Spiritual Growth Journey
My name is Cindy Bingaman and I have been on a spiritual growth journey. I currently live in Harrogate, Tennessee, USA. I have lived in 9 states and 2 countries.
I am the youngest of 3 children and the only daughter. We were raised in a Christian home and sent to Christian schools. We were there every time the church doors opened. I received Christ as my Savior early on but it wasn’t until I was in my mid-twenties that I really started to gain a deeper understanding. It’s only been within the last 2 years that I have come to understand God’s amazing grace on my spiritual growth journey. Grace was not taught nor practiced in my family. My own mother and father disinherited me 3 times.
In my late thirties, I went through a horrible divorce and I was spiraling out of control. I lived in an area with no family for support, 2 beautiful children to raise, and an ex-husband that would not help in any financial way. At 41, I was at the end of myself. I begged God to be Lord of my life on my spiritual growth journey.
Shortly thereafter, God brought me to my husband, Les. We went through middle school and high school together. He had gone through a horrible marriage too. He was in Germany, I was in North Carolina. God worked in and through us both in healing emotional scars. Jesus Christ has been the center of our relationship. We have been married for 8 years.
We live in a small rural town. It was not our intention to be here. God just brought us here. My husband is a retired military disabled veteran. God knew what Les needed, peace and quiet.
Our area, although it’s in the “Bible Belt” meaning there is a church on nearly every corner, is 85% unchurched or have left the church. The church we are attending is reaching out to the 85%. It is only 3 years into the ministry. We are growing. My pastor asked if I would lead a women’s Bible study. In the past, I would have said no. Les and I were starting to study Jonah prior to his asking, so I did not say no. I spent days in prayer. I kept coming back to the excuse of not being equipped.
Then, God brought me to Christian Leaders Institute. As I poured over the website, I thought I would love to go through the entrepreneur track. Still, more prayer and God said you will do women’s ministry track. I started the getting started class. Now I am hungry for more. So much prayer has been poured into “God show me where you want me”. I had thought about going back to school, but there is no Bible Seminary and I am my husband’s caregiver. He has so many doctors appointments and the VA hospital is a 2-hour drive. Attending a school would not be possible.
My pastor has agreed to be one of my mentors. He is very excited about this. We talked about ordination which he also thinks is great. He is encouraging me to get a Chaplain certificate as that would open even more doors of opportunity. I am so excited, it is as if scales have fallen from my eyes on this spiritual growth journey. I’m seeing the possibilities for where God can use me. All of this because of God’s amazing grace!! Thank you, CLI, for making this possible!
Learn about minister ordination with Christian Leaders Alliance.
Revival Hope
I am Doug Berryhill. I have the privilege to tell you about God’s incredible role in healing me from my past and giving me revival hope.
My life was great in the beginning. But things soon started downhill: my mother had depression problems. She depended on sleeping pills for help. When the depression became overwhelming she committed suicide. It was a month before my sixth birthday. I was crushed. I was alone. I saw myself as a victim – a pawn in some awful experiment. I withdrew and became a loner – I was socially clumsy and not popular at all. I was the kid that everyone else made fun of. By the 4th grade or so, I would have been voted The Most Likely To Fail.
But my Dad was a major presence in my life. He was my link to the reality of love, caring and belonging. I did poorly in school and I wasn’t much of an athlete, but my Dad loved me. We spent a lot of time together, my Dad and I. It was because he loved me.
But in my mid-teens, my Dad began to change. Over time, he became convinced that he needed to raise some money. So he purchased a life insurance policy on my life with himself as the beneficiary and made some calculations. The back of that policy still has the handwriting that is my Dad’s. It has the words: “If he does not die before about” … and something about 2 days … and a place where he calculated how much he could get from the policy and for my car if I was no longer around. Then he called me into the house, explained that he needed to raise some money and that to do so, he was going to have me killed.
My last, best hope was gone. Abandoned again. Deep, deep pain again. Alone AGAIN.
But my God was watching out for me! While I was in college, I met someone at the Wesley Foundation who I could hold onto. I met a wonderful young lady named Shirley. We’ve been married for 48 years.
Yet, there was still a great emptiness inside me. My mother abandoned me by destroying herself; my Dad abandoned me by trying to destroy me. Was there nothing or no one that I could trust completely? Was there no one that I could belong to that was absolutely secure and that couldn’t be wiped out by death, suicide or a change in perspective?
The great undercurrent of my life has been focused on answering a complex three-part question:
• who can I trust absolutely?
• who won’t abandon me?
• who will heal my memories?
Some 25 years ago, I participated in a psychological examination that is renowned for its accuracy and thoroughness. It said that I had deep, deep wounds and that I was greatly at risk in 2 or 3 significant categories. Psychologically I was in very serious trouble. You know what they can’t figure out? They can’t explain why I’m not in jail or a psychiatric ward somewhere… or worse. They can’t explain it because the survey doesn’t take into account the healing and rebuilding power of our great God who gives me revival hope!
You know, the great thing is that God didn’t have to do a lot with me – just convince me of the Truth, that’s all. I can’t explain how God did it. But the conduit for that healing was the Bible and learning about His character and plan which brought me revival hope in Him.
In studying the Bible over the years, I learned:
• it’s His great desire that I belong to Him.
• He’s in the business of calling the people of His creation into His eternal family.
• that as much as I want to belong to Him, He wants me even more.
• that in Jesus Christ He provided everything I need – the perfect way of Belonging.
Being a part of God’s eternal family has replaced my aloneness with an incredible sense of Belonging and revival hope. So I am at peace… I’ve been made whole and I’m not afraid anymore! I am filled with joy! It’s because I have a Home and because I belong to the eternal God of all Creation. Nothing can take that away from me, after all, my Daddy, my Abba Father, loves me!
Now I have this opportunity to study and learn more about our great God at Christian Leaders Institute. I am happy to continue to grow in Him and follow where He leads me in revival hope!
Learn about minister ordinations with Christian Leaders Alliance.
Christian Leader Ministry Training
My name is Gloria Belonwu and I am receiving Christian Leader ministry training at CLI. My country of origin is Nigeria in West Africa, but I am a citizen of the United States of America now. I was born in September of 1963 into a Christian family. Our denomination was formerly known as the “Christian Missionary Society” but is currently known as the Anglican Church or the Church of England. I received an infant baptism at birth and got confirmed into the church communion during my preteens. Growing up, I will say that I knew quite a lot about God and Jesus Christ through the teachings at the church and through the Bible knowledge classes in high school where I tried to read and memorize some scriptures in order to pass the class. But I did not have a personal relationship with God or any encounter with Christ until later in my life.
In 1990, I got married to Mr. Christian Belonwu in a small Baptist Church in his village. I gave my life to Christ in 1995 at a dinner program that was organized by the “Full Gospel” businessmen’s fellowship. I had some disagreement with my husband at that time with my new faith. He did not want me to go too deep into it because he was scared that these wealthy Christian brothers would take his wife from him. In order to calm down my husband’s fears, I decided to leave the full “Gospel Fellowship” and joined the “Scripture Union of Nigeria” and I was able to grow spiritually here.
The decision to be a Christian leader and receive Christian leader ministry training has been in my mind after leading my small Baptist church at one point in the late nineties. Also from my quest to know God more and find out ways to serve Him. I have been telling my family and friends for years now that I will be going to Bible school after retirement. I put the Bible school training after retirement because of my full-time job and current financial burden which I believed would be better after retirement. But I changed my mind when I found out about online free Christian Leader ministry training with Christian Leaders Institute.
I plan to use the knowledge and experience from the Christian Leaders Institute to help in many areas in my current church. Since I plan to go back to Nigeria at some point after retirement, I will want to help my local church in their spiritual growth and my community at large. Free Christian leaders training will mean a lot to me at this time. The scholarship program will help me to start doing the training now while I still have the energy and strength instead of waiting until after retirement. I pray that God will help me to achieve my goals as a Christian Leader in Jesus name.
Learn about minister ordination with Christian Leaders Alliance.