Michael: 00:00

Hello. Hello. Hello, speakers of truth. I wanted to take a moment to let you know that there is still time to register for our annual ABC Called to Council Conference happening May in Fort Worth, Texas at Doxology Bible Church. In this year's encouraging conference theme, If God is for Us from Romans chapter eight with our pre conference theme Counseling Through God's Attributes.

Michael: 00:22

In this year's plenary teachers are Paul Tripp, Jeremy Pierre, Jeremy Lelik, and John Henderson. And we're really excited about this year's track options as well. We've got mental health, which will be biblically unpacking diagnoses like OCD, schizophrenia, gender identity, and many more. Our other track will be trauma through eight sessions. The track teachers will equip counselors with a basic level for perceiving, thinking, responding to the experience of trauma.

Michael: 00:49

You can check out more information at the website. Other tracks like Counseling Children and Teens, Fundamentals of Biblical Counseling, Common Sexual Issues, and for our pastors and church leaders, have a track just for you, which will be pastors and church leadership, helping equip you in three different levels, the personal level, the ministry level, and then effective leadership. And our other tracks include understanding emotions like shame, guilt, and regret, and our eighth track, spiritual abuse. You can register now at www.calledtocounsel.comforward slash register. If you can't make it in person, no worries.

Michael: 01:29

We will be live streaming the conference, all the plenary sessions, and worship. And this year's live streaming track will be understanding emotions, guilt, shame, and regret. We'll see you there. Welcome to speak the truth, a podcast devoted to giving biblical truth for educating, equipping, and encouraging the individual and local church and counseling and discipleship. Hello.

Michael: 02:01

Hello. Hello.

Shauna: 02:01

Yo. Yo. Yo.

Jeremy: 02:03

How's it going, guys?

Michael: 02:04

Hey. There's Jeremy and Shauna.

Shauna: 02:06

You got the cameras going today, I'm trying to avoid them.

Michael: 02:08

Yeah. Y'all don't see this, but what's funny is Shauna's intentionally trying to get out of the shot these cameras that we're trying to. Because just as a quick plug for our Speak the Truth listeners that we do have a YouTube channel where I did a few videos last year with Jeremy when we were unpacking a diagnosis on the diagnostic and statistical manual and certain disorders and looking at those with the biblical lens.

Shauna: 02:32

Anyway it was, like, our highest some of our highest episodes. Right? Like, listen to?

Michael: 02:36

Yeah. So in 2025, we're gonna be and it'll be coming later this year, probably, Lord willing, in in the summer. At any rate, but we'll have some videos on YouTube and start bringing the podcast to video. So, Shauna, as I'm trying things out, Shauna's making sure she's not in the shot. So

Shauna: 02:55

I'll try next time not to just roll out of bed

Michael: 02:56

and show up.

Jeremy: 02:57

Right? It looks amazing in here.

Shauna: 02:58

It does.

Michael: 02:59

It's a

Jeremy: 02:59

great setup.

Shauna: 03:00

Good job, Michael. Yeah. Way to take us to the next level. Way to plus it.

Michael: 03:04

Alright. We've been going this is gonna be the second episode in our miniseries. Just who is ABC? And last episode, we talked about the history of ABC. In this particular episode, we're gonna be talking about the heart of ABC and just getting into what's the distinctives between ABC and any other counseling ministry certification center, whatever it is, what are the distinctives of ABC and the heart of ABC in that?

Michael: 03:30

And so

Shauna: 03:31

I really enjoyed that last episode. And so if you haven't heard it, stop stop this one. Pause this one and go and listen to that one because I think for me, like, I'm always thinking about how are we improving the ministry and moving us forward. And it was a really great reminder for me just to get settled of how far we have come and, Jeremy, just how you've led us all these years and and just I'm just with a heart of gratitude of just what the Lord has done, which brings us to today and then how we're moving forward. So great podcast.

Shauna: 03:56

Go listen to it.

Michael: 03:57

Yeah. And I I think that to that point, Shauna, it's like the history of ABC has completely just pressed the heart of ABC and God has really refined ABC and where it's going. And that's really what we wanna talk about and focus on in this episode. And so with that, get a little bit of help from Jeremy and Shauna here. With Shauna being on staff, as Jeremy shared at the end of our last podcast, what is the mission and vision of ABC?

Jeremy: 04:21

So I'll read the mission, and then, Shauna, maybe you can help us unpack what we mean here.

Shauna: 04:26

Sure.

Jeremy: 04:26

So our mission statement is ABC exists to enlist, equip, enrich, and encourage people everywhere to live and counsel the word, applying the gospel to the whole experience of life.

Michael: 04:39

The whole experience of life.

Jeremy: 04:41

I like that. That's right.

Shauna: 04:42

We took time on that mission of and you can and, really, you can go to our website at ChristianCounseling.com and and read this a little bit more. But just for those who are listeners, to take those ease to say, hey. Let's not just have some fun ease here to make this mission statement. Like, what do they really mean? And how does each of these ease drive what we're doing, like the resources that we're creating?

Shauna: 05:03

One of the things that Jeremy didn't really get to expound on in the last episode, but I think was one of the the main keys of where ABC started was you wanted to have a platform for resources for people. Right?

Jeremy: 05:13

Yes.

Shauna: 05:14

For the church to be able to care for their people, for counselors to have tools, and and not only to learn as a counselor, but resources to actually be able to give those that they're counseling. And so that has continued forward and we're even gotten new ideas that is to come. So that's important to listen. But each of those Es has a specific purpose. And so enlisting is we want to enlist believers with a heart to grow in their knowledge of scripture as it practically applies to all the issues related to counseling.

Shauna: 05:40

We're all called to counsel. That's our that's our conference. There's meaning behind that name, just not like a random name for the conference. We really believe that we're all called to to counsel. And so how do we wanna enlist those people?

Shauna: 05:52

And that really is our church is leading out and talking to their members, identifying people who, hey, we already see you caring for people. How can we bring you on board to get you more training and and so you can be more efficient in in counseling scripture?

Jeremy: 06:05

So does the enlisting really Yeah. Points to membership? Yeah.

Shauna: 06:08

Yeah. Yeah. And that membership aspect, do you wanna tell a little bit about membership and how that all started?

Jeremy: 06:13

Yeah. So we started as a membership organization, and we that's what we still do. But in listing, once you become a member, we have lots of different resources. We have amazing assessments, different homework handouts for people. All of our conference plenary sessions, I think, are available to members.

Jeremy: 06:32

And so it's it's not just for people to join us so that they can get resources. But, honestly, if if a person joins ABC, it's also a way to support the work that we're doing.

Shauna: 06:43

Mhmm.

Jeremy: 06:43

Just through a very, very inexpensive membership fee.

Shauna: 06:46

Yeah. When and, really, as as my time when I when I joined the team in 2019, we we had those conversations. Do we raise the price? When reality, it's been $99 really since the beginning. Yep.

Shauna: 06:57

And we just haven't. We just kept it the same because we want it to not be an expensive expense for the person. And so that's that's really awesome. So if you're not currently a member, go to the website. The second e is equip.

Shauna: 07:08

This this is a huge heartbeat of our ministry. We wanna equip the church and community by providing training and certification in the work of biblical counseling and discipleship. And so I know Michael's gonna ask some questions maybe later to dig in to what that really means specifically, but the goal really is just to empower the church to equip their people and their call to counsel. And so how can ABC technically partner with the churches in doing that? And then the 30 is enrich.

Shauna: 07:33

We want to enrich our members by offering those ongoing resources that has a biblical worldview of people and their problems while promoting scripture as a supreme source of healing where healing truth may be found. So we know that God's word is a living word and is active and Jeremy pointed to that being a key principle the sufficiency of scripture and that's going to be the heartbeat of all of our resources, all of our training in the churches. Literally everything ABC does is grounded and anchored in that. And then the fourth E is just encourage followers of Jesus Christ to know, cherish, and honor Him as they minister His word to one another while supporting each other. This one was actually a big one for Michael and I because when we when we started our journey in biblical counseling, we really didn't have a lot of people around us that said, oh, we that makes sense.

Shauna: 08:20

We get that. We wanna be a part of that. And so, thankfully, we were local to ABC, and so we were able to jump into some of these conferences. But I I even love that about us today. Like, when you come to a conference, it feels like family.

Shauna: 08:33

It does. You're so excited to see people, connect to people in other churches that maybe you only see them once a year, but there's just this level of encouragement that everybody's willing to step in and help you with your case or or think through something and just really helping each other grow in the word to be able to care for people.

Jeremy: 08:50

Yes.

Shauna: 08:50

What are your thoughts on that?

Jeremy: 08:52

Yeah. I think when I see that, fourth e of encouragement, the first thing that pops to my mind is our conference.

Shauna: 08:58

Mhmm.

Jeremy: 08:58

Because we really design it, not only attendees that are coming or encouraging each other, but our plenary speakers. We want that to just fill the tanks of the people that have been in the trenches for a year and encourage them, to continue the the hard work that they're doing.

Shauna: 09:13

Mhmm. And even through those relationships that were formed at conference sometime in in other in the training centers and stuff, they've created their own cohorts, and they have their own like supervision groups or or things to help them create new resources for the biblical counseling movement and stuff and so it's just been really fun to see that that that's an important part like we're intentionally saying we're creating a conference or we're doing other trainings or even as our churches lead out. But, hey, how are we encouraging that's an intentional thought

Jeremy: 09:40

Yes.

Shauna: 09:41

That we're trying to have with one another of how we're each other in our call to ministry.

Michael: 09:44

Yeah. That's really good, and I think that actually plays into some of the other questions that I wanted to capture in this episode, which really have to do with what you guys were just talking about as far as the conference was concerned is really pointing out a distinctive. Because there's conferences out there. There's there's really good conferences out there. But what's distinct with ABC is, to your point about the plenary sessions, where it's there to encourage those who are in the trenches, but then also there's the encouraging piece, but then there's the equipping piece where there's the actual tracks.

Michael: 10:15

Yes. Right? And having the tracks to really equip the saints for the work of ministry. And so when we use that phraseology that we're all familiar with really in the church and in the biblical counseling world of equipping the saints for the work of ministry, but this is a distinctive in how we actually accomplish that. Yes.

Michael: 10:32

Any thoughts on that, Jeremy?

Jeremy: 10:33

Do you guys remember the year that we started the tracks?

Michael: 10:37

Was it 2017?

Jeremy: 10:39

I think it 2017. I

Michael: 10:41

remember that one distinctly. I remember John Erickson Tada. We're at IBC. Yes.

Shauna: 10:45

John Challies came in.

Jeremy: 10:46

Yep. That's right.

Shauna: 10:47

Yeah. I think

Jeremy: 10:48

it's 2017. Yeah. John Henderson called me one day and just said, hey, Jeremy. What do you think about this idea of separating our breakouts into tracks? And he and I started brainstorming and created our the the tracks.

Jeremy: 11:01

And so people have loved that. It's actually grown our conference significantly because you're not coming and just going to different topics every single breakout. You choose a track, and you leave the conference with at least eight hours of solid training on one specific topic. Mhmm. And it's it's gone a long way to really deeply equip somebody when they come to the conference.

Shauna: 11:23

It's also made us very intentional in the people that we invite to speak because we're honing in on a topic. We try to get a person who has really experienced that, live that out. They have the expertise of that particular thing, and and that has increased our our level of training. Yes. Mhmm.

Michael: 11:40

I would say with it too because Sean and I are at Southern and working I'm working on my MDiv trying to finish that up. I'm halfway. Sean is working on her her master's

Shauna: 11:50

In leadership.

Michael: 11:51

In leadership. But what's interesting about just sort of academically speaking, how these concentrations are within these programs that they offer, right, in these degrees where there's so many elective credit hours that go towards having just an advanced concentration or a specialized concentration on something. And I would say that's really distinctly speaking what ABC brings to the table where, to your point a moment ago, like, that's eight hours in the same vein.

Jeremy: 12:19

Mhmm.

Michael: 12:20

That's eight hours worth of training in a in a specific area. And then if you like, for churches that come and they'll bring their whole teams and let's say that they got five or six different volunteers that they invest in, like, each one of those go to a track, then they debrief afterwards. And just the equipping that they leave with that how that becomes more fruitful in the local church now with whatever their counseling ministries. And we'll get into more of that here in just a moment too. But any other thoughts on the on the conference, which I'll obviously we got a conference coming up here Yes.

Michael: 12:51

At the May, and I'll put that in the show notes. So if you haven't registered yet, there's a quick plug for that. Go and register. So with with that, I mean, that's one of the clear distinctives of ABC. I think maybe another distinctive that maybe we could we could focus on for a moment is last episode, we talked about the equipped to counsel curriculum.

Michael: 13:10

But, Jeremy and and you also mentioned a little bit about that as well. But how does that sort of create another level of distinction between ABC and other organizations out there?

Jeremy: 13:20

I'll speak into that. And then, Shauna, you've had some experience with some other training situations. What we do is level one of our certification is all equipped to counsel, and we have been able to build a beautiful relationship with Christian Counseling Education Foundation. So a lot of the reading that is required with each chapter of ETC, equipped accounts, comes from the Journal of Biblical Counseling, which you can't get any better than those articles. Mhmm.

Jeremy: 13:49

And so that's a distinction where you're getting this amazing practical training through ETC, and then you're getting some very, very rich deep teaching theologically through those journal articles.

Shauna: 14:01

And and as as we've been talking, I thought back to the answer that you said, one of the distinctions of our conference. Can I just answer that really quick? Absolutely. I think I think one of the things that's important that's been a huge benefit and a blessing for me is so then encouraging aspect of our mission, one of the things about our conference is I'm reading all these authors and these people who are coming, like, through the year. And whether they're in the seminary curriculum or just books that are are just new that just new newly were published.

Shauna: 14:29

And then you get to come to the conference, and these are the people that Jeremy and I are inviting to come and lead out and speak on the tracks. It's not a cold environment where they're just coming up, teaching their lesson, and then going hiding in a green room. No. It is a very just a very warm, close environment to where the first years, just remember being able just to walk up to someone and be able to ask them a question of, hey, I actually am counseling someone in this particular room, and you said this in your lesson. Like, what are your thoughts on that?

Shauna: 14:55

And everyone makes themself available after they speak. You can catch someone just walking down the hall and talk to them. And so all of our speakers really invite people just to come up to them and just really talk to them about just life and ministry. And I just think that's so life giving to people Yes. Because you're finally getting to meet the voice that you've been reading, and then now you're able to ask them particular questions.

Shauna: 15:17

So that would be one thing that I think is very special about our conference.

Jeremy: 15:20

Yeah. That just reminded me of something that's really special just within the the the world of the speakers.

Shauna: 15:27

Yeah.

Jeremy: 15:27

And that's every year, all of us that can make it, we gather in a room together. So you walk in a room. You see people from CCF. You see people from Southeastern, people from Southern, people from ACBC. You it all it's just a broad spectrum of people, and we gather in a circle, and we just lift the conference up in prayer.

Jeremy: 15:46

We lift each other up in prayer. And just to see the the Christ like love between all of these different folks is just to me, it's a beautiful image of the kingdom of god.

Shauna: 15:56

And I'm a little I have them intertwine their arms together, and we we actually link arms in unity, and it's just a very sweet time. Yeah. I love that, Jeremy. That's so great.

Jeremy: 16:06

Just feels like we're all

Shauna: 16:07

Yes. In the

Jeremy: 16:07

on the same page with the same mission of just esteeming the scriptures, equipping people, and loving the saints.

Shauna: 16:13

Yes. It's so good. Yeah. Okay. So now back to your certification question.

Shauna: 16:17

One of the things I wanna remind our listeners that was important to ABC is, yes, we are a ministry that does certification, but we're not in this place where we're saying anyone, everyone has to be certified in order to care for someone. Certification is not necessarily the main goal that we're thinking about. It's the training aspect of it. Yes. And so certification is really just something that is communicating your level of training.

Shauna: 16:40

And the way that we hold our certification is one of the things that separates us from other certification organizations. And so what our certification communicates is what separates us from from everyone else, right? So, it's not necessarily the authority over the counselor. It's like a seminary degree. It's communicating your level of training and then we have different levels, right?

Shauna: 17:02

So, your level one is saying, hey, this person has taken seven months to a year to study. What does it mean? What does God's word say about counseling? And learn practical aspects of that and hone in on specific topics. They're a part of a training center.

Shauna: 17:16

They're doing role plays. They're really like learning how to practically apply these things to case studies, these truths to case studies. And then level two is when they go in and they get their experience, right? It's one hundred hours of supervision that we have a theology exam and our theology exam is, hey, We don't want you to write an academic paper. We want you to answer these theological questions in a way that you would practically communicate it to someone.

Shauna: 17:38

Just had someone recently say, I love being able to think through this question and write it in that way, and it makes me feel more equipped to be able to answer this question now that I'm on the fly. Yes. And then our counseling exam that stirred around Jeremy's book and some other things that just really helps say, how are we how are we putting things in place that us and the training leaders can come alongside someone, engage how they're learning, right? Hold them accountable, help them grow specifically in their area of growth because everyone's different. And so I think that's important to realize that one, what our certification's communicating.

Shauna: 18:11

And then, it's helpful because as we're all called to council early on, Michael, we went to seminary but we had to pick a seminary that was not as expensive, right? And the education came along with that but not everybody can go to a seminary and don't they have the time for it? They might not even be called to learn to that extent and obviously afford it. And so to have these avenues that you can get training that's affordable for someone, that you can also bring a friend alongside with you and create kind of a cohort or training environment, I think is very important. And that's what certification can also offer you.

Shauna: 18:46

You have anything to add to that?

Michael: 18:48

Yeah. That's really good because I think with those distinctives, with the certification training, the conference that, you know, equips and supplements and cares and encourages those who are out there. But within the local church, what I'd like about the the certification training, again, is, as you pointed out with the theological foundations that are established in level one. So to somebody who's not able to put forth arguably $25,000 for a seminary degree, they can get this concentrated training and equipping in biblical counseling that gives them the biblical studies, that gives them the theology, and it gives them the practical theology that they need to serve in their in their context. So I think it mobilizes, it helps mobilize the local church, which was another distinctive where separately from other organizations out there that specific to ABC with our training centers, it really mobilizes the local church to equip the saints for the work of ministry.

Michael: 19:47

And like you pointed out earlier, being certified demonstrates the level of training somebody has received. Right? But it it it really emphasizes the autonomy of the local church and that it it puts the shepherding in all in in all of that on and their responsibility on the local church. And I think that's a huge distinctive of ABC.

Shauna: 20:07

It is really huge. And and one of the things too we have to remember is or what's oh, it's highly distinctive is our entire certification has a core curriculum. So other organizations could have where they get training in different places, which is still the local church. But even with our church doing the equipping, every single person who says I'm ABC certified has read and is equipped by the equipped to counsel book. And I think having that unified training is something that's very unique and special that has all of our people speaking the same language.

Jeremy: 20:36

Yes. If you enter certification with us, we have a very rigorous application process. So we we are vetting the people that are that we accept as students. But when it comes to the authority that is over that student, we want that to be the church. We believe that the church is the authority.

Jeremy: 20:55

If somebody's counseling in a way that creates a situation, that it's the it's the local church that wants to deal with that. And and we want to encourage the churches and and consult with the churches as needed. We have done that on several occasions where we we consult with the church, but we want the church to be the church and not us be be the the overarching authority of every single student that comes, through certification. In my world of licensing, I I am under the licensure of a board in the state of Texas. And and if I were to go get five certifications, if I did something that was questionable, those people would not call the certifying bodies that where I've gotten certification.

Jeremy: 21:38

They're gonna call the board because that's who has the authority. So it's similar to that. ABC is a certifying organization. We are not the authority. We don't want to claim that because we don't believe the scriptures would want us to do that.

Jeremy: 21:50

We wanna make sure that the authority is is the church.

Michael: 21:53

Yeah. That's really good. And and and just to piggyback off that a little bit more is when we're talking about the certification training and and really giving the student what they need and equipping them to go back into their local context, It's also the certification training is also providing a level of methodology of practice. Oh, yes. Right?

Michael: 22:13

It's taking Very

Shauna: 22:14

much so.

Michael: 22:14

Yeah. So it's it's it's taking the theological foundation that are within the first five modules of the equipped to counsel curriculum, And then you get a little further in, and so they're building blocks, and then you begin to develop a methodology of, alright, how do I practice this? So there's there's specific paradigms that that are being tracked throughout the process and building in that progress of that. The journals, the counseling journals, and we we've actually revamped that. And I would argue that could actually serve as a soft launch for a local church in a counseling ministry because it gives them a methodology for counseling.

Michael: 22:49

And I just serving some other organizations out there, just observing sort of their process, they don't offer that. They don't have that. So that is very much distinctive to ABC. I'm not saying no one else out there offers it, but I'm saying to the extent that ABC offers it, I I mean, that's one of one of the, at least feature wise, those are some of the things that are that I share with pastors when I'm talking to pastors and churches on biblical counseling and how can this actually fit in their local church context. It's taking the certification, but again, bridging that with the authority of the church so that in the same way that the church develops leaders for Sunday, whether it's children's ministry, small group ministry, whatever it is, equipped to counsel serves, I believe, as probably one of the highest levels of the personal ministry of the word that you can actually have in the local church.

Michael: 23:37

Yeah. I agree. That's the beautiful thing for the local church is whoever taking the curriculum, whoever certified or even taking the materials and the resources back into the local church, it is going to strengthen with that level of intentionality. It's going to strengthen that local church and the personal ministry of the word. And I think that's what's so beautiful about ABC's curriculum and how it really does equip and empower the local church.

Jeremy: 24:00

Yes.

Shauna: 24:00

Yeah. It's great. And what's really cool is over the years, as we've had as we've gathered several different men and women, different, levels of spiritual maturity And our class, when we would have these teaching pastors who's been teaching pastors for years come to the class, we're thinking, okay, what can we actually teach them? Thinking, I really hope this class is gonna be something that's beneficial for them. And to our surprise, the way that the Lord gifted John and gave him the words to write Equipped to Counsel back in the day, and now we're on our sec second or third version, I guess, of the Equipped to Counsel, it it just it impacts you at whatever level you are.

Shauna: 24:34

Like, you're literally just starting out on what is being called to counsel really mean to being a pastor for several years, it's been amazing to hear from the pastors afterwards, and not just one, like several of them, come back to be like, I feel like I've been lied to all my years, right? Or I will never preach the same after this. And so I'm just so thankful for the uniqueness of our curriculum. And then the things, like you said, the journal articles and all the other practical aspects that we've built around the Equip to Council, that really makes our certification process special. And then, like you're saying, that being the church being able to be the one to do it.

Shauna: 25:08

Now, if you're listening and you don't have a church that has a training center, that's okay. We do still have that online process. And we have hired people that are specific graders that will help you and guide you and encourage you along the online process as well.

Jeremy: 25:23

That's right.

Shauna: 25:23

We do have virtual training centers, so you could look on our website to find a training center, there are some that do virtual if you want to grab one of those cohorts. But then also, we're talking a lot about the church, but we do have licensed counselors who are friends too. And since our certification is not the authority over the counselor in the church, it does, and it's communicating your level of training, it does open the door to allow those who have who are Christian counselors and their license and that's all the training that they've gotten to now come and go through our certification process to to help become more equipped on how to counsel scripture and when counseling And so we've gotten a lot of, obviously, a lot of people who've utilized that in their professional environment Yes. That has been really helpful. And so now it's we're being a part of when someone says, I'm a Christian counselor, that we've helped them to really be able to stand by what that really means.

Michael: 26:13

Yes. Yeah. And and to that point, there's been several personal friends over the years that I've I've gained that are LPCs where it's changed. Like, Sean, to your point about pastors and their their articulation of how it's changed their preaching, There's, again, a lot of LPC's that I've met that I know that it their counseling through ABC and that training has changed the way that they counsel Absolutely. As licensed professional counselors.

Jeremy: 26:40

Yes.

Michael: 26:41

So, again, the uniqueness of ABC and what it offers is really beautiful. Just another point that I wanna I wanna point out and then whatever y'all's thoughts are after that as we wrap up this episode. But as training centers, the training centers have grown exponentially. Like, Jeremy, when you were talking about early on, you mentioned Emily and Yes. They were sort of a pilot in sort of this idea of having training centers for ABC in the local church sort of mobilized.

Shauna: 27:08

When I started, we had about five.

Michael: 27:10

And where are we at now?

Shauna: 27:11

Are we at 70 something? Yeah.

Jeremy: 27:13

Something like that.

Shauna: 27:14

Yeah. And so

Michael: 27:16

So through the

Shauna: 27:17

Five years of growth.

Michael: 27:18

Yeah. And I can speak specifically for our context here at truth renewed, excuse me, as a training center for ABC, which we launched in 2019. Here locally, we've certified other nonprofit organizations like Crisis Pregnancy Centers, Pregnancy Help for You, who's just down the street. They had their team, I think maybe six or seven of them historically that have gone through where they have a counseling ministry. When these women are coming and and thinking through what their options are and they're they're able to get those free services that the the crisis center offers them.

Michael: 27:53

But on the back end, depending on how that relational equity was built on the front end, that they have a counseling center now in house that they can offer that. And now they're trying to build a bridge between what they do there in crisis care with the local church. So the fruit that's coming from just a training center that partners with different nonprofits in in their context. And this is sort of the fruitfulness that's actually happening as a result of the unique nature of what we have at ABC in our in our certification training. So it's a just a beautiful, beautiful distinct feature that we have that is just as awesome.

Michael: 28:29

Any concluding thoughts as we wrap up just the heart of ABC?

Shauna: 28:32

Wrapping up? I wanna talk for another hour.

Michael: 28:35

We're at we're at thirty minutes right now.

Jeremy: 28:37

Yeah. I think just in summary, the heart of ABC, again, is to glorify the lord in all that we're doing. Our heart is to equip the saints to utilize the scriptures in a very robust way to address the ailing struggles of people around us. We want to support the church in that. We wanna support individuals in that.

Jeremy: 28:57

So our heart is to really also to that last part of our mission statement is that people would learn how to experience the reality of of the gospel through all aspects of their life. Yeah. A lot of times, that is a very foreign thought to Christians in is how does the implications of the gospel impact my suffering or even my struggle with sin? So that's our heart, and and our hope is that we we never stray from that.

Michael: 29:24

Yeah. That's good.

Shauna: 29:25

And so I guess one of the to to go along with that, Jeremy, one of the things I might wanna point out to those who are listening is certification is just an element of the ministry. It's not the full on heartbeat. There's a lot of people who use equipped to counsel just for enrichment in their church. Our membership is not just for those who are certified. It's opened for general membership.

Shauna: 29:44

Yeah. If you if you're not even certification's not even something I wanna obtain at this point. That's okay. Like, you can still come and be a part of our conference. You can still be a member and utilize our resources.

Shauna: 29:55

You can still buy the Ecliptic Council book separately and just read it as a book if you want or ask a few other people to just join a cohort, and you don't have to focus specifically on the certification. So I just wanna make sure people know

Michael: 30:05

that too. Yeah. I I

Shauna: 30:07

love this conversation. It's so fun. I love what God's doing here through the ministry.

Michael: 30:11

And to that last point, when they're in the local church and they're thinking, man, this sounds great, but that's just not me. I'm not a counselor, but you're a Christian. We're all called to counsel. You brought up last episode John's heart with Matthew 28 and the great commission and go make disciples and having that carol in that that we're all called to counsel. And so bringing that back to the local church and saying, you have small group leaders who need equipping.

Michael: 30:37

They don't need to be called biblical counselors, but they're under shepherds

Shauna: 30:40

Yeah.

Michael: 30:40

In their context. Mhmm. And so they can they can use this training for that. And so there's a lot of different options for those in the local church. Thank you guys for listening, and we'll see you guys next time.

Shauna: 30:50

Bye.