2024-2025 Interns

I don’t know about you, but I am so excited to have nicer weather and to be able to get outside more! As I look forward to the next 60 days, I feel so grateful for the growth and support I have had through this internship. There are parts of me that feel just like new flowers is spring, starting to grow with new life and purpose.

Two weeks ago, we had a family ministries strategy planning session for the upcoming ministry year. Having the opportunity to meet with all the campuses student and kids' directors was a really amazing experience. To sit in a room with so many seasoned leaders in family ministries was very humbling and aspiring. There were so many amazing ideas to help our ministry grow as well as ways we can partner with families in their faith journeys. I look forward to being apart of the continued mission in helping our kids and students grow in their faith.

The Intern class has been reading through the book, Leading Others by Mac Lake. This is an interactive learning guide on different areas of leadership and leading other people. We are able to read through each chapter and put the new content into practice with our teams. This has been very helpful to try new leading skills as well as reflecting back on past situations where this could have come into play. Going along with the leadership skills and leading our team; I have been able to step into teaching and leading a new Elementary Large Group host. Stepping into this leadership experience has stretched me to implement everything I have been learning!

As I look forward to what the next step is after graduation in May; I wanted to share that I have completed my application for the apprenticeship program! As God prepares me for what is next in my journey, I ask for your continued support, prayers and guidance!

Hello friends, I am so excited to share this month all of the updates and new findings! At the end of January we had an overnight (24 hour) retreat at Maumee Bay state park. During this time we were able to sit in quite with God and reflect on a few things; what we are grateful for, leaning into prayer time and scripture also thinking of things we like about ourselves. On top of seclusion time we also had 24 hours of fasting. I was pretty nervous about this quite time- as a mother and wife who also works, I don’t think I have ever sat in complete silence. This experience gave me the space to slow down and trust God during this time.

During this season we have completed a few different assessments. The color assessment and the enneagram assessment. By doing both of these assessments it has really helped me to learn how other people may interpret how I communicate things and how I can understand myself and others more deeply. Both of these results have shown me that I thrive in the calm, content and peaceful environment and I always want to produce and do my best.

As an Intern class we traveled to Chicago for a short trip. During this time we visited a few different churches and had the chance to meet so many amazing people. We had some team building and connection time as well as some fun exploring the city. During this trip I had the opportunity to interact with a few different people who have the gift of prophecy. This is something new to me and I have not interacted with anyone with this gifting. Spending time with them and hearing so many stories and examples of their experiences of God showing up in their lives was so inspiring. Thank you all for your support and the chance to have these experiences!

This month I have had time to reflect on my journey from the last year. I have had the chance to go back and read the journal entries I have made since last January and remember everything I was experiencing while starting the interview process. This was an amazing chance to walk through each step of the journey as well as see how God has responded to my prayers.

God has given me the word “Listen” as my word for 2025. This word is exactly what I need to focus on in my current journey. I am learning how to listen to my body and learning how to care for myself. I am also growing in being present where my feet are and intentionally listening to who I am with. Lastly, I am learning how to listen to God and what his voice sounds like to me.

January 28-29 we are attending a 24-hour retreat. During this time, we will be disconnecting from electronics as well as having a 24-hour fast. This is meant for us to slow down, lean in and grow with God. I am super excited to see how this goes and cannot wait to give you all an update!

This month we have been preparing for Christmas in our new space. With all the excitement in our new building it has also brought new challenges as well. As we are stepping in and decorating our new space in kids as well as the Lobby and other spaces, we have realized we have to intentionally map out our new areas on how we will be setting up decorations. We have had an amazing decorating team who have helped to envision and execute our wonderful decorations for At the Movies and Christmas. It has been fun to watch this team creat new vision and fun ideas for our space.

This month I have been diving deep into my self care and what that looks like for me. I have had to be extremely honest with myself to understand that I have not been caring for myself in a healthy way and that I really did not know how to care for myself. This was hard for me to admit, and this came with feelings of shame and guilt. I have been working through various levels of care and what that looks like for me specifically. I am so thankful to be able to process this with my mentor and some other wonderful supporters. I am getting curious with myself to discover some hobbies and things I like to do in this season of growth.

It is hard to wrap my brain around the fact that this year is over. I remember very vividly waiting to hear if I would be selected for the first round of interviews. I have taken time this last week to go back and read my journal entries for this year. It is crazy to see how much God has shown up in my journey so far. Stepping into this next part of the Internship journey the question has already been brought up “What is next?” I have been living this entire year incredibly open handed and I intend to continue to trust in God and the journey he has for me.

A few things I am looking forward to in January and February are an overnight retreat and our intern trip. I can’t wait to share more details with you all in the next few months.

Happy New Year!

I can not believe that we are stepping into the holiday season already. We have been celebrating so many things the last 60 days in our new building, and I am so honored to be apart of this amazing journey. Cedar Creek Findlay has hit a milestone in attendee numbers since before covid; in Kids we are averaging around 190 per weekend and as a whole church we have seen just under 1400 people in one weekend of At the Movies! What a fun and amazing time to introduce new people to Jesus.

I want to jump back quickly and talk about our Halloweekend experience! Back in kids we had so much fun that weekend with dressing up in our costumes, to our candy adventure, pumpkin patch, hayrides, and we also got to SLIME some Elementary group leaders! The whole month of October we had the chance to step into teaching our Kindergarten through 4th graders about evangelism. We had a fun challenge for the kids each week to invite new people to church. We taught them about how to ask people to come to church, that sometimes people tell us no or they do not want to come and that is ok; not to get discouraged and keep inviting people. Overall, the girls won the challenge, and we had 3 amazing leaders get covered in gooy green slime.

This mont for At the Movies the kids have been loving their popcorn treat and watching a small clip from some fun movies like Meet the Robinson, Toy Story, Encanto, Up, Moana and The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe and a few more! I have really enjoyed showing the kids that the TV shows and movies we watch all the time have ways we can learn about God. Being able to relate the movies to daily life and situations helps the kids to realize that God is with us all the time.

A few weeks ago, we also had our second round of campus visits. We went to Whitehouse, Oregon and West Toledo campuses. This was a lot of fun seeing the other campuses decorated with their At the Movies decorations as well getting to spend a little one-on-one time with the campus pastors. Learning more about a multi site church and how it functions with each sight tending to its demographic of attendees has been very eye opening and interesting.

I have really noticed a shift in multiple areas of my life while on this adventure. Taking the step of faith and living life with an open heart and open hands to God has really shown me that he truly has a plan for me and I can be his hands and feet on the Earth to help others see their purpose! I want to let all my class members, supporters, family, and friends know that you have all made a significant impact on me and a change in my life and I will forever be grateful for you all!

Hello Friends! I can not believe we are finishing month 3 already. This month has been remarkably busy learning new things about myself, traveling to other campuses and stepping into new leadership opportunities.

This month we completed the Working Genius Test, which helps us to see what our strong talents are when it comes to a workplace environment. My top two geniuses are Tenacity and Enablement. This means that I am naturally gifted, gain energy and joy from pushing projects and tasks through to completion, and I enjoy providing others with encouragement and help during projects and tasks. These 2 geniuses fit me very well and i can see how I bring encouragement and completion to the team and the workplace.

At the beginning of October all the interns and our mentors had a chance to meet for the day to dive into some different spiritual disciplines. We discussed Worship, Journaling, Bible Reading, Community and Scripture Memorization. These are just a few from a lengthy list of disciplines. I would say Worshiping is my strongest discipline from this list. I love music in general, so it is quite easy for me to listen and sing out my praise to Jesus daily. The one I want to work the most on is Scripture Memorization. I am still working on making Bible reading a daily habit, so the more I get comfortable reading the Bible I fee that remembering scripture will come in time.

We have done our first round of Campus visits this last month. We visited Perrysburg for a Saturday service then Findlay, and South Toledo during Sunday services. This round South Toledo was the only campus I had not been to. Walking into the campus I love their large lobby space! It is so open and welcoming to everyone. Stepping into the kids' space was cool to see the similarities and the slight differences in how the function. I am looking forward to the next round in a few weeks to learn more new things!

Overall, the last 3 months I have been growing my leadership skills as well as my personal speaking skills. I was able to step into the main leadership roll and running the kid's area on Sunday 10/14. I have done most of these rolls before but this time around I felt much more comfortable and confident in myself in the position. I also noticed because I was less stressed, I was able to be more present in meeting families and caring for our dream team. Making these connections felt like such a win for me so early in this process! I am so blessed to work with the Kids Dream Team and be able to help lead and care for them.

Thank you all for the continued support encouraging words!

Hello Supporters!

The last 30 days have been a whirl wind to say the least. I would love to introduce you all to Levi Brice (picture below). Levi attends the Perrysburg campus, and he is experiencing this life changing Internship adventure with me, as the Perrysburg kids Intern. Having another kids intern in the class along with me has been amazing. Jumping into the Internship headfirst was a big adjustment and knowing that Levi is experiencing the same things has been comforting as we can communicate with each other and support each other.

This last month I attended the GROW conference. At this conference it was amazing to meet Pastor Chris Hodges from Church of the Highlands and to hear him speak on his passion to help grow churches and leaders. Being able to learn and hear where Cedar Creek adopted some of the values and the process of how we “do church” was cool to put the pieces together. Sitting there during the talks and hearing exactly what he is saying is the culture we live in but also hearing his heartbeat behind his teachings sparked a fire in me to lean in more and take next steps in my own journey.

The whole month of September went by so fast! All the planning and preparation we have done to move over to our new home was in full swing. I want to give a big Thank You to everyone who has helped in the build out and helping this space come alive. Also, a huge shout out to all our dream team for stepping up for extra Saturday meetings and trainings but also for helping us own our spaces! Our transition to our new space has been amazing, getting to set up our new rooms and order new toys for the kids has been a blast. Grand Opening weekend we raised our weekend kid's numbers to 186!!! We are so excited to see where God is moving in these kids and the journey, we get to walk with them on!

Talk to you all soon!!

Hello supporters!

I am so excited to start sharing my internship experiences with you. Stepping into this season I have been preparing myself for a very open-handed year. This season I am looking to grow personally in so many ways.

Our first internship class we talked about time management and task management systems. Jumping into the internship we have many meetings throughout the week, along with all of our tasks we must complete. Coming back to a “work” schedule has been so giving for my soul as being a stay-at-home mom for the last 2 years has left me craving a task driven lifestyle again.

I was so excited to help during the dream team launch. Being able to serve the team who I have been serving next to the last few years was a humbling experience. Being able to help cast vision to our dream team for the upcoming year was life giving. As I have been learning Cedar Creeks values and passing it on to the team; I hope that we all have a fresh vision going into our new building.

This last week I was tasked with writing out my Testimony. This task made me feel very anxious and nervous at first. My story is very personal and difficult for me to talk about. Through the week as I was finding my words the anxiety started to fade away. I realized that putting voice to my story was very empowering. God gave me this story and gave me my voice to share with others.

Thank you all again for walking beside me in this journey!