Women's Conference

We were blessed to today to be able to provide Pavana Baptist Church, our hometown here in Honduras with Mrs. Carol's Famous Women's Conference.  The North American ladies prayed all week for Yobani's wife Iris and his mother and sisters to come to this conference.  Yobani's family is profound Catholic.  So Katie's God moment on this beautiful Wednesday morning is when she was standing at the front door of the church and could see the ladies coming up the path from the construction project right up to the front door of the church.  Pastor Reinati's mother was so excited to see Yobani's mother which warmed all our hearts so much.  So our prayer from this Women's Conference is that Yobani's family will continue to worship with Pavana Baptist Church. Yobani has been going to church each Thursday evening at the police check point so hopefully this family will receive Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. Amen y amen.

Carol greeted everyone and introduced herself in complete Spanish.  So proud of my sister Carol for learning enough Spanish to share her opening in Spanish.  We all stood up and opened in prayer. 

Afterwards Carol proceeded to share how busy we are as women no matter where we live or language we speak.  So today we are going to learn more about how we can take care of ourselves because we are special in God's eyes.  As Carol was sharing Kathy, Charlene and Katie were hanging out their bags which was going to be used to store their materials they will receive during the conference.  They gave the ladies a mirror first and ask them to look at themselves in this mirror and what do you see?  Also look at the lady to the left and right of yourself and what do you see?  Do you all look the same?  No you do not!  God created us all uniquely in His image.  Let's look at your first card which is orange, it is from Psalm 139:13-14 about we are fiercely and wonderfully made by God.  We are all God's creation.  Now let's look at the yellow card and read this verse together our of Ephesians 2:10.  God gave us gifts and how are we to use our gifts. God has a plan for each and everyone of our lives and we need to use our gifts God has given us to serve HIM. God has prepared us ahead for his work.  He knew we would all be here together on June 19, 2019 to serve Him and you.  So we are using our gifts to serve you ladies here in Pavana today.  What are your gifts?  Do you prepare food for a sick friend, do you prayer for others,  or do you sew or mend clothes for someone?  What are your gifts?  

Let's pull out your pink card and read the bible verse on here. The reading is from 1 Corinthians 12:27 and we are always doing something with our hands.  We wash clothes daily!  We cook our meals for our family daily!  We wash the dishes daily!  We sometimes even collect the firewood to cook with.  Our hands are always doing something for someone else. So today we are going to treat our hands very special.  The Honduran ladies were given a tube of lotion and asked to face the lady next to them.  Carol asked the ladies to open up their bottle of lotion and massage each other's hands very gently and treat each other very special.  I promise you these sweet ladies have not ever had a hand massage before.  So they were feeling very special at this time.  Laughter and giggling was all over the church sanctuary as they enjoyed themselves so sweetly. Katie thought the appropriate verse for this particular time was The Proverbs 31 Woman.

Once the ladies settled back in to the next part of their morning the ladies from Carol's church made aprons for Carol to bring to present to the ladies.  So the ladies were able to go and pick out the apron which best suited them and they truly enjoyed trying on different aprons from North America.  They felt blessed to receive such a sweet gift.  Carol asked the ladies to pull out their green card which was from Ephesians 6:10-11, The Armor of God.  When we work daily ladies we need our aprons to protect us from the dirt and filth we endure daily from cleaning cooking and whatever comes our way.  This apron like the Amor of God protects us daily from the dirt of this world.  These aprons will keep us clean.  It also represents the breastplate of righteousness which is God's Word in our lives daily. This enables us daily to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, God's Son. This enables us also to live right through the example of Jesus Christ.  Our life is a journey which begins with our salvation.  We are sinners saved by the blood of Jesus Christ who arose on the third day and ascended into heaven to sit at the right hand of His Heavenly Father.  As sinners we will make mistakes but we just daily need to fix our eyes on Jesus Christ and He will lead our way.  Others need to see Jesus in our daily lives so we can be the Bible some people do not read.  So ladies with your aprons on daily stay strong in the Lord and live a life worthy of a righteous life.

Charlene and Kathy brought salvation dolls to share with the ladies from their church. Carol shared that the doll had two sides.  The side with the eyes closed was someone who did not have Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.  They were living in the world of darkness.  The side with the eyes of open was a believer in Jesus Christ and lived in the light of his glorious world.  They were given the dolls to go out into Pavana and share with a lost friend and share the story about the Salvation Dolls.  Hopefully they did just this.  But I know four Catholic ladies sitting there that day who heard the story and we pray Jesus Christ becomes their Lord and Savior!!!!

The last part of the day was when the ladies made a craft to put into their homes and place each one of their bible verse cards on.  They had fun helping and learning how to make their craft.  My God moment was when I saw Charlene helping the pastor's mother making her craft.  Charlene was so intense with helping her every step of the way.  Charlene was speaking English the whole time and the pastor's mother was saying si si.  There is not a language barrier when God is at the center of it all. Meida was also helping others make their craft so Meida couldn't be everywhere but this did not stop Charlene from doing her best and please take note of the finish product.  The pastor's mother was so proud of her craft with her beautiful smile glowing all over her face.   At the end of the day the pastor's wife stood to invite all visitors of the church to please join them for Thursday night ladies bible study and Saturday night worship. Once again let's pray for our Catholic ladies they will find their way back up that path to the Pavana Baptist Church.