What is the importance of vulnerable leadership in the Church? In this episode Gina has a conversation with Monty & Christa Kelso about navigating the often complex journey of mental health in the context of marriage and ministry. From our family of origin to the challenges of life’s circumstances, learning what healing looks like is a difficult process that requires trust and surrender in the midst of suffering.
Monty & Christa have learned to ride the waves, prioritize and fight for health and allow Jesus’ redemption to bring hope and healing to others through their lives and ministry.
Monty is the President and CEO of Slingshot Group, an organization that helps churches with staffing, coaching and succession. Christa is the founder of Be Free Indeed, a ministry that provides support and a safe place for those struggling with anxiety and depression.
Click below to listen starting at 24:32 to follow along.
The Power of Vulnerability in Leadership
Christa:
I’ll never forget the year, when our friend Sherry was leading worship at our women’s retreat and she goes, “Christa, this is the year that you share your story.” And I went, “Ah, I don’t think so.” She goes, “Nope. It’s time.” The room was packed with hundreds of women, and God gave me the grace to share it. I’ve never experienced this before, the women literally lined up for the rest of the weekend.
Monty:
You took the lid off the topic.
Christa:
I took the lid off. And they were literally lined up after every session just share their hearts, their stories, let me pray for them. That’s when it was like, “Wow, we got a problem.”
Gina:
That speaks volumes to the trap when you’re in leadership, to “present”. What you think is expected of you, you present this life, present this spiritual life, present this marital life. It’s this belief that because I’m in leadership, I need to appear like this.
It’s such a trap and it’s such deception, because the freedom and the healing that can come when our leaders are transparent and vulnerable and real and demonstrate that, I can love Jesus and be in pain. I can have a relationship with God and be struggling.
Christa:
That’s just now starting to change.
Monty:
Conversely, those leaders, any individual who hides from their true struggles, keeps a secret. The secret is the foothold that the evil one will grab a hold of. That’s why there’s so much burnout, so much spinning out, why sadly people in leadership, people in the church sometimes end up in the ditch.
Christa:
Secret sins can kill you. That’s one of the things we talk about in our class at Be Free Indeed. Our groups are very raw, and real. The enemy is out to steal, kill, and destroy your mental health.
Gina:
I think we don’t realize they hold so much more power when they are secret, and when they’re kept in the closet with the door closed. As soon as you speak it, it loses its power immediately.
Monty:
It brings it into the light.
Gina:
It goes from being this giant monster to being right sized. Monty, I’m so glad you talked about community and the importance of that, and the safety of that, because that’s where that light can come in. That’s where that community can surround you and be that where the isolation can’t. The very thing that you think is gonna protect you, is the thing that imprisons you. That’s such a trap in the church.
A Hopeful Navigation in the Darkness
Gina:
Monte, you talked about always seeing the silver lining, what is that like for you Christa? I would think that when you’re in a dark place, you want to smack the person who’s always trying to find the silver lining.
Monty:
I’ve learned how to express my optimism too! I’ve learned a long time ago that I can’t fix her, or fix the situation.
Christa:
So true! It’s hard being married. I think one of the brilliant things about learning the Enneagram, is that it really helped me understand, and learn to honor, appreciate, and cherish who Monty is. Because all the years I didn’t understand, and it was hard in our marriage, I just knew he couldn’t get it.
I know he has had a few days in his life depressed because there’ve been deaths or really tough circumstances in our lives. But at large, I know he doesn’t get it because the darkness is so dark. It’s just so dark and isolation is the tool of the enemy. Honestly the lies that begin to develop in your mind when you are isolated and that juxtaposition between, “I just wanna feel safe and quiet and protected.”
It becomes dangerous so fast because of the lies that you don’t have the community and the voices that are balancing that to say, “You need to be with me. Let’s get some sunshine, let’s take a walk. How about eating something?” The things that I don’t want to do. I want to stay in bed, I don’t want to eat, and I don’t want to see anybody.
Monty:
What I had to learn is that the simplest things when you’re depressed are overwhelming. It’s not logical, but just real, and thus it’s easier to stay in bed and pull the cover over your head and not have to make a single decision.
Christa:
Making a decision is impossible, to get up and take a shower, it just feels like the most overwhelming thing you can possibly imagine.
Monty:
I think it would be obvious to say, “What’s wrong? Are your medications wrong? Are your circumstances wrong? You’re living in two states now, that’s gotta be it. You don’t have access to your grandkids for a month. That’s gotta be it.” But none of of that adds up logically. Does it influence it? Maybe a little bit.
That’s why we’re always chasing mental health and being healthy. You can’t just get a prescription and think, “Okay, we’re good now.” No, it will always be something that we battle, unless God does provide complete healing, and after 30 some years I don’t think that’s going to happen.
Christa:
Obviously He could. I still feel like He says in my spirit, all the time, people don’t understand that we, as Christ followers, are called to suffer. That’s not the only thing we’re called to do, but we don’t really hear a lot of teaching about that. There’s a beauty in learning to suffer. One of my heart cries is let’s learn to suffer well, and that brings a lot of attention to Christ. Bringing Him attention, that’s what glory’s about.
I’m on sabbatical right now. Be Free Indeed is kind of in a dormant state. We have some ministry going on with wonderful leaders. I’m trying to write a book, the Lord told me the first year that Connor was born, “You’re going to write a book. Write it all down.” I have a journal, at least one every year.
2019 was a very difficult year. I have had such good years when we started Be Free Indeed, and I was just really having a wonderful time. But 2019 hit and a lot of circumstantial things hit one after another, hard ones. I didn’t realize until I went on a sabbatical a year ago in January, that I was carrying a lot of people’s pain. I hadn’t learned not to.
Once I said, “Okay, I’m not coming to meetings. I’m not leading the ministry.” All the leaders were doing their thing and it was good. I began to just write, and God was just pouring out my story. Then all of a sudden, one day I thought “My story is not the only story here, we gotta have many stories.”
The book has turned into freedom stories, and now there’s 10 of us. I’m so thrilled about the people who are writing, and for Drew Tilton, who’s coming alongside me. I had six good months, and I got a lot of writing done, and then all of a sudden it’s not good.
Monty:
We’re just coming out of, probably one of the hardest seasons, within these last six months that you’ve ever had.
Christa:
I got COVID. I was doing really well and when I got COVID and it just went to my brain. In the midst of it, there were incredible blessings from God, I was able to get a new doctor in Viejo. I tried to find a doctor here and it wasn’t coming together. I was over medicated again, and not to any fault, really. I mean, 98% of psychiatry is a crapshoot in terms of, “Well, let’s try this combination and with good intentions.”
Monty:
Not only finding the right medications, but the right dosages.
Christa:
This new psychiatrist is a different kind. He’s a medicinal psychiatrist and it’s a discipline that’s out of the University of Utah. He spent three hours with me at my first appointment. He looks into every window of my health, not just the medical side, the brain and how it’s functioning chemically, but how I make decisions, what are my relationships like, and all my health and I’m just so thrilled.
He has been reducing my meds for the first time in years. I’m off one that I was on for 21 years. It’s amazing. I don’t tremble anymore. There’s side effects to medications and I’m feeling better than I have in years.
Gina:
There’s this interesting juxtaposition of being able to posture yourself that this isn’t your identity.
Christa:
That took a lot of inner healing.
Gina:
But that almost is a contradiction to saying you may never be healed. That’s a really powerful thing, because there’s something about being able to go “This isn’t who I am, but this is something I battle with. This is something that happens to me.”
Monty:
That’s very insightful for you to say that there’s a difference. That’s very fundamental.
Christa:
There’s a difference between being healed and being cured. You have to understand that if you have diabetes, you’re probably not going to suddenly not have diabetes. If you have a brain that tends to have lows and highs, that medically outside of God’s healing, is probably something that I’m going to deal with for the rest of my life.
There’s probably not a cure. But I’m healed in my spirit, and that is where my identity is. I had to go through months of inner healing. I’ve had therapy, and I’ve had inner healing, which is a wonderful marriage. This is what Be Free Indeed is based on, is inner healing. That is where you invite Jesus into the wounded places.
You find out when was the first time that you experienced that fear, that you’re healing in or that particular emotion that is presenting itself in that session now. Where is the door? And then you close the door. Jesus lets that door be closed, and it doesn’t mean it’s not going to be opened. Those experiences I had in trauma with my family, I’ll think that doors closed, and then, something happens and the door opens again.
Monty is the President and CEO of Slingshot Group
Christa is the founder of Be Free Indeed
Check the rest of this conversation Mental Health, Marriage & Ministry, Finding Light in the Darkness
Check out the Dwell Meditations
