Friends that Love God and Love People

Christmas 2011

I am blessed to have a group of ladies in my life that love God
and love people. Some of these ladies I have known for 20 years and some less.  When we get together it is to focus on God’s Word and how it applies to our own individual lives. It is a time the ladies can share needs in their own lives and can receive prayer that is based on the Word of God. We have had so many prayers answered. This scripture tells us the importance of praying in agreement:

Matthew 18:19 - "I say to you that if two of you agree on earth concerning anything that they ask, it will be done for them by My Father in heaven." 

What we have in common is a love for God and a call to minister to women and hurting people. Many of these ladies are reaching out in areas they have walked through themselves.

2 Corinthians 1:4 - "who comforts us in all our tribulations, that we may comfort those who are in any trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God."

Many of the ladies have received comfort through loss of a spouse or loved one, medical issues, loss of a job, adult children situations, aging parents, caregiving, and so many other storms of life. They could have given up and fallen away from the Lord but with having fellowship with other women they made it through the storm.

• One lady had cancer twice and is totally healed and now encourages other women who are going through the same thing. She tells people she is not a cancer survivor but a cancer overcomer.
• Two ladies became widows in mid-life and are now teaching a grief recovery group.
• Another lady had an abortion years ago and now ministers to woman who have broken hearts due to an abortion in their past.
• Another precious lady became a widow and then had a stroke now she has a counseling degree and ministers to women who are in dire situations.
• Some of these ladies are single moms who raised their children with God's help and many of them have become spiritual moms to younger woman.
• One of the ladies who is 79 years old just came back from a 10 day mission trip to Cambodia.
• One sweet lady never married or had her own children but is now mentoring and nurturing younger woman in how to set boundaries in their lives.

What I love about this group of ladies is they don’t focus on themselves but they are very outreach minded.  Through the years we have done so many fun outreaches, this a few of the things we have done as a group. 

• One year we went to a neighborhood right after the time change and went door to door and gave people batteries for their smoke detectors and then asked them if we could pray for them. 
• Another time we went to a neighborhood to pass out Easter Illustrated message flyers and gave people beautiful flowering plants. 
• Every Christmas we adopt widows or families with children and provide them with a nice Christmas. 
• We adopted a young lady who had been homeless and ministered to her and gave her a household shower when she got her first apartment. 
• We gave care packages to our soldiers in Afghanistan.

Christmas 2010

We also celebrate birthdays together, we have a cake with candles and sing happy birthday to the birthday girl and have her blow out the candles.  This may seem like a small thing but recently I had someone tell me that it was the only birthday party they had. I believe we should always celebrate life and birthdays are another way of celebrating that person’s life.

My birthday 2011

Birthday Celebration for Phyllis

Ethel and Joyce sharing their Birthday Celebration

Birthday Celebration for Nancy

I encourage you to find friends that love God and love others and make a decision to let your time together be uplifting and focused on what we can do for others and not what they can do for us.