Help the grieving in your community navigate the difficult holiday season, which will be flooded with memories of happier, past celebrations. Offer a special Surviving the Holidays seminar to provide practical holiday coping strategies and hope for brighter days ahead.
Surviving the Holidays is designed for two audiences:
“People are so hungry for it.”
Surviving the Holidays is structured as a freestanding, two-hour event designed to be led by a lay team. It’s structured in two distinct parts. First, your group will view a holiday-themed video session, and then your team will lead a group discussion about the material presented on the video. Each seminar participant is provided a special Holiday Survival Guide.
Surviving the Holidays is designed so that anyone grieving the death of a loved one can attend. It’s an outstanding way to minister to people who are hurting within your church and throughout your community.
“Our hope was to have at least 20 people attend the event.
God blessed us with 78 participants at the seminar.”
When you promote Surviving the Holidays to your community, it becomes a very effective tool to help that will draw people to your church.
There are two reasons for this:
Best of all, once people are exposed to the helpful material and warm environment, many will want to become part of your church and its ministries!
“Thank you for providing us with the proper tools to have this outreach ministry in our community.”
Additional Survival Guides:
Additional Leader’s Guides:
“If you’re on the edge of deciding whether or not to do this, go for it!
Each life there was impacted for the better.”
A total of 14 leading Christian counselors, authors, and pastors are featured on the Surviving the Holidays video.
Sabrina D. Black, author and speaker, is the CEO and clinical director of Abundant Life Counseling Center. She is a limited licensed professional counselor, certified addictions counselor, and certified biblical counselor. She experienced the death of multiple close relatives and the miscarriage of her baby. www.abundantlifecounseling.webs.com
Dr. Robert DeVries is professor emeritus of church education at Calvin Theological Seminary. His first wife of 28 years died of cancer. Now remarried to Dr. Susan Zonnebelt-Smeenge, they work together to help people in grief and are coauthors of many books, including The Empty Chair: Handling Grief on Holidays and Special Occasions and From We to Me.
Dr. Alfonza Fullwood is the senior pastor of Riley Hill Baptist Church in Wendell, North Carolina, and adjunct professor of preaching and speech at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. He has led preaching clinics and seminars in North Carolina and abroad and has been in ministry for over three decades.
Susan Lutz served as a counselor at the Christian Counseling and Educational Foundation in Glenside, Pennsylvania, for over 15 years. She now counsels at her church, New Life Presbyterian Church of Dresher. She authored the booklet Thankfulness: Even When It Hurts. Her parents passed away.
James White is the pastor at Christ Our King Community Church in Raleigh, North Carolina. He currently serves as the executive vice president of organizational relations for the YMCA of the Triangle and as a board member for Carver Bible College. James experienced the loss of his parents.
Dr. Susan Zonnebelt-Smeenge is a licensed clinical psychologist. Her first husband died 18 years after he was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor. Now remarried to Dr. Robert DeVries, they work together to help people in grief and are coauthors of many books, including Getting to the Other Side of Grief and Traveling through Grief.
Consider offering TWO seminars. Schedule one in the weeks before Thanksgiving and the other between Thanksgiving and Christmas. If you decide to offer a single seminar, schedule it before Thanksgiving.
* Find out more about the full GriefShare weekly support group program.
Consider offering TWO seminars. Schedule one in the weeks before Thanksgiving and the other between Thanksgiving and Christmas. If you decide to offer a single seminar, schedule it before Thanksgiving.
As a special event, you are not limited to your standard weekly meeting schedule. Groups have offered very successful seminars on Saturday mornings, Sunday afternoons, and weeknights.
The video seminar is loaded with practical, hope-inspiring ideas, including:
Yes. The DVDs have a menu option that allows you to activate English subtitles.