One word to describe Rachael Groll, SEU class of 2018, is multi-passionate. She has served in the local church for over a decade as a children’s pastor, has worked for a global missions organization for the last four years, and is also an author and creator of a popular Christian podcast.
Rachael lives in Pennsylvania with her husband Tim (a fellow SEU ministerial leadership graduate, who runs a community health center), and her three daughters.
The Beginning of a Ministry
Rachael decided to follow Jesus when she was at youth group as a young teenager. Ever since then, Rachael felt a call to ministry. At the age of 19, she opened a private Christian daycare center. After 15 years of operating the daycare, she felt led to close its doors, and the day after, she was offered a position as the children’s pastor at Living Waters Church in Meadville, Pennsylvania. This position came with many opportunities for her. She became a licensed minister and led the church’s outreach ministries. In 2017, Rachael also published her first book, Go: Beginning a Kids’ Outreach Ministry, which details the story of the sidewalk children’s ministry and curriculum that she developed (called Living Waters).
To further hone her skills in children’s ministry, Rachael decided to go back to school to pursue a bachelor’s degree at SEU in ministerial leadership. SEU’s online program enabled her to continue working full-time as a children’s pastor and also devote time to her family. For Rachael, pursuing a bachelor’s degree not only confirmed the calling she already knew she had, but helped others recognize her calling as a female in ministry. “In general,” she said, “women in ministry have to try a little harder, speak a little louder, and be very intentional about raising our voices.”
After finishing her degree at SEU in 2018, Groll went on to pursue her master’s degree at Biola University in Bible exposition and theology, which she completed in the spring of 2023. During her years in higher education, Rachael’s ministry took new forms. The year 2020 brought significant changes to her life and ministry. She made the transition from her full-time children’s pastor role to a full-time missions role. In this full-time missions role, she worked remotely as the director of spiritual care for the missions organization Children of the Nations, where she resources, trains, and equips children’s pastors for ministry in five countries.
Additionally, due to the policies placed on social gatherings during the pandemic in the state of Pennsylvania, she and her husband helped start a small group on the lawn of their front yard. Eventually, this small group became a church and is now led by several of their friends.
Author and Podcaster
In 2020, Rachael was getting ready to publish her second book titled She Hears: Learning to Listen to Jesus. It is a six-week Bible study for women that examines the life of Jesus and the relationships he had with six different women in the gospels. Because she released her book during the pandemic, Rachael struggled to find ways to promote her book traditionally. Normal marketing routes, such as book tours, women’s conferences, and speaking to churches, were not available to aid her in publicizing her book. She felt led to start a podcast. Rachael bought recording equipment, but let the idea sit for about six months. During this time, she felt convicted. “I realized that delayed obedience is still disobedience.”
In 2021, Rachael launched her podcast, also titled She Hears. Initially, she covered topics like those in her book, as well as spiritual disciplines, church hurt, and answering questions she received online and in-person from friends. The podcast gained about 1,000 downloads within the first year.
After the show’s first year, Rachael began to reevaluate her approach. “The Lord told me, ‘You need to treat this podcast like you would the church,’” she said. Instead of using the show to spread the word about her own book and message, she realized she needed to use it to spread God’s word and message. To more directly communicate the goal of the show, Rachael changed the name to Hearing Jesus. Once she renamed the podcast, she was initially going to just re-upload content from She Hears under the new name. However, once the show started to grow, she felt led in another direction. Her show walks listeners through the Bible one chapter at a time, explaining the history, culture, background, and relevance of each passage. Her goal is to inspire the reading of God’s word. She now uploads new episodes daily Monday through Friday.
In the first year after Rachael renamed her podcast, it received 1 million downloads, and six months after that, it reached 3 million. The show has been in the top 20 charts for Christian podcasts, the top 50 for religion and spirituality podcasts, and even the top 3 globally in all podcasts. She has featured a wide variety of guests on her show, including Max Lucado and Kyle Idleman.
Resources for Women and Children
In September of 2023, Rachael launched a new podcast titled Hearing Jesus for Kids. Due to the comments from mothers in her audience wanting accessible information about the Bible for their children, she decided to create this new show. Due to Rachael’s background as a children’s pastor, this was an easy thing to do. She used the same daily Bible studies from Hearing Jesus and developed them to suit kids ages six to twelve.
Rachael also created a Facebook group for the women who listen to her show. Through this Facebook group, they are able to interact in a smaller, more intimate setting to ask questions, message her directly, request prayer, and speak with other women who enjoy the show. “God has created a community of women that are supporting each other and helping each other grow in their gifts and individual ministries,” Rachael said.
Multi-Passionate for the Kingdom
Though she has many areas of passion, Rachael continues to work remotely for Children of the Nations and focuses most of her time on podcasting, because it is the area in which God has blessed her the most. “I originally thought I was an author that had a podcast. Now I think I am a podcaster that has a book,” she said. In the future, Rachael hopes to travel more with her family through missions, exposing her daughters to different cultures and people so that they, too, will have a heart for the nations. She also plans to continue to write and provide resources for women so they can learn to hear God’s voice.
Learn More
Children of the Nations
Ministry Degrees at SEU
She Hears
Hearing Jesus Podcast
SEU Alumni
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