January is almost gone and as I think of the last month, the word ‘permissible’ seems to continually come to mind. Have you ever been given an opportunity that sounds great on paper, but doesn’t seem like it is the best option for you?

Community, Lifestyle, UncategorizedAlycia JohnsonJanuary 31, 2022 Comment

Parables & Complaints

The parable of Matthew 20:1-16 and teamwork

Discipleship, CommunityAlycia JohnsonJanuary 20, 2022 Comments

Leading A Small Group: Practical Advice

Practical tips and advice for a new small group leader

Community, DiscipleshipShoba RanjitsinghJanuary 17, 2022Comment

Launching A Small Group

Advice to help launch your first bible study group

CommunityShoba RanjitsinghJanuary 4, 2022Comment

Letter From The Editor + Top 10 Articles of 2021

Happy New Year’s Eve, sister!

We hope your December was restful and relaxing. Praying there were lots of joyful moments with family and friends. Ushering in 2022, we are imagining a new tomorrow. Praying things are headed to a positive state here in the United States and all around the world.

CommunityAlycia JohnsonDecember 31, 2021NewYear, letter from the editor, Hope Comment

5 Signs of A Healthy Church

Two weeks ago, we had a discussion about 5 signs of a cult and being aware of what type of church you attend. There are many groups that are misleading or drawing people away from the church. However, there are equally a great number of churches that draw people to Jesus. It is important to recognize when you find a great church so you can plug in and be a part!

Community, DiscipleshipAlycia JohnsonNovember 30, 2021Discipleship, community, church, church hurtsComment

Five Signs of a Cult

Once upon a time, I had a group of friends. It started harmless enough. We were the best of friends who loved to live life together. One day everything changed. Life started to get less and less fun. Divisions were caused and rifts were built. Suddenly, having fun was a sin.

CommunityAlycia JohnsonNovember 18, 2021Cult, Community, Spiritual giftsComment

Love Is Not Rude

1 Corinthians 13, verses 4 through 7, has always fascinated me. As a child, I saw it as yet another unattainable thing in the Bible. It was something that Christians were supposed to be, but also something I could never be. It felt overwhelming. As a youth, I started to understand that these were qualities of Christ, yet they still felt beyond my grasp. As a young adult who walked away from the Lord, I no longer cared what the Bible said about anything

Community, DiscipleshipAndrea BuieNovember 17, 2021manners, the love chapter, 1Corinthians13, Loveis, pride, rudeness, rudeComment

Building Bridges & Burning Ships: Part 12 (The Finale)

On this conclusion on how to burn ships and build bridges, I want to burn the ship that your actions are necessary for God’s work. Guess what I learned? All the people, places, and things I thought God needed to complete His will - they were not necessary for GOD to complete what He wanted. Others chose their stories and I miss them dearly. However, I made the choice to follow God to where HE wanted to do a miracle.

Justice and Missions, CommunityAlycia JohnsonNovember 4, 2021 Comments

Letter from the New Editor In Chief: All things Work Together

This left me at a crossroads...continue to work for a place I helped build (and accomplished what I wanted) or chase after my own/personal dreams and desires. I took a giant leap of faith and stepped into a very part-time job where I get to be a part of my dream for my family. As I took that step of faith, I prayed - that God would open the door for me to pursue my dreams as a speaker and writer. Yelena did not know about that prayer - nor did she know that several years ago God had given me a promise through the verse Romans 8:28.

Community, DiscipleshipAlycia JohnsonOctober 11, 2021lifestyle, Editor-in-Chief, letter from the editorComment

Building Bridges & Burning Ships: Part 11

At this point in time, throughout my years of serving Tirzah Ministries, you have heard the behind the scenes story of my time of preparation. You’ve seen what it’s like to burn ships - to destroy old ideas and concepts that no longer serve the future God has planned for me. I can’t say it is easy to be transparent about your life. However, I have been so fortunate to have so many AMAZING women ministry leaders, authors, and pastor’s wives pour into me. I may never meet you in person, but I hope my stories teach you and your ability to share your story on Tirzah inspire you to a deeper faith.

Community, Justice and MissionsAlycia MarieAugust 18, 2021building bridges, burning ships, seriesComment

Be An Influencer

Do you have anyone in your life right now that you admire? I do. I am fortunate enough to have several women in my life who are ahead of me both in years and faith that I look up to and who are full of godly wisdom. Prayerfully, there are some younger ladies in my life who look up to me in that way.

Community, DiscipleshipJennifer GoodwinAugust 17, 2021community, mentorship, titus 2 Comments

Building Bridges & Burning Ships: Part 10

I never saw myself continuing this story yet again. We’re talking about Burning ships & Building Bridges again, but this time I’ll pull you back out of leadership and into my personal world. I’ll never forget the week of February 21st. It was the week I burned ships, so I could learn to build bridges.

CommunityAlycia MarieAugust 13, 2021building bridges, burning ships, series, communityComment

Building Bridges & Burning Ships: Part 9

This is the beginning conclusion of my “Burning Ships & Building Bridges” series. The next three parts are actually going to pull you into the final chapter of “How God Led Me to Start a Home for Teen Mothers”. What I hope you learn from this is that there are topics that are important here on earth. They are important for us to understand and learn how to build bridges versus burning ships. All of the topics I’ve discussed have been temporal issues - gender, race, sexuality, pro-life, and more. The final issue that is most temporal of all that I want to discuss is everyone’s favorite topic, politics.

CommunityAlycia MarieAugust 12, 2021politics, building bridges, burning ships, seriesComment

To Do Or Not To Do

It was a Friday morning, my day off- I enjoyed a quiet slow start and had a leisurely breakfast. As I prayed about how to spend my day, a verse I had read came to mind. “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you.”-Matthew 7:12a NIV

Offering Help & Hope

The state that I live in has just entered a week of full lockdown restrictions in the wake of the Delta strain being found among local Covid tests. It was both annoying and stressful to receive the news just one day before school holidays were due to end but, in another way, somewhat timely.

Community, A Noble CharacterGuest UserAugust 5, 2021hope, healing Comment

Building Bridges & Burning Ships: Part 8

In the United States, today’s war seems to fall more along black and white than Jew or Greek. It is interesting to me how people think victimization of a race is new and unique. When we look throughout history, we can go all the way back in time to the war between the Jews and the Greeks in the Bible. All over the world there are culture clashes and race wars. There are the Hutus and Tutsis in Africa, the apartheid in South Africa, and a war in the Slavic areas that broke out because of people in different countries marrying one another!

Community, Justice and MissionsAlycia MarieAugust 4, 2021building bridges, burning ships, series, racismComment

Building Bridges & Burning Ships: Part 7

Since we’ve been on the topic of gender for the last few weeks, I thought it would be great to shift gears to everyone’s favorite topic - sexuality. In the 21st century, sexuality is our new identity. Why?

Community, RelationshipsAlycia MarieJuly 28, 2021building bridges, burning ships, series, sexualityComment

Building Bridges & Burning Ships: Part 6

I should clarify, “Building Bridges & Burning Ships” is a culmination of what I have learned throughout my young adult years in leadership. It was a long road to learn these lessons with mistakes along the way, times where bridges were burned and ships were built, instead of bringing unity there was disunity. Times where I found myself in the middle of disunity, instead of unity.

CommunityAlycia MarieJuly 22, 2021building bridges, burning ships, part 6, seriesComment

Coffee, Cake & Christ

We are a group of eight friends. Wives, mothers, grandmothers from different parts of the world with one common bond. We all love Christ and met through Bible Study Fellowship in Auckland several years back. Now, though we are no longer in the same Bible study group, we meet once every other month. We try to make it fun each time- a picnic, a swap party, a shared meal, coffee and cake and during the lockdown we even met on zoom sessions a couple of times!

Community, DiscipleshipShoba RanjitsinghJuly 16, 2021community, Proverbs 31 Woman, encouraging othersComment