Women's Ministry circa 1997.By Rose Neumann
(Last month eight women from Glendora congregation attended the annual Southern California Women’s Fellowship Retreat for ladies in Grace Communion Fellowship. Assistant pastor’s wife Rose Neumann gave us this report on July 14.)
The theme of this year’s retreat was “Live Connected to the Vine.”
The Vine of course is Jesus Christ, as is mentioned in John 15:1-10. Angelina Romero read the passage for us as a keynote and explained how the word “abide” in John 15 is a big word with six different meanings in the Greek.
Women's Ministry circa 1997.“Abide” here means ”remain in place and don’t let go.” It means not moving from Jesus who tells us “I am the vine you are the fruit on the vine.” All our speakers and worship leaders reemphasized this theme.
First of all, the wife of our Church President, Tammy Tkach, talked about ”Our Invisible God.” The Father and the Son invite us into an intimate relationship with them through the Holy Spirit. Trouble is we often talk too much. We come at this relationship from the direction of us being at the center. “We need to listen,” Tammy said. Listen to what God is saying to us through the Spirit at work in our minds. “The Great I-Am is here – be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10).
That was so nice to hear. Tammy had to leave our meetings to speak at three meetings of our church in Martinique in the West Indies. I heard that her husband travels 100,000 air miles each year and Tammy is with him a lot of the time. We need to keep them in our prayers.
The Corona and Bellflower ladies did such a great job with special music. We were all inspired.
Next came a powerful testimonial from Barbara Romano, the wife of a pastor for 34 years and now a pastor herself. One day she was looking for a new mission and heard the voice of God impressing on her mind, “Go to Cambodia – turn their darkness into light.” She obeyed. Walking through towns and villages it soon became obvious that the mission was about the scandal of human trafficking. The voice in her heard said ”I’m going to use you to step human trafficking.”
Now like Paul’s call to go to Macedonia instead of Turkey (Acts 16:9), Barbara didn’t exactly know how to best do all this. She saw hungry kids, colossal suffering and a group of 9-12 year olds in a bar victimized by their slavers. The voice said. “Buy a bag of soap.”
Soap?
What does soap have to do with the Gospel, she wondered.
She did it and the idea soon came to enlist these young girls in a laundry business. You see, many men work in these villages in the hot sun and need their clothes cleaned. Pretty soon she had a Christian laundry service up and running. Next came a coffee house and bakery – all Christian-managed businesses. One woman with one idea following God’s lead did all this – praise Him!
Our own Barbara Edwards then led us in a craft sale. You also had to draw a fruit of the Spirit and name it. I chose “peace” and put my husband and our families on it and it was by then a full piece of fruit indeed. Then came a chocolate-tasting activity and a raffle drawing. Dina Dixon and Janet Shay from out congregation donated some of those raffle baskets – 60 gift baskets for 67 ladies, pretty accurate.
This story from Cambodia inspired us all to take part in a very meaningful Communion led by Thelma Davis. Thelma said that sin never dies but we are promised victory over sin. We are all “Christians under construction.”
Celestine Olive ended the retreat with a very humorous talk on “God our Constant Gardener.” “Let him landscaper you with his skill. This will take work because Jesus prunes and purges. But the great mystery is how he will support us through all this.”
With these ears ringing in our ears we ended our latest Retreat. “Women of faith” we like to call ourselves and our pastor wanted me to end this report with a letter from one of our dearly beloved women suffering many ailments and who cannot even attend church. Here is recent letter from Angie R. to Pastor Neil.
“Sorry I couldn’t attend the 40th anniversary but I heard from Marietta Grundy it as a success. I’m still not strong enough to sit, stand or walk too long. Since I also need both kneecaps replaced and have a degenerative spine it seems I’m regressing instead of getting better but I praise God everyday for his glory and for giving me strength to do my chores and take care of my life.
“I’m still waiting for the cataract surgery coming up soon and am happy to say that Matthew (Grundy) and some of his friends helped me get rid of half of my storage, so I’ll have to finish the rest maybe in August because of my eyes but its OK.
“Just wanted to give you an update but am very optimistic and hopeful and thankful to our good Creator and Savior – love to all – Angie.”
Women of Faith – this is great description of people in our church such as Angie who are facing great trials yet who inspire us all.