons from pastors who have left parish ministry
By G. Jeffrey MacDonaldJournalist and UCC minister in Duke Divinity's Faith & Leadership
Though the number of pastors leaving parish ministry hasn’t amounted to a “great resignation,” those who have left still offer insight into the current state of the American church.
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Start with listening.
Avoid making assumptions about your community's needs, and instead, listen with intention to the people inside your faith community and in your surrounding area to understand what assets already exist and where the needs truly are.
Over the course of approximately one month, the Community Discovery Package will guide your group through three activities and two gatherings. You'll listen deeply to the people in your community, cultivate curiosity about why your community is the way it is, ask through-provoking questions, and experience your surroundings through new lenses.
This resource is for you if:
Pricing for the Community Discovery Package is based on your faith community's size, starting at just $100.
Order the Community Discovery Package.