Here is What Happened at Heart to Heart

No weapon forged against you will prevail,
    and you will refute every tongue that accuses you.
This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord,
    and this is their vindication from me,”
declares the Lord. Isaiah 54:17 NIV

When I advise people who have been attacked or falsely accused, I usually encourage them to simply allow the Lord to vindicate them. The truth will come out eventually, and God will fight our battles for us. Even Jesus remained quiet when His accusers spewed one lie after another against Him, and He allowed them to convict Him over false accusations.

The problem in this situation, however, is that it involves a large number of people who could be swayed or hurt, and I have the responsibility to defend and protect this ministry that God has ordained. I am going to give you the basic facts of what happened so that you will know, and then it will not be spoken of again unless absolutely necessary.

We had a leader in our Heart to Heart ministry who has the sweetest heart and truly loves the Lord. I know this. She served with excellence and diligence. We became friends, and I loved her. However, as the founder and director of this ministry, and the one who has to answer to God for the way it is run, I needed to address two issues that were a possible detriment to the ministry.

For one, as she led the Flourish ministry, I had become very uncomfortable with the flow of language in the groups. I allowed it for a time because I assumed it was just a different personality. I believe in freedom to be different. However, I noticed that many weeks had no Bible in it at all; it did not line up with the Flourish book; and some of the language was borderline New Age. For example, “Becoming one with your flower.” I could not allow this to go on any longer. She says that she had no intention of New Age infiltration, and I believe her. I really do. However, I requested a change in the language so that we wouldn’t head down that path.

In the last two weeks that she led, she had actually centered the groups with Scripture, and I praised her for that. My specific request was that she continue doing Flourish but to tone down the flower talk and continue centering the sessions on the Word. That was it! Is there anyone who would disagree with that?

I reminded her of the mission of Heart to Heart. This is the purpose that the Holy Spirit specifically spoke to me to be the foundation of this ministry. It is thus:

This is a place where women from all over the world can come together for fellowship, worship, and growth through in-depth study of the Word of God; where women strengthen and encourage each other in their faith and develop deeper intimacy in their relationship with God.

Our motto is Growing Together through the Word.

Flourish did not line up to this mission at all, and as the founder and director of this ministry, I have every right, as well as the responsibility to request the change. I did not ask this person to step down from leadership. I only reiterated my appreciation and love for her as a sister before I made the request.

The second concern I addressed was that she was posting things in the group that contradicted what I was trying to do. For example, she was promoting a Lent study I specifically said that we were not going to do as Heart to Heart. She posted assignments, a video, links, and a schedule. She promoted it each week in the Flourish group. I asked her not to do this.

She also posted contradictory Bible verses than what I was posting. We had agreed in the beginning that I would be the one to post the memory verses each week. But then in the group, she shared different verses as the memory verses, totally disregarding anything I had posted. She had also declared a “Scripture Quilt Showcase  Day” in the Heart to Heart group without consulting me. I didn’t feel that it was appropriate to declare a special day in my ministry group without at least consulting me. All I asked was that she let me know first if she wanted to do something like that again.

Again, I did not remove her or ask her to leave. All I asked were two things: for her to make Flourish more Biblically based and to not post anything that contradicts me in the Bible study group. That is all.

She came back saying that she wasn’t sure if she should continue leading at Heart to Heart. She asked me to let her know if I think she should stay or go. I had asked her before to continue with us but with the condition that she make those two changes. However, since I saw that were not seeing eye to eye as to the mission of Heart to Heart, and since I feel that the leadership team needs to be in unity and to move in the same direction, I added one more thing to my approach.

I told her that her answer to these four questions will determine whether or not she should stay or go. I said that if she can answer yes to all four of these questions, she should stay. However, if she could not answer these with a yes, then we may need to go our separate ways, and that I would give her my blessing as she continues to step out in her own ministry.

1. Can you agree that this is a Word centered ministry and that Bible study must be about studying the Bible?
2. Are you willing to comply with the changes I have asked for concerning posting in the group? It is not that I need to be in charge, but we must not be posting things that compete or pull against each other.
3. Are you in agreement with the changes I have asked for in Flourish? Will this be a Word centered study, or is it going to continue going down the superficial path it has drifted? If our hearts truly differ here, I need to know, because I think this is the root of the problem.
4. Can we work with unified hearts and agree with the mission of this ministry as the Holy Spirit clearly laid on my heart for Heart to Heart Women’s Bible Study?

I waited several days for her response, and she would not answer these questions. Therefore, I had no choice but to remove her from Flourish. I kept her as a co-leader and in the leaders’ group, but I could not allow her to be a primary leader in this ministry if she could not agree with the mission. I feel that is a perfectly reasonable response.

In turn, she removed herself from the leaders’ group and from the ministry altogether. Now, rumors are being spread on Facebook that she was mistreated and that a particular women’s ministry is acting ugly. Someone is spreading false information, and people are buying into it. This person is calling me a Pharisee, a hypocrite, legalistic, etc. and saying malicious things about me and this ministry.

Like I said, I was going to just let it go, but this affects you. I do not want you to be hurt or deceived by this. I wanted you to know why and how this happened. Truth can set us free. So, if you see this junk going around, don’t entertain it. Just let it be. You know the truth; God knows the truth; and I know that truth. That is all that matters.

Let’s continue growing in the Word and lifting up the name of Jesus! Let us pray for restoration and be kind. God is glorified when we rise above all of this and continue in obedience to the leading of the Holy Spirit and stay grounded in the Word of God.

May God bless you!