A Place at the Table

The Asher Family Foundation had been established in 2016, but life events had caused it to take a back seat for several years. As the Friday breakfast began to take shape, I spoke with my wife, Rene, about reviving the Foundation and using its resources to provide breakfast and study materials. I believed the Lord was calling me to become a more faithful steward of my time, talents, and resources. Rene was in complete agreement.

My goal was simple: I wanted to create an environment where everyone was welcome. I did not want anyone to feel obligated to buy breakfast or purchase a book. I simply wanted him to show up and know there was a place for him at the table.

I asked the men if they wanted to begin a Bible study in January 2025. They all agreed, and our list of people to invite began to grow. I also knew I was not the only man whose work could interfere with regular attendance. I did not want someone to miss a week and feel as though he had fallen too far behind to return.

We chose The Titus Ten, a book designed as a ten-week study. I presented it as a ten-month study. That may have been one of the best decisions I made.

Slowing the pace allowed the study to serve the fellowship rather than control it. Scripture was never secondary in importance, but completing a lesson was secondary to caring for the men sitting around the table. If a conversation needed more time, we gave it more time. The study would still be there the following week. The opportunity to enter one another’s lives might not be.

The Fellowship Remains

A typical Friday morning is difficult to describe because we never know exactly who will be there. There have been mornings with only two of us and mornings with as many as fifteen. We probably average around six.

On a few occasions, every face around the table has changed from the previous week. One man may return after months of working nights. Another may come back after navigating a major life transition. Someone else has returned from vacation, recovered from illness, or finally been able to break away from work. Meanwhile, some of the men present the week before may be absent for those very same reasons.

That is part of the beauty of it. No one has to apologize for being away, and no one has to worry that his absence cost him his place. The faces around the table may change from one Friday to the next, but the fellowship remains.

If this were simply a study, some of the men would have little reason to return after being gone for weeks or months. They return for the same reason I do: we have grown to love one another. We share one another’s joys, carry one another’s burdens, and have become part of one another’s lives.

Our backgrounds are varied. Several of the men are pastors, one is a chaplain, and others attend different churches. Some do not attend church or have had very little close exposure to Christianity.

Someone once asked us, “What church do you all belong to?”

I answered, “We don’t.”

One of the men immediately replied, “Yes, we do.”

We laughed because those of us around the table understood what he meant. Iron Sharpening Iron is not a replacement for the local church, but something recognizably Christian has formed among us: fellowship, prayer, truth, love, encouragement, and the bearing of one another’s burdens. In that sense, the church is present around the table.

The diversity of the group also means that no one can assume everyone shares the same vocabulary or background. One morning, a man said, “I have heard you guys talking about a testimony. What is a testimony?”

We spent the rest of the morning answering his question and sharing our testimonies. No one rushed him, and no one treated the question as too basic. The planned lesson could wait. That conversation was the lesson we needed that morning.

Rejoicing and Weeping Together

Romans 12:15 tells us to “rejoice with those who rejoice” and “weep with those who weep.” Over nearly two years, we have had reason to do both.

The men walked with me as I continued facing the consequences of my heart attacks. In May 2025, I was diagnosed with heart failure—news I found extremely difficult to accept. A heart-failure specialist offered some hope that the earlier testing might have been inconclusive, but a cardiac MRI that October supported the diagnosis. The group became one of the places where I did not have to carry that reality alone.

We have also walked with a brother whose wife was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. We prayed with him, encouraged him, and tried to strengthen him through her illness. When she died, we shared both his confidence that she was with Christ and the deep sorrow of her absence. Christian hope did not eliminate the need to mourn.

Her funeral was one of the most beautiful celebrations of life I have witnessed. Her husband spoke eloquently about their life together, their love for the Lord, and her tireless witness. He has said that our group helped him. The truth is that he has helped all of us.

And through hardship, illness, work, loss, and every serious conversation, there has always been laughter—often more than we could ever recount. We have learned to make room for the whole of life.

A Name Already on the Table

A few months after beginning the study, I noticed the handmade leather Bible cover one of the men brought each week. It was thick-cut leather—definitely a man’s Bible—and displayed prominently on its cover were the words from Proverbs 27:17: “Iron sharpens iron.”

After seeing it week after week, I realized the verse already described what was happening among us. The name was not created through a branding exercise. It had been sitting on the table in front of us.

We became Iron Sharpening Iron.

From Conversation to Covenant Ministries

Initially, our studies consisted of reading the assigned chapter and highlighting portions of the book for emphasis. But our discussions regularly led to deeper questions, convictions, and related topics the book did not fully address. At first, I answered those questions as best I could in real time. There is nothing wrong with that, but over time I felt an obligation to do better for these men.

I began anticipating questions that might take us beyond the book. When a subject deserved more attention, I asked the group if we could pause the scheduled material and devote the following week—or sometimes several weeks—to it.

One of the first deeper explorations concerned David as a man after God’s own heart. The book seemed to leave us with more questions than answers, and I was not ready to move on. The men welcomed the opportunity to go deeper.

My prepared notes gradually matured into Leader Guides. Then I began asking whether I could provide the men with a companion Study Guide as well. What started as highlighted passages in a book became a pattern: listen carefully, recognize when a question deserves more than a quick answer, prepare faithfully, and create something others can use.

During this same period, a close friend who pastors a Lutheran church periodically joined me for coffee at home and occasionally attended Iron Sharpening Iron. We discussed theological concepts I was beginning to understand but did not yet have the vocabulary to express. He reminded me that I did not need to solve every question alone or reinvent Christian doctrine; the church has nearly two thousand years of history from which to learn.

That counsel started me down a deeply rewarding path through the apostolic fathers, the Reformers, and the historic confessions. I discovered language for convictions best described as Reformed theology, along with a growing appreciation for Covenant theology.

I had preached in various churches over the years and continued to feel called toward pulpit supply and broader teaching ministry. Eventually, I established Covenant Ministries as the ministry arm of the Asher Family Foundation. Iron Sharpening Iron became its first ministry program.

My background in software engineering taught me to think in systems. I began developing a framework through which studies could be prepared, reviewed, managed, and presented on our website. The work has grown into far more than I initially envisioned, requiring us to define its scope carefully and move forward with purpose.

But the system did not create the ministry. The men did not merely receive material produced somewhere else. Their questions, experiences, encouragement, participation, and willingness to explore Scripture more deeply helped shape every part of it.

We Did It

I want these men to know that God used their faithfulness to bring Covenant Ministries into being. It does not matter how many Fridays any one of them attended. The fact that they participated—and trusted us with a part of their lives—shaped me and formed this ministry.

When I look at the foundation of Covenant Ministries, I see the men gathered around the table at the café. I see each one of them.

This was not something we set out to build. But together, we built it.

WE did it.

And now the work is beginning to move beyond the café. Recently, I spoke with one of the men about using these resources at home. He and his wife can each read through a study. He can request the companion Leader Guide and then lead a conversation with his wife and two sons. The fellowship and teaching that helped shape him can now help him serve his family.

That is real discipleship for real life.

Faithful Stewardship

As I look forward, I see an emerging theme of faithful stewardship—the realization that our time, talents, treasure, relationships, experience, and every other resource entrusted to us can be used in service to the Lord.

That is the example I pray God allows me to set. It is the legacy I hope to leave and the journey I hope others will embrace with us—not merely as recipients of ministry, but as faithful stewards who help carry it forward.