Consultation
Trauma Healing
Couples on Mission
Diversity & Oneness in Missions
Chaplaincy
An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
For more than 26 years, Sowing Seeds of Joy has been deliberate in giving and exchanging guidance/information on a variety of subject matter among churches and agencies within the global Christian movement communities. Speaking engagements, mentoring/coaching, and discipling opportunities have been prominent and engaging activities for the organization’s founders, staff, volunteers, and board members. The organization’s mantra “connecting the hearts of people to the heart of God” is endorsed throughout workshops, conferences, Zoom calls, and one-on-one encounters from year to year. Sowing Seeds of Joy is very much active in cultivating missions, relationships, and humanitarian outreach in word and deed.
CONSULTATIVE SERVICES
More than 20 years of Kingdom impact and expertise
-
Mobilizing Communities of Color
-
Diversity of Missions
-
Racial Reconciliation
-
Chaplaincy Preparation
-
Missions Development
-
Marriage, Family, and Missions
-
Diaspora of Unreached People Groups
-
Safe Conversations
So, how might we serve you?
Trauma Healing
Trauma is everywhere. People are gaining more awareness of how trauma impacts a life, not just at the incident and recovery level – but if unaddressed or repressed, it can have a huge negative impact on a life. Hearts are hardened by anger and bitterness, and the seed falls on this hard ground and does not take root. In offering this training, we desire to produce laborers interested in replicating the efforts of Sowing Seeds of Joy; our message is “connecting the hearts of people to the heart of God.”
Upon request, Sowing Seeds of Joy certified facilitators Ron and Star Nelson will provide training a group size of 8–16 individuals per session. This Trauma Healing training equips church leaders and lay persons with basic mental health and Biblical principles to better respond to their own inner pain, and to that of others. Our aim is to multiply us as facilitators of trauma healing sessions. Once trained and certified, you, as a trauma healing facilitator, provide basic trauma care. This training/trauma healing session is conducted at the offices of Sowing Seeds of Joy or at the host/church site. The cost of this training is $175 per person. Noted cost covers registration, administration, presentation, and handouts.
“SSOJ provided me the opportunity to focus on serving other people in need of hearing God’s good news message and encouragement in living the gospel at a time when I unexpectedly needed to focus on that same message for myself. After the unexpected death of my father in 2013 I was depressed and going on a mission trip to Haiti was honestly, the last thing I wanted to do.
However, I had already verbally committed to attending. SSOJ leaders and the Haiti team members came alongside me to guide and help me in fundraising and
other preparation tasks. That time has left an indelible mark on my life by facilitating the opportunity to serve and connect with other people and another culture for the cause of Christ.
This experience has shaped perspective, causing me to be more culturally conscious and missional-minded as I go throughout daily life. Additionally, one of the team members has become one of my closest friends (we were both bridesmaids in each other’s wedding), and I am still in contact with several other members of our team today.”
~ Bryana Robinson
Couples on Mission
Sowing Seeds of Joy offers a healthy marriage program.
This service can be used for pre-marital counseling. There are no eligibility requirements for enrollment into the program. This program is Sowing Seeds of Joy’s answer to advocating for couples to be on mission with God starting with their union. We believe learning to serve together is one of the keys to happiness and sustainability. Couples who complete the pre-marital education through Sowing Seeds of Joy will receive a completion certificate. The curriculum provided cultivates voluntary marriage and relationship education skills.
All couples will experience an interactive faith-based workshop. Couples will receive marital tools to enhance and grow their marriages in the areas of communication, roles of the husband/wife, intimacy, and servanthood. Couples will also learn of three traits of a Marriage on Mission as follows:
1) A couple on mission is hospitable. As soon as Aquila and Priscilla arrived in their new city, they opened their home.
2) A couple on mission is willing to see themselves as a part of the solution; they seek to be a part of the solution.
3) A couple on mission is faithful to the end. And Much More.
This training Healthy Marriage workshop is conducted at the offices of Sowing Seeds of Joy, or at the Nelson’s home. The cost of this training is $225 ($70 discount for couples, making the cost $155). Refreshments will be provided. This training can also be conducted via Zoom upon request. Noted cost covers registration, administration, presentation, and handouts; however, it does not cover the cost of the required book(s).
Diversity & Oneness
in Missions
Sowing Seeds of Joy is invested in seeing and being a part of a healthy missions community. That said, we are heavily engaged in training, giving talks, providing information, and advocating for diversity and inclusion within and among the ranks of mission agencies, their leadership, and missionaries. As a bridge to the nations, and ambassadors for the Great Commission, we believe it to be our organizational responsibility to plant the seed of unity
among those who carry the gospel to the nations and do so with the intentionality of involving all people of color (POC). A dismal statistic is that ½ of 1% of the current missionary force in the world is African American; we take little pleasure in noting that fact and that African Americans and other POC are “MIA”(missing in action) on the cross-cultural mission fields of the world. As an organization, we wholeheartedly agree with the preacher, author, and theologian John Piper.
Read the following excerpt from God’s Ultimate Goal: Excerpt from “A Holy Ambition” - By John Piper:
God’s ultimate goal in creation and redemption is to uphold and display His glory for the enjoyment of His redeemed people from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. This is the main thing. This is God’s ultimate goal, and it happens to be for the enjoyment of His redeemed people. And those people, in God’s design, happen to be of every people and tribe and tongue and nation. Oh, how I would love to make the case that this diversity, this cultural and ethnic and racial diversity here, is essential to this! God did not make us as different as we are culturally, ethnically, and racially for nothing. It is not an accident. It is not a punishment after the tower of Babel. This is because a diverse song sung to The Redeemer is more glorifying to the Redeemer than a simple song in unison. If we all sang one note, from one culture, from one ethnicity, from one race, it would have a loud and glorious sound, but oh, it would not look or sound like the song that will be sung to The Redeemer from diversity as He is winning it from.
The author, John Piper, is spot on with his thoughts on diversity and its relationship to honoring God.
Chaplaincy
Why I Became a Chaplain: I have a deep passion for the world. I have a clear calling to serve those in need. In essence, I became certified as a chaplain to fulfill that purpose. I believe that no one should have to go through crisis alone. I have joined over 1,700 Chaplains who are active and currently credentialed by the International Fellowship of Chaplaincy (I.F.O.C.) to bring care in the areas of police, fire, medical, prisons, search & rescue, sports, colleges, hospice, nursing homes, bikers, and others.
What does being a Chaplain mean? It means to minister in areas of critical incident stress, grief and loss, trauma, and stress management; it means providing counsel, education, advocacy, life-improvement skills, and recovery training; it means building a bridge between the secular and spiritual environments of community life; it means bringing life-changing service in every sector of community life, such as health and welfare, education, transitional living, emergency service, and governmental support. Sowing Seeds of Joy accepts the challenge to engage in the crises of the world and invites others to join them and God on mission.
As a chaplain, how might I serve you?