There are several factors in creating an environment where women feel safe to share. Where you gather is important; it matters. Whether you choose to meet at the same location each week, or rotate between the homes of the women, providing a quiet space where conversations won’t be overheard helps to set the table for sharing your hearts and experiences in a context of safety.

At that first gathering, express the significance of confidentiality, that this is a safe place for each heart to be curious, to ask questions, to explore with Jesus, and each other. What is shared in the group, stays in the group, and will be honored. Together you’ll hold and protect this sacred space.

Exploring A Guide to Extravagant Listening in The Deepening Journey Journal Workbook and in the Leader Guide together will help set the stage for a safe environment for sharing. We’ve also created an 8 day reading plan on the Bible app that you could explore together leading up to your first gathering. It’s available here to download or to click through to the bible app

As the leader of the group, you have the opportunity to both model sharing authentically and vulnerably, and to care well for those who risk sharing their hearts and stories.

Can you think of a time when someone sat with you face to face, leaned in, and listened intently as you shared with them a story of when you were hurt or betrayed or abandoned in some way? What was that like for you? Or have you experienced risking sharing a story or situation you find yourself in, only to be met with advice, books you ought to read, “helpful” scripture, and someone else sharing their ‘similar’ story?

Friendship, sisterhood, and intimacy grow as we care for each other, remaining fully present, intentionally exploring our own stories and each other’s stories of loss, grief, and repair, as well as in the joy and celebration. It is far too easy to listen and quickly respond with pearls of wisdom or scripture. It takes more energy, time, curiosity, and wisdom to allow yourself to stay present to the sadness or pain, to ask good questions, experience empathy, to weep with those who weep, joining with each other in the moments that present themselves.

The practice of listening well is loving, honoring, and healing. What if listening is not merely the act of hearing the words spoken? What if listening is the practice/art of understanding the meaning behind the words? Listening is being attuned to a person’s heart and experience – joining them in their story, weeping as they weep, sharing their joy, and everything in between.

One of the most remarkable skills anyone can ever practice, listening is creating environments in which the other person feels heard, understood, known, cared for...loved. It is so important, we wrote A Guide to Extravagant Listening in both The Deepening Journey Journal Workbook and in the Leader Guide, because practicing loving this way invites authenticity, belonging, and healing!

This is so important, we cannot stop talking about it– inviting women to practice loving this way–we’ve also created the following resources:

Loving Through Listening, a reading plan on the Bible App here or PDF download here.
Around the Table: Active and Engaged Listening, a video inviting us to practice listening this way here.

What better way to embark on this significant journey than a conversation about learning to love each other through listening?

The Deepening Journey is designed to foster intimacy and friendship among the women as the journey progresses, therefore the importance of these friendships and the intimate nature of what is shared will not be conducive to inviting drop-in visitors and guests. Creating a space that builds trust among the women is crucial, and that won’t happen if the door is open for women who come to check it out after you’ve built some trust and safety.  We recommend you make this point clear, and after the second week, close the group.

If there are several women who want to explore The Deepening Journey, yet have missed the opportunity to be part of your group, what might it look like for them to start their own group and exploration?

Having been part of and gathered groups of 4-14 women, we believe the ideal number for a group is as unique as the women gathered. Our hope is that your group would be small enough to feel intimate and where each woman might feel comfortable sharing, fostering intimacy, and large enough to hear various stories and perspectives that can be enriching. We invite you to consider:

• Your meeting place–how many women will fit in your living room, around your dining room table, on your back porch?
• Your desire for the group–if the intention of your group is to explore together, to be a witness to each other’s lives and stories, to experience deepening friendships that you’ll each be known and seen and cared for, having a smaller group will allow each woman more time to share.
• Who is Jesus putting on your heart to invite into exploration and friendship through The Deepening Journey?

Sometimes the best invitation is to one other woman, that the two of you may explore The Deepening Journey together, starting or deepening your friendship. We hope you’ll be able to find what feels comfortable for you and for the others in your group!

Your story and experience matter! What are you hopeful for? This is an invitation for you to share your story of how you’ve experienced The Deepening Journey and/or The Deepening Weekend and what you are hopeful for. Perhaps leading up to the group’s first gathering, invite them to:

• Explore You Are the Beloved or Loving Through Listening reading plan with you here.
• Watch Around the Table conversations on YouTube here.
• Experience The Deepening Community on Facebook here.

Leading a group with a friend can become a beautiful expression of your friendship for the women in your group to experience and be invited into. What if you move in your glory together as you coordinate your group? Talk with the woman you’d like to lead the group with, considering:

• Does one of you enjoy facilitating conversations? Or maybe one of you is great at starting conversations and the other wraps up well?
• Which of you comes alive creating an environment for women to feel comfortable (with snacks, etc.)?
• Is one of you more savvy with technology?
• Would one of you prefer to engage with the group via email and text in between sessions?

Walk with Trinity God in this, asking him to show you how you might move together in union like Father, Jesus, and Spirit move together.

In our 20+ years of gathering women’s groups, we’ve found that weekly groups often provide a consistent rhythm to foster the opportunity for knowing and being known, yet we’ve seen that frequency and rhythm of meeting is as unique as the group of women. Some thoughts:

• Weekly: provides the most consistent engagement for groups.
• Every other week: if you only meet every other week, if someone misses a week, it could potentially be a month before they’re able to reconnect with the group.
• Monthly: we would strongly encourage connecting in between sessions to foster community, getting to know each other, and journeying together around The Deepening Journey. Taking walks, meeting for coffee or a meal, going to a museum, doing things you enjoy together are great ways to get to know each other.
• Retreat: we’ve heard positive feedback from women who have taken the opportunity to get away together to create a retreat exploring The Deepening Journey, immersing themselves in the beauty of being away from the day to day, unplugging for intimacy with God, and deepening friendships.

The Deepening Journey Journal Workbook is available on Zoweh's Outpost Store here, and includes on page 8 the link to watch the session videos. The session videos are also available on RightNowMedia here. Ask your church leaders if they offer this resource.

Zoweh offers several reading plans through the Bible App. For a complete list, click here.

At Zoweh, we LOVE coming alongside churches, pastors, women’s ministry leaders, and small group leaders to help create environments for women to experience intimacy with God and friendships with each other. Can you imagine what happens when many women in your church community experience The Deepening Journey, and taste the goodness of God in redemptive communities together? We’ve seen the shift in hearts that affect churches as women grow to love and care for each other in the mundane and messy moments of life together.

First, consider–what is the culture of your church? What might it look like to bring this into places/ways where women are already meeting?

Some ways we’ve seen churches invite women into more through The Deepening Journey:

• Large Group Setting: Does your church offer a weekly group for women? What might it look like to reserve a room with a screen, set up tables of 6, and invite women to come be part of watching the content together, then exploring the conversation questions and friendship together over 8 weeks with the women at their table? If you have women who volunteer to lead, have a leader training, and assign them to different tables to help guide their groups through conversations.
• Small Group Ministry: Does your church have small groups that meet in homes on their own schedules? Consider inviting those who are leading small groups of women to consider The Deepening Journey as their next study.
• Small Group Ministry Kickoff Event: Offer an evening for women to experience session one of The Deepening Journey together around tables, then releasing the groups of women to continue the following five sessions in their groups at their own schedule/pace.
• Event: Set aside a Friday evening–Saturday afternoon to invite women to experience all six sessions of The Deepening Journey together at tables, with the opportunity for time alone with God questions between sessions.
• Retreat: Schedule a weekend someplace beautiful for women to experience a guided exploration through The Deepening Journey together.
• Zoom Setting: Does your church have an online service with women attending/watching from far flung places? Offering The Deepening Journey as a weekly zoom group would be a way to include these women in redemptive community, even from a distance.

We welcome the opportunity to hear what YOU are hopeful for the women of your church to experience, to help you craft and design a way for them to explore The Deepening Journey that fits in your church’s schedule and culture. We do not want this to be one more thing for you or for the women of your church to do–we want this to be an invitation into friendship; into experiencing more love, more life, and more freedom with Trinity God.

Once again, the options and possibilities are as unique as the women in the group!

In The Deepening Journey Leader Guide, we share on page 7 what we are hopeful for. What are YOU hopeful for? What is stirring in your heart? Why did you offer this? What have you experienced with God and the women in your group in your months together?

We invite you to walk with Jesus, asking him what he is up to in this group of women.  We see the value in staying with your group and continuing to go deeper. Perhaps you’ve found your inner circle of women and long to continue in deeper work together. And we’ve also experienced the beauty of opening the group to new friends who might benefit from what you all have begun to build together and can graft them into. How do you feel the Spirit guiding you in this particular group, at this particular time?

The Deepening Weekend is Zoweh’s getaway with God for women. From Thursday afternoon to Sunday noon, the team will guide women through twelve live sessions, each followed by time alone with God, where women bring the questions of their hearts to God, not each other. There are opportunities for play and creating through free time activities, as well as appointments with trained spiritual medics who will listen to and pray with you.

The Deepening Journey is Zoweh’s six session video resource with Journal Workbook for women to explore on their own and in groups. It offers women the opportunity to experience Redemptive Sisterhood, and how we were made to live and flourish in the Kingdom of God, what comes against that intended flourishing, as well as the offer of healing, integration, and restoration, as they explore their own and each other’s stories in an intimate setting with God and each other. It is also a way for women to prepare for The Deepening Weekend, or explore more intimately together after The Deepening Weekend.

Imagine exploring The Deepening Journey with your friends, culminating in an adventure together at The Deepening Weekend!