Q WHAT MADE YOU PIVOT FROM A CORPORATE CAREER TO A CAREER IN MINISTRY AT CROSSROADS CHURCH?
I began to have this growing and unshakable feeling during my corporate career at Procter & Gamble that I should be closer to the church. Honestly, when I left P&G, all my friends and bosses thought I was crazy with a capital “C.” The biggest risk I ever took was leaving my career to go work in the church. My boss said, “I hope you know what you’re doing because this is what you’re walking away from,” and then she showed me all these numbers and bonuses. I left her office thinking, “Of course I don’t know what I’m doing. Otherwise, it’s not faith.” Not a lot of women think of themselves as risk takers, and that doesn’t really do us any good because a life of faith is about taking risks.
When I stayed home with my four children for seven years, that’s when my interest in teaching started to emerge. Sometimes God has to strip us down to get our attention about what is in us. I’m aware of the general gifts and skills that God has put in me to give to others. I think if I’m in that lane somewhere, there’s a lot of room for risk, adventure and new opportunities.
Q WHY DID YOU WRITE YOUR FIRST BOOK, “HOW TO STAY STANDING: THREE ESSENTIAL PRACTICES FOR BUILDING A FAITH THAT LASTS”?
Living in Cincinnati, I see a lot of good people who are doing all right. They might even say they believe in God but don’t really have a faith that would hold them up when trouble comes — and they don’t even know it. You either have a faith that’s real where you’ve experienced God for yourself or else when trouble comes into your life, you won’t be able to stand. I’ve watched too many people say they love God and when crap hits the fan, their faith falls apart. Some people will encounter this book in a place of collapse, and I hope they do. The reality is we don’t know what we’re standing on until our life falls apart a little bit.
Q WHAT HAVE YOU LEARNED FROM WRITING YOUR BOOK?
I’ve discovered that I have a heart for nonprofits and people who are trying to help vulnerable women stay standing. Every time I serve at the Dayton Correctional Institution, I meet with women inmates who think they are broken. I tell them that we all have stories riddled with pain. I love being able to communicate to women that they are not their worst action or their darkest moment. They are more than that, and they are worth rebuilding. I tell them that God can do whatever he wants with their life from wherever they are now. I love that I get to spend my life talking about a goodness and a strength that goes far beyond me.