from Jim Herrington
This has been a banner year for Faithwalking. In seven years, God has taken a weekend 101-retreat to a ministry that is impacting people, congregations and communities in cities in the U.S., Canada, and Central America. This update captures a few highlights from 2014.
In Houston, the work continues growing. This past year, we led twenty-two retreats in Houston. We have a growing presence in the Spanish-speaking community, and volunteers largely run the 101 retreats in the English-speaking community. A dozen congregations now use Faithwalking in their discipleship ministry, and we launched the Compass Initiative to support congregations utilizing Faithwalking to launch missional communities.
Outside of Houston, we launched work in San Antonio and Denver, and we continue supporting work in Dallas, Guatemala City, Midland Michigan and another dozen cities through our work with Western Seminary. Next month, we will host the first learning community in Houston bringing key leaders from these cities together for problem solving and encouragement.
That’s a snapshot of the significant growth of the ministry, and we are grateful for God’s blessings reflected in this growth. The thing that energizes us more than the numbers of retreats, participants and cities are the stories of personal transformation.
Recently I was training a coach-in-training. As a part of the training, I asked, “Tell me why you volunteer to coach?”
She replied with great enthusiasm. “I’ve been a Christian for thirty years. In my forties, my faith became dull and boring. I became cynical about church and bored with my life. Through the Faithwalking work, I was confronted with numerous integrity gaps in my life, and I was provided with a supportive coach (in 201) who helped me address those gaps.”
I asked, “What was the impact of doing that work?”
She said, “The most noticeable thing is that my relationship to my husband has been renewed. We’ve been married for 31 years, and our relationship had grown stale. As I cleaned up some integrity gaps with him, not only was our personal relationship been renewed, but we have found a common ministry to share that brings a renewed sense of purpose to our lives.”
That’s just snippet of a conversation like ones we hear daily. God is transforming people’s lives through the Faithwalking ministry.
As we look to 2015, we need your support more than ever. It’s the generosity of gifts and donations that fuel our ministry’s growth. Without those gifts, none of the stories above would be possible. I know many of you donate to the Faithwalking ministry in many ways – with your time, your talents, and your finances. We humbly ask that you would continue your giving – or start giving back to the Faithwalking ministry. We realize that many of you may not be able to give what you would consider a “large enough amount to matter”, but know that any donation – no matter how large or small IS large enough to matter for us.
Thank you for your prayerful consideration and for all that you have done and continue to do as a part of the Faithwalking community!
