Dear Friends in the Leadership Institute,
We will be in the Advent season when we meet for our Institute class on December 7. Our minds and hearts will be focused on the most stupendous event in all the world’s civilizations, the Incarnation of God in the person of Jesus Christ. This is also a season when we need to recommit ourselves to a deepened life with Christ. Colin and Janine Saxton will guide us in our deeper Christian journey as they teach on “Spiritual Formation and Spiritual Direction.” They will be speaking from their rich experiences of working with Friends in many nations of the world.
Colin is General Secretary of Friends United Meeting and is bringing remarkable unity among Friends around the world. He has a Doctor of Ministry degree in Leadership and Spiritual Formation from George Fox University. His recording as a Friends minister is from Northwest Yearly Meeting, where he was Superintendent. Janine is completing the Master of Arts degree in Spiritual Formation at Barclay College. She is very involved in a spiritual formation group in Richmond, Indiana, where she and Colin live. About walking spiritually with others Janine says, “I love to journey with people.” Janine is a writer for Barclay Press, and she is called to the ministry of building Friends community and cross-cultural relationships. Colin and Janine love the Friends Church and earlier served as a pastoral couple in North Valley Friends Church. They are the loving parents of four beautiful adult children: Hannah, Ellie, Amy, and Sam.
One of our goals in the Institute is to build fellowship and close connections among Friends. In fact, the Leadership Institute includes Friends from more than 70 Friends Churches, and they represent several Yearly Meetings in different continents. Remarkable! We would like for you to find the location that best fits your travel and time needs, and I am eager to help you start a group in the area that is most convenient to you. If the time is not right for live streaming, you can view the video-recorded sessions here as the Pratt Friends Church and Vancouver Friends Church have done in the past.
Several other Friends across the country view the videos in their homes. We have the following sites where you may want to attend on the first Monday night of each month: Friends Community Church (Angleton), Fowler Friends Church, Faith Friends Church, Bangor Liberty Friends Church, Lighthouse Fellowship Church (at the home of Jerry and Mary Louthan), Friends Bible Training School (Alaska Yearly Meeting (at the home of David Miller), Friends Ministry Center (Wichita), Barclay College (Jackson Hall), North Newton (at the home of Merl and Eunice Kinser), Northwest Friends Church (at the home of Tom and Bonnie Bousman), and Arkansas City Friends Church (at the home of Bud Lawrence). Other sites where the technology is available to view the classes include: Miami Friends Church, Booker Friends Church, Chandler Friends Church, Hesper Friends Church, Sudanese Community Church (Omaha), and Iglesia Amigos (San Antonio).
We anticipate a most promising Institute class, and I hope you will invite your Friends to grow spiritually with you when we meetDecember 7, 2015 at 7:00 p.m. central time, 6:00 p.m. mountain time.
May God’s blessings be upon us in this beautiful time of awaiting the birth of our Savior,
-Dave Kingrey, Director of Leadership Institute
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