By Jennifer Eckenwiler
NextGen Marketing Coordinator
Grace Community Church in Detroit, Michigan
Over the last nine months, I have had the honor of participating in Year of Equipping, a cohort of emerging leaders from all over the NAB who gather to dwell in God’s Word, share what God is doing in our contexts, and discuss who God is, who we are, and what God is up to.
I was invited to participate by my good friend, Wayne Stapleton, whom I have had the privilege of knowing for over half of my life. To be honest, I was skeptical about joining at first, because my role in marketing and graphic design at Grace Community Church in Detroit is not one I believed would benefit from such a program. I quickly discovered, however, just how valuable it would be to connect with other emerging leaders to discuss our experiences and connect over this common phase of life we’re in.
With each monthly meeting and in-person gathering, our group became closer and closer. Even though we only met nine times, our final meeting in Medina, Ohio, felt like a reconnection with old friends, consisting of late-night games of spoons, inside jokes over the dinner table, and conversations in the car about where we’ve seen God at work.
This final module in Medina also enabled us to participate in the NAB’s Bonfire, where we not only learned from each other but also met and connected with leaders from across the NAB. As we heard from Alan Roxburgh and discussed the unravelling story that we are part of and the leadership challenges that coincide with this story, the objective of Year of Equipping was proven to me – that we, as emerging leaders, would feel the confidence and calling to share about our experiences as followers of Christ and listen well to each other to see what God is doing.
While we were in Ohio, our dwelling exercise was focused on Acts 16:6–15; what God kept revealing to me was the usage of the word “we.” Even though Paul and his ministry team were acting upon Paul’s vision, the apostles decided what they were going to do next as a collective group. Part of hearing and obeying God is the act of discerning what we hear alongside other people – in community. Toward the end of our time together, Alan said something that has stuck with me: “A covenant is the recognition of the coming together to do something that we can only do when we’re together.”
That statement is what we are called to as the body of Christ. It would have been easy for me to simply read the assigned articles and books over these last nine months, or dwell in the Scriptures on my own. I would have learned a couple things, I’m sure, but then I would have quickly moved on to the next thing. The gathering, discussing, and learning we took part in, and the friendships that were formed in this cohort, are the real gifts of this experience.
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If you, or someone you know, is interested in learning more about Year of Equipping or taking part in the next cohort when it starts up in September 2026, reach out to Wayne Stapleton, VP of Emerging Leader Engagement.
Reframe is a four-week, online training for pastors and leaders to help you assess your congregation’s evangelism readiness. This training will provide an evaluative framework to help you to recognize gaps you may need to fill and distortions you will want to correct, and it will provide a clearer path forward toward helping your church become more evangelistically faithful.
Reframe is not a training that will focus on how to better do evangelism but instead will focus on how to be evangelistic.
- How well equipped is your congregation for the ministry of evangelism?
- How do you evaluate your church’s health in that regard?
- How would you identify equipping gaps in your congregation’s evangelistic faithfulness?
Each training consists of an online, 90-minute session. They will take place 10:00–11:30 a.m. (Pacific) each Wednesday in June (3, 10, 17, 24), which means time is running short to sign up!
Training is free for NAB ministry leaders. Register at the link below. For questions, connect with Deb Judas.
Recently, as part of connecting multipliers with the global mission of the NAB, nine pastors and leaders from NAB churches partook in a vision trip to Romania. Stu Streeter, VP of Church Multiplication, alongside Pastor Drew Steinhart of Disciples Church in Medina, Ohio, led the team of planters and revitalizers to experience firsthand the ministry of Camp Falcon Rock and to explore sister-church partnerships with our brothers and sisters in the Convention of Hungarian Baptist Churches of Romania (HBC).
Partnership is at the heart of trips such as this; they are not only about building partnerships between churches in North America and sister churches in Europe or elsewhere, they are made possible, in part, due to the churches and individuals who choose to partner with the NAB through their generous gifts. When you give to the NAB’s Ministry Resource Fund on an ongoing basis, you are helping to support Kingdom work such as this.
Your faithful monthly gift of $5, $10, or $25 – or whatever amount – when combined with other small gifts, will make a big difference. Thank you for prayerfully considering this invitation to partner with us.