Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership with Ruth Haley Barton

Join us for Season 15, Lent for Leaders: With God in the Wilderness.  Ruth Haley Barton and Steve Weins will journey through Lent with a spirit of self-examination and desire for intimacy with God. Each episode will highlight a particular temptation found in one of the passages from Cycle C of the Revised Common Lectionary for Lent that is relevant for leaders today and Ruth and Steve will provide practices to combat those temptations.   In week one, Ruth and Steve examine the temptation of Jesus in Luke 4. How do we see these temptations to be relevant, spectacular, and powerful show up in our own lives? How can the practice of hiddenness be the antidote to this? What does it look like to fashion our own wilderness? We’ll discuss all this and more in today’s episode.   Lectionary readings for the first Sunday of Lent, Cycle C: Deuteronomy 26:1-11  •  Psalm 91:1-2, 9-16  • Romans 10:8b-13  • Luke 4:1-13   Music Credit: Kingdom Come by Aaron Niequist Returning from Lent Music In Solitude   Mentioned in the episode: The Way of the Heart by Henri Nouwen Lectio Divina for Luke 4: This week we are giving all listeners a chance to hear what happens over in our Patreon community. Please enjoy this guided Lectio Divina reading of the scripture used in this week’s episode,  available to everyone on our Patreon page.   Ruth wrote a reflection for Ash Wednesday over on our Beyond Words blog. Support the podcast! Patrons at the $10 level will receive a digital download of Ruth Haley Barton’s Lent: A Season of Returning. It includes Cycle C scriptures and space to journal your own thoughts and prayers. This season $10 patrons will also receive guided spiritual practices like Lectio Divinas and Examens that correspond with each week’s episode. Become a patron today by visiting our Patreon page!   The Transforming Center exists to create space for God to strengthen leaders and transform communities. You are invited to join our next Transforming Community:® A Two-year Spiritual Formation Experience for Leaders.  Delivered in nine quarterly retreats, this practice-based learning opportunity is grounded in the conviction that the best thing you bring to leadership is your own transforming self!

Our next podcast season begins next week! Season 15 will help us walk through Lent together. Steve Weins is back with Ruth and together the two will tackle this time that invites us to self-examination and intimacy with God. In this teaser episode, Ruth and Steve will share their hearts for this season of the podcast and their hope that these conversations will help you face your own temptations and provide practices that will create space to be strengthened in the wilderness with God.    Season 15 begins Wednesday, March 2. Episodes will drop each Wednesday, reading into the following Sunday of Lent.   Mentioned in this Episode Find all of our lent resources here. Practicing Lent for spiritual leaders with books Ruth recommends for Lent Guerrillas of Grace: Prayers for the Battle by Ted Loder   Music Credit: Kingdom Come by Aaron Niequist Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus from Lent Music In Solitude Support the podcast! Patrons at the $10 level will receive a digital download of Ruth Haley Barton’s Lent: A Season of Returning. It includes Cycle C scriptures and space to journal your own thoughts and prayers. This season $10 patrons will also receive guided spiritual practices like Lectio Divinas and Examens that correspond with each week’s episode. Become a patron today by visiting our Patreon page!

Please enjoy another bonus conversation about worship, this time with our friend and former Transforming Community worship leader, Rory Noland.  Rory has a new book out called Transforming Worship: Planning and Leading Sunday Services as if Spiritual Formation Mattered. He and Ruth sat down to discuss the book as well as their long history and the role spiritual formation has played in their friendship. Rory gives a master class on Transforming Worship and its importance in this conversation.   Further reading: From the Transforming Center Blog: Sweet Hours of Prayer: How Fixed-Hour Prayer Nourishes the Soul Part I and Part II   Check out Rory's book Transforming Worship: Planning and Leading Sunday Services as if Spiritual Formation Mattered.   Music Credit: The Lord is in Our Midst from The Lord is in our Midst Transforming Worship Vol. 1 New Every Morning from The Lord is in our Midst Transforming Worship Vol. 1

Please enjoy this bonus episode, a conversation between Ruth Haley Barton and Aaron Niequist, recorded at the Becoming A Transforming Church retreat. Ruth and Aaron discuss Aaron's experience as both a participant and worship leader of Transforming Communities and the ways in which worship and fixed hour of prayer contributed to his journey in community.   If you feel drawn by God to get on a new kind of journey we hope you would consider Transforming Community 18. We are still accepting applications. TC18 begins February 20-22, 2022. Find more information about Transforming Community 18 HERE.   Music Credit:  May Your Kingdom Come by Aaron Niequist

We have a special bonus episode for you today to mark Epiphany.   We dusted off our podcasting microphones to have a conversation about Epiphany. Epiphany celebrates the coming of the Magi to the manger to visit and worship the baby Jesus. In this discussion, Ruth and members of the Transforming Center staff discuss the mystery and meaning of Jesus choosing to come to earth in such an imperfect setting, what we took from the Magi’s story and the invitation to adventure and risk that God may be giving in the new year. Ruth closes with two poems that cap off these reflections and mark the end of the Christmas season.   Mentioned in this episode: Epiphany No. 16 by Kate Compston from Bread of Tomorrow: Prayers for the Church Year by Janet Morely The Work of Christmas from The Mood of Christmas and Other Celebrations by Howard Thurman Music credit: Joy to the World from Christmastide Music in Solitude A Light Unto My Path from Advent Music in Solitude Interested in going further with your own spiritual transformation? We are still accepting applications for Transforming Community 18. 

This season we invite you to walk through Advent by engaging with the lectionary Scripture readings and listening for what God might want to say through them. In each episode, Ruth and members of the Transforming Center staff will read and reflect on the themes of Cycle C of the Revised Common Lectionary for Advent together.   For this last episode of our Advent season, we wanted to give all our listeners an opportunity to engage with a lectionary reading through the practice of Lectio Divina. Ruth shares some thoughts on Christmas as the culmination of the Advent season and then guides listeners through a Lectio Divina reading of John 1:1-5, 14 with the help of other staff members. We invite you to listen to this in a quiet space where you can make yourself fully present to God and respond to the prompting of the Holy Spirit. We are praying this is fruitful practice for you during this week leading up to Christmas.   Music credit: Come Thou Long Expected Jesus from Advent Music in Solitude Mary's Song of Praise from Advent Music in Solitude   This podcast season is designed to be a companion to this year’s updated Advent Reflections, “Come, Lord Jesus, Come: Walking Through the Advent Season Together, Year C.”  The Advent Bundle includes both the softcover and digital edition of the Advent Reflections and a set of 5 corresponding Advent Liturgies to print out and pray as a family or with others. It is available now in our online store.   This month, $10 Patrons receive a weekly guided audio Lectio Divina practice with one of the passages of scripture from the Revised Common Lectionary. Become a Patron today to receive these practices. Interested in going further with your own spiritual transformation? We are still accepting applications for Transforming Community 18.

This season we invite you to walk through Advent by engaging with the lectionary Scripture readings and listening for what God might want to say through them. In each episode, Ruth and members of the Transforming Center staff will read and reflect on the themes of Cycle C of the Revised Common Lectionary for Advent together.   In this conversation, we discussed the prayers for and of indifference and how we are personally wrestling with them, particularly as we engage with the story of Mary and Elizabeth this week. Ruth uses another one of Drew Jackson’s poems to spark conversation about God’s practice of speaking through the disgraced and marginalized members of society.   Mentioned in this episode: God Speaks Through Wombs by Drew Jackson For more on discernment and the Prayer of Indifference see chapter 7 of Sacred Rhythms by Ruth Haley Barton or Season 1 Episode 7 of the Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership podcast, The Art and Practice of Spiritual Discernment.   Music credit: Come Thou Long Expected Jesus from Advent Music in Solitude Mary’s Song of Praise from Advent Music in Solitude   This podcast season is designed to be a companion to this year’s updated Advent Reflections, “Come, Lord Jesus, Come: Walking Through the Advent Season Together, Year C.”  The Advent Bundle includes both the softcover and digital edition of the Advent Reflections and a set of 5 corresponding Advent Liturgies to print out and pray as a family or with others. It is available now in our online store.   This month, $10 Patrons receive a weekly guided audio Lectio Divina practice with one of the passages of scripture from the Revised Common Lectionary. Become a Patron today to receive these practices.   Interested in going further with your own spiritual transformation? We are still accepting applications for Transforming Community 18. 

This season we invite you to walk through Advent by engaging with the lectionary Scripture readings and listening for what God might want to say through them. In each episode, Ruth and members of the Transforming Center staff will read and reflect on the themes of Cycle C of the Revised Common Lectionary for Advent together.   In this conversation, we discussed the invitation to repentance in this Advent season. Ruth reframes the idea of repentance as more than just confession and turning from sin but also a posture of openness towards the changing of one’s mind or ideas and the staff discusses what that stirred up in them and the hope they may or may not have in it.    Mentioned in this episode: Guerrillas of Grace: Prayers for the Battle by Ted Loder  How I Changed my Mind About Women in Leadership edited by Alan Johnson   Music credit: Come Thou Long Expected Jesus from Advent Music in Solitude Journey from Advent Music in Solitude   This podcast season is designed to be a companion to this year’s updated Advent Reflections, “Come, Lord Jesus, Come: Walking Through the Advent Season Together, Year C.”  The Advent Bundle includes both the softcover and digital edition of the Advent Reflections and a set of 5 corresponding Advent Liturgies to print out and pray as a family or with others. It is available now in our online store.   This month, $10 Patrons receive a weekly guided audio Lectio Divina practice with one of the passages of scripture from the Revised Common Lectionary. Become a Patron today to receive these practices. Interested in going further with your own spiritual transformation? We are still accepting applications for Transforming Community 18.

This season we invite you to walk through Advent by engaging with the lectionary Scripture readings and listening for what God might want to say through them. In each episode, Ruth and members of the Transforming Center staff will read and reflect on the themes of Cycle C of the Revised Common Lectionary for Advent together.   In this conversation, we discuss what it looks like to “prepare” for Advent, particularly with regard to the “rough edges” that need to be smoothed to make way for the coming of Jesus and Ruth concludes with a poem called “The Waters of Insurrection.”   Mentioned in this episode: Invitation to Silence and Solitude by Ruth Haley Barton God Speaks Through Wombs by Drew Jackson   This podcast season is designed to be a companion to this year’s updated Advent Reflections, “Come, Lord Jesus, Come: Walking Through the Advent Season Together, Year C.”  The Advent Bundle includes both the softcover and digital edition of the Advent Reflections and a set of 5 corresponding Advent Liturgies to print out and pray as a family or with others. It is available now in our online store.   This month, patrons at all levels received a bonus conversation between the creator of the Advent Liturgies, Charity McClure, and podcast producer, Colleen Powell where they discussed their experience using these liturgies with their families. Become a Patron today to hear that conversation and all of our other bonus content. Interested in going further with your own spiritual transformation? We are still accepting applications for Transforming Community 18.

This season we invite you to walk through Advent by engaging with the lectionary Scripture readings and listening for what God might want to say through them. In each episode, Ruth and members of the Transforming Center staff will read and reflect on the themes of Cycle C of the Revised Common Lectionary for Advent together.   In this conversation, we wondered what it looked like to “lift your soul to God” in the midst of so many difficult realities, how we bring our anger and despair to God, and Ruth’s practice of watching for the light each day. Ruth concluded with the poem “For the Darkness of Waiting” by Janet Morely.    Mentioned in this episode: Invitation to Silence and Solitude by Ruth Haley Barton Bread of Tomorrow: Prayers for the Church Year by Janet Morely This podcast season is designed to be a companion to this year’s updated Advent Reflections, “Come, Lord Jesus, Come: Walking Through the Advent Season Together, Year C.”  The Advent Bundle includes both the softcover and digital edition of the Advent Reflections and a set of 5 corresponding Advent Liturgies to print out and pray as a family or with others. It is available now in our online store. This month, patrons at all levels received a bonus conversation between the creator of the Advent Liturgies, Charity McClure, and podcast producer, Colleen Powell where they discussed their experience using these liturgies with their families. Become a Patron today to hear that conversation and all of our other bonus content.