Today I collaborated.
My friend Cyndi and I collaborated on a writing project.
Cyndi and I are newer friends. We met less than a year ago in an online writing group. She released her first book, Princess in Progress, just a few months before I released my first devotional, The Way of Gratitude. One day, she reached out to me and we began chatting, One thing led to another, and now we’re working together on a women’s community called Gather & Grow.
The idea came to Cyndi first, a Holy Spirit inspired idea to gather women together to grow in their faith. She began cultivating the group with monthly prayer prompts based on promises of God’s love, freedom, provision, purpose, and more. Then, she shared Scripture reading plans appropriate to the seasons, such as “Cradle to the Cross” by reading about Jesus’ life from Christmas to Easter.
Both of us are passionate about helping women grow in their life and faith in a variety of ways. So when I saw what she was already doing and she invited me to come along, of course I said yes! The more creative ways we can band together to help women learn more about Jesus and spend time with God daily, the better! In addition to what Cyndi was already offering the group, we began to hold monthly spiritual practices events where we–you guessed it–Gather & Grow together. These events have been mostly focused on Sabbath and rest, and we’ve shared a little about other spiritual practices, too.
It’s been so fun to work together on these things with Cyndi! Not only do our passions and lifestyles align, but our writing styles and goals for our ministries are similar. She leads Walking the Walk Ministries, where she offers both physical and spiritual coaching, a holistic approach to life change. Using her background in fitness, health, and ministry, she absolutely thrives when she’s leading people to reach their next steps in their body and soul!
Now that I’ve properly introduced you to her, let me share more about today.
Today, we collaborated on our biggest project yet.
Together we prayed about, wrote, edited, designed, and produced a 28-day spiritual growth program. Called Summer Soul Camp, it’s like a Vacation Bible School for grown-ups! Each day there’s Scripture to read, guided prayer, and a journaling prompt for deeper reflection. Each week focuses on a different spiritual practice, sometimes called spiritual disciplines or rhythms. And to top it all off, we’ll also meet live via Zoom each week for coaching, teaching, and encouragement.
I’m so proud of what we’ve put together. It was a big project! We wrote scripts and recorded videos, wrote and designed a participant workbook, and prepared lessons to teach during the live coaching calls. We put together a four week Scripture Reading Plan, writing out journaling prompts for each day. We wrote and revised, and wrote and edited, and wrote and designed, and wrote and prayed. Bringing an inspired idea to life like this–from scratch–has been such a powerful experience. And collaborating on it with a friend like Cyndi… Well, it is clear evidence of God’s power working in our lives.
As a writer, most of the work I do is on my own. And to be honest, I enjoy this! I’ve had a lot of great coworkers in my past, but I’ve always done well on individual projects, too. But I didn’t realize how much I had missed collaborating on a project with someone else. I love tossing out ideas and forming them into whole concepts! There’s only so much ideation I can do by myself.
Working with Cyndi on this project has helped us both to create something we could never have done on our own. I’m excited for Summer Soul Camp to begin on June 2. I’m praying for the women who will spend these four weeks Gather-ing & Grow-ing. Most of all, I can’t wait to see how a divinely inspired idea, put together through obedience, is used to transform lives.
Our anchor verse for Summer Soul Camp is Ephesians 3:17-19, and I think it’s only appropriate to end this Today I post with the verses that come next:
“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.”
Today I collaborated. And the result was immeasurably more than all I could ask or imagine!
If you’d like to be part of the Gather & Grow community, join our Facebook group here or sign up for Summer Soul Camp here.
