Three years ago I hesitantly joined 7 other men, all strangers in a FIND group. I came in with little expectation other then to see where this would go. I was pleasantly surprised at the dedication and commitment of our group and the level of trust and openness that has developed between us.
Our relationship with Christ and with other Christian men grows when there is trust. Trust is the key and when you add hope to that, you get transformation and spiritual growth. The trust we have built over time has created a hope that doing more of the same will create the change and depth we are looking for.
This generally does not happen in Church. A space must be created for this type of individual trust to develop.
That’s not a knock on the Church — it’s a confession about what most of us men do with it. We sit next to each other for years and never once say what’s actually going on inside us. FIND is where I found brothers willing to step into that gap, into the place where the church, as an institution, so often falls short: real men, in a room, every week, refusing to hide anymore.
The three keys to FIND’s success are time that builds trust, that creates hope, that drives men, strangers at first to— overcome themselves. Get less afraid to open their mouths about their faith, their failures, their fears. And I’ve watched it happen up close in my own group. We are not the same men we were three years ago. That kind of change doesn’t happen by accident, and it doesn’t happen fast. It takes showing up. It takes commitment to the same table, the same men, week after week, whether you feel like it or not.
The deepest proof of this shows up as our brothers go through the storms of life. Some of these storms create a level of grief none of us have words for. But because we had already spent years building trust — because we’d already been vulnerable about smaller things — we are able to walk into and through the storms with each other. We didn’t have to learn how to love each other in the middle of the hard times. We already knew how, because we’d been practicing it every week for years. That is what FIND makes possible. That is what shows up when you trust the process long enough for it to actually work.
That’s God’s hand on this ministry. And it’s why I’d tell any man considering FIND, or already in a group and wondering if it’s worth the effort: it is.
Mike Malkemes is a member of the FIND group – The Journeymen. He has been married to Kenzie for 17 years and they have two kids, Jonathan (23) and Kaylee (13). Mike is a Marine and a veteran of Desert Storm and is a graduate of the University of Houston where he earned his BBA in Finance and Economics. Mike is the Founder and CEO of Generation One (https://www.generationone.net/) - an early childhood school and ministry for inner city kids.
