EP306 Digital & Mental Health - Stigmas in the Church

and something we say in mental health space and in recovery space, you're only as sick as your secrets. Now that's more in terms of addiction, but even in the sense of mental health, when you have to carry this burden privately, it's just heavier.

Welcome to the Church Digital podcast. Through this podcast we'll talk about the technological innovations within the church, but more than tech for tech's sake, we'll address deeper questions. Is discipleship making possible digitally? How should we approach the digital mission field? Can a biblically grounded church operate in digital space? And where does the metaverse and artificial intelligence fit into all of this? Whether you're a big or small church, the Church Digital's goal is to help churches like yours learn to be a multiplying church digitally and physically. And now here's your host, Jeff Reed.

All right, hey everybody. Welcome to the Church Digital podcast. We've got episode 306. Jeff Reed here, founder with the Church Digital. Excited to be kicking off a new season. I've had so many seasons I don't even know what season number this is. I want to say it's season eight. If I had Whitebeard here in Discord, he would fact check me and tell me correctly, but he's not in the room yet. So I think it's season eight. The season I'm really excited about though—we're doing a deep dive on mental health.

Whitebeard is in the room. Thank you, sir. We were just talking about you by the way before we get into this. Like, we're doing this live recording on Discord. We do this on the TCD Discord server every Tuesday or Wednesday. So we will have all of the live recordings in the events board listed there. But check it out—Tuesday or Wednesdays we typically do TCD recordings. And so like this season, we're doing obviously mental health.

Whitebeard, I was asking you to fact check me. What season am I on? This is a new season. We just wrapped up season seven. Wait, that's a church. Or was that season eight? Wait, that's a church. I don't know if you can get that number, but so we're on season nine.

He's telling me season nine. Wait, that's a church. I freaking love Whitebeard. He is like the perfect fact checker for everything until he like gets an attitude and starts correcting me. It's one thing to fact check me, but then correcting me is completely different. But so we're in season nine. Thank you, Whitebeard. Wait, that's a church.

Oh no. We are on season nine of mental health in digital, digital and mental health. And so there's so much implication centered around mental health in digital ministry. A, ourselves as we're doing ministry in that space. B, as we're ministering to people in a mental health environment. C, protecting ourselves as we're in sometimes addictive environments and dealing with people that have addiction type tendencies and issues, not to even get into other mental issues that people might be dealing with digitally.

Was interesting in a stream yesterday—was talking with the group, talking about this season that was kicking off, and they started like sharing, you know, examples of stories of people that they've dealt with that have had mental issues. And it seems like in digital ministry, like once you really get beyond broadcast and get into relational aspects of digital ministry, digital church, digital missions work, you really find yourself engaging with people that are in dire straits, that have more needs, that are more open to conversing about it, and they are in invisible space.

So I'm excited for this season. We've got eight weeks coming in, and I'm going to bring Megan Carter on, who's obviously you can see her, but Megan is—I'm not gonna lie—she's the brainchild of this season. I just said to Megan, "Hey, I want to do a season on mental health. Will you help me?" And she designs the episodes and the questions and really is, you know, she's going to take over the Church Digital podcast for the next eight weeks, and I'm just going to be like pretty eye candy on YouTube for you all.

No, but I'm really excited about this. Megan, why don't you just set the stage a little bit and introduce yourself?

Yeah, so Megan Carter. I'm on staff at First Capital Christian Church. Anywhere has multiple names depending if you're in person or online. So yeah, I get to be part of the staff and next steps pastor there. There's a lot that goes along with that. It's hard to sum up in like a sentence what that does, but it's basically guiding people into whatever their next step may be. And so a big part of that, in my passion that God's placed in my heart, and something that I've personally dealt with, is mental health. So going through trainings to just become aware of more than what I've just dealt with, but what other people are struggling with and be able to help them in other ways as well, is huge passion of mine. And so getting to step into something like that is awesome. And so I'm excited to partner with you guys and do this as well and meet some awesome guests that we're gonna have on this episode or these seasons.

Yeah, so I'm excited about the episodes here that Megan's put together, and the first one that she put together was what we're talking about today: mental health stigmas and the church. And I honestly, my contribution was, "Okay, let me connect the dots and see who would be an interesting person to talk about the mental health stigmas." And DJ Chong quickly rose up for this episode.

So DJ, my gosh, he is—I want to call you an OG of digital ministry because dude's been doing digital ministry like before, maybe before I was. Like, he's been doing this for such a long time. And I feel like DJ, you know, people tell me, "Jeff, you know, everybody. I don't know anybody compared to DJ Chong." DJ Chong's network and relationships were incredible. I mean, at one point he was running a database of churches that were doing ministry online. Like, you could if you started broadcasting, you would check in with DJ to let him know that you were doing like literally—that was the extent of what was happening. It was incredible.

And so DJ, maybe just introduce yourself here a little bit and tell the audience who you are.

Thank you, Jeff. It's—OG just means I'm old. I just turned fifty-eight in July. I'm so honored to be here and being the kickoff, the leadoff hitter for your series, which means I can get on base, but your next three people are going to provide the grand slam, which will be amazing.

And so mental health is such a big issue. It's a global crisis. Our Surgeon General here in the US have acknowledged that loneliness is a crisis and epidemic, and that's only just one part of mental health. Before I dig into that, share with you who I am. I've been blogging for over twenty years, so that's kind of the history I've had with the online world, and just continue to use the latest technologies—social media, podcasting. I think we started Social Media Church back in 2012, 2013, something like that. Five hundred episodes there. Handed it off to N. Smith. He continues to run that.

I'm actually coming to you live from Silicon Valley today. Happen to be up here doing some networking and coworking. Married twenty-nine years. Went to Virginia Tech for my undergrad in Computer Engineering. Went to Dallas Seminary. So I have a background in technology and theology. Worked in church for five years and realized I can be an okay pastor, but who needs an okay pastor? My journey is realizing God uses not just my skills but also my passion.

And so twenty-four years ago, how I got into mental health ministry—it's part of my own experience. I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder at the age of thirty-five when I last left vocational pastoring. And the past twenty-four years has been a perfect personal recovery journey, but also continuing to serve the church at large with the capital C and outside its church walls. And one of the things I realized is every time I share my mental health journey, it opens more doors for ministry than why not open the Bible. And so the online space has been a great place to connect with people, and I'll impact a bit more of that as we continue this conversation. So thank you for inviting me to be part of this conversation at TCD. Love it.

And so what I want to say, and I'm looking forward to so much there—even to digging into the dealing with the bipolar twenty-five years ago. Like, oh my gosh, that begs so many questions right there. The church response in that space and how it's evolved over time. You know, we've got six people in the room—Hector watching this live, Hector, Whitebeard, what a Rob, flat cap, Wal. First pet. If you guys got questions, put them in chat. We'll try to engage, pull them into the conversation as we're going.

And I'll tell you what, let me ask that question, and then I want to back off. Twenty-five years ago you were diagnosed with bipolar. I'll say for me, doing ministry twenty-five years ago, as a pastor I had no idea how to deal with bipolar people. Like, I mean, I don't want to say like I would shove them off, but it was for me way too complicated to understand even how to do that. And sadly, I know pastors twenty-five years later today that are still probably responding in that same way.

How did the church perceive you twenty-five years ago when you kind of were like—was it open hands? Was it question marks? Like, talk to me a little bit about that journey, about a personal level, what you've had to deal with.

Yeah, so twenty-five years ago I was thirty-five years old, and I think looking back at my life, middle school, high school, always had symptoms and feelings of depression and sadness, but not to the degree where I couldn't function. And so since I could survive, hold down a job, do okay in school, I wouldn't think of going to a counselor to get help because I'm okay, I'm surviving. And because of the shame and stigma as a Chinese American, all the more reason not to seek mental health treatment.

And back then, twenty-five years ago, there wasn't much conversation about mental health. And my only point of reference when it came to bipolar disorder was there was another guy in our church who had bipolar with much more severe symptoms where he couldn't function for months at a time and he couldn't hold down a job for months at a time. And so his symptoms were so pronounced that for a couple weeks he'd be super energetic, super outgoing, and then for another month he would be so sad and so depressed and could barely talk to people.

And so the mood swings, which is what bipolar disorder is—a diagnosis around you have very high highs and low lows. So it looks like one moment you're Superman, super energetic, super outgoing, and maybe misbehaving a little bit, and then depression, just sad and blue. Now my symptoms were not so pronounced until I had some stressful moments in my life. And so over the past twenty-five years, every three to five years I have some stressful episodes like moving cross country or changing jobs or being laid off, and those are triggers that affect my mood regulation where I need to adjust my medication and seek some extra professional help to get readjusted and normalized.

So that's a quick snapshot of what bipolar disorder—number two. There's two kinds. There's number one and number two. I can't tell the difference, but mine's number two, which means it's less severe than some others.

How did you like feel during that time? Would you like—did you feel support by certain people? Were they in the church, out of the church? Or did you feel that stigma on you? I think a lot of people can relate with that. Like, I can. I have that same kind of story.

Of dealing with that, so I'd love to hear kind of your perspective. Yeah, when it comes to mental health, 25 years ago and even now, it's by default a private and heavy burden to carry. There's not many safe places where you can just let your hair down and share more openly about what you're struggling with. And certainly 25 years ago, even more so, where it was just a private thing that my pastor and a few close friends, and even just a few family members knew about, but not all my family knew about it, and certainly not my church. And so when you have a secret, and something we say in mental health space and in recovery space, you're only as sick as your secrets. Now, that's more in terms of addiction, but even in the sense of mental health, when you have to carry this burden privately, it's just heavier. And the Bible talks about when we share a burden it becomes lighter. Share burdens one another and you will be healed and lighten your burden. So over the years, I found a few safe places, even some online, which we'll get into. The past three years, I go to a little church called Saddleback. Some of you may have heard of it. And I've been part of the mental health ministry at that church, and I host a Zoom-based support group where we meet every week for an hour, and people feel cared for and supported because at the safe place. And so that's been really cool. And I think there's so many opportunities in the online space because people are more open because of a sense of intimacy that when you're in person you just don't know. People take a little more risk, and because we don't yet know each other, then we're like, well, what's there to lose? I'll share a little bit more online. And there's certainly there's good guidelines on how to facilitate a safe space to make sure it continues to be safe online. And there's plenty of online spaces where it's not safe. What you call it, Twitter X or Reddit or so on. You know, so do you find, and you know, I know you've been doing digital a long time. Um, you were engaging in Twitter. It was funny actually. My first time, first time I met you, I was with Eric Guyer, who's now lead pastor over at another small church, Mariners, you know, right down the street from you. And Guyer, this is years ago, he was executive pastor at a church here in Miami. And Guyer was infatuated with you. Like, he could not believe that you had a megachurch of people over a thousand people following you on Twitter. Like, Jeff, there's a megachurch of people that are listening to what this guy DJ Chong says. Can you imagine a megachurch listening to people online? Like, in his mind, you're like the first TikTok influencer or something. Um, but you've been doing this a long time. Do you find that people are open to talking digitally? Like, you know, I know some people are hesitant to do recovery-type conversations online. They view it from a negative perspective. But you've been comfortable discussing it in your safe spaces digitally. Like, do you find that that's trustworthy information? That it's healthy? Like, how do you manage the tension or have the conversation when people are like, no, you can't, you can't do recovery in digital space? It has to only be in person?

Um, boy, that's a lot because the medium and the opportunity of online is it's a wild, wild west and it's wide open. So there's so much tension in the online space, and it's the loudest and the ugliest voices that have been polarizing and painted the online space as something dark and nasty and shouting. But with the right people and the right use of technology, you can create safe spaces that can be very intimate and very powerful. But um, those safe spaces are not just done in the wide open internet. So I don't think you can create safe spaces in the public Twitter sphere or, okay, I don't know what if they call it X here or Reddit. But I think you can create it on a private Facebook group, and I can give you examples of that. I'll give you two concrete examples because I've been part of them and they've worked. A Facebook private Facebook group can do it. A Zoom meeting can do it. Uh, Reddit, if you have that privacy or membership entry point, then that gives you the technical guardrails to create that safe space because you don't want trolls coming in and out. So for example, in VR space, that would be challenging too because in um, Rec Room or whatever, you know, controls just come in there. So you don't want that. Yeah, but technology can also um allow memberships and people can come in after you approve them. Uh, I don't know Discord well enough if you can control access to some things. I know in Mighty Networks you could. So two examples I mentioned, one is called Subtle Asian Mental Health. It's a private Facebook group with 61,000 members, volunteer run, and it's been around for about three or four years. And all kinds of Asian Americans around the world, English speaking, and people can post anonymous questions and get pure support from other Asian Americans who have shared their mental health reality. And we do moderate the group with volunteers, and so the content is vetted and we don't have triggers. And so it's become a safe space for 61,000 members. I don't know anything like it for Christians. Uh, there's a few small ones for Christians, but um, it takes a little bit of manpower to really shepherd that space. And there's a Christian mental health uh Facebook group on Facebook that has maybe a thousand people. But the there's not the ongoing conversation like the Subtle Asian Mental Health with 61,000 members. We get at least 10 to 20 posts a day. So once you have a critical mass of momentum, then it feels like it's a lively place instead of a ghost town. Now, the other example I'll share is what I've participated in at Saddleback Church. We have a Zoom support group uh that's been meeting since September of 2021, and we've gone through seven rounds of a workbook called Living Grace, which starting August 1st will be free, a free digital workbook about mental health and faith. Living Grace is the name of the book. And when you have show notes, I'll send the links to you. And it's a 16-week workbook that integrates faith, facts, and future. Faith is a spiritual devotion that grounds us, grounds our mental health realities in scripture. And scripture's got plenty to say about our human condition and when it comes to mental health, they don't use that phrase, but you know, there's anxiety, there's worry, there's suicidal ideation, depression, grief, it's suffering. It's all throughout the scripture. It's part of the human condition. But our vernacular lingua franca is mental health. And so grounding at scripture, facts is neuroscience. So the person that designed the curriculum, Matthew Stanford and Joe Padilla, really wanted to ground it in psychology and science so that we understand what's going on in our mind and our relationships and our emotions. And then future, so three Fs because they like to alliterate. Future is practical skills that we can practice as a part of our mental and emotional health because mental health is not something you can just think your way out of. You need to engage your body and develop some new practices. So those are two excellent examples of what we can do in online spaces to create safe places for supporting one another, cherishing one another in mental health.

That's awesome. I absolutely love that, and I'm going to have to check out that whenever it's available because that's going to be so cool. Um, I would love to hear, I think I could probably sit and listen for hours or days um of stories you have. But I would love to hear like a story of how walking through with someone um in maybe even a religious space um in a church or on digitally in a ministry, how that like successfully happened. And then even on the flip side, like what have you seen where it's like went downhill real quick and it's not been helpful to the other person? Maybe two kind of stories like that?

I'll take the second one first because we've been spared and blessed from having to deal with the really challenging cases, which is kind of the initial fear that many of us have when we try to enter into the mental health care and support space. That, oh, what if this or this happened and we can't handle it? And yes, we want to go in discerning and prepared, but those edge cases are rare. But you do want to be prepared. So in most cases, 90, 95 percent, people just need care and support, prayer, someone that can listen empathetically and non-judgmental and validate their experiences. That we all have feelings and thoughts that fly by in our mental radar. And just as in Asian culture and perhaps in non-Asian culture too, we say don't trust our feelings, but we also can't trust our thoughts. Not all of them. But we do need discernment as we experience all of life. And that's where the word of God, the spirit of God really helps us. But um, where we've seen uh amazing stories of healing and support, um, I'm actually in conversation with a lady in North Carolina who has had so many mental and physical challenges that over the past three years, because we held this space for her online, she's been able to experience healing and strength and hope and comfort. And now she's moving into her purpose. Um, just this past week, we had a sermon from Reverend Dr. Arti Kendall from Britain, who was a speaker at Saddleback Church. He talked about total forgiveness and that really touched our heart to release some of the pains of the past so that she can continue her healing journey. And then she's had ups and downs, as many of us have ups and downs when we live with some of the more mental health challenges. And we've been able to pray and support her through some of those. So through the darkest times, we are there with her, just as Jesus is with her through the dark valleys. And we're not alone. So the I'll summarize it this way. The most valuable thing when it comes to having support groups, in addition to professional therapy or medication, is that having a support group helps us to know we're not alone. And when we know we're not alone, not just with an invisible God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit, and though all that is true and grounded, having a fellow brother and sister, a human person that we can talk to, just adds to the care and support we need to go through this thing called life. And the way I say is, I can use all the help I can get. So I need the Trinity. I need the church. I need my online relationships. I need my in-person relationships. I need healthy eating, exercise, sleep. I sleep nine hours a night plus now. So that's what my body needs. That's what my body needs, which means I have to be very efficient with my waking hours to do what I do.

Yeah, I love that you brought that up because the whole person is so important when we deal with mental health and our spiritual, physical, all this. Yeah, you're holding the mic. You have a question or comment?

Yeah, this is my comfortable position, holding. I'm actually getting a new arm, and so I'm going to miss if I don't, if you're watching on YouTube, if I screw up, I'll move my hand down. These bars actually pinch, and I've pinched my fingers a couple times in. Hey, DJ, um, if you can adjust your mic on your head um a little bit, I think it's rubbing on the skin and giving us like some rubbing noise. Maybe try that, if get it into a different spot. Um, or maybe it's your collar, but we'll just be sensitive to that.

It is my collar. You'll have to edit.

Yeah, we'll see what we can do. Um, ask. Yeah, yeah, Andy Mage. It's Andy's problem. He'll have to deal with it. Um, so do you feel like, and now you're at Saddleback, you know, creators of Celebrate Recovery, um, Kay Warren. I know recovery, mental health was a big deal for her when Rick and Kay were there at the church. Um, do you feel like the so...

Mental health is a big deal for Saddleback historically and I assume that Legacy is still moving forward with the new leadership that there. When you look at the church in general, are they still receptive? I know during COVID it felt like mental health was all the rage because everybody was in lockdown was freaking out. You know, the push is for everybody to get back to normal, whatever normal means. Is the church in general receptive to ideas about mental health still? Is there challenges and negativity toward it or agnosticism, not wanting anything to do with it? Like, what's a temperature check for the church in 2024?

Well, let me zoom out first. The latest research has been focused on the impact of COVID, so that's the hard data from surveys in terms of how the church was responding to COVID and mental health, and it's kind of a coin toss. About 50% of churches are anti-psychology because that's been the history of psychology. Because some of it was founded on humanistic research and theories, there's a reaction from more conservative Christians against mental health categories. So there are churches like that that are against using mental health categories and languages and diagnosis. And so any challenge we face with depression, anxiety, and so on is just a spiritual problem. Now, some people are helped with that minimalistic approach, but I know and believe many people are not helped with just a small approach to mental health challenges.

And so maybe half the church are more open to an integrated approach where faith is a resource for mental health treatment and recovery. And here's what's funny: I'm working and connecting with people in both secular spaces, non-faith spaces, as well as faith spaces, and what's surprising is non-faith, non-Christian people are more open to faith and spirituality as a resource and as a support for mental health recovery than some pastors. Kind of backwards in my book, but whatever the case may be. Some churches are not receptive, but some are. The crisis, the mental health crisis—I'll use the word crisis, epidemic—is so big that there's so much work to do, and churches are generally speaking not as engaged as they could be because there are so many programs that churches are more concerned about, whether it's children's ministry, youth ministry, celebrate recovery, weekend worship, small groups, and just keeping the church running. So mental health tends to take a backseat, even though mental health challenges affect at least 20% of our general population, and people in church are just as human as everybody else.

So you know, 20% of people in your church, and if they're not struggling, then they probably know someone who's struggling—friends and families. And so some of the thought leaders have recognized that mental health is the greatest mission field, it's the greatest ministry, it's the greatest felt need that the church can take bold step in caring and supporting for people without necessarily getting people through professional training that takes two to four years of graduate studies and thousands of hours of supervision.

The Living Grace curriculum that I mentioned has an online training that just takes 45 minutes to train up group leaders that can facilitate a support group, whether online or in person. And the first two times I did the group, I literally just read the workbook word for word to test if the curriculum could stand on its own. So I'm here to test that the curriculum can stand on its own. I've been able to train up two or three other co-hosts, and it's helped people experience care and support over the years.

Yeah, I can't wait to see that. Yeah, I, um, somebody kind of posted in here about somebody talking about, is it okay for Christians to take anti-depressants? And I was kind of going that same direction because I know growing up for me, like I didn't feel like it was okay to say that I had anxiety or I dealt with depression. So what would you say to someone who's maybe listening that they're struggling with that or they're just feeling some sort of way and they're not really sure what's going on? Is it okay for Christians to struggle with that? For Christ followers to struggle with those things? And maybe, like you mentioned earlier, some things in Scripture that kind of coincide with those, just a few of how that can help somebody?

Well, medication is a challenging topic because not everybody is in agreement. But in the reality of life, I don't think we're in agreement on much of anything. I mean, whether you call it politics or nutritional tips or diet, and certainly medication is even more challenging. When I'm on medication, and so when you look at prescription medication, they always have this bigger list of side effects than they do the benefits list. So I'm like, why are there so many side effects when it comes to prescription medication? Not just psychiatric medications, but even your general physiology medication. You know, the human body is very complicated, and so even the latest nutrition theory, they're recognizing that dietary and nutrition practices are very individualized. Each of us have unique DNA, and we respond to food and medication in different ways.

And so what I'm learning about mental health is it's a very personalized and customized journey of wellness. Just, and I think it's a reflection of all of our lives. All of us have to figure out how our body is designed, how well it responds to food, how well it responds to medication, how long, how will it respond to lifestyles, and so on and so on. So the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, and by God's design, each of us have unique fingerprints. I think we have unique plans for health, mental, emotional, physical, and that's hard work. We would prefer to have a one-size-fits-all solution when it comes to medication, everything else, health, but I think we're learning as technology is showing us, customization and personalization is not a bad thing. It's a human thing that we would do well to respect our unique design.

Yeah, our unique God-given design for taking care of our bodies and minds. I want to pull the thread on that one. That's, you know, there are churches, I'm sure you know, probably know better than me. Um, recovery church is down here in Florida where our whole church was developed, sent it around. You know, focusing on recovery focus. And sometimes, um, you know, I say this with experience, sometimes celebrate recovery at a church actually unintentionally becomes a completely separate thing from the church where it actually is like a church in itself for people that are going through recovery. Is the goal to give them an opportunity for exclusion, to do their own thing? Is it appropriate? Is the goal for unification where people are together, whether they have issues or not? Like, what's the healthy approach as we're looking at this?

Well, I'm going to build on what I just said. It's a customized approach. It takes a bit of discerning of the people you have and the leadership to figure out what's going to work best in their current situation. So it's a longer conversation. Short-term versus long-term.

Yeah, short-term versus long-term. Um, short-term, meet them, you know, individualized. Long-term, bring them back in. Gauge it necessary. Like, what, how, how do we learn to discern? I guess maybe that's a better question to ask.

Well, thanks for asking the question. I don't have an answer on the spot. Um, there are training guides and people that are in the coaching. So I'll mention one: Laura Hall is in the mental health Christian space providing the kind of coaching and discerning to help people customize their mental health program and support group strategies. So there's someone who's spent—she's a trained counselor based in Canada, and she does a mental health summit every year in October, specifically to provide those resources and provide that coaching. So I'm gonna hand the baton off to her.

Yeah, she's awesome. I've met with her before. She's really cool. She's doing awesome things for mental health ministry, that kind of thing.

Yes, I love that. So I find it way more helpful to refer to a person than to a program. Yeah, I just find programmatic approaches to be a bit flat, and when it comes to mental health, we really need that personal touch. So as I've started, just a year and a half ago, something called Christian Asian Mental Health, because I feel called to really zone in on that niche. So there's mental health generically, which is huge, affects 20% of American population, and then the Christian mental health space is still nascent. I think it's still underdeveloped. There's huge opportunities, and we could get into that perhaps on a future episode. But there's a conference coming up end of September in Cleveland that will be the first national church and mental health conference that's going to continue on an annual basis, Lord willing, started by Steve Gersa of Key Ministry. We'll add a link in the show notes. And then I'm zoning in on Asian American churches because every Asian American church needs mental health ministry. And the reason I feel compelled to serve that demographic is if we don't focus on the unique needs of particular groups of people, Asian Americans are going to be left out if we just go generic.

And part of the thinking behind that: Asian Americans are the least likely to seek mental health treatment, three times less likely to seek professional help compared to white counterparts, and we have high suicide rates in several demographics—young adults and older people. And so the unique needs we have culturally in our shame-based culture is just really dire.

Yeah, I think that's really important for anyone who's doing ministry in any way, like looking at your demographic of who you're reaching. And they're going to have different, you know, things that they're struggling with. Like you said, the shame culture. They're going to have different things. So it's really being able to focus in on those specific ones that are going to help so many more people and the people you're trying to reach.

Yeah, I mentioned Christian Asian Mental Health. I forgot my punchline. Uh, I was gonna say, uh, the way I want to approach the churches, and I'm happy here, Jeff. During our warmup on this episode, you were saying you're working with the Chinese church there where you are. Is I want to provide concerted service to the churches in developing their mental health ministry. I don't want to just throw them to a website or on-demand training program. Though I will do that as a kickstart of just being familiar with content, but that personal touch. And my theory on mental health, it's not just a chemical issue. It's a disconnection relationally that is affecting our mental health. So we're not just disconnected because of chemical imbalance. We're disconnected relationally, and technology is isolating us. Doesn't have to, but if we use technology properly, as you do here at TCD, you're bringing that relational connection, which helps our mental health and emotional, relational, and spirituality and becoming whole. Really, with becoming whole again when we connect as human. Human is a mental health ministry. Is that just coaching of mental health to get all ministries to understand better? Is there a mental health pastor? Is it volunteer-driven? Like, what would a typical church mental health ministry look like?

That looks like an excellent question, and I'm going to lean back on my answer. It needs to be a personalized and customized approach. The reason we have so many different kinds of churches—each of them have a unique DNA and fingerprint. In the same way, each church needs to have a unique approach to mental health ministry. Now, there are some things that go common across the board. So I have a very lean startup prototype framework model for mental health ministry, and they start with the letter S because pastors like to alliterate. And pastors have to be at the well—they're the gatekeeper, they're the shepherd. So they need to understand what mental ministry is in their church before they can deploy and mobilize their volunteers to run the ministry. So five S's. Okay, we have ten minutes. Um, first, they need to talk about mental health in their sermons. To quote the great Dr. Ed Stetzer, sermons stop stigma. And we need to be grounded in God's truth who guides us into all truth for life and wellness. So sermons. Second, stories—stories of lived experience, people experiencing mental challenges, but yet we have support and comfort through the scripture. So sermons, stories. Third, seminars. So bring in the clinicians and therapists from your local community to provide practical skills and understanding for how we deal with our challenges holistically, whether that's depression, anxiety. Those are probably the first two I would deal with because that's the most common things we all deal with. And then you can touch on grief, suffering, burnout—those are common things of our human experience. And then you can get into more specifics like DSM-5 diagnosis like clinical depression or anxiety disorder or bipolar or schizophrenia or special needs. Okay, so that's sermons, stories, seminars, support groups. Uh, I would refer people to the Living Grace curriculum. I've got five or six on my website that are Christian and mental health. There's not too many. Fresh Hope is another popular one. So support groups provide the care and support that complement what therapist and medication provide for the treatment. People don't need treatment just once a week or once a month. They need it every week. So support groups provide that community. And then fifth S is Sabbath. God modeled it. It's a Ten Commandments. And you and I know churches are overworked. So we need a healthy rhythm of rest so that we work from rest, not rest from work. Sir, I see you taking notes. I'm writing it down right now on my whiteboard desk. So S—sermons, stories, seminars, support groups, and Sabbath. That's five S's. What an appropriate ending. You got your Rick Warren would be proud. You got your five points. They all align so well with that. Um, man, this is good. I'm yeah, I'm even trying to think like what's a good question to wrap up or land on. Um, you want to take any from the audience?

Sure, I would be open to that.

Uh, how Flap says he's done Fresh Hope. Yeah, great. How often do then how do they need to? Flap, I'm not understanding that. Uh, Zack Valley, I'd love to hear about one of the practices DJ recommends, maybe one of the basic entry level ones that nurtures mental emotional flourishing.

Here's the most basic one: learning how to breathe deeply. So K. Warren's focus in mental health ministry is something called breath. So she has these seven Zoom seminars on breath called Breath, and she's focusing just as you mentioned at the top of the hour that I've really zoned in on a niche of a niche when it comes to Christian mental health. For K. Warren, she's really zoning in on the niche of parents trying to support their children with mental health. And one of the most biological, critical, physical, emotional, mental things that we can do well for ourselves is learning how to breathe well. So when we learn to breathe deeply, rhythmically, it literally biologically resets our brains. So we're having a panic attack or anxiety, depression, walking and breathing resets our body physically, and that helps reset our mind and emotions. So that's something I've had to learn. Very basic, very practical. Within sixty seconds, ninety seconds, you'll feel different. So breathing, a box method or whatever method, breathing. We've got Megan. No, we've got um, Mindy Caliguire coming on, um, five or six, I think, and uh, she's with soulcare.com, and uh, she's like it's talking about rest. And just from personal experience, she's done um, so much for me on that space in helping me restore through that.

Yeah, Zach's like yeah, I do love that. Um, yeah, it's so good. As we're landing the plane here, um, let's get practical. We've got—we're mental health savvy. Uh, maybe someone within our organization or someone in leadership is not recurrently, you know, in difficult situations. Um, you know, maybe a physical church pastor that's not understanding of some of this. How do we um, start those conversations? How do we help others maybe try to battle through some of the stigmas and misunderstandings that they have from a practical standpoint?

Well, here's as practical as I can make it. Pastors already know that their congregation and their community is struggling with mental health reality because pastors are often the first person that someone struggling with life is going to for help. And their struggles are not just with getting the bills paid or relational conflict in marriage. They're experiencing suffering through depression, anxiety. So pastors already know. Pastors are often overworked, and they don't know what to do. They weren't trained in seminary for counseling and psychology. They're trained in dead languages like Hebrew and Greek. But um, so they know they need help, but they don't know who to go to or who to trust. And sometimes just send me to a counselor—oh, they might just be in it for the business. No, we're trying to help people. And so to speak to the pastors um, is critical and to show them the basic needs and the resources and courses that are available. So I would refer to something called The Sanctuary Course. It's a free online video series, eight weeks, with discussion guides, with stories, with science, and with scripture. Hey, those are all S's too. And it's a free course developed in England and Canada. And so um, that would be a great discussion starter to get your church leaders on to the same page about the need for mental health and what the church can do to participate. So rather than just sending this podcast, which is also an easy thing to do, The Sanctuary Course is a practical way to engage that conversation to recognize the church's role in being a sanctuary, a place of care, support, and comfort when it comes to not just suffering in general but mental health specifically. So bringing your people together, recognizing that we're the hands and feet of Christ, care for people—it's our call to care for people. Jesus cares about our wellness. And then the pastor can be a part of moving from pastoral care. Instead of them carrying the burden of pastoring the people by themselves, move from pastoral care to congregational care. That's the move. And then you've activated people to care for your church and your community, and everybody will be healthier for it.

Awesome, DJ, man, you have kicked off this season um incredibly, and I'm excited to see uh where we're going with all this. The chat has been blowing up with different resources talking about uh Jay Sharon Light University, and we're going to talk more about that later. Megan's got some experience with Light, and um, yeah, we need to train our chatbots in mental health. That's a fun conversation for a different day. Um, but uh, DJ, thank you very much for jumping on here. Uh, but we're going to land the plane. Megan, thanks for joining us as well and being a champion in this area and helping out with the Church Digital podcast season nine, Digital and Mental Health. But we're going to land the plane for this one. Uh, for DJ, for Megan, this is Jeff with the Church Digital. Thanks for joining on the podcast. We'll see you next time on the show. Y'all have a good one.