Henry -  I welcome back. Now, if you notice, we have our chaplain Christmas merch. We do introduced a hat a couple. 

Abby -  Oh, look at this. Says chaplain on the back. 

Henry -  So yeah, I don't want to turn back. I might pull things off. The bottom line is, is that we have the merch to the red and the green Chaplain shirts. And before we get into today, just something we learned from Tom Walcott, our chaplain for the foundational class, he said that wearing the chaplain shirts are vitally important. They actually say to people that this is safe. 

Abby -  You are a chaplain, right? And again, you're creating an inviting space, even if you aren't doing a planned chaplain's event. If you just go out and you're wearing your Chaplain shirt, you could have someone come up to you, right? 

Henry -  So you're on the sidewalk, you're walking along, they go chaplain, you know, in red, you know, I'm a Christmas Chaplain laughing. I'm sure everyone will laugh about that, but there's an interest, right? Yeah, so today we're going to talk about the collaboration with churches, civic groups and nonprofits, which can be a great opportunity for chaplains. 

Abby -  Yeah, there's a very strong biblical case for this. I mean, we just know ministry is so relation, relational. It multiplies when we get more and more people in unity and together. We see that in Jesus ministry with His disciples. We see Paul in the Bible traveling in teams and groups, and we see that as the early church model of how they were doing resources and responsibility, 

Henry -  collaboration reflects biblical models of shared mission and mutual support strengthens ministry, resiliency and reach 

Abby -  collaborating with churches. So for many of you, this might be an easy task if you are already involved heavily with a church, and maybe in some way are hoping to do chaplaincy within your church, or already are doing chaplaincy within your church, but there may be multiple churches in the community that you want to partner with, and so yeah, these are foundational partners, and getting as many churches to come together is going to expand the reach and the impact. 

Henry -  You know, I was in my mind, I was imagining a lot of scenarios with this. So I'm picturing it's a church, an old church, located in downtown, and the church is sort of known in the community, and so you go up to the pastor and say, you know, I'd like to open our church Up to seasonal prayer times, to three candlelight services, and just with cookies and all of those things, invite the community to our church during Christmas, and maybe it connects to the advent calendar. Yes, there's so much opportunity here to talk to churches and put churches back into relevancy by what we do at Christmas. And I'm picturing like a Hallmark movie here, you know. And I was just picturing this concept like, Okay, so we're our little village here Grand Haven, Michigan. So I was picturing this whole story okay, okay. So picture this. So Sarah lives in Chicago, and she's coming up to see, you know, her cousin and and then there's this, and she's not necessarily a believer, so she's driving up, she gets stuck in the snow, and then, lo and behold, this guy, who's actually a Christmas Chaplain too, has this Chaplain stuff on it, and says, are you okay? Yeah, yeah, in the car, it doesn't work. And then there's this, yeah, I'm leading a candlelight service. And then she comes to the service again. I I'll be quiet now. But you got the idea, I mean the potential for what God can do if churches gather 

Abby -  spaces for people to bring them, bring them into this place, you know. And I really also love the point of partnership maximizes Kingdom resources for community impact. Again, if you get a couple of churches together who want to together do a candlelight service. Now, again, it's maximizing those Kingdom opportunities and expanding that reach. And it really does mutual respect builds on long term ministry alliances. Again, you have some people going to this church, others going to another those people can come together. It's. Just again. Unity is something we see again. The Bible encouraging again and again and again that the body of Christ should be unified. 

Henry -  I love the thought that will that if you're a chaplain at your church, you get others to sign up that Christian Leaders Institute student to become chaplains too. So now 

Abby -  Chaplain team, you have 

Henry -  a Christmas Chaplain army that forms in your community. And then you may be in July, it's Christmas planning in July, where you're talking about what you're going to be doing and how you get that army of Chaplains is going to serve in this seasonal time as Christmas comes. But this team could be for Memorial Day, for 

Abby -  Easter, all of that Thanksgiving, absolutely. And then you can collaborate with civic groups. So again, trust is earned through service and respect. So if you're supporting these events and the leaders without having any sort of political agenda or getting into any sort of debate, you can bring again that presence of peace and stability in these public spaces, and most of all, again, then pointing people to Christ, 

Henry -  Oh, I love that. Ministry of sciences highlights trust as an essential for influence, non coercive presence opens doors for sustained partnerships 

Abby -  and then collaborating with nonprofits. Many nonprofits are caring for vulnerable populations year round, and so as a chaplain, you can add spiritual presence without violating any boundaries, and these partnerships respect mission while extending pastoral care a lot of times, these nonprofits may even have a Christian aligning as well. And so there could be some shared goals with distinct roles to complement or to create complementary impact. 

Henry -  You know, I'm just thinking like you take a Salvation Army. They're very local. There may be a Salvation Army church, or maybe you're part of the Salvation Army. And you can also, instead of just ringing bells. You might have a little Chaplain booth right by the bell ringing. And again, it's like there is presence perceives proclamation you're ringing the bell, but you never know somebody may. And again, I bring this up. I don't know what the specific guidelines are for the salvation, but I can picture opportunities, right? 

Abby -  And there's many nonprofits in your local area where, again, kitchens, yes, they're caring for vulnerable populations, and want an opportunity to bring the presence and power of Jesus Christ into those situations. 

Henry -  You know, I have with various gospel missions and food kitchens. You know, if you said to the leader of the food kitchen, you know, I would be very willing to have a little candlelight service at your food kitchen. 

Abby -  Will they come and get food and then you can have a little service for those that want to stick around after 

Henry -  it's just powerful. What can happen? 

Abby -  Some practical tips for collaboration. So again, that showing up before you're speaking, you know, again, you have to build the trust with whether it be a church or a nonprofit or a civic group, and then using those languages of partnership and support, celebrating each other's wins, communicating clearly together. And again, you're not trying to compete with your local churches, with your local nonprofits, with your local organizations. You are trying to complement each other, and again, impact and reach more people. 

Henry -  You know, I remember the wedding officiant in one of the churches you're younger, you know, like 10, 11, years old, we and we happen to have a wedding banquet center next to our church. You remember that? Yes, well, so we did this whole light, efficient program where we invited the community to come into the space, use our church service, our church if they would get married, there if they wanted to, and they had some pastoral counseling, and they did stuff that we teach here at Christian leaders Institute in ordained through Christian leaders Alliance. So we open the church for this purpose. Now, just by opening the church for this purpose, many young couples and families came to this church because the church opened the door, yes. So this is where collaboration get really tasty and exciting, where you say to your pastor, he has no time at Christmas for anything. However, if their church opens up for candlelight services, if a nonprofit opens up for something like this, the collaboration goes forward, and then ultimately, you you hope and pray that people will participate in the nonprofit, participate with the church. Yes, start coming. Coming to church. Maybe come, if it's a church, to the Christmas service where they went to the church and they walked in the door here, but later on, they go to the regular service that the pastor puts on. See, this is about where chaplaincy connects with helping local nonprofits churches to actually grow and embed and reach 

Abby -  more people. You know, again, yeah, that consistency and communication foster reliability, and that humility positions chaplains as trusted 

Henry -  collaborators. And this is what we want, 

Abby -  final reflection, this collaboration and unity and mission and diversity of gifts. And that's, again, the thing. I mean, each of us are one person. You know, God's gift to each of us differently. And so to connect with churches, organizations and nonprofits, you're going to bring in more of those gifts of each person, and can raise up more people. And so chaplains, we have the opportunity, though, to be the relational hub that really bridges and builds the community to serve their community more so together, presence of Christ is made visible in every sphere. 

Henry -  Yeah, it's we integrate ministry networks amplify community transformation and bridge building. Chaplaincy aligns with the body of Christ metaphor. So in some ways, the chaplains become agents of Christian impact, agents of church growth, agents of relational building. Lot of times, churches, they're into a programmatic pathway. They're they do services, they do programs for kids all that. And here chaplains can come in and sort of balance that out compliment. Oh no, we are just gonna, you know, talk to people and, you know, have them pray and try to organize people to come around these certain events that are still important in the community of memory, in the United States or in another place in the world, Europe, and in the process, who knows what God does? Absolutely