And I'm just beginning to see the power of simply giving a book, giving Jesus

calling to people who are going through a health crisis or a divorce or grief or some other kind of struggle,

you know, that you don't have to talk and talk and talk, you can just say, hey, I want to give you this.

Cindy Ryan is the associate pastor of First United Methodist Church

a congregation of over 2,800 members in Grapevine Texas.

In our church we've had a variety of things that have happened over the years, including some difficult things, some wonderful things, some opportunities to reach out to our community in powerful ways and

and recently I just realized that probably for the past five years

undergirding all of that has been the book Jesus Calling and the way in which that book has

resourced us individually and together has been really powerful and life transforming.

In today's experience Jesus Calling podcast will tell the amazing story of one church

and the collective impact that has been made by sharing Jesus Calling within its community.

In the following weeks we'll be sharing the incredible personal stories from both members

of this church and many other Jesus Calling Readers around the World. Readers who have had their lives transformed.

My name is Cindy Ryan and I joined the staff at First United Methodist in Great Vine in 1996 as one of the pastors and on and off during that time I have been

serving as a pastor on staff including welcoming new members and helping people

connect and serving and in a variety of ways.

I began hearing in the congregation people sharing about Jesus Calling and about how it had helped

them personally in their different struggles.

I heard groups talking about having the book and that they were studying it together or looking

at it together.

I had conversations with people where they even said, do we each have the same

book because it seems like it's personally written for each of us.

...