4/29/26 - 2144: Serving Ministries (Behind the Scenes)

Jim: This is iWork4Him.

Martha: Where faith meets work and believers unleash their calling.

Jim: When you're built to serve, you're built to serve. Any other work position just won't suit you. Some people are perfectly suited by God to assist others in completing their mission from God and their mission becomes the assistant's mission. Look at Joshua. He was the administrative assistant to Moses. Then he took over for Moses. Leah Borg, she supported the founders of Virtual Ministry Assistant for 12 years.

12 years of supporting a vision and a mission that became her own. When the founders decided to retire, Leah was ready to take on the mission of providing the best Virtual Ministry Assistant out there with a team of trained professionals from all over the country. Leah's here today to share her story and tell some amazing stories of faith that have come out of the Virtual Ministry Assistant team, supporting ministries across the globe.

Leah Borg, welcome to iWork4Him.

Leah Borg: Thanks Jim and Martha, it's great to be here. Thanks for inviting me.

Jim: We wanna make sure everybody knows that you are Virtual Ministry Assistant, but your website is ministryassistantservices.com and people, so people will get confused 'cause I really wanna make sure people understand and can find you.

Martha: And we'll have all that in the show notes.

Jim: We will have a lot in show notes. Leah, we always start off every first time guest on our show with this one question, what's your Jesus story?

Leah Borg: I'm glad you asked. It's always nice to share that in this line of work, where we're working with a lot of different ministries. So I grew up in a Christian home. My parents took us to church every week. I think I was there probably the Sunday after I was born because my parents were just very involved in the church and so they took us every week. I heard about Jesus, but it wasn't until I was about five years old that I really heard a revival speaker talk about my personal need for a savior, and I was too scared at that point in my life to go forward during the revival, the altar call, that they had at the at the conference that weekend. But I went home, was able to talk to my parents, and they led me to the Lord and in our house. Our tiny little house in Pensacola, Florida.

Jim: So a lot of times little kid becomes a believer. And it could go two ways. We've interviewed thousands of people. It goes two ways. One, hey, never stepped away from my faith. It just kept growing stronger and stronger. And the other one's yeah, and then I became a teenager and I hightailed away from the church and ran away from Jesus till I was 20 or 30.

What's your story?

Leah Borg: So I would have to say that I just was just little by little growing and growing. I've had moments of doubt, obviously, and rededicated my life several times when I was at camp, that kind of thing. Those times where you're really dedicated in the word. And so I have had moments of doubt, but for the most part, the Lord has been very gracious and has just kept teaching me to trust him and teaching me to be faithful and teaching me. And he's been very faithful to me. So now we're trying to raise our family in the same way and bring them up to know and love him.

Jim: That's awesome.

Martha: That's so good and so encouraging for our listeners to hear and to know that you're now focusing on that next generation in your family.

So how did you first get connected to the founders at the, at your company, which again, we have the link, it'll be ministryassistantservices.com.

Leah Borg: So it's a random connection, actually. About 12 years ago, they were starting Ministry Assistant Services. The passion of Daniel and Haley, the founders, was that they were gonna help pastors, ministry leaders, that were on the edge of burnout. They were seeing that in their own church. They were experiencing that themselves. And so they were trying to figure out, what would the Lord have them to do to help?

And so they started Ministry Assistant Services. And on a whim, my pastor at the time shared on Facebook a link or something to connect with them. And I filled out their little application, sent in my resume. And I didn't even update my resume from college. It was just random stuff. I had done volunteer work and everything, and Haley called me almost immediately and was like, I recognized that you're a military spouse.

I was a military spouse at the time. Her best friend was a military spouse, and she recognized the college that I went to because it was right down the road from her. And so she called me up and I was the first virtual assistant that they ever hired, and the rest they say is history.

Jim: So what was it about their mission that resonated with you enough that it became your mission too?

Leah Borg: The thing that resonated with me was the ability to help small churches, because I've always been in a small church. We're talking like 200 or less. Growing up I was in a 200, about 200 person church. And then my church that my husband and I actually helped to start here in Texas was only about 50 people. Now we're at a church of about 150, so I just live in that world. And I wanted to be able to bless the pastors and the ministry leaders that sometimes they don't even have an office because they're not big enough, the church is not big enough right now.

Our church meets in a recreation center, so the pastor has no office right now. His office is at home. And so just being able to bless churches like that just really resonated with me.

Martha: That's so good. And there are, I don't know if you know the number of churches that are that small, but that is actually the norm across the country. We have so many small towns and so many people that that really resonates with that. It's a great niche.

Jim: So the 330,000 churches in the united States.

Martha: Okay. I wonder how many are 200 or less?

Jim: I would guess 90% of 'em.

Martha: A good majority. A lot of them we always think like there's all these big churches, but there's so many that really fit that. So let's talk about what it was like to manage being a virtual assistant, virtual Ministry Assistant and being a mom and a wife and the volunteer work, whatever. How did you keep all that in check? 'Cause I believe that you are also a coordinator for American Heritage Girls too, right?

Leah Borg: Yes, ma'am. I just started a new position with American Heritage Girls. That's all volunteer work, right? Some days I manage it better than others, I'll be honest with you.

Martha: Oh good. You're normal. (laughter)

Leah Borg: Yes, we're very normal. I like to do a lot of time blocking where I work on this particular project or this ministry or whatever for an hour and then I move on to another one.

And then I do that during the day. The way we homeschool ,'cause I have four children and so we homeschool around the dining room table. They all have their, whatever it is they're working on at the moment. They have their videos that they're working because we do a video school, and so they're all working on that.

I'm sitting at my computer normally, typing out an email of some kind. And so I can stop and help them and then go back to whatever I'm working on. So sometimes my time blocks are five minutes of this and 60 minutes of helping my children, but somehow it all gets done. And I just, I time block.

But I also have a very good support system. And my husband, he definitely needs a shout out because he's actually watching the kids right now for this.

Jim: That's awesome. Then give him a shout out.

Leah Borg: Yes. So my husband, Ryan, he is definitely, he's a great support and he is, every time I come to him with some new project that makes my eyes twinkle, he's okay, let's see how we can make this happen.

 (laughter)

Jim: A project that makes your eyes twinkle. I love that. Alright and just a quick plug in. American Heritage Girls, we haven't talked about them in a long time on this show. That's an alternative to the Girl Scouts. A Jesus centered alternative to the Girl Scouts. Talk about it. How could people get involved?

Leah Borg: So you just go to americanheritagegirls.org and look for a troop near you. I'm actually an area coordinator, and so now I have a bunch of troops that are under me that I support. And that's a new position for me actually, as of the end of last year. But it's a great opportunity and like I said, we have four, four girls and they're all gonna be in it actually next year. We're gonna have all four of them in it, and we enjoy it because it is a Christ-centered option that, that we have.

But it's not just alternative to scouting, it's also building women of character and integrity. And it's such a refreshment from my heart to be surrounded by other moms who have the same goal in mind of raising godly girls and sending them out into the world to make a difference, because we truly believe that we were made for such a time as this.

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Leah, you got a master's degree in Teaching and Learning. How did that prepare you for taking over a business? Did you ever imagine yourself a business owner? For 12 years you were a Virtual Ministry Assistant.

Leah Borg: I did not. I didn't see the master's degree coming or the buying our own business coming either. So that was definitely a God thing. A couple years ago, I realized I didn't have a whole lot of education experience. My undergrad is not in education. I took maybe one education class in college. And I was not thinking towards homeschooling my own children. And so my husband and I decided I would go get my master's degree in teaching and learning.

I just finished that up in October of last year. I'm gonna walk in May, so I'm very excited. My little sister who's 12 years younger than me, is also walking with her master's degree too at the same university. That's gonna be exciting for us to be together. But I don't, there was a lot of leadership classes in the teaching and learning grad degree, and I think those prepared me. I was actually surprised that there was leadership classes.

But the grad degree is actually preparing most people for being a principal or a vice principal at a school. And so it makes sense that there would be leadership opportunities for them to learn. But they helped me to, be a better leader because I didn't know. I didn't know when I started the master's degree that the business was coming. So the Lord knew and he was preparing me.

Jim: Technically you're the guidance counselor, vice principal and school superintendent, right?

Leah Borg: That's right. (laughter)

Jim: So for a small private school. Okay. That, so that's good you had all that training.

Martha: That's awesome. I just am curious, like what is the specialty at Ministry Assistant Services?

Leah Borg: I would say the specialty is whatever the pastors and ministry leaders need us to be a specialty in.

Martha: Okay.

Leah Borg: Every time we get a new client, I say we add to our tool belt because that client comes in and they have this new process. They have this new platform. They have this new software, whatever it is that they want us to learn. And so we're just adding to our tool belt. We're just adding all of these tools that we can then present to the next client and say, Hey, yes, we do have, experience in X platform, whatever it is that they need.

And so it just adds to our ability. So I would not say there's any kind of specialty except just serving the clients where they are, doing what they need us to do so that they can have some time freed up for whatever it is that they need to do. If the pastor needs more time for sermon prep or if he just needs to hang out with his family on a Friday night and we can give him back that, that ability to have that time with his family, then that's our specialty.

Jim: So you could say your specialty is adaptability.

Leah Borg: Sure. Flexibility. Flexibility. There you go.

Jim: But have you ever run across a client though that's using a piece of software and you're like, yeah, just so you know, this software's fine. But we've been helping these other ministries use do their thing with this software and it's gonna make save you a ton of money with an investment in this software. Have you ever been able to help them make good decisions about software choices?

Leah Borg: Oh, absolutely. We have been able to advise them and typically we don't like to come in and like first day on the job, say, oh, here pastor, here's something better for you. But if we come in and say, Hey pastor, this is not really working for what you want it to work for, what about this?

And we can advise them once we've gained that trust from them and they, feel like, oh we're a partner with their ministry and trying to help them and support them, not do whatever we wanna do. Like we don't wanna come in with that mentality of we're gonna do whatever we wanna do, right? We wanna serve the pastor in the best possible way.

Martha: Okay, so let's talk about, I'm just gonna divert a little bit 'cause I'm the person that likes to get a picture what it actually looks like. So what does it typically, and I understand there's every variation of this for every church, but what's it typically look like for someone to be a virtual assistant for a pastor?

Like just helping our listeners to wrap their head around that, because maybe right now they're thinking about their pastor and how they're struggling with getting things done in their small church. What can it look like because you just said something about, helping them on a Friday night so that they can, or whatever it is that they're needing. Give us some examples.

Leah Borg: So we can help the pastor get stuff done so he's prepared for a Sunday. That probably is what every virtual assistant is looking towards is the next Sunday. Or maybe the next big task for a client, because we don't just have pastors, we also have ministry clients, we also have missionaries.

So they all need different things and, a typical client, like you said, there's probably not a typical client that I could give you. Just examples of how we can bless the pastor and typically they come to me and they say, Hey, I'm looking for this. And I tell them, yes, we can help you with that.

And a lot of them will ask things like what about personal? Could you schedule personal travel for me? And we can do that, as long as they give us permission to do that, we can help them with that kind of thing. And it's just, the pastor has a meeting with our project managers and says, this is what I need.

And sometimes the pastor comes and says, Hey, we have this process and we have this platform and we know what we wanna do. And sometimes he comes in and says I have no idea, but this is my end goal. Can you help me? And we can sit there and go, okay, this platform could help you with this. This database can help you guys get organized as a church. This database will do your payroll or this database will do your tithe or whatever it is, and then we can help the pastor figure out.

I've told clients before, if you just send me an email and say, Hey, I have no idea how to get this started, we probably can help you because we have so many people that have done this for such a long time that there could be advice to be given to the pastor as well as just the actual doing of the work.

Jim: This is so good. I mean that's part of our story too, which we will get to in a little bit. But it's having somebody that could just help you, 'cause when you are running a ministry and they're doing all the things that we're doing, you just can't get it all done.

You're the owner now, just in January, you became the owner of ministryassistantservices.com. What's gonna change and what's gonna remain the same?

Leah Borg: So the reason why we bought it is because the former owners, really good friends of ours, they just didn't want it to change. They wanted it to have the same passion, the same ministry focus, and so they didn't want a whole lot to change.

So there's little things that have changed to streamline some processes, but they had it set up already really well because they had been doing it, like I said, for about 12 years. So they already had it really well set up and we were able to just come in and say, okay, this needs a little bit of tweaking. This needs a little bit of refinement.

Some of the things that I have to do now, like client meetings, I've written out my own process for that. I've written out my own template for the emails that I'm gonna send out, that kind of thing. And so just streamlining some of those things to make it more efficient. But we try to serve with excellence. We try to serve with efficiency. And that was their goal before we bought it. And so we're just maintaining that now. And the same part is there to serve the pastors, to help them not only administratively, but financially too.

Martha: Okay, just popped in my head. So do you have your own virtual assistant? For you?

Leah Borg: Do I? No. (laughing)

Jim: She's got four. She's got four that live with her.

Leah Borg: That's true. They're helpers.

Jim: That should be their tuition. Helping mom with the business. Come on. I get it.

Leah Borg: They're good little helpers. Whenever I have to have meetings or whatever, they'll be like, okay, mom, what can we get done while you're in your meeting? How long is this meeting gonna be? So they are little helpers. They're good little helpers.

Martha: And I think that's a great example on the on the staffing side of your business, in the sense of people that are listening that say, Hey, I am interested in doing the assisting part. You're a prime example of the fact that, you're homeschooling, you're raising your kids, you're running your, you are running the actual business of all of it but have been a virtual assistant for a long time first. So you've experienced that.

And I think that our listeners, if there's anybody that - I'm guessing you're always looking for more assistants as your clientele grows as well- but there may be somebody that this is intriguing to, and it's not that you have to be locked in a room all day with no life going on around you. I love hearing the flexibility of it, and yet the ability to focus and do all the things that need to get done for the pastor. So that's really great.

Okay. I know this feeling that we all get where we just can't get it all done and my workload never goes away. I always feel like I'm behind the eight ball and I'm only one person and I believe we all have some entitlement to some life outside of our work. So for 13 years, Jim and I have run iWork4Him together.

And we learned really early on, by mistake, that we couldn't do it by ourselves. And we started using a virtual assistant way before COVID hit, and that's why we wanted everyone of our listeners to hear and get to know Leah Borg and Ministry Assistant Services.com. We know that many of the ministry friends out there that are listening need to hear this message and need to know that you guys exist.

So contact Leah and find out how her team can help you. Ministry Assistant Services.com.

Jim: Leah, a lot of our friends listening, as we just mentioned, they're like, ah, they need a ministry assistant, but they think, number one, we could never afford this. And number two, they don't understand how you can hold somebody accountable when they're not in the office right next door. How does this all work?

Leah Borg: So like I mentioned earlier, we try to serve them not only administratively but also financially. So we try to keep our cost as low as we can for the client. And our ministry assistants understand that, and they are happy to jump on board with that mission as well. So we try to keep our costs as low as we can, 'cause like I said, we serve a lot of smaller churches that they don't have huge budgets for administration, especially outside of the church. And so we try to keep that cost down, but the accountability comes when they're able to talk to me if there's anything that they're not getting done from their virtual assistant, if there's anything that's they're not happy with, then they can talk to me.

I know that is one of the things that we have to work on because we are not in the office next to the pastor. So there's a lot of communicating that has to go on from the pastor or the ministry client to us and us to them. Because I always use the example if the pastor gets up on Sunday morning and he gives an announcement and he changes it in the middle of the announcement, we're not sitting in the congregation to write that down and go, oh, pastor changed this announcement. " We are, we're not meeting in the fellowship hall, we're meeting in the gym now." We're not there to make that change. So he has to communicate back to us that, that he made a change.

And so that we can communicate out to the congregation appropriately and not give them that information. So a lot of communication, a lot of phone calls, a lot of email. That's how we stay accountable to our clients.

Martha: That's so good. Okay, so we already talked about it a little bit, putting in a plug for anybody listening, are you actually looking to hire more assistants and what does that process look like?

Leah Borg: So we generally are always looking for good talent, and even if we're not hiring at that current moment, I always keep all of the resumes and stuff that I get in my email because then the next time that we are hiring, I just start working through that list. Hey, are you still looking for a job?

And then after that, after we contact them and say, are you still looking? Then they fill out an application form because I want to see how you respond to questions. How eloquent are you, how communicative are you? Through those, through all those questions that I asked. And then after that we do reference checks to check with some ministry references, somebody that's worked with them in ministry, someone that knows them personally.

So we check with them and then they have an interview call with me because I want to hear them over the phone because our clients are going to hear them on the phone. So there's, I just I get them to communicate with me a couple of different ways before we hire them so I can see how they do written, written out, how they communicate that way. But then also over the phone, how do they communicate? Are they just sitting there and it's dead silence, while I'm supposed to be interviewing them? Do they give me good answers? Is there a lot of interaction?

Because our clients are gonna need that. And then after that, we make a decision on whether or not to hire them. And most of the time we have lots of good talent that comes our way. And most of the time if they get through all three of those steps, the form the questionnaire, and then the reference check, and then the interview call, most of the time, we either hire them right away or we say, Hey, we don't currently have any work for you, but can I keep you on the back burner for next time that something comes down the pipeline?

Jim: I think you should add a fourth step to that one.

Leah Borg: Okay.

Jim: You take that other, I think you should do the - here's the fourth step. You should do the zoom call to see if they've perfected the, I got my hair done and I've got a clean top on, but I still have my jammies on, my slippers, to see if they've perfected the use of video presenting, a positive image, but still being at home and their jammies and slippers.

 (chuckling)

Leah Borg: That's not a bad idea, jim. That's a very good idea.

Jim: There are some, when you look at what happened at first during COVID and then the people who were chronologically superior to us really struggled with, how do I dress for this?

Leah Borg: So I'll tell you, there have been meetings that have been business from the waist up, 'cause I knew that's all they were gonna see. So I won't lie. I've been there.

Jim: Absolutely. So you've worked almost 12 years as a Virtual Ministry Assistant with Ministry Assistant Services.com. I imagine you saw God work in miraculous ways through that position because you're not only working for this person, these people that you're supporting, but you're praying for 'em, you're interacting with 'em. Tell us one time, what's one miracle that really sticks out to you?

Leah Borg: It's a personal miracle. I've had two babies since I started working here. And so just the way the Lord worked out my workload because after my fourth baby I didn't know what I didn't know, and I still had a lot of clients.

But during my maternity leave, 'cause I took, I think I like a month and a half off for maternity leave. And during that time, the Lord took away two of my clients. That might seem like a really bad thing, but at the time, the Lord knew that I couldn't handle having those two clients because they were my two big clients, and they were so apologetic.

We're so sorry, but we found somebody in our church that wants to serve and volunteer. And I was like no, i'm happy for you. I'm very happy for you. I'm glad that someone there is able to use their talents and serve your church. But I did lose a client, but the Lord knew that I couldn't handle that after having more children and homeschooling.

So he, there's been seasons of ebb and flow where he's given clients and he's taken them away and that's just a personal miracle for me. But he's done lots of other miracles too, and, providing for our virtual assistants and giving them what they need in their seasons of life as well.

Martha: That's so good. So I can imagine as an assistant, let alone a virtual assistant, that sometimes it can be a pretty thankless job, but I believe that's not been your experience. Is that right?

Leah Borg: No, I have had so many good opportunities for people to give me a thank you. One of them was that same client that I lost during my maternity leave. They sent me so many baby gifts. They were just, we're so sorry. We're so sorry. Here's a box of diapers, here's a box of wipes. Here's some clothes. They were so sweet, and i've had clients do that for every time I've had a baby. They've sent flowers and things like that.

There's even that personal touch, even though you're, it's a business relationship, there's that personal touch. So there even I can even give you an example. A couple weeks ago there was bad weather, really bad, cold, icy weather here in Texas. And one of our virtual assistants was able to help one of their clients over that weekend.

It was a Sunday morning and they needed to pivot whatever it was they were doing. And the client emailed me that morning, thank you so much. They were so helpful. And they did it on a Sunday morning when they were trying to get to church themselves because they lived in an area that didn't have the bad weather, and so they were still going to church at their regular service time. And so they were just so thankful.

So our clients do reach out and say thank you. We get pretty regularly emails from clients. Thank you so much for this one specific thing that they'll tell me about a virtual assistant that they work with, and I'm always happy to pass that on to whichever virtual assistant it is.

Martha: Yeah. Oh, that's so good. So any final words of encouragement to virtual assistants everywhere that might be living out their faith and serving in some sort of an adopted mission that they're on? What's your encouragement?

Leah Borg: I would just say keep doing what you're doing because the Lord sees it. It might not be seen by man, but the Lord sees it and he will bless it. And like I said, with my miracle, the ebb and flow of how the Lord has planned out different things, he's doing that in everyone's life, even the behind the scenes stuff that, some of this, like you said, some of it is behind the scenes, some of it is thankless.

Some people don't see it and they don't appreciate it. Or you only get the emails when you know something goes wrong. But just keep being faithful. Keep serving with excellence and the Lord knows and he will reward.

Martha: That's so good.

Jim: That's awesome. Leah Borg, thank you so much for being on iWork4Him today. Leah Borg with Ministry Assistance services.com. Check her out. If you are needing some assistance, she can help you out. Leah, thank you.

Leah Borg: Thank you so much for having me, Jim and Martha. It was great to meet you guys in person.

Jim: Yeah, you bet. You've been listening to iWork4Him with your hosts, Jim and Martha Brangenberg. We're Christ followers in our workplace. It's our mission field, but ultimately iWork4Him.