Introducing Faithelement Studies for Women
These short-term topical studies are designed for women's groups and individuals. Each study provides a private online area providing resources to guide your group's study. These include an introductory video, as well as a video that is to be shown within each session. A leader's guide provides insight into the topic, as well as ideas for leading each session. Participants are provided with journal prompts to guide prayer and reflection.
Intentional Living. Get it now!
The first study is titled: Intentional Living
More About the Study
Living intentional lives sounds like something for the most organized among us. Chances are, when you read the title, you either loved it or hated it. But living intentionally isn't really about living organized, orderly lives. Even the most spirited and free-flowing among us can make decisions that put the most important things of our lives in the forefront and encourage the minutia to fall to the background.
We live in a time in which our lives rush by in a blur of activity. There are meals to fix, meetings to attend, aging parents to tend, forms to complete, and emails to return. The lists of daily tasks can stretch for miles. And in the middle of it all, we easily forget what is really important. Things like faith, love, family and community relationships, and prayer fall to the bottom of the list because they don't have a deadline pressing our attention.
In this study, we are going to spend time talking about how to flip the priority list around. When we take the time to infuse meaning into our daily activities and conversation, we give more importance to things like faith, and love, and prayer.
Each session will look at a different aspect of what intentional living can look like. The first session discusses how God is an integral part of the process of living an intentional life. In the second session we discuss ways that we can engage our faith practice in intentional ways in order to make the space for a deeper faith to flourish. Session three discusses the importance of actively remembering and recalling the ways that God is present in our lives. And finally, in the last two session we will discuss ways that we live in community with other people of faith, and ways we engage the outside world with the love of Christ.
My hope is, when we take time to think about the ways that we can intentionally engage our life of faith with everyday tasks, that we can spark our imaginations to about how fulfilling our lives of faith can be and how our lives of faith can lead us to impact our communities and our world.
Nikki Hardeman
Rev. Nikki Carroll Hardeman is a teacher and minister. While currently staying home with her children, she continues to pursue her vocational call to ministry through adjunct-teaching Hebrew Bible at Mercer University, teaching and writing through FaithElement, and supply preaching. Nikki strongly believes that for too long, clergy have not given their congregations enough credit when teaching them about scripture and faith. She has a deep passion for encouraging people of faith to dig deeper in their study, and to wrestle with the complexities that a life of authentic faith can present. She believes that as we do this, we grow; and as we grow as people of God, we inspire others to seek their own life of faith.
Nikki graduated with a Bachelor of Arts from Mercer University in 2002 and from the McAfee School of Theology with a Master of Divinity in 2005. While at Mercer, Nikki met her husband, Daniel, and they married following graduation. After McAfee, Nikki served as the pastoral resident at the First Baptist Church in Rome, Georgia, and then as the Associate Coordinator for Congregational Life at the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of Georgia. Daniel and Nikki have three children: Natalie, a curious six-year-old; Aiden, who is in heaven; and Liam, a very busy two-year-old. They also have a lovable basset hound, Emma. When she has a free moment, Nikki enjoys traveling, quiet time with Daniel, watching great T.V. shows on Netflix, taking on new projects around the house, and experimenting with new dishes in her kitchen.
