Grounded Presence, Sinking Deep

A Testimony of a Leading to Eldership

This piece of writing attempts to capture a piece of ministry I gave at the Young Adult Friends Gathering at the Jordans Meetinghouse near Beaconsfield, England, in August 2025. I led a session entitled “Gifts of Eldership and Spiritual Nurture.” I invite you to read the following as you would listen to ministry.

My eldership journey began with an invitation. In fall 2023, I was asked to speak on a panel at a regional meeting about being a young Friend and intergenerational community. I had been a part of the Oxford Young Adult Friends (YAF) group for just under a year and still felt quite new, but I agreed to take part. By the end of the meeting, I felt inspired to find a way to take on more of a role within the YAF group.

A month later the two Friends who had been organizing the group decided that it was time to lay down the role to allow others to pick up the work. I volunteered to join the new organizing committee. As part of the handover process, one of these Friends spoke to us about what elders do in meeting for worship: holding the meeting in prayer; being attentive to the movement of the Spirit in the room; watching for Friends who may have a message but not sharing it; grounding the meeting and drawing it into deeper faithfulness.

I started to practice this and found it quite simple. It was much easier for me to focus on the meeting than on my own concerns.

Sometime later my friend Matt Rosen was looking for elders to accompany him as he traveled in the ministry. I didn’t really know what this entailed but expressed an interest anyway. Our first adventure together was to Fritchley in Derbyshire. It was a great learning experience for me, not least because I was soon asked what my role there was. As I recall it, the answer I found then is one I stand by: to support my minister to be faithful. This looked different ways on our different adventures; within the meetings themselves, it was most often being a grounded presence, sinking deep into the silence and praying for Matt. Afterward, we would spend some time together reflecting on our experiences of the session.

Occasionally, there would be pieces for me to share, too. At first, I felt quite unsure as to whether that was within my remit. Matt was reassuring that my primary responsibility at all times is faithfulness even if that seems to lead outside the box I had put myself in (and that it was nice for him to not be doing all the work).

In each place we visited, there were one or two Friends who would approach me afterward and thank me for my presence, my stillness. Nominated or not, I think those Friends were elders, attuned enough to the Spirit to notice and understand what I was doing there.

Outside of meeting for worship, I think eldership and pastoral care overlap somewhat, as outside of meeting is where the groundwork for gathered meetings is laid. Eldership in that space looks like community building. It is in making people feel welcome when they come to meeting, learning their birthdays and making sure there is cake, making sure the dinner is prepared, that the meetinghouse is set up, that the Zoom is properly configured, that there is someone to talk to about joys and about struggles. For me, eldership looks like love for everyone who comes to my meeting. It is the joy of learning how the Spirit is moving in the lives of my Friends.

Though my experiences of eldership thus far have been very rewarding, there are challenges too. Elders are often called upon to mediate conflict. It can be difficult to set aside personal feelings about a situation and listen to what God is asking of you in those conflicts.

Addressing our own spiritual needs is crucial, as we must be standing in the waters ourselves in order to lead others to them. This is what I hope eldership committees can be—places where our elders support one another in their spiritual lives for the benefit of the whole community.

I have received eldership from many places along the way. A notable example of this for me was related to a time I was making arrangements for some visitors to the meeting. I was tasked with making Saturday arrangements, and there was a scheduling conflict for use of the meetinghouse. As it was an event organized by other members of the meeting, I thought it would be easy to resolve, but I quickly found myself in conflict with those Friends. I was very distressed in this time. I did not understand why God wanted me to proceed with actions that put me in conflict with my meeting. I spoke to some young Friends about the situation one evening and they formed a clearness committee for me that night, staying much later than we usually would. That support was so valuable to me; it helped clarify the leading for me and gave me the strength to continue on the path God had laid for me. It also transpired that conversations that those Friends then had allowed the way to open for resolution of the conflict. I needed the help of my community and it was given. I am incredibly grateful for that.

In each step of this journey, I have been motivated by love of my community and faithfulness to the will of God. In both offering and receiving eldership, it is necessary to trust God and trust each other. I have witnessed the transforming power of God; it has taken me step by step into faith. I have learnt how to listen for that power behind the words and a little of how to call to that power in others. I am still practicing listening to and trusting this power. Laying it all out like this in ministry has cemented for me the great gift that God has given me in this leading—the immense tenderness, love, and care I have received to share with others.