First Time Speaker Retrospective

Today I assumed the role of "speaker" for the first time in my life.  I spoke to a group of women on a Zoom meeting for a bible study I am participating in.  I did not know how to approach the task of preparing ahead of time.  I wrote down a few thoughts, but in the end, I felt a little jumbled.  Here's what I wish I would have said:

Some background on me.  I first attended calvary chapel in May of 2018, when I was invited to the Plantation area to stay with friends.  I think, mistakenly, they thought that I attended church, and I thought that they did.  As it turned out, I really liked Calvary Chapel Plantation, which was streaming the live feed from Pastor Doug that weekend.  The message really resonated with me, as did the rest of the weekend getting to know this sweet couple and their somewhat grumpy dog.  He growled at me a lot :)

When I returned home to Colorado, I began attending church pretty regularly via the online services offered on Sunday and Wednesday evening.  In July of 2018, I decided to rededicate my life to God, because the messages were really impacting me.  I received via email a link to the P.R.A.I.S.E  bible study method.  This is what I consider my first introduction to inductive study of the bible.

Over the next few years I continued to attend Calvary Chapel Fort Lauderdale via their live services offered online.  The live service offers a chat room where you are greeted by volunteers with roles such as:  prayer, greeter, online pastor.  The ministry that they offer is great, because it makes you feel welcome and connected during a remote worship experience.  However, due to the nature of managing a large online worship experience, over time this began to lack depth for me.  I loved connecting with the other participants, but we had to stay focused on our "purpose" in the online chat room --- to watch the live service and keep our comments limited to that.  I began to long for more depth in my experience.

In November 2019, the online pastor extended an invitation to the participants in the chat room to email him about studying the bible in greater depth.  This pastor and I began to use the P.R.A.I.S.E. method daily via a short email to one another.  However, over time, I did not feel like this was the collaborative effort I had hoped for, and I became frustrated.  After less than a month, I could no longer keep up with the accountability of the effort, for which I felt terrible.

Sometimes as I watched online and wished for greater connectedness, I day dreamed that we could start an online bible study group or even travel to a retreat somewhere and all worship together in person.  But none of these thoughts seemed likely.  Until...enter Pandemic 2020.

In March 2020, when everyone-everywhere transitioned to remote worship, Calvary Chapel Fort Lauderdale moved their small groups to remote/online experiences via joinagroup.org.  Even while the service was rolling, I navigated to the page to check it out.  And that's when I found the Titus introduction to inductive bible study group.

So...I joined.  And I've been a little lost.  And I haven't always understood why --- I did not know how far the study had already come before I joined.  But I immediately connected with this study group.  How professional!  How incredibly well done!  The teaching via zoom seemed like they had always been doing it this way.  I loved their team teaching method and I loved our break out rooms where we could talk in a smaller setting and really feel a connection of being in a small group.  I loved the use of WhatsApp to stay connected throughout the week.  This experience has been life changing for me!  Not only because I learned some new inductive bible study methods.  But because I began to connect with these women in a way that I never would have, if we hadn't all been stuck at home.

Some of my favorite memories of the class?

• Accidentally ending up back in the main meeting room with the leaders after class and talking with them about who I am and where I am.  I honestly felt like I had just wandered into another room in their church and happened upon them sitting around a table talking
• The weekend when I had a panic attack (darn social distance side effects) and I took a chance and shared with my WhatsApp group what was going on with me.  Janet sent me a lovely card in the mail.  Betty gave me ideas for how to focus on something else positive to distract from the anxious feeling. The other ladies of the group prayed for me and made me feel loved, even though I felt scared and kind of ridiculous.
• Getting to know other women.  This is my mantra lately.  Girlfriends.  And mentors.  And connecting with feminine energy.  I work with a lot of men.  Female interaction is not a regular part of my life.  
• Discovering Cynthia who enjoys so many of the same things I do (travel, writing, skiing at a non-dangerous level, reading) and who wants me to come visit her and stay in her room with a lovely wall of books and an incredible pool.  You now you are making a connection with someone when you write a completely run-on sentence of "ands".  She makes me feel so welcome.
• A wonderful bible study which filled in more than a few blanks for me.  I loved watching Betty diagram the scripture.  Her study of the word "For" will forever amaze me.  I've learned to look up words that do not make sense to me instead of glossing over them.  I've learned to re-read a passage of the bible in several translations.  Comparing those translations can shed incredible meaning on a passage whose meaning once seemed dry and lost to me.  I've learned there is so much more to learn and I want to go back through the videos that Betty and Cynthia sent to me to re-visit some of the lessons that were recorded.

I feel drawn to South Florida.  My dear friends are driving back there today, during a pandemic.  I have new friends who connect in a way that I can't put into words yet.  Three women said that they wanted me to come and stay and hang out with them.  The feeling is connectedness, in a time where we are all supposed to be separate, in order to keep each other safe.