Roy and Lainey are becoming great friends of Elim Church Selly Oak, and over the last couple of years, they have brought great relationship insights to the people in our church community. Roy and Lainey are our ‘go to’ people for relationship investment training, and not only for church wide seminars but for any couples who might need some specialist relationship advice and input. Though they are based in Hungary, it is no barrier, as Skype has proved a great tool to continue to help our people access quality relationship advice. I wholeheartedly recommend the ministry of the Hitchmans to you. If you choose to make the investment of time and finance into working with them, you won’t be disappointed!
Working in ministry we are often faced with problems. We want to help and are called to help. We rush to save others ignoring the devastation in our own lives. Our situation is probably not unique. We helped other people happily while we ourselves were struggling to keep it together. We managed to stuff away certain areas of our lives only dealing with them when something brought them to light. This meant that we only ever dealt with the tip of the iceberg, ignoring the massive structure under the sea until one day we finally crashed and were sinking.
We met Lainey and Roy about a year ago after yet another rough holiday season. The demands of the holiday, family and ministry caused us to leave little time to look at the demands on our marriage. We fought more than we laughed together, we were separate in many areas that we should have been together on. God was not in our marriage even though we proclaimed Him in ministry. Lainey and Roy were an answer to desperate prayer. They have helped us restructure our relationship placing God again at the center. Together we began dealing with areas of our life that needed to be dealt with for so long. This has enabled us to focus better on ministry and what God has called us to do. We are thankful for their friendship, for holding us up in prayer, holding us accountable for our actions and helping our family and marriage.
Roy and Lainey are great communicators with a passion for sharing Biblical principles to help families with life, love and relationships, both corporately and one on one. It’s in their DNA. They can’t help it.
Working in ministry we are often faced with problems. We want to help and are called to help. We rush to save others ignoring the devastation in our own lives. Our situation is probably not unique. We helped other people happily while we ourselves were struggling to keep it together. We managed to stuff away certain areas of our lives only dealing with them when something brought them to light. This meant that we only ever dealt with the tip of the iceberg, ignoring the massive structure under the sea until one day we finally crashed and were sinking.
We met Lainey and Roy about a year ago after yet another rough holiday season. The demands of the holiday, family and ministry caused us to leave little time to look at the demands on our marriage. We fought more than we laughed together, we were separate in many areas that we should have been together on. God was not in our marriage even though we proclaimed Him in ministry. Lainey and Roy were an answer to desperate prayer. They have helped us restructure our relationship placing God again at the center. Together we began dealing with areas of our life that needed to be dealt with for so long. This has enabled us to focus better on ministry and what God has called us to do. We are thankful for their friendship, for holding us up in prayer, holding us accountable for our actions and helping our family and marriage.
One of many ways that Paul Hudson our International Missions Director and boss has blessed us as a couple over this last year was introducing us to Roy and Lainey Hitchman.
We are living in a foreign culture, with people who constantly do things alien to us, the temperature is crazy and we are over 6000 miles away from our families, except for God and our gorgeous puppies Meg and Ruby we are alone. Like everyone else we felt everything was ok in our marriage and it is but that’s not to say it wasn’t heading in the wrong direction. By meeting Roy and Lainey talking to them in a natural but secure way we soon realised that we needed to put safeguards in place. Date night, a Sabbath together, praying and sharing our hearts on a daily basis three things they encouraged us to focus on and already we are seeing that what we thought was ok wasn’t!
Not only did they help us but they came to Cambodia for a month and really impacted our leadership team, helping in the healing process in some situations and carefully pointing out problems to others, but they done everything in a gracious loving way that even when someone was being told to change they didn’t mind because they were being loved as they were being challenged. It is quite incredible the gifting that this genuine couple have been blessed with!
I think that every missionary within Elim in fact every Pastor and his wife in Elim should have access to this couple, and I believe if they do Elim will be seen as a Movement that cares about the important things protecting marriage and relationships. Recently we advised three couples in the U.K. to have Roy and Lainey to their churches that they would be blessed. All three trusted us and all 3 told us they were fantastic.
Throughout 2016, we Skyped with Roy and Lainey roughly once every 6 weeks. One year on, it has been a positive experience. Rather than gaining counsellors, we feel that we have gained friends. It has been very personable and we have appreciated the chats that we have been able to have. They are a little further down the road than us and so we have been able to learn from their experience.
In a world that is very reactive, we recognise the importance of being proactive/intentional in regard to our relationships. Nowhere is that more important than within the context of family, where Satan can wreak havoc when he gets a foothold and discredit ministry that has taken years to build up. What Roy and Lainey have given us are tools that we can use in dealing with conflict and in leading our family. In thinking through how we think and act, it helps to prepare us for when difficulties arise. We would highly recommend their ministry to you and believe that it would be beneficial to anyone, especially those involved in Christian service.