Debra McNinch is a wife, mom, speaker, first-time author, and the founder of the BATTLECRY Prayer Movement—a growing community of parents who are praying their prodigal children back home to Jesus.

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She loves photography, working on her photo farm, and sharing life with Steve, her husband of 34 years, two sweet puppies: Poppy the Berne Doodle and Dodger the Miniature Schnauzer. She is also the faithful feeder of Butters, the neighborhood stray cat.

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Debra’s favorite things are Jesus, coffee, cupcakes, and glitter (in that order!). She collects vintage junk, anything sparkly, and more Sharpies than one person needs. She takes pride in learning a new skill each year and gets through life by leaning on God’s Word—and a little humor. She especially loves when the two collide.

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Born and raised in Winfield, Kansas, home to Bluegrass and Burger Station, Debra has moved nine times to six different states. Each move brought her closer to God and connected her with lifelong friends.

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In Fall 2024, Debra released her first book with CrossRiver Media, sharing her family’s story and how it led to a powerful prayer movement for prodigals. She writes and speaks to encourage parents to keep praying and keep believing—because prodigals are coming home.

https://www.debramcninch.com/

Welcome to 12-Minute Converse with Jesus Believers.

God chose first to have a conversation with us, His creation.

Our prayer is that this listening space brings growth and transforms your life forever.

Praise God for you, Deborah.

It's a great pleasure to connect with you.

What part of the world are you in today?

Southern Indiana.

Where did you realize there's a need for prayer for the prodigal son or child?

My story started about eight years ago when I myself thought that I had raised three kids to all serve the Lord and walk closely with Him.

And I myself didn't realize till they became adults that they had their own path to choose, that they had their own way of the world to go to.

And that they would, they also, as many kids in the world had set aside their faith in God and walking with Him.

And I got a phone call one day from one of my kids that simply said, Mom, I'm transgender.

And at that time, it was still kind of early in the movement that we see today, but I didn't know really what it meant, but I did know my life was about to change.

And I knew that I was going to need to find a way to pray for the prodigals.

And it just became who I am.

And the Lord spoke to me very early on and told me to write down the things that He was telling me, because I was going to need to share them with others.

And immediately I knew that I promised myself if I could find a way out of the pain, I would do several things.

I would never forget that God was a God of miracles and that nothing was too hard for Him.

And I promised myself that I would speak about hard things, that I would tell my story so I could connect with other people going through prodigal situations.

And I promised myself that I would start a support group for parents like myself that now had prodigal children.

And that is how Battle Cry began.

And that is how my story began.

And that is where we're at today.

We've, if you fast forward from that phone call till eight years later, we have a network for moms of prodigal children.

And we have over 1600 moms.

And it grows every single day that parents are realizing that their children have walked away from the things of the faith and have followed the way of the world.

And we are a community that stands strong together.

And we believe for our kids that they're coming back to the Lord.

How many children do you have?

I have three amazing blessings in my life.

And they're all adults and they're all kind of off doing their own things in the world and following their own paths.

But I have, you know, you have to let them go.

I didn't realize that really, I will say, as a mom, nobody told me when they were small, that they had this thing called free will.

You don't really think that they're going to do that.

You just assume they're going to follow the path that you have followed.

And I wasn't prepared for them to make their own choices and to walk away.

And if I could go back and do things differently, I would definitely pray different than I do, than I did, I should say, than I did when they were growing up.

And I would, I wish somebody would have looked at me and said, do you know that there's an enemy after your children?

Because I really didn't at that time.

Of the people who are in the community, how many people are dealing with similar situations?

Or are you seeing a spread of different scenarios that are occurring?

We have all kinds of scenarios in my mom's group.

We have parents that are dealing with LGBTQ issues.

We have parents that have kids that are in prison.

We have parents that have kids that are addicted to alcohol and drugs.

And we have many, many parents that are facing estrangement, which is kind of a big like moment we see now happening in culture where kids are walking away from their parents and relationship with their parents.

And we also just have parents that have kids that simply don't believe that just are great, you know, kids and they're doing great things in the world.

They just don't believe in the Lord.

And it's pretty even across the board about all the different kinds of scenarios that we have.

But we, I can promise you that if you're going through something with your family, with your children, I promise you there's a mom in my group that's going through the same thing.

What is the essence of the name that came about with this movement?

The name Battle Cry came out of one of the very first things that I had written after that phone call.

I started a little journal because the Lord, as I said, told me to start writing things down.

And one of the very first things in that journal that I had written said, this is my battle cry.

Love goes to war.

And I knew right away that we were in a war with our families and in a war for our children, for their lives, for their spiritual lives.

And I knew that I was going to be the one to stand up and lead a movement of moms to fight this battle.

And we have all kinds of things happening in our Battle Cry group.

It's a private community.

You have to ask to join, but there's no cost.

It's free to join.

But when you get in there, we have a main page, which think about like a Facebook.

It's kind of like that, but it's its own private community that has nothing to do with any of the major other social media networks.

But in it, we have a main page.

And on the main page, people will post prayers.

They'll post verses.

They'll post sermons maybe they heard, or they'll just post maybe something that's on their heart.

But then the beauty of our community is we have individual private groups for all of those different prodigal situations.

And so you can find a small group of moms that are going through the same thing that you're going through.

We also do book clubs.

We do Bible study.

We do Zoom prayer on Monday nights live.

We have people from all over the U.S. that join us for live prayer once a week on our community.

And it's powerful.

It's powerful.

We pray every single day.

Set your alarm if you're listening to this, set your phone alarm for 12 central time, whatever that is in your time zone.

That's 1 p.m. where I live.

And just say a prayer when it goes off for the prodigals.

There are thousands and thousands of people across this world praying for the prodigals at that time every single day, and it's powerful.

So in my group, you will find community.

You will find support.

You will find a place to land with people that are going through the same thing that are going to support you, that are going to listen to your story and let you cry your tears.

But then the beauty is we're going to say, okay, mama, get up.

It is time to fight, and we're not going to let Satan have our kids.

It's an amazing undertaking, my friend.

Wow.

Amazing undertaking.

So when you started, did you have in mind that it would be the way it is right now?

Not at all.

I started this.

It'll be actually in May of this year, which is 2026, depending on when this comes out.

We will have been a group for five years, and so we're getting ready to have our five-year birthday of Battle Cry.

And when I began, I actually thought, you know, this is going to be depressing.

A lot of moms that are really sad sitting around, you know, talking to each other about all their problems, but it's not.

What I have found is that we focus everything we do in the hope we have in the Lord and the joy we have in Him.

And it is the most hope-filled, faith-filled, joy-filled group of moms that you could ever imagine.

It's not a place of tears and sorrow.

It is a place of hope, faith, and anticipation of what the Lord is going to do in our stories.

It's discipleship.

Yes, 100%.

You know, we just need someone sometimes to come along beside us and remind us that God is not done with your family.

He's not done writing your story yet.

There's going to be more.

You're in those middle parts right now, but there's going to be an ending one day, and we have to keep the faith, keep our eyes on Jesus, and we will get to the end.

I was making mention of the things that I saw on the background of your wall that others obviously aren't seeing.

Tell me how important is prayer to this movement?

The whole movement is founded on prayer.

I actually call this a prayer movement, and the Lord gave me a battle plan at the very beginning to pray.

I knew that I couldn't just wake up every single day and just willy-nilly my Sunday school prayers and get through this.

I knew that I was going to need a plan in place to pray and believe for my family, and it's a simple five-step plan.

One, you're going to pick a verse.

If you have a prodigal child, pick a verse right now today and pray that verse every single day.

Second step is worship.

You're going to worship.

Pick a couple of worship songs, and in those days that you think you can't get out of bed, put those on and let your soul be refreshed.

Let your soul just cry out to God of how good he is and his glory that he deserves, and so put on some worship music.

The third step is prayer.

Start a list of five things right now that you could pray every single day for your family.

Every single day, pray them, and then add to that list.

The fourth step is declarations.

Pick out four or five promises of God and start declaring those with authority every single day over your family, and the fifth step is community.

Find your mat carriers.

Find the people that are going to go to the roof, tear it off, and lower your child down before the Lord, and we'll stop at nothing to get your child there.

It's a simple five-step plan.

Prayer is the most important thing.

We stand, stand, stand, stand together in prayer and faith that our kids are coming home.

Five years from today, Deborah, you're listening to this conversation.

What's a message you'd leave for future you?

I would tell myself, girl, you did a great job of keeping your eyes on the Lord, and look where your child is now.

He is home.

He is serving you, and it is better than you ever could have imagined.

Do not give up.

Is there any question that I could have asked that I didn't ask that would have helped you serve us better?

No, I think this is an amazing conversation, and my motto is no one fights alone, and I just want to remind everybody that there is someone, everybody, all these Christians want to be on your side.

Everybody that is serving the Lord, let them, let them come along beside you and pray for your family.

Amazing audience, links are in the show notes if you want to connect with Deborah and her community.

Deborah, a pleasure, a treasure.

Thank you for being on What is Inspired by 12 Minute Converse.