Women’s Conference: Saturday, July 26, 2009

Greetings to Everyone from Tanzania:

Though I arrived here last Wednesday and the rest of the team arrived Friday night, it seems that I have been here a month already. It’s not a bad thing at all. I am so excited to be here and attempting to savor each moment that I have being in Tanzania, doing ministry, and spending time with my team and the many friends that I made here in the years before.

Last Saturday at the Women’s Conference, the topic of my sermon was Serving God in Your Relationships. The message was very simple in that I didn’t give many points to follow but to simply learn to love those within the Body of Christ because we have been commanded to do so and because it is necessary in order to function within the Body of Christ. At the beginning of the sermon, my translator (friend and sister, Gaundencia) and sang a song that I had translated from English to Swahili. I think that it really blessed the women. The other women on the panel also blessed the women with encouraging messages to help them to develop closer, deeper, and more intimate relationships with God.

Throughout the day, there were many alter calls, many tears, many songs, and many testimonies. The Lord desired to do something in all of our hearts and that, He did. One of the women gave a testimony that there was a situation in her life that was very dry. She likened her situation to the vision that Ezekiel had in the Bible when God asked him to speak to the dry bones. She noted that it was weighing heavy on her, but after she received prayer that she felt the burden was lifted and the dry bones in her life were given flesh.

Though the morning started a bit slow, by the end of the day we were leaping for joy as we held on to the truth that the “joy of the Lord is our strength.” It was a wonderful day!