asMessage to the Wanderer: Go Home
My name is Steve. I’m from Franklin, MA. Currently, I am a called servant leader and studying at the Christian Leaders Institute (Learn more about online free Bible courses, Click Here).
My Story
My story started when I accepted Jesus at eight years old in my heart. It was then that my family accepted Christ due to a healing miracle my cousin Jim experienced. Further, there was Jim’s vision of Christ at the foot of his bed shortly before the scheduled operation. Their family and ours were nonbelievers. Yet, we understood the power of what had happened and who it was that Jim said he saw that night by his bedside, Jesus.
We were faithful to follow Christ through church attendance and small groups. As a result, I was filled with the power of the Holy Spirit and the speaking of tongues at the age of 12. I loved Jesus. But then, the trauma.
It wasn’t until recently that the Holy Spirit showed me to help me process life experiences properly in His ever caring way. I realized it was this same event, my Grandfather dying violently beside me in my childhood home, that was the entry point. It led to decades of rage, insecurities, injustices, pity, and fear. Then all the actions and consequences came from those chaotic emotions that my then 12-year-old heart could understand or comprehend.
Trauma Impact
Failure and incompletion after failure and incompletion, my choices led me further and further away from the Lord and everything having to do with Jesus. In my early teens, I was stealing alcohol from my Dad and deep into experimenting with the typical gateway drugs. I turned away from the worship of God and turned into a rebel with a rebel’s heart. I was disobedient and hurtful towards my parents, disallowing the protective love that I so desperately needed but didn’t know I needed.
There were troubles in my Christian Middle School, in my public High School, with the law, keeping any jobs, in my military service, and with my relationships into my adult years. Drugs and alcohol couldn’t soothe the pain, women couldn’t cure the anger, and staying distracted proved itself unable. It seemed as if my cycles of destruction were the only truth in my desperate life.
Turning Point
This cycle carried on for many years, with my choice of pain relief escalating to the highest level of drug use and alcoholism. So much so, it ultimately became my everyday state of being. I was not looking for this to end, nor did I even know how to stop if I wanted. My life was of such dysfunction that I was in a relationship that ended with my being threatened with my fiancee’s murder-suicide attempt.
I needed help. Yet, I wasn’t availing myself of repentance or God. However, my situation was bound to turn for good because I had a praying Mom in my corner. She battled fiercely for me.
Just a few short months after this threat against my life, I was weak enough to be vulnerable to the “calling home” of the Holy Spirit. He asked me a straightforward question, “Which do you want, son, what you’re chasing after, or what I have for you.?” I broke! I wept for the last 25 years of being a spiritual runaway! Then, I repented as if my life depended on it! I renounced my rebellious deeds and desires as a man escaping death! Finally, I renewed my relationship with the Creator of this beautiful universe, and my Heavenly Father welcomed me home!
Changed and Called as a Servant Leader
Within days, God supernaturally set me free from drugs and alcohol. Within weeks, I had an intelligent vocabulary restored, and within months, I was smoke-free. That same year, I was gifted a business opportunity by the Lord through a connection in my church. Then, at the end of that year, I was introduced to my now-wife, Janet. We’ve been servants for the Lord together since and are also the foster parents to a beautiful 13-year-old daughter.
I’ve come to appreciate the compassion and unconditional love that my parents modeled to me through these troubled years of living. I pray that God continues to see fit to use me as a called servant leader wherever and however possible. Further, I’m grateful to the leadership and staff here at the Christian Leaders Institute for opening up even more possibilities for me to be a called servant leader to all that I come in contact with. All Glory to Christ! Peace to you all!
Steps to Sign Up At Christian Leaders Institute
Step 1 – Register for a free study account that automatically enrolls you in the Christian Leaders Getting Started Course Part 1 &2.
After you register, you will automatically be enrolled in the “getting started” course. You will locate the course at your “home” button when logged in. Scroll down to find the Christian Leaders Getting Started Course Part 1 &2 Link. Click the link and open the course.
Step 2 – Complete Part 1 of this course, and then you are allowed to enroll in mini-courses or regular courses.
The Christian Leaders Getting Started Class Part 1 shows you how to enroll in courses and mini-courses. Part 2 of the course connects your calling into ministry with programs offered through Christian Leaders Institute. Part 2 will offer some ministry training and introduce you to the other programs offered through Christian Leaders Institute.
Learn more about ordination at the Christian Leaders Alliance. Interested in a low-cost college degree? Check out the CLI’s Leadership Excellence School.
From Ashes to Beauty
My name is Ruth. My father wanted to ensure his daughters grew up with a solid biblical name to remind us constantly of God’s presence in our lives. I’ve had ups and downs with that, but God is faithful. Now, I am at the Christian Leaders Institute gaining competence in my ministry calling (Learn more about online free Bible courses, Click Here).
My Spiritual Journey
My parents came to the USA from Portugal soon after they married. So, my sister and I were born here. We grew up faithfully and fervently attending our bi-lingual church, mostly every day of the week and twice on Sundays. At 12 years old, I realized I should give my life to Christ officially and publicly, so I did. I was a child and had the faith of a child. The church we attended was sound, but those growing up in it seemed to grow in its culture and not so much in personal faith for ourselves.
When I went away to college, I drifted from what had become a superficial relationship with Jesus. I partied and lived a generally wild life. That life proved to be good at one thing, getting me kicked out of school and back home. My husband and I met when I was 21. We married almost four years later. Nine months after our vows, my father passed. Three months after that, I was pregnant with our son. A year after that, I had thyroid cancer.
During all this time, I used God as a bandaid. I went to Him in my need and walked away once He fixed or healed it. We had a daughter five years after our son. We bought houses and built our kingdom as the foundation of our lives silently crumbled. On the verge of divorce, I well and truly cried out to Jesus that I was done doing things my way. I needed Him and only Him. Again, He rescued me.
Ministry Journey: Gaining Competence in My Calling at CLI
Married for almost 22 years now, our children, 20 and 15 years old, grew up in a loving, God-fearing home. Unfortunately, when I had my thyroid surgery, the doctor inadvertently nicked my vocal cords and paralyzed the left one. God has since called me to sing. He has given me a desire to play guitar and my husband a desire for bass and sound. Our son plays six instruments, and our daughter plays five. We have a worship team and a family ministry band called SEED Christian Music. God has made beautiful what was dead and broken. He has made beauty from ashes. There is no way I could have imagined what a life He had planned for us.
In recent years, I’ve found myself in many mentoring and counseling roles in my church with young women of our congregation. God has placed it on my heart to be well prepared for the next mission He wants me on. This is the reason I have decided to study with CLI/CLI. I want to do my very best to be a well-equipped soldier for whatever comes next. I am excited to be gaining competence in my calling from God. Then I can help lead those hurting as I was into His loving arms.
Steps to Sign Up At Christian Leaders Institute
Step 1 – Register for a free study account that automatically enrolls you in the Christian Leaders Getting Started Course Part 1 &2.
After you register, you will automatically be enrolled in the “getting started” course. You will locate the course at your “home” button when logged in. Scroll down to find the Christian Leaders Getting Started Course Part 1 &2 Link. Click the link and open the course.
Step 2 – Complete Part 1 of this course, and then you are allowed to enroll in mini-courses or regular courses.
The Christian Leaders Getting Started Class Part 1 shows you how to enroll in courses and mini-courses. Part 2 of the course connects your calling into ministry with programs offered through Christian Leaders Institute. Part 2 will offer some ministry training and introduce you to the other programs offered through Christian Leaders Institute.
Learn more about ordination at the Christian Leaders Alliance. Interested in a low-cost college degree? Check out the CLI’s Leadership Excellence School.
My name is Merve Joseph. I am studying at the Christian Leaders Institute (Learn more about online free Bible courses, Click Here). The following is my journey to ministry study online at CLI.
My Family and Work
I am from the beautiful Caribbean twin-island states of Antigua and Barbuda. I grew up in the small village of New Winthropes in the island’s northern region. My extraordinary wife is Tallio. Together we have an amazing daughter, Keziah Joseph, age nine (9).
My employment is with the Government of Antigua within the Family and Social Service Division. I am in the Counselling Unit, where I have functioned as a Biblical counselor for approximately eight (8) years. I desire to continuously present Jesus Christ as our life and the solution in all our earthly circumstances.
My Journey to Ministry Study Online at CLI
Growing up, I attended the Wesleyan Holiness Church with my great aunt, Ms. James, on Sundays. However, during my teenage years through my young adulthood, I only attended church on “old year’s eve” to ring in the New Year!
I started thinking about the meaning of my life and my purpose here on planet earth in 2000. After I tragically tore my ACL during the first University basketball game of my senior year. In my mid-twenties, preceding my university years, I started attending the St. John’s Pentecostal Church in the capital city of Antigua. Sometime during the Pentecostal journey, I called upon the Lord Jesus Christ as my Savior. I had no earthly idea what it meant to have the Lord as my Savior during those years.
After that, I spent ten (10) years in the Pentecostal Denomination. I was trying to fill the deep-seated spiritual vacuum within my spirit that only Jesus Christ Himself is the source. Eventually, I met the Person of Jesus Christ. The People to People Ministry taught me who Jesus is and what He means in my life. Today, I know that I am a child born of God, and my passion is to proclaim Jesus Christ!
Through the Christian Leaders Institute online, I will be better equipped to proclaim Jesus Christ. I will also know His Word more accurately and effectively. Thank you for reading my journey to ministry study online!
Steps to Sign Up At Christian Leaders Institute
Step 1 – Register for a free study account that automatically enrolls you in the Christian Leaders Getting Started Course Part 1 &2.
After you register, you will automatically be enrolled in the “getting started” course. You will locate the course at your “home” button when logged in. Scroll down to find the Christian Leaders Getting Started Course Part 1 &2 Link. Click the link and open the course.
Step 2 – Complete Part 1 of this course, and then you are allowed to enroll in mini-courses or regular courses.
The Christian Leaders Getting Started Class Part 1 shows you how to enroll in courses and mini-courses. Part 2 of the course connects your calling into ministry with programs offered through Christian Leaders Institute. Part 2 will offer some ministry training and introduce you to the other programs offered through Christian Leaders Institute.
Learn more about ordination at the Christian Leaders Alliance. Interested in a low-cost college degree? Check out the CLI’s Leadership Excellence School.