Guest Joycelyn Seybold. God called Joycelyn to serve him vocationally with Entrust. How does he call other women, and to what roles?

Links
Joycelyn's Entrust Equipping Christian Leaders article https://www.entrust4.org/post/why-train-women-god-calls-men-and-women-to-serve-together

Entrust Equipping Women https://www.entrust4.org/equippingwomen

Transcript
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00;00;03;12  | Hello, friends. Thanks for joining us again here on Entrust Equipping Leaders today. Laurie Lind continues her conversations about training women in ministry. Today's guest is Joycelyn Seybold, the director of Entrust Equipping Women. We hope this podcast is helpful to you in your ministry. We invite you to subscribe. Tell a friend and leave us a review.
00;00;27;18  | Well, it's very exciting to have Joycelyn Seybold from Entrust as our guest on the Equipping Christian Leaders podcast today, the series about the broad question of why train women, and we'll get into why we're even asking that question and then some thoughts about that. But Joycelyn, because you are a woman in ministry and a woman who trains and equips other women, I wonder if you could start by telling us a bit about your background and how God called you into Christian ministry?
00;01;00;13  | Sure, I can do that. So I grew up in a Christian family. My father is a retired pastor. And my my mom is I was an education teacher and most of her working life. So I grew up in a Christian home, but I really didn't come to know the Lord personally and start walking with him until I was in my early thirties.
00;01;27;14  | And so there was a disconnect there in terms of really understanding the personal relationship with the Lord and really understanding the Holy Spirit and how He guides us in and connects us to and helps us understand God's word. So how did He call me into the Christian Ministry as I was working with first in children's ministry and then in youth ministry?
00;01;57;07  | I really felt the need to be equipped in in leading and teaching in those roles that I was working in or serving in. And so over time, it was really a two and a half, three year process since I was being called a seminary and my pastor confirmed that. And so I went ahead and went into seminary and was trained in interdisciplinary side with New Testament in Christian education and really with the focus of desiring to be better equipped into teaching whatever role the Lord was calling me into.
00;02;40;17  | You know, even as we get into this, it strikes me that your path may have been similar to a lot of women who are believers. You you said you were working in some ministries in your church and then felt the need to be equipped. So you came into it. How did you come into having those roles in your church in the first place?
00;03;03;05  | That's an interesting question. I think while I know that I, as a speech pathologist with my former background speech language pathologist, I had worked a lot with children and actually all adults as well. And so I started in children's ministry. And as I was telling stories and going through those lessons, I really felt that, wow, I need to know the Bible better.
00;03;33;17  | And then stepping into youth ministry even more so is how can I come alongside of these youth bettering, guiding them. And I need to know better what the words says and how to come alongside of them. And so it was really, in essence, through that serving that I realized how little I knew and how much more there was to know.
00;04;02;03  | I really think that might be the story of many, many people sort of begin to serve because we have some ability or some concern for a certain area of ministry and then realize, wow, there's more I could learn about this after the fact. So you did mention some of your Bible studies in theological. Tell us again which schools you went to or what degrees you earned in the Christian world in.
00;04;33;06  | Well, I mean, to step back to actually my undergrad because it was linguistics. And I look back and look at how I've always been interested in language and cultures and so linguistics and actually some of my courses were Africa apology, which you're looking at studies of humanity, cultures and that mix. And so I think the Lord set that is kind of a base or know basis where I was already interested in learning about people and languages.
00;05;04;13  | And so then and then the speech language pathology kind of added that and really developed my people skills. And then with the seminary and the Christian education piece that really I originally I thought I was going to be serving in children's ministry and our mentors there really kept challenging me with that. But that focus on Christian education really helped me focus in on really how to study God's word and then how to then take that and put that into lesson plans or you know, how to put that together.
00;05;47;07  | That then to teach others. And then the New Testament piece the Lord really used of languages. And that ties back into the interest in language and how I was wired to help me see things in the Bible that in a special way, because that's the way I'm wired.
00;06;08;01  | So those have all kind of worked together to to form some of who you are today and the ways that you're wired, as you said, have fed into the choices you've made and the things that God led you to. Now, somehow you landed on staff with and trust a few years ago. What is your role with Entrust?
00;06;31;19  | And my role with Entrust is the executive director of the Equipping Women Entrust.
00;06;37;28  | Equipping Women Entrust almost from its beginning, kind of had a branch devoted to training and equipping women initially behind the Iron Curtain and so on. What are some reasons that that's a value add?
00;06;52;12  | Entrust and it's a value add in trust because women are called to entrust to women are called to teach younger women. And then also women are called to make and teach disciples as well. And so you see throughout the Bible that God uses both men and women. And so there you. So you need to have both a focus on teaching and training men and a focus on teaching and training women.
00;07;32;11  | And historically, maybe the interest started mostly focusing on men, I believe. And then there became an awareness that the ladies were interested in learning and growing, too.
00;07;45;07  | Mm hmm. Yes. That tends to be limited resources for training women and especially in the context of the Eastern European Church. 90% of the people in the churches were women and so when you think about a pastor overseeing a male pastor over 18 women, it just was really evident to those women that, you know, we need to be better equipped and trained to to help our sisters and come alongside the pastor in certain areas that he he wouldn't be able to come alongside those women.
00;08;24;01  | What were some of those areas? I mean, I know he might not have been on the team at that time, but you've probably heard some of what that was about.
00;08;32;28  | Yes. I mean, it was a seven different courses over time. And and I'll say, too, with the training that I had with Entrust is really practical ministry, where the seminary training was knowledge based and understanding with some application. But with the interest training, I really learned the practical ministry aspect. And so what does that look like? That looks how do women come alongside of other women in mentoring them?
00;09;04;10  | How do they help them identify their spiritual gifts? How do they help the women learn how to study the Bible and understand that through the Holy Spirit, they can personally, individually understand God's Word and and just helping them understand there's a systematic way of inductive Bible study to really understand it and contain them. And then in marriage, marriage and family and raising children and there are many other areas, but that gives you a flavor of all the different areas that women need equipping in.
00;09;46;29  | Mm hmm. And again, I'm sort of thinking back to the past there, but these ideas that the women could could grow in these areas to serve one another. Do you know, was there some pushback from the church? And it's what we're asking this question why train women? Did that question itself come up back in the early days?
00;10;09;28  | I wasn't there. I so it might have come up. However, what the approach that was taken was really the women went to the pastors and and to their denominational structure and presented them with this need. And then the pastors chose the women who wanted who they felt were leaders or could become leaders to help and really, it was through that that yes, there was pushback.
00;10;47;18  | But then as they saw the women's lives beginning to change and in relationships with others and in how they dealt with their family, how they supported their families, then they got into, wow, this is really something that is different than is being done in the church and that is really beneficial to the church.
00;11;13;10  | So what do you see women being especially called to do within the context of the local church?
00;11;22;10  | That's a loaded question.
00;11;23;24  | It is a loaded question. I totally know that. And we don't want to get into on the political arguments. But yeah.
00;11;30;12  | Yeah. I mean, in some cases that's a denominational question. But in other cases you see the spiritual gifts and you see women called into areas of service, hospitality, evangelism, marriage ministry, teaching children and youth and teaching women. And so those are typical places that are in the context of a local church. You are most you know, when I looked at this question, I looked at it as a specialty call, too.
00;12;05;16  | I think that that women tend to serve in those areas across cultural ministries, being very involved in in the global aspects of classical ministries.
00;12;19;21  | So when we talk about this training in the equipping, like if God has called someone and given her some certain spiritual gifts, wouldn't that be all she needs? And I'm thinking back to you. You had a role, a couple roles in the church, and yet you felt you needed more. But if God's given me the gift of whatever hospitality, boy, isn't that enough?
00;12;42;16  | I hope the Holy.
00;12;43;10  | Spirit is our guide and teacher, and God can teach us the Holy Spirit and God's Word. And He gives us that gifting. However, he also calls us to come alongside of each other and to to teach and to equip others. And so you think of, well, somebody has a spiritual gift, a serving, but they're not understanding how to apply God's word.
00;13;15;24  | Then they may think of character development and the things that God calls us to be, were, know the whole aspect of thinking of sanctification, and that we are called to become more and more like Christ Jesus. Generally that takes interaction with other people to develop those through to the Spirit. And no matter where you are serving in the church, no matter what spiritual gift you have, we all need to be sanctified.
00;13;49;14  | And that generally comes from that interaction and guiding and teaching and rebuking for, you know, when you think of those different aspects, the iron sharpens iron.
00;14;03;11  | Yes. Yes. I was just thinking that iron sharpens iron in all of the one another's in scripture that know don't learn a lot unless there's someone challenging us, encouraging us through the Holy Spirit as well. And so then this intentional equipping can move us further along that path, maybe of that same indication process. And also then some of those ministry roles.
00;14;33;05  | Because, you know, we we may have the spiritual gift of serving, but we're all called to evangelize. We're all called to disciple. And so that's going to look different. We're going to do it in different ways through our spiritual gifting. However, there are things that we all universally as believers, need to develop and to be able to come alongside others and help them develop in those areas.
00;15;01;01  | You've been listening to a conversation between Laurie Lind and Joycelyn Seybold, two women who serve with and trust and who are passionate about equipping next generations of leaders in the local church. On our next episode, you'll get a bit of a Hebrew lesson, some further understanding of God's plan for men and women to serve him together and,  well, 
Laurie demonstrates how not to ask good questions. Be sure to subscribe to Entrust Equipping Leaders so you don't miss out.






Entrust Equipping Women: www.entrust4.org/equippingwomen