Unconditional Care For Women In Johnson City

A warm smile at the door. A clear answer when everything feels blurry. That’s the heartbeat of our conversation with Kacey Buchanan as we spotlight Agape Women’s Services in Johnson City—an oasis of free, judgment-free care for women and families navigating unplanned pregnancy, STI concerns, and the complex emotions that follow.

We walk through what happens when someone steps into Agape: confidential pregnancy tests, ultrasound confirmation, and practical next steps delivered with empathy and evidence-based education. From Birth Academy classes to a stocked boutique with diapers, formula, and clothing, Agape pairs knowledge with real-world resources. Dads get a seat at the table through the Dads Matter program, building skills and confidence to support mom and baby through that critical first year.

The heart of the episode explores healing after abortion. Kacey shares how Abortion Recovery Care and the Forgiven and Set Free study give women language for grief, guilt, anxiety, and isolation—emotions many carry alone for years. We discuss the power of naming losses, processing memories, and breaking secrecy in a safe, mentoring environment. As women move through the stages of grief and embrace forgiveness, chains of shame fall away, relationships strengthen, and hope returns.

We also talk impact—hundreds of tests and ultrasounds, strong class attendance, and ongoing outreach to ETSU and local churches. If you need confidential support or want to help, Agape is easy to reach on West Walnut Street and online. Join us to learn how unconditional love, honest information, and steady community can turn crisis into clarity.

If this conversation moved you, subscribe, share this episode with a friend who needs it, and leave a review to help others find these resources. Your support helps more families discover practical care and lasting hope.

To help you to navigate the home buying and mortgage process, Jonathan & Steve are currently licensed in Tennessee, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, and Virginia, contact us today at 423-491-5405 or visit www.jonathanandsteve.com.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome To Benchmark Happenings
• 0:45 Introducing Agape Women’s Services
• 2:00 What Agape Provides For Clients
• 4:00 Judgment-Free Care And Education
• 6:00 Classes, Resources, And Dad Support
• 8:10 Abortion Recovery Care And Healing
• 12:00 Naming The Pain And Grief
• 16:00 Emotional And Relational Aftereffects
• 20:00 A Path To Forgiveness And Freedom
• 24:00 Statistics, Impact, And Community Outreach
• 24:42 Sponsor Credits And Closing

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:02

This is Benchmark Homeland. Brought to you by Jonathan and Steve from Benchmark Homeland. Northeast Tennessee. Johnson City, Kingsport, Bristol, the Trump City, one of the most beautiful places in the country to live. Tons of great things to do and awesome local businesses. And on this show, you'll find out why people are dying to move to Northeast Tennessee. And on the way, we'll have discussions about mortgages. And we'll interview people in the real estate industry. It's what we do. This is Benchmark Happenings, brought to you by Benchmark Home Loans. And now your host, Christine Reed.

SPEAKER_02: 0:45

Welcome back, everybody, to another episode of Benchmark Happenings. And the star of our show today is Miss Casey Buchanan. Woo-hoo! Woohoo! My beautiful friend. Casey, thank you for being here today.

SPEAKER_01: 1:01

Oh, thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be here.

SPEAKER_02: 1:04

Absolutely. And we share a common bond and a love for a ministry here for women in the Tri-Cities. And it's we're going to talk about Agape Women's Services today.

SPEAKER_01: 1:18

Great place.

SPEAKER_02: 1:19

Absolutely. And so for those of you that have not heard about agape, it is here downtown Johnson City. It's on Walnut Street. Recently moved to a beautiful space and to welcome all women that are just interested to learn more about maybe an unwanted pregnancy or to get a STI test or a pregnancy test, an ultrasound. But we're more than just that. So agape is unconditional love, sharing the love of Christ. And so Casey, share with us a little bit about agape and um what is offered.

SPEAKER_01: 2:12

So agape is a beautiful facility, as you said, where a woman can come in for support. She may have an unplanned pregnancy that she is has nowhere to turn to. So we offer pregnancy tests. Um might find herself in the position where she needs uh STI testing, sexually transmitted infections, and don't know where to go, we're there. Um and then to confirm a pregnancy, we offer ultrasounds. So um I think for me, the beauty of agape is just a caring place where uh where you have people to offer not only education, but resources and an ear to help. So um you and I work in the education part uh as volunteers with agape. So um just being fairly new to um agape the last couple of years, continually learning what a resource and what a treasure they are to women in this area. So um just a huge resource.

SPEAKER_02: 3:26

It is, and and you know, everything is free that is offered um by agape, and it's um staffed with um volunteers who um love uh to serve and they love to serve women and um a lot of these uh volunteers we go through a lot of training throughout the year to be able to serve um women. And one thing we want to make sure is when anyone walks in the door at Agape, we want you to feel loved and we want you to feel wanted.

SPEAKER_01: 4:06

Absolutely, unconditional love, unconditional love. How many places do you get to go and feel that? Especially in a very um in an unplanned part of life. Yes, you know, just the unconditional love being the hands and feet of Jesus.

SPEAKER_02: 4:24

That's right. And and you know, and when when someone walks in the door of a agape, we really don't know um at the time what their need is. There may be a lot of other things that they need, but it when you're walking in and as a if you're a single female and you think you might be pregnant and you're all alone, that is a scary place to be in. Absolutely, and so we want to wrap our arms around that individual to let her know that it's gonna be okay, and we're gonna give you the education that you need to make the best decision possible.

SPEAKER_01: 5:14

Yes, absolutely. And just kind of going over some of their key messages, Agatha strives to offer the community judgment-free support, medical services, resources, mentoring, and evidence-based education to empower individuals to make healthy ch choices for emotional, physical, and spiritual well-being. I mean, what more could you ask for?

SPEAKER_02: 5:40

That's right. I mean, it it's it's a holistic approach. And when women walk in our doors, they're gonna get truth.

SPEAKER_01: 5:50

Absolutely. Truth and and I'm sorry. I'm getting closer to the mic. Truth and support. And there's just that's it's priceless.

SPEAKER_02: 5:59

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And so some of the things that when someone walks in the door, uh, they're met, they're greeted with um a warm, friendly face, uh smile, and um they're welcome anytime to come when our doors are open. What are some other things that agape does, Casey?

SPEAKER_01: 6:22

Well, they don't just help women, you know, I'm here, I'm pregnant, I don't know what to do. They will walk in helping you, okay, this is a pregnancy. I want to see this pregnancy through. They will walk through the pregnancy with that client and through that first year by offering pregnancy classes. They have a beautiful um the children's corner, I think is what it's called. I'm sorry, it's escaping me right now, but it's a women who come and attend the classes, they can go and shop, and this beautiful store has clothing, diapers, formula. Um so just not only providing emotional needs, educational needs, but the physical needs and the support that they that they need. Um, we also have dad's classes. So they have programs where birth academy, where their mom and dad can come. Um hope class uh gives the client an opportunity to meet with mentors um once a week during the pregnancy. Um birth academy, they learn about labor delivery, medical pain management, c sections, birth preferences. I mean, wow. I didn't come to agape, but I would have liked to have known a lot of those things. Um there's a dad's group, dads matter at agape. So um there's a place for for men too, and then um you and I work with ARC, which is the abortion recovery care, and our um we want to be an ear for women who have chosen abortion in their life and have that in their story and a place to come and maybe they've never told one anyone, and that's very common that we've found is sometimes a woman will never share that. So it we are there to just listen and then we offer a a class that is a in-depth study to the forgiveness of God, his character. And it's called forgiven and set free.

SPEAKER_02: 8:41

And it truly is set free. I mean, just to see, because um uh people in community and even in churches do not talk about abortion. And we know that um statistically it's it's one in four women have had an abortion. And and I would argue that those statistics are incorrect. Um, I think it's a lot more. Um since Roe v. Wade was passed uh back in 1970, it was in 1972 or 73, 63 million babies have been aborted in the United States alone. Um back when um that was reversed and it went from the federal government down to the states, um, we're seeing some changes at the state level, um, which we we're we're happy about that, we applaud that. But I think as believers, that is something that we need to um defend the helpless and those who can't speak up for themselves.

SPEAKER_01: 9:52

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02: 9:53

Because women are being told a lie, that it is a glob of tissue, it's not a baby, but we know at the moment of conception through science, science proves God. True science proves God, and we know at the moment of conception that that is a human being made in the image of God, our creator, and that baby was designed for a purpose here on this earth.

SPEAKER_01: 10:22

Absolutely, absolutely, and you see women come in and a variety of reasons. Lots of times they've never shared it with anyone, and we see women who have carried this throughout their whole life for years for their whole life, and um it is just it's an untapped group of people in the body of Christ who are being undecipled because they don't feel worthy.

SPEAKER_02: 10:53

They don't feel worthy, and it's like I think of the wearing the cloak of guilt and shame, and and they're wearing a cloak, a heavy cloak that's covered in hundreds of thousands of chains, and it's so heavy that these women are carrying around with them because it is the secret sin. It is, um, and even if you're not a believer, um, when we we have met with women who have made the choice of an abortion, they're carrying that with them, but they don't know why. They don't know why they're acting out and having the issues that they have. And just some of the things, some of the emotional responses of abortion, Casey, can you just talk about that?

SPEAKER_01: 11:40

Yeah, I think that has been the most alarming, insightful, uh, gut-wrenching um thought of what these women go through. Because abortion is presented as this is going to fix your problem. This is gonna fix your problem. It acts like you can turn back the hands of time and that you can go back to life before that moment when you're pregnant. And what a lie. And so um you can't turn back time. And the women are experiencing these emotional, this emotional trauma that we're gonna talk about because what they're they're doing and there's they're grieving a loss of life. Yes, it is a loss of life. It is a precious child, and they it's forbidden grief. That was actually a phrase that was uh coined, forbidden grief. Women who've had abortion do not have anywhere in society to properly grieve their children. And so it's it's an it's an unknown, a nebulous pain that they can't name. And they see all of this overflow into life as to they think they're crazy. Like, because it's presented like this will this will end your problem and life's gonna go on.

SPEAKER_02: 13:07

Because that's what the world, that's what the world tells us, is it's gonna fix your problem, you can go on, but every human life that ends, God created us innately to grieve and go through that process of grieving. That's what I love about forgiven and set free. As you go through the classes and attend each week, we actually through that class and through the healing that God provides, allow you to grieve the loss of your baby. It's beautiful, it is beautiful, and you get to name your baby, and you actually, and it's a hard process to go through, but it's much better than the pain and suffering that you've been dealing with on your own in secret.

SPEAKER_01: 13:57

Exactly.

SPEAKER_02: 13:58

And so share just for women that might be listening, Casey, and maybe they had an abortion or they know someone, uh, what are some of those emotion emotions that women have?

SPEAKER_01: 14:12

So an emotional response, and this is fear and anxiety. Mm-hmm. The possible repercussions, and this could be flashbacks and nightmares, fear of being pregnant, fear of not getting pregnant, fear of God's punishment, fear that God doesn't like you or love you, panic attacks, fear of losing another child or a loved one. Then it goes to self-hatred and self-loathing, and that can manifest with eating disorders, cutting. You tolerate abuse in your life, excessive alcohol and drug use, the sense of femininity is absolutely destroyed or challenged. Like I don't feel worthy of being a woman because I have aborted my baby.

SPEAKER_02: 14:59

Right.

SPEAKER_01: 15:00

Isolation, feelings of inf inferiority, anger. You get easily agitated. There's a sense of frustration, you blow up easily, you're easily offended and thinking, what's wrong with me? Um and grief and sorrow, sorrow, you have crying spells, avoid baby reminders, obsession with due dates, like how old would their child be, how old you know, when the due date was, how many weeks they would be, um, when the abortion date was, confusion, being easily distracted, guilt, secretive, feeling shameful, alcohol and drug abuse, sex addictions, often often feeling like a victim, feelings of rejection, regular feelings of remorse, and always saying sorry, flashbacks, have depression, that includes crying spells, again, alcohol and drug use to numb that pain, loss of interest in things you used to enjoy, difficulty getting and staying motivated, hard time concentrating on tasks, suicidal thoughts and attempts, again, isolation, feeling helpless and hopeless, and thinking life will never tra change. And then can also surface in family and relationship strains, intimacy problems, not feeling bonded to other children, or being overprotective of your children. You're evasive with friends, you have difficulty maintaining friendships, and you constantly feel like a bad mom. I mean, so and I watch women that come into this class, and this is one of the first things we talk about. And you just watch the light bulb go off in their head, like oh my gosh, I couldn't name the source of this. And they've beat their self up and they feel like they're spinning their wheels.

SPEAKER_02: 16:59

That's right.

SPEAKER_01: 17:00

And isn't it it's such a beautiful process? It is like such a powerful ministry that you just watch the Holy Spirit come in, yes, sit down with his daughters, and heal them step by step, week by week. And so we walk through grieving. And the first is um with uh abortion in this Bible study, uh the relief and denial. Relief that it happened, denial, and then you go into the other stages anger, depression, acceptance, forgiveness, and just each week watching the chains fall off these women is absolutely beautiful. It is beautiful.

SPEAKER_02: 17:48

It it's it's it's having a front row seat to the work of the Holy Spirit in someone's lives. And you know, we we do have a lot of women that come through uh who are believers, and I think recently we and we also have um uh an offering for women who are not a believer. Um I still think that um the truth will set you free, and it's the truth of God that sets women free. And I still think even if you're not a believer, when you hear the word of God and his truth, that is what set you free. And that is the gospel, my friends.

SPEAKER_01: 18:29

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02: 18:30

That Jesus died for you and for me, unconditional love, his grace was poured out, and his blood was shed for our sins, past, present, and future. He went to the cross willingly and died, laid down his life, but on the third day he rose again. And that is the gospel, and there is not anything we need to add to it. And if we believe and accept that and ask Jesus into our hearts, then we are saved. And and that will produce a changed life. And your life will change. God will change you, and He will work on you, and that's what I love about forgiven and set free is it truly is changing a life, and that will impact women and their families throughout generations to come.

SPEAKER_01: 19:26

Well, the women come in feeling less then.

SPEAKER_02: 19:28

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01: 19:30

And you have women that had the abortion before they were Christians. You have women who even had an abortion when they were Christians. When they are Christian, that's right. You know, you never know what you would do until you walk in someone else's shoes. And to offer that place for women to just come and be vulnerable, open up their heart, and watch God heal that heart. Um Jesus' blood is enough for anything you can face.

SPEAKER_02: 20:03

That's right. And and we're we're not there to judge. No. Only Jesus is the ultimate judge and authority of anything. And like you said, Casey, we don't know what people are going through, and you never know what you're gonna do until you're in that situation. But that's what I'm so thankful for agape. It is a um, it runs on donations from people who want to help. Um, it is a nonprofit ministry out there, and I'm so thankful for Agape. Um, and uh I know that you are too.

SPEAKER_01: 20:47

It's changed my life.

SPEAKER_02: 20:49

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01: 20:50

It has absolutely changed my life, and just uh we were talking about statistics earlier in our November uh newsletter. Up to date, they have seen 1,567 clients. That includes 439 pregnancy tests, 348 ultrasounds, 256 STI tests, 492 class attendants. And their staff is top-notch. Absolutely. Just beautiful inside and out. Um and the work that they do and the fruit of that uh ministry is really impacting our community.

SPEAKER_02: 21:36

It is. And and we go to ETSU, um also go and speak at churches, and we've got flyers that um that we can give out. If there was any anyone that attends a church that listens to this podcast, please contact us because uh we have posters that we would love for you to put up in your church to share about agape and also forgiven and set free, a post-abortion uh Bible study. And for women who choose to uh keep their precious babies, um, we have women who will walk alongside you till that baby is a year old to offer support, to be a mentor. Um, we provide resources, we meet the physical needs. Um so I know you want to add something else to that, Casey, about um things that we do, our mission and vision.

SPEAKER_01: 22:37

And well, I just love to go back to the point of we're unconditional love. We're a safe place, we're devoted to loving and serving all of our clients before, during, and after an unintended pregnancy. And that is priceless.

SPEAKER_02: 22:54

That is. And that won't ever change at agape, will it?

SPEAKER_01: 22:58

No, it won't.

unknown: 22:59

It won't.

SPEAKER_02: 23:01

Well, Casey, is there anything else that we have not covered um about agape that you would like to share?

SPEAKER_01: 23:09

I can't think of anything else just uh emphasizing what a resource it is to our community and anybody under the sound of our voice that has abortion in their history or past, uh, or someone that you know, I want to encourage you if you even if you just know someone and you remember that's in their past, check on them and just tell them that there we have a program where they can sit and talk no judgment. Um and if they need to share that, because I can guarantee you they probably do. So if you have abortion in your story or you have someone in your life that does, point them in our direction and we're there to help and support.

SPEAKER_02: 23:58

Absolutely. Well, Casey, thank you for being on today, and uh it was truly a blessing, and uh I always look forward to getting to spend time with you, and I'm so glad God put our paths together. Me too.

SPEAKER_01: 24:14

Ditto.

SPEAKER_02: 24:16

All right, well, thank you for sharing about agape. And you can go to the website, look up Agape Women's Services in Johnson City. There's a phone number there. Uh, easy to get in touch with. Um, and uh downtown Johnson City on is it West Walnut Street? West Walnut Street. So, all right, thank you, Casey. Thank you, Christine.

SPEAKER_00: 24:42

This has been Benchmark Happenings, brought to you by Jonathan Tipton and Steve Reed from Benchmark Home Loans. Jonathan and Steve are residential mortgage lenders. They do home loans in Northeast Tennessee, and they're not only licensed in Tennessee, but Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, and Virginia. We hope you've enjoyed the show. If you did, make sure to like, rate, and review. Our public is Northeast Tennessee. So if you have questions about mortgages, call us at 423-491-5404. And the website is www.jonathansteve.com. Thanks for being with us, and we'll see you next time on Benchmark Happenings.