Jesus said, “What is God’s kingdom like? What can I compare it with? It is like what happens when someone plants a mustard seed in a garden. The seed grows as big as a tree, and birds nest in its branches.”
Then Jesus said, “What can I compare God’s kingdom with? It is like what happens when a woman mixes yeast into three batches of flour. Finally, all the dough rises.” Luke 13:18-21 (CEV)
Henry and Jody combine their individual passions to respond to God’s call to build His Kingdom through educating, empowering, and energizing His children! They have led weekend seminars, weekly sessions, and two- and four-week classes in churches, homes, and even, open-air camps in Europe. It is their ability to be flexible in order to meet the needs of the individual group that is so appreciated by the local leadership and makes the participants know that God sees them.
Some of the class subjects they have taught include:
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Bible Study – Basic How to, specific books, Why is it Important
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Small groups – Why, how, and identifying the gifts in the members
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Grief – What it is, How to Help, How to Promote Healing including support groups, “visiting angels”
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Discipleship – How to Grow up Disciples from Believers – children to teens to adults
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Spiritual Gifts – Encouragement, Prophecy, Music
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Missions – We are all Missionaries
Henry and Jody Neufeld met at church in 1998, married in 1999, and have been doing ministry together ever since. They could not have imagined where God would lead them or the many changes He would bring to their lives.
Henry is the owner of Energion Publications. His major statement of faith and his vision for the church can be found in his book Not Ashamed of the Gospel: Confessions of a Liberal Charismatic, and involves a call to demonstrate our love for God by loving our neighbors as ourselves, and engaging in dialogue rather than conflict.
He received his BA in Biblical Languages from Walla Walla College and his MA in Religion, concentrating in Biblical and Cognate languages from Andrews University. He did one quarter additional work in linguistics at the University of Illinois at Chicago Circle, and also completed an Associate of Applied Science degree in Interpreting and Translating from the Community College of the Air Force while on active duty.
He left both the church and church service following his graduate education. He served in the U. S. Air Force for 10 years as a linguist. He returned to the church in a United Methodist congregation (Pine Forest United Methodist Church in Pensacola, FL).
He was born in British Columbia, is the son of Seventh-day Adventist missionaries, and was raised and educated in the Seventh-day Adventist church. Though he is no longer a Seventh-day Adventist, he still respects that heritage and tries to maintain contacts and relationships with people in his former denomination.
Jody Neufeld speaks from a heart healed through God’s extravagant love. As a Registered Nurse for over 30 years, Jody learned much from her patients and families in the hospital as well as twelve years in hospice ministry.
Growing up in the heartland of America to working-class parents, she went to church every week and even played the organ as a teenager but did not know God as a personal Savior. It was through a revival, now known as the Pensacola Outpouring in 1995-2000 that Jody made her commitment to Jesus Christ and she has never looked back. Through divorce, the deaths of her parents, and her 17-year-old son, James, that Jody feels she came to know the God of Moses, David, Esther, Paul, Mary, and Peter.
Jody and Henry have three children and nine grandchildren.