Graced to Lead

Ep. 14: Cultivating a Relationship with God with Michele Scott

• Belinda Gaston • Season 1 • Episode 14

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What if cultivating a deeper relationship with God could transform your leadership more than any corporate strategy ever could? Join me, Belinda Gaston, as I welcome the extraordinary Michelle Scott, founder and CEO of Cultivate Coaching and Consulting LLC, to Grace to Lead. With over three decades of experience in a top-tier international telecommunications company, Michelle shares her inspiring story of transitioning from a high-powered corporate role to fulfilling her divine calling in coaching and ministry. Her journey and insights illuminate how embracing your faith can enhance your effectiveness and fulfillment as a leader.

Michelle, one of the best Bible teachers I know, underscores the importance of spending time with God amidst the bustling demands of leadership. We delve into practical strategies for integrating spiritual practices into your daily routine, ensuring that your relationship with God guides your path. Through our conversation, discover how acknowledging God in all your endeavors can profoundly shape your leadership approach, whether you’re navigating the corporate world, ministry, or your own business. Tune in for wisdom and actionable advice on leading with faith and purpose.

Connect with Michele:

Cultivate Training Institute
YouTube Channel -  Cultivate Training Institute
FB Community group - Cultivate Training Institute Group
FB Page - Cultivate Training Institute

Cultivate Coaching & Consulting
Website: cultivatecoachconsult.com

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Belinda Gaston:

Welcome to the Graced to Lead podcast.

Belinda Gaston:

I'm Belinda Gaston, your host, and listen. If you are a Christian woman who leads at work, in your own business or even in ministry, you are in the right place. Here. You'll find practical advice and encouragement as you lead through real conversations that will challenge and inspire you. So join me on this journey to becoming better leaders God's way. Are you ready? Let the journey begin.

Belinda Gaston:

Welcome everyone to the Graced to Lead podcast. I am Belinda Gaston, your host, and listen. I am excited about our guest today.

Belinda Gaston:

Today, we're going to talk about cultivating your relationship with God as a leader, and I have with me none other than the Michele Scott, who is founder and CEO of Cultivate Coaching and Consulting LLC. She's a transformational leader with over three decades of leadership experience. She's distinguished not only as a professional, certified coach and consultant and mentor, but also a passionate cultivator of individuals and organizational potential. She has been, for over 31 years, a leader with a major international telecommunications company, where she served in positions everywhere, from a director of projects as an engineer for the eastern United States, spearheading re-engineering processes, as a business process analyst, all the way to engineering implementation manager and business analyst, liaison. And what really sets Michele apart and this is one of the things I think that we can glean from here is that she has seamlessly transitioned from this 31-year career as a leader and administrator to fulfilling her life's calling in coaching and in ministry, and that's not easy y'all. So we can definitely learn from her.

Belinda Gaston:

I am so excited about our conversation today. Can you help me virtually welcome my guest and friend today?

Michele Scott:

guest and friend today, Michele Scott, Welcome to Graced to Lead Well. Thank you for having me, Belinda.

Belinda Gaston:

This is so exciting and I'm honored to be able to be on your podcast. Thank you, we are happy to have you here and listen. We're going to jump in. One of the reasons I was most excited about having you on the show is that oftentimes, as leaders, we're going to jump in. One of the reasons I was most excited about having you on the show is that oftentimes, as leaders, we're leading all the things. We're busy, we have all the things, and I think I've told you this before, but I think you are one of the best Bible teachers I have ever met and that means to me that you've managed to figure out how to cultivate time with God, and as leaders, that's a challenge.

Belinda Gaston:

It's challenging to find that time, and so first let's start with the basics. Why do you think spending time with God is important for leaders?

Michele Scott:

Well, I think it's important to spend time with God because he's the ultimate in terms of leadership. He crafted the hand expertise on how we are to conduct ourselves and how we are to serve people. Then I think that it's important for us, as leaders, to get to know God.

Belinda Gaston:

And you know I love the word cultivate too, and that is a part of your, your company. That's your company name, which I absolutely love. That's your company name, which I absolutely love. And when I think about spending time with God, if you were to do a Google search on how to spend time with God, all kinds of stuff would come up, and so I think, for our listeners, it might be helpful to be a bit specific about what that means. So can you describe a little bit about what it means to spend time with God? When we say spending time with God for leaders, whether they're in the corporate space, whether they're in ministry or their own business, what does spending time with God mean?

Michele Scott:

I like to look at it like we look at relationships. It's developing a relationship with God, first of all, because God is a person. He's not a thing, he's not this figment of our imagination up in the sky, he's not unreachable. He says he wants to be involved in every facet of our lives. You know, I'm going to get some scripture in here. Proverbs 3, 5 through 6 talks about we trust in him and in all our ways we acknowledge Him and then he will direct our paths. So we want to build this intimacy with God, because that is what's most important. It's like with our spouses, right, we're married and the only way we get to know them is if we develop intimacy and relationship with them. And that doesn't mean physical necessarily. You know we can't touch God, but we can communicate with God. So it's this two-way relationship that we need to establish, not where we're just pimping him. We make the request and then he responds, whether it's a yes, no, a wait, maybe later. But we want to sit back and take the time to also hear from him Now.

Michele Scott:

You asked what ways does that occur? Well, for me, I love to study the word. If I start reading the Bible, my goodness, god is speaking, and then for other people it could be just sitting and meditating on the word of God, which is different than studying the word of God. And then there is prayer, where we actually communicate out of our mouths or mentally, you know, in our minds, communicating with God, or he communicates to us through circumstances of life. We see things occurring around us, us through circumstances of life. We see things occurring around us. You have a lot of analogies when you see things happening that God will speak to you and you say you know what? And so he speaks to us even that way, through our family, through people, other people directly communicating to us or indirectly communicating to us, that God speaks in all those ways.

Michele Scott:

So we're not limited to just this formality that we've been taught, where we have to get in a posture, a certain specific posture, and we have to sit, and then we want a King James version God, thee, thou and those you know and talk to him. It's really just like we're communicating. This is how I communicate with God and it's throughout the day. He says to pray without ceasing. That doesn't mean that we've got to be in that posture again, it just means talk to me. I talk to my husband when he walks by, so I'm going to talk to God as I think on him. I can watch shows on YouTube and television and it'll speak to me, especially if I'm listening to someone's church service or Bible study. That is also a way that I draw near to God.

Belinda Gaston:

I love that and I thank you for breaking that down, because I think that sometimes, particularly in the corporate space of leadership, it's easy to try to make this building the relationship with God or spending time with God this very ritualistic, formal thing, because as leaders, we strategize, we analyze, we create plans and that's kind of what we bring towards our relationship with God, or we try to separate the two right. This relationship that you have with God informs your leadership, and you said that you know how does that work. What does that relationship look like? It could look like studying the word of God, the Bible, and I love that you said the King James. You know the vow of those, because I think sometimes we can get intimidated if we you know.

Belinda Gaston:

So studying the word also may mean finding a version. We want it to be accurate, but finding a version that relates to you, and you talked about sitting and meditating and you talked about prayer and even kind of paying attention to the circumstances of life, and so I think it helps us to kind of put a framework around what that means. Now I want to ask you a question. I imagine, Michele, that because you're such a good teacher and you know the word and you clearly have a relationship with God, that this has probably been easy for you. Like, maybe you were born. Like when you were born, babies cry, but you started speaking in tongues, I don't know. Like in my head.

Belinda Gaston:

you know how these images of people like as a toddler you would pray. I don't know, but I imagine that you know that's probably not the case. So my question for you is have you always had this cultivated relationship? Have you always studied the word of God, especially during your time as a corporate leader? If so, can you tell me about that? And if not, can you tell me a little bit about that?

Michele Scott:

I will say that I have not always, especially in the corporate environment, studied the word of God, I think, because my gifting, my spiritual gifting, is as a teacher and that's the office that I walk in.

Michele Scott:

Then some things come kind of naturally to you because of how God has equipped me, but I have not always studied. Equipped me but I have not always studied. I've been a learner of the word of God, listening a lot to people articulate the word to me and teach me, and in the corporate environment I say I've been a practitioner of the word, and so that is how I've conducted my life. You see, I didn't receive salvation until I was in my twentiess. So as a child, no, god was developing the gift of the teacher in me because I loved to teach, I loved to read, but I didn't have any knowledge of God. So in the corporate environment I have just been, because around the same time that I was getting into corporate and graduating from college, that's when I received salvation, and so I was applying what I was learning as best I could about the word.

Belinda Gaston:

That's so good, Michele. So OK, you've broken the myth of me thinking that you were born, you know studying and praying and all of that. But I think this is this concept of being a practitioner I love that word a practitioner and a learner versus a studier is something that I'd like for us to explore a little bit. Can you talk a little about the difference between being a learner slash listener?

Michele Scott:

between being a learner, slash listener, a practitioner and a studier of the word of God. So learning just means I was ingesting what was being spoken to me, not necessarily that I examined it to see whether it was true or not. I was an open, like the Bible says, sepulcher. I was receiving everything because I was an empty vessel. I wanted it all. I wanted to know as much as I possibly could, not being able, though, to delineate whether it was accurate or not. And so that's the difference between learning and then, when I got into studying, it meant I had to be like the Bereans right, get in there and see what's being said, if it's so for myself, and examining the word, and then having conversation with God on my own, outside of the other voices that have been speaking to me about who he is to see, even through his word. Okay, lord, some of this stuff that I've been taught, I'm having to erase or replace because it's not accurate in terms of how it's been interpreted to me. And so that's the difference between now the learner and the study.

Michele Scott:

Now, the practitioner means okay, god requires some action. For me, it's good to know it, but now I have to put it into action, it has to become a daily part of who I am, a whole intricate part of my essence, my being right, because the word says that we get rid of this old nature and we put on this new nature. So I have to now walk in that and it's in every facet. I don't delineate. I'm Michele, the teacher in ministry, and when I'm outside of work versus when I'm working, this word is in me at all times. So it's going to come forth even in my leadership. My principles and my values and my identity will come from the word of God in terms of who I am as a leader.

Belinda Gaston:

That's really good and I think this helps our listeners as they think through where they are. I mean, it's even making me think where am I as a leader in my walk and my relationship with God? Am I a listener, a learner and none of these are bad places to be in, they're just different stages is to be in, they're just different stages. But am I a learner? Am I a studier? Am I a practitioner? And the impact that has on my leadership. Oh, thank you so much for sharing that.

Belinda Gaston:

So let's shift a little bit. We've talked about the fact that you weren't born praying, so that myth is busted, and we talked about kind of your role as a leader and how you've managed in these three areas to kind of cultivate your time with God. But I often hear from other leaders when you get together. So what happens in these leadership spaces? You know you might have the corporate meeting or the corporate conference or event and you get together with other leaders and you do all the things you're supposed to do. You meet, you greet, you have your elevator pitch and all those things to tell people who you are and get to know one another and inevitably, if you are a Christian, you may say something or do something that makes someone else who's a Christian, they pick up on it and they're like, oh, you're a Christian and all of a sudden the language shifts. Then people, you can tell, feel more comfortable talking about prayer and asking questions.

Belinda Gaston:

And it's got me thinking about times where people may want to do more, they may want to express more, they may want to grow their relationships more and they struggle in that space and I think everyone struggles. But I think in leadership it's different because, once again, as we talked about in our Matters of the Heart series, we're still people and so, as we're leading, those things that are in our heart and our mind kind of spur up. And so I wonder if you can also share again about maybe a time when you may have struggled with your time with God in leadership. I know that again, I've heard the stories, especially when you connect with other people, but since you're the guest, I would love to hear if you're comfortable sharing. Has there been a time in your 31 year career leadership where you struggled with your time with God and if so, can you share a little bit about that time and what that was like?

Michele Scott:

Yes, I have struggled, I think, daily, yearly, with the reality is because we have to prioritize God, our relationship, just like we have to prioritize our marriage or relationships with our children or what's important to us. I think we all like to think, oh, I'm so faithful and dutiful and I communicate with God all the time and I'm consistent. Every morning of my life I get up and God is the first person that I talk to. But what does that look like? What's the quality of that? And so, yes, I have struggled, especially during those times where I got married. You know, when I was single, I could devote the majority of my time. I was a single mom, but my daughter was young and so I could devote hours. I used to worship for hours, especially after she was in bed, because it was just me.

Michele Scott:

But when I got married and then I had children two consecutive years in a row, then it became very difficult for me to manage my time. And you know crying babies don't care what time it is, they're up all kinds of hours of the day. So it took off whatever consistency or regimen I had in prayer. Then my children took that over. You know, I was up feeding bottles, changing diapers and people thought I had twins. They're actually two years apart, but it felt like I had twins. They're actually two years apart, but it felt like I had twins.

Michele Scott:

And then, you know, my daughter and school and work, and I was working a full-time job and and it was demanding because I was on a systems and systems where if the system goes down, you're working, I don't care if you have quit your shift, you know your shift is over, you're going to work till that system is back up. And so all those demands on me, I was struggling, I won't even say to fit God in. I was having sparse conversations with God, you know, and it probably was a lot of requests versus spending intimate time with him. And so those years and until my children probably got up to like middle school you know, where they're kind of self-sufficient, I was struggling and I was doing ministry that whole time you can be in, you can be on every board, the usher board, deacons, elders, whatever capacity that you serve in, and you can be just or a pew bitch warmer.

Michele Scott:

You can go to church every Sunday faithfully and not have any intimacy with God, because at that point you're just receiving from other people or you're in a capacity of giving to other people, but where is God in the midst of that? And so those, yes, I have. Even now I'm retired and I'm doing my own business. I am basically in control of my day, but I have to be intentional about putting God first, because this world is very busy, it's full of distractions, you know, things that catch our attention, that pull us away from what we have planned for the day, you know, and so we have to be very intentional about our time, our space, you know, that we set aside for God.

Belinda Gaston:

I think this is kind of a Selah moment. You said a lot, but the idea again about serving in the doing and the going, about serving in the doing and the going, that does not equate to a relationship with God. And so if I am a corporate leader and I am reading my devotional every day and then I get on with my day, if I'm not stopping in that moment to really what God is saying, that's not necessarily relationship, that's routine, Right, and I think that is for our listeners. If you felt that one, that's an area that we'll all be praying about, Because I think that that is something that we do often as leaders is we're caught up in the busyness and the things to do and we think if we are doing good meaning, good works, or if we are helping others, or if we're solving things or creating solutions, that we're doing God's work and you are doing God's work, but we can't take that relationship out of the work. I feel like that's a Selah moment.

Michele Scott:

Because, if you think about it, even in our marriages right, if we don't put the work in, we can sleep in bed together and live in the same house. Live in the same house and we can feel like roommates because we have not developed, spent quality, not quantity quality time together. And that is what's important with as business leaders, with the Lord, it's like we can do those ritualistic things. We can check off the list, because we're grateful to do lists and strategies and plans right. Our planner is full of what we're going to do for the day. Some of us are so analytical and detailed. We got it hour by hour and so we can check off. I gave God the hour right. We use an hour because Jesus said won't you come? Ask the disciples to come and pray with them for an hour. So we think we've done good when we do that right. So we check off. I got the hour in. Some people may feel, oh, I only get 10 minutes in. It's not the quantity, it's the quality of time and, as you said, is it developing relationship?

Michele Scott:

Did we allow God to time to respond to what we've said? Did we bombard him with just all our needs, our cares or our, you know, father, we pray the Lord's prayer. You know our father in heaven, hallowed be thy name. We will say that thy kingdom come, do your will here on earth, lord, as it is in heaven. We'll go through all of those ritualistic things, but what happened? What change in our heart occurred? Where did we learn more about God? Where did we draw nearer to him? And he said you know, ask, knock and seek, or if you draw near to me, I'll draw near to you. Are we sensing that there's a change in our relationship, or is it becoming stagnant and stale? And that is, to me, the difference.

Belinda Gaston:

I agree, and you brought up something that I think leads to another question for me, and that is this idea of hearing from God. And so I think there are people who may not do this, and I'm going to ask you for some practical tips in a minute for folks. But I think that there are people who may make an attempt, say, okay, you know, this morning, in between my, you know, coming into the office and my first meeting, or logging on and my first meeting, I'm going to dedicate you know X amount of time to God. And then they go into this time and they have their Bible and their notebook or their Bible app or whatever they're using, and they sit and they may not sense anything. It's like, okay, now, what Can you talk a little bit about? What it means to hear from God in these moments. Like you know, when you're in a relationship with a person, you can talk to them, but what does that like, talking to God and hearing from God?

Michele Scott:

So most of us are not going to have a Moses experience where we hear the bellowing of his voice right and the people when they heard it at the mountain they were fearful anyway. But what we do have is, internally, we hear God speaking through our thoughts. It's you know, the Bible talks about the mind all the time and so it's our being able to perceive in our thought life and in our sensing of what he's saying. It's internal, it's not an external thing. So when you're sitting, if you're doing a devotion sitting, if you're doing a devotion, then these thoughts start coming right and it develops. What you've been reading or what you've been studying, or you get a thought about how that applies to some facet of your life. Not for other people. We should be hearing for ourselves, not even our children sometimes. We need to be hearing for ourselves. What is God saying to me, about me and our relationship? So that, to me, is how it occurs.

Michele Scott:

Some people, when we're hearing from God, we're writing, we write, I write a lot, I journal a lot, and then God will be again. You'll get the thoughts. It's still the thought process. What are you hearing within yourself? So you have to be quiet. You got to get quiet. You can't. You know.

Michele Scott:

Some people can do it in music. Some people, like I, can't go to sleep with all the TV on and all the distractions. I need it dark and quiet, and so it's like that for me, with my time with the Lord, that I have to have it quiet. I like when everybody leaves. So even can I make a point that I know the Bible says early in the morning, right, that we should seek him. Well, your morning may be different than other people's morning in terms of the time of the day, because everybody doesn't work in the morning, right. As a business leader, some people have a night shift and so your morning may be that evening time of day. Just make sure you have a time. Some people go work out before they pray. It's okay. Let's get rid of the rituals and just work on the relationship, and that's it. Is that a drop the mic moment? That?

Belinda Gaston:

is a drop the mic moment.

Belinda Gaston:

Let's get rid of the ritual and work on the relationship, and I think that you probably just freed a whole bunch of listeners who've been trying to get up at 5 am and have this time with God when that may not even be their most alert time, and I had to release that for myself.

Belinda Gaston:

I choose the time of day when I'm most alert to give my attention to God. It doesn't do me any good, but I am a morning person, but I haven't always been a morning person, but it does me no good to get up early in the morning and be too sleepy to even focus on God. I mean, there is a level of sacrifice and intention here, but we also have to really focus on what relationship means. So I'm so glad you shared that, which leads me to my next question about tips. I mean, this is really the point of this podcast is to help people have some practical application here. So are there any practical tips? What practical tips would you give leaders to either start working on this time with God or increase their time with God? Are there practical tips that you can share?

Michele Scott:

I think I'm reading this book or going through this Bible study, now called Experiencing God, knowing and Doing the Will of God, and it's by Henry Richard and Mike Blackaby and Claude King, and this book has really transformed my way of thinking about all facets leadership and how to encounter God. It's about encountering God and a lot of times, as leaders, practically what they can be like is, even if we're sitting in a meeting, even if we're leading a presentation, even if we're just trying to figure out how to do something on our job you know, we get these projects sometimes because we're the trailblazers, there's no path set and so we have to figure it out Then that is the time within yourself. We don't have to go in a separate room and pray. God makes it so simple. We can just sit at our desk and within ourselves, because we can also pray internally. We can also communicate internally.

Michele Scott:

You don't have to be at your desk muttering and people think you're talking to yourself, like Hannah was in the Bible. Right, you can sit there and within yourself, just talk to God, get a quiet moment. You could take five minutes and have such a deep conversation with God, whether you're talking to him about your day or the project you're working on, some employee that you have to deal with, some decisions that you have to make him in all our ways. I know we've been taught that God doesn't. I won't say everybody's teaching, but there are some teachings that God's not speaking that much, or he's not listening to you, or he doesn't talk that much he does because his word says that if you, he wants to be acknowledged in all our ways, that means every facet of your life he wants to be intricately involved. So if you speak to him on it, I guarantee you he'll give you an answer on it.

Belinda Gaston:

So incorporating your time with God throughout your day not being in the ritual of things. Are there any other tips that you'd like to share?

Michele Scott:

Now I like whether you're in the morning or whether you go to bed at night. The journaling is very good to do. Someone walked our Bible study team through a prophetic journaling moment where we were playing some music and we had a journal open and as the music played worship music, of course. Right. It's important what you're listening to, what we're putting in our ear gates, that then you begin to hear what is God saying, what thoughts are coming to you, and just write it down. That's another way. There are ways we can go for a walk during your exercise routine. Be intentional instead of listening to motivational speaking, maybe listen to the word of God or listen to a praise song. Let it minister to you. This is still communicating and communing with God. Even if I do a lot of talking to God in my car, when I don't play the radio like I used to, I'm in my car, always talking to God. If I'm shopping for clothes, I'm saying Lord, what do you think about this? It's that practical. We have to treat him like a person, like he's with us. He's not a consultant, and I remember this is coming back to me now last week the Holy Spirit says he's not the maker, he's the helper, so he helps us. He's the aid for us. So that means then we got to talk to him. He doesn't force us to do anything. That's the maker I'm talking about. He's not that kind of maker, and so we got to talk to him. He doesn't force us to do anything. That's the maker I'm talking about. He's not that kind of maker, and so we need to involve him. And then so it's not just God, the father is the son, jesus, and the Holy spirit. He's the, the Jesus is the advocate. It says he's praying for us, sitting on the right hand of the Father, and then we've got the Holy Spirit over here. He's the one that's residing with us. This is, he's the one that God has left with us. So, as leaders, we can pull on the Holy Spirit as we are working and leading and going about what he has called us to do. You can just, holy Spirit, simply say Holy Spirit, I need help, give me some instruction. He says if we lack wisdom, ask, ask. It's that simple. I think we complicate this relationship with God because of the religion and the rituals that we have been taught, where God makes it easy for us. He just says come, come to me. Come right. If you're heavy laden, if you're heavy burdened, I'll give you rest. Seek me and you'll find me. Knock the door, be open, ask right and you'll receive. It's that simple. Keep it simple K-I-S and I'll leave the other S out. Just keep it simple. Keep it simple and just build the relationship Just like it's.

Michele Scott:

You and I. We're getting to know each other, right? So the more you share with me about yourself and the more I share about myself, then we get to know more about each other. And it's like that with God. The word is there for us to get into. Don't make it a ritual.

Michele Scott:

Listen, just take one scripture.

Michele Scott:

Don't try to read the whole book.

Michele Scott:

I'm trying to read the Bible in a year because I like to study. I'm so behind. That's the reality of it. I get stuck on one verse or one scripture. So it's okay just to take one scripture and meditate on it, delve on it. What does that mean, lord? Help me to walk that out. It's better to accomplish and perfect one thing than try to have a multitude of things that we're just stumbling and failing at. So that's a practical tip for me. It's just you can journal, you can write, you can listen to music. You can incorporate God into your life in so many different ways. It doesn't have to be the sit still Now, not to put that aside and say that's not important. That is very important because it's like I always use the marriage again, like if my husband is watching television and I'm trying to have a deep conversation with him, then that's distraction, and I'm trying to have a deep conversation with him, then that's distraction. So we do want to give God that other time as well, allotted time to sit with him.

Belinda Gaston:

It may vary day to day what that time is, and that's okay, I think those are very practical tips and I was taking notes as you were talking, because I think that that we don't hear, we don't have these conversations enough. So thank you for sharing that. I think we're going to end, but I would like to know if you have any final thoughts that you'd like to share based on what we've talked about. Any final thoughts, and then we'll add Well, I will allow you to share how people can reach you.

Michele Scott:

Any final thoughts and then I will allow you to share how people can reach you. So any final thoughts was thinking that if we broaden that perspective, that lots of people who don't find themselves in corporate settings where they are thought of as a leader, as an executive, or they're not managerial in position, we can still be leaders in those corporate environments. Because when we look biblically at leaders, these are people who are willing to serve and who have an influence. So you can be non-management but because of your personality or the God within you, you are perceived as a leader. People will follow you. You're influential in the lives of people and you serve well. And so can we broaden our perspective, because people may say, well, this doesn't apply to me at all, because I'm not even a leader. Well, it does. Do you serve others? Are you influential to other people? Then you're a leader and just lead well.

Michele Scott:

And then this relationship with God is just keeping it simple and experience, seek to experience him. Come in expectation that God will speak to you. Come knowing that he desires to be in your life and that it does whatever you've done. Whatever you've done, just repent and get back in relationship with him, even in the work environment, the Holy Spirit will begin to convict us. If he's still a pen. You know we take a pen by accident and we go home with it, or you know we print something off on the printer that's personal and not you know. For the Lord, just repent. It's that quick, truly turning from what we've done so that we can get back in right relationship with him. Don't ever let your relationship falter or you be lost because you feel like you can't be forgiven. God is a God of forgiveness, so stay in that vein, even as leaders, that it doesn't matter how bad we think it is, god says he can forgive.

Belinda Gaston:

It think it is, god says he can forgive it. I think that's a great place for us to end. The term influence keeps coming up, I think, in all of our episodes so far. Whether you have a leadership title or not, we all are leading someone and serving someone and influencing someone, which makes you, by default, a leader. So thank you for sharing that. This conversation has been amazing, Michele, and I appreciate your time. I appreciate you being here. Before we wrap up, I would like for you to take a moment to share with people how they can stay connected with you when anything that you'd like to share that you're working on.

Michele Scott:

I have a coaching business, cultivate Coaching and Consulting, as you mentioned earlier, and I can be reached on the website is cultivatecoachconsultcom. If you'd like to schedule a session with me or a group of sessions, or even a free consultation is available on that website. And I delve into leadership, especially team leadership, as well as life coaching is what my niche is. And then I'm reachable on Facebook. As I said, I'm going through this 12 week experiencing God and knowing and doing the will of God Bible study. I'm teaching it right now. So there's a Cultivate Training Institute community on Facebook that you can join, where you'll see all the past videos I've done, the past teachings and the Zooms that we do weekly for that Bible study, as well, as there's a Facebook page that's Cultivate Training Institute that you can catch me on, and I have a YouTube channel as well. Cultivate Training Institute is the YouTube channel where you can see all the videos that I have uploaded.

Belinda Gaston:

Thank you for sharing Michele, and I'm sure that our listeners will be connecting with you. For those of you who are listening, I will have all of the links for how you can reach Michele, the coaching business, her community and her Facebook information, and we'll also drop the link in for the Experiencing God for those who want to, either to participate in the Bible study. Michele, it has truly been a pleasure. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for your wisdom and for sharing and for our listeners. You don't want to miss connecting with her, so make sure y'all connect Michele. Thank you for being here.

Michele Scott:

Thank you so much for having me.

Belinda Gaston:

And so, for those of you who are listening, thank you again for listening. I invite you to like the podcast on wherever platform you're listening. Don't forget there is a link in the description of every podcast episode where you can actually subscribe. You'll just get a notification of the new podcast episodes. But thank you so much for listening. Please share the podcast and continue to follow us and, until we speak again, remember that you are indeed Graced to lead. Be well, bye-bye.

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Belinda Gaston

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