Mike Bowden serves as the Soul Care Facilitator for ESDA and leads spiritual retreats all over the world. In this episode, Adam Ormord and Kelly Arabie of Grafted Life Ministries interview Mike about his experiences abroad as a missionary with TEAM and his own journey in caring for his soul.

Join us for a very personal discussion, as Mike’s heart was awakened to longings for more in his relationship with God, and eventually, a deeper intimacy with Christ through the ministry of spiritual direction.

This transformative experience also led Mike to training as a spiritual director and the desire to create sacred spaces for others.

"People aren’t always used to someone caring for the soul, so in a way, as we create a holy space, we are holding the soul for someone, so that they can receive and listen...

“Sitting with someone and have them feel safe, without pretending, without denying
what is going on inside them, watching God at work—all those bring great joy.”

In this conversation, we get a glimpse of what community can look like, seeing people come to know God in deeper, real, honest, authentic, relational ways.

Resources Mentioned:

• ESDA Gathering 2023 – “Holding the Soul: Exploring God’s Design for Transformation”
• The Other Half of Church – Michel Hendricks

The Grafted Life Podcast is provided by Grafted Life Ministries, helping people build deeper relationships with God and each other.

Casey Tygrett is our guest on this episode of the Grafted Life Podcast. Adam Ormord and Kelly Arabie of Grafted Life Ministries talk with Casey about his latest book, The Gift of Restlessness. Casey is a pastor, speaker and the director of spiritual direction practice for Soul Care, a ministry which helps church and nonprofit leaders restore health to their souls.

Resources Mentioned: Soul Care website (https://soulcare.com) – Spiritual Direction Practice, Becoming Curious, As I Recall (re-released in winter 2024 as The Practice of Remembering), The Gift of Restlessness, https://www.caseytygrett.com

Quote: “Dissatisfaction becomes the spiritual director of our souls,” writes Joan Chittister, “without the dissatisfaction of the soul, how would we ever find our way to more?” The Gift of Restlessness, p14

The Grafted Life Podcast is provided by Grafted Life Ministries, helping people build deeper relationships with God and each other.

Adam Ormord and Debbie Swindoll are joined by Danny Mullins in the final episode of our series, “Exploring God’s Design for Transformation.” Danny provided a workshop on Immanuel Prayer for the 2023 ESDA Gathering in Phoenix. Sharing his personal story, Danny gives insight into the ministry of Immanuel Prayer and how experiencing God’s love changes us.

Resources Mentioned: At His Feet Ministries (https://dannymullins.org), Into the Silent Land (pg 16) by Martin Laird, Sustainable Faith (https://sustainablefaith.com) Jim Wilder’s website: Jim Wilder - Life Model Works, Karl Lehman’s website: Getting Started | Immanuel approach

The Developing Mind by Daniel Siegel, The Light Has Come by Lesslie Newbigin, The Solace of Fierce Landscapes by Belden Lane, This Here Flesh by Cole Arthur Riley, Jesus and the Disinherited by Howard Thurman

The Grafted Life Podcast is provided by Grafted Life Ministries, helping people build deeper relationships with God and each other.

Adam Ormord, Executive Director of Grafted Life Ministries and ESDA, spoke at our ESDA Gathering on the topic of “The Relational Soul.”

We are created as God’s beloved, and we learn how to love by experiencing love. “The best gift we can offer anyone is our own authentic transforming self."

Resources Mentioned: The Relational Soul by Richard Plass and James Cofield, Relational Spirituality by Todd Hall and Elizabeth Lewis Hall, The Life We’re Looking For by Andy Crouch, and Home by Adam Ormord.

The Grafted Life Podcast is provided by Grafted Life Ministries, helping people build deeper relationships with God and each other.

Adam Ormord and Debbie Swindoll are joined by Dr. Dianna Kubacz in Part 4 of our series, “Exploring God’s Design for Transformation.” With her training as a medical doctor and experience in medical missions, Dianna was a keynote speaker at our 2023 ESDA Gathering discussing how our brains are wired for transformation.

Sharing her parts of her own story of transformation, Dianna shares God’s invitation to joy through reexamining what it means to be attached to Him.

Dr. Allan Schore defines joy as “what we experience when we sense another person is glad to be with us.” Joy is integral in attachment formation because our brains are wired to seek it. Joyful experiences are what we lean into.

Shame, however, is the opposite of joy. In shame experiences, there is a perceived sense of disapproval, often attributed to a sense of worth.

“If God has an enduring love for us that brings us good, the only force in the human brain that can understand such lasting kindness and care is the brain’s attachment system.” The Other Half of Church (Wilder and Hendricks)

God invites us back to joy as we are invited back to being known. Creating relational spaces of safe community in God’s covenantal love is the way forward.

Resources Mentioned:

• TEAM (A Global Alliance of Churches and Missions)
• With: Reimagining the Way You Relate to God by Skye Jethani
• The Developing Mind by Dr. Daniel Siegel
• The Other Half of Church by Jim Wilder & Michel Hendricks
• The Soul of Shame by Curt Thompson, M.D.

The Grafted Life Podcast is provided by Grafted Life Ministries, helping people build deeper relationships with God and each other.

Dr. Neal Siler joins Adam Ormord and Debbie Swindoll as we continue our series exploring God’s design for transformation. Neal spoke at our 2023 ESDA Gathering on the topic of "Reorienting our Attachments." By paying attention to our own developmental and relational deficiencies, and allowing the Holy Spirit to restore what's been broken, we can move towards a more secure attachment with God, resulting in healing and wholeness.

We can have either secure or insecure attachment styles:

• Secure base attachment
• Insecure attachment styles – anxious ambivalent attachment, avoidant/dismissive attachment, fearful avoidant/disordered attachment

"At the root of all attachment issues is a lack of trust and a lack of safety."

To reorient our attachments, we identify our core longing deficits (Significance, Purpose, Belonging, Security, Understanding, and Love) and choose to believe that the only person who can meet those needs fully is the Lord Jesus Christ. "Out of that relationship, all other relationships flow."

Resources Mentioned:

• ESDA Gathering 2023 – “Holding the Soul: Exploring God’s Design for Transformation” – Dr. Dianna Kubacz, Dr. Neal Siler, Danny Mullins
• Healing Care Ministries – www.healingcare.org/
• The Healing Place Center for Counseling and Spiritual Formation: www.thehealingplaceva.org (Contact: thehealingplaceva@gmail.com)
• How I Got Over: Healing for the African American Soul – Dr. Neal Siler
• Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My Journey – Dr. Neal Siler

The Grafted Life Podcast is provided by Grafted Life Ministries, helping people build deeper relationships with God and each other.

Michel Hendricks, co-author of The Other Half of Church, joins Adam Ormord and Debbie Swindoll for a conversation on how we are wired for relating to God and others. Sharing his personal story of encountering Jesus and his own spiritual journey, Michel relates how he came to a place of confusion and need. This, in turn, led him to Jim Wilder and learning how the brain is designed for change.

When describing growth, nutrients of relational soil include things like joy, gratitude, and group identity. By growing in practices that train our brains, we begin to default toward the good and beautiful places God is at work in our lives.

With so many practical applications to relationship, this conversation provides encouragement and equipping in relational skills. Our hope is that this episode increases a longing for Relational Reformation, where we as Christ’s followers are known by His love.

Additional Resources:

• Jim Wilder - Life Model Works - Church Consulting
• A Conversation with Michel Hendricks - Grafted Life Seminar

The Grafted Life Podcast is provided by Grafted Life Ministries, helping people build deeper relationships with God and each other.

Debbie Swindoll founded Grafted Life Ministries with her husband Curt, and she served as Executive Director for twelve years. Debbie has enjoyed the study of relational theology and the intersection of faith and neuroscience, often called neurotheology.

Why do we learn more about God, but often we are not experiencing true spiritual transformation? Can people really change? How do people change?

In this conversation, Adam Ormord and Debbie explore God’s design for our attachment to Him. Debbie shares one of the vignettes from the gospel of Mark where the disciples’ attachment to Jesus was revealed in their relational dynamics.
We also hear stories from the gospels where attachment to Jesus is revealed, and attachment repair takes place.

In noticing the relational encounters in Scripture, we have opportunities to engage with God. By imagining ourselves in Scripture, by reading slowly and seeing what arises, we can notice our own heart attachments.

Resources Mentioned:

• The Other Half of Church – Michel Hendricks and Jim Wilder
• The Developing Mind – Daniel Siegel
• The Anatomy of the Soul – Curt Thompson
• The Soul of Desire – Curt Thompson
• Renovated – Jim Wilder
• ESDA Gathering 2023 – “Holding the Soul: Exploring God’s Design for Transformation” – Dr. Dianna Kubacz, Dr. Neal Siler, Danny Mullins, Marilyn Vancil, Adam Ormord

Join us for a live conversation with Michel Hendricks, author of The Other Half of Church on Saturday, March 4, 2023 at 11am central time. All are welcome, and registration is required.

The Grafted Life Podcast is provided by Grafted Life Ministries, helping people build deeper relationships with God and each other.