Welcome, Friend!

On behalf of the team of friends who have worked diligently and creatively to launch the Verbena Foundation and this website, we welcome you into this conversation.  

Over the past twenty-five years, Laurie and I, with the help of many friends and prayer partners, have hosted individual retreats for men and women who come to Greensboro for three days of intensive prayer and discipleship. We have also participated fully in broader relational ministry through these years and many years before. The heart of our work has always been one of reconciliation: reconciliation of a divided person; reconciliation of relationships and increasingly a passion for the reconciliation of a divided church.

Over the course of these years of working intensively, one person at a time, we have learned some things that have broader application to the body of Christ.  One could consider a prayer intensive with one person for three days an extravagant use of time and not very efficient for building the Kingdom of Heaven. Yet, opening up space for that one, we believe, allows more fully for the mystery of that one person, that created being, to unfold in Christ. And that is our experience. Jesus, in that time, opens up space through his wounds for healing. We cannot begin to count how many times the healing and freedom of the individual has led to a spouse, to a renewed marriage, to a womb now fertile, to the reconciliation of broken relationships and broken hearts.

Out of this experience we see Verbena as more than a plant or a flower; it is more than a symbol; it is more than a name for a Foundation. It is a willingness to open up space intentionally for conversations, for prayer, for celebration. It is a way for communicating a whole new rhythm of life in work, and play, and rest. It is a spirit of humility and sacramental being. The Verbena Foundation is a catalyst and an avenue for these conversations and experiences wherever and with whomever they can be had. They have already begun and that is helping us to begin to get at the heart of it, which we invite you into with us. There are many ways this will be worked out as we keep asking, seeking and knocking together.

The vision for the Verbena Foundation is that it will continue to facilitate the three-day intensive prayer and pastoral care ministry that we have conducted, and continue to conduct with individual men and women. We will also continue the wider relational ministry and leadership involving various retreats, visiting, travel, and speaking invitations in North Carolina and throughout the country. Under a Board of Directors and as Executive Director of the Verbena Foundation, I will also give leadership to an expanded vision, working with many others who share the values of Verbena and whose own dreams and callings may be facilitated by it. It is anticipated that many forms of dialogue, forums, and gatherings will be encouraged and sponsored by the work of the Foundation, with primary emphasis on the unity of body, mind, soul and spirit and unity in the Body of Christ. Our website will publish my reflections, along with many others who share this mission and who want to work collaboratively in and through the Foundation.

As you visit this website, we hope and pray that you will share the vision with us and that it will open some creativity and conversation for you. Over time you will become more aware of what some of the folks initially involved with Verbena are doing here and worldwide and who they are. You will also come to realize that a team of people, our intercessory prayer team, is spread across the country. This team prays for each individual seeking prayer, for the work of Verbena and for Laurie and me and our family. It is the core and the mainstay for all we do - and even that we are able to do it. Through all of our communications we will continue to emphasize the vital place of intercessory prayer in transformation at any level.

We also intend to keep gaining perspective and entering into dialogue on the healing of the whole person, mind, body, soul and spirit. We need to be careful not to ignore, for instance, that Christian thought and practice encompasses the health of the body and that the body is deeply affected by the wounded soul. We have often been cut off from very good sources outside of our Western Christian paradigm out of fear of a different language and even system of belief. Our hope would be that we might look at some of this information more objectively and without fear of weakening our own faith and also examine Jesus' followers who have gained and communicated thought and practice on the healing and health of the body.

There is much more we could say about the hopes and dreams of Verbena, more of which is already up on the website. Enjoy.

Blessings,

Trip Sizemore