Women's Ministries

Looking for an area of service or outreach in which your church’s women’s ministries or PresWIC can be involved? This page focuses on activities that others have done that can be adapted and used by your women.

The women of Warrior PresWIC, which covers West Central Alabama, are active in supporting ministries:

• At home and beyond:“Send the Light,” is an offering which is oriented towards international missions. The PresWIC team tries to choose mission work or missions projects that have their roots in Warrior presbytery. In 2009, a member of First PC in Demopolis was chosen for her ministry, “The Border Sewing Ministry.” Several times each year, this kingdom woman travels to Mexican churches along the border to teach women how to sew so that they can use these skills to help support their families. The women then take what they’ve learned and use it as an outreach to other women and families right where they live.

• Within the United States: Collections for the “Showers of Blessings” offering go primarily to support mission work within the United States. Palmer Home for Children in Columbus, Mississippi, was selected for this project.

• Denominationally:The Women in the Church Love Gift highlights the work of a PCA agency or committee. Mission to North America’s Special Needs Ministry is the 2010 recipient.

• Churches of the presbytery: In October each year, Warrior PresWIC sends a Pastor Appreciation card to every single pastor in the presbytery. They also produce a directory just for pastoral families that includes all contact information of Warrior presbytery pastors and their families. ”

• Women of the presbytery:“Keeping the women of Warrior Presbytery connected” is the purpose of the Warrior PresWIC blog. The blog is designed for the women to stay informed, be encouraged, and learn more about the PresWIC…”one of the many ways women can encourage, mentor, and edify one another in the 21^st century!” You are invited to check it out: www.warriorpreswic.blogspot.com.

Click here to read, download and print the entire issue of Equip Women to Disciple in PDF (Acrobat Reader Required)

Click here to view this portion of the publication in PDF

Palmer Home for Children was the destination for the first-ever women’s mission trip from First PC, Jackson, Mississippi. During their week of service, teams worked on assigned tasks such as washing and painting rooms and buildings and working at the thrift store. Each evening the children enjoyed activities planned and directed by the women, and one evening the housemothers were treated to a Ladies Night Out of facials, pedicures, and snacks. The mission team spent one afternoon making and freezing casseroles for the house parents to use on busy nights. The Jackson team agreed: it was a wonderful week of service and FUN!

Stitches of Love is an international outreach that began in 2003 with three women from Providence PC, Quakertown, PA, whose ministry was to make blankets for a local pregnancy center. It has since flourished into a ministry of 1800 volunteers across the US who hand craft items for infants and children in need in the US and Afghanistan and also for our military families and military personnel in Afghanistan. The goal for 2009 was for 18,000 items to be made and gifted through volunteers who are taught to knit, crochet, weave, embroider, and loom knit. Stitches of Love intends to continue to seek the highest poverty areas in each county and community to give needed items. Each new chapter formed is encouraged to choose those communities closest to their location that are needed. Therefore, we foster a community connection and realization that poverty exists everywhere.” To learn more about this ministry, visit www.stitchesoflove.us.

The high school girls at Lansdale Presbyterian in Lansdale, Pennsylvania, are engaging in ministry to their former peers: their friends now in college. Recently, the girls packed care packages filled with homemade goodies, candy, silly string, cards/notes, etc., to send out. The group met at the home of a member and completed the night with Bible study.

Student Lunch is a ministry of Faith Presbyterian in Anchorage, Alaska, for high school students. The pastor and his wife invite high school students to have lunch with their family every other Sunday. After lunch, there is a time of edifying and rousing theological discussion over dessert while everyone one another’s company. Fellowship and discussion ends by 3 o’clock. Students are welcome to come even if they only have time for lunch.

After hearing at a PresWIC meeting about homes in their area where there are literally no books to read, the Pearl Presbyterian Women’s Ministry, in Pearl, Mississippi, decided to collect new and used children’s books and adult Christian books. New Life Christian Ministries, an inner city ministry in West Jackson, collects and distributes the books.

Kingdom Outreach for the Almighty (KOA) is a ministry of Covenant Presbyterian in Harrisonburg, Virginia. KOA ministers to the refugee and international community in Harrisonburg. Church members involved befriend families, deliver baskets of household goods and food, help with an ESL program, pray for the refugee community, and share the gospel. Many of the people being ministered to have experienced tragic circumstances, become refugees in an unfamiliar country, and are now facing the challenges of starting a new life, learning a new language, and adjusting to a vastly different culture. The families of the international community appreciate the help as they adjust, and church members enjoy the blessing of learning about the many cultures represented.

Points of Connection…A Case Study on How Women’s Ministry was Re-built by Applying Women’s Ministry Biblical Leadership Training Principles

At the annual Leadership Training Conference in February, a number of useful seminars were offered to the leadership participants. One in particular reflects how a local church went about redesigning a strategic women’s ministry based on the foundational philosophy and resources of CEP’s ministry to PCA women.

As you read, note how this particular local church, ChristChurch Presbyterian, was led in recasting and rebuilding a vibrant, connectional ministry.

The seminar leaders, Kathryn Jackson, a young mom of three with strong teaching gifts, and Jane Carter, a single PCA staff woman serving in the PCA Retirement & Benefits, INC offices, and current Women in the Church President, began by recalling a recent Leadership Training Conference.

Their local church sent eight women to the 2009 annual Leadership Training Conference accompanied by the pastor’s wife. The last speaker of the day was Susan Hunt, former Director of Women’s Ministry in the PCA. Later the women would say that her words seemed like a foreign language…they had never heard such things…they didn’t get it…they were clueless in Atlanta!

Here are the steps they took to move from clueless to connected:

Evaluation

They returned to the local church and decided more study was in order! The leadership team chose three books to aid them in better understanding what the Bible says about women’s purpose in the local church. Of the three, one was supremely helpful; a breath of fresh air; a life-changing kingdom focus. That book was The Legacy of Biblical Womanhood authored by Susan Hunt and Barbara Thompson.

Click here to read, download and print the entire issue of Equip Women to Disciple in PDF (Acrobat Reader Required)

Assessing Needs and Interests

“Who are our women?” They devised a survey that provided a foundational picture of the diverse women they served and revealed their yearning for true connectedness. Surveys are tricky, and they didn’t want to use the survey to create a needs-based ministry, but to gain a snapshot of who were the women in their church – ages, stages, how connected were they to the body of believers in their church.

Intentional, Strategic Planning

• Creation of purpose statement
• Focus on communicating that purpose through multiple outlets
• Bible study redesign – Structured to include biblical teaching (content) followed by smaller discipleship groups (structure) that prayerfully attempts to integrate faith into all of life
• Build connections through multiple outlets; building cross-generational relationships, a framework for Titus 2 mentoring
• Using discipleship groups to serve the body as they serve together
• Points of Connection Forums – simple, yet profoundly effective by selecting topics that are of interest to all women regardless of age or stage. Go online to www.christchurchatlanta.org, click on women’s ministry and read more!

Challenges?

• One word: CHANGE. No one likes change. It has been a challenge for women to embrace this new Bible study format and focus on discipleship. The leadership team is constantly trying to overcome this challenge via prayer and continual vision casting…it all comes back to purpose.
• Being a church in a big city – the team joins in working with the pastor and session to emphasize the importance of commitment to the church body!
• Motivation of older women who have ‘been there, done that’ to jump in and continue to serve the younger women. Older women are surprised to learn that younger women WANT to know them and learn from them.
• Looking forward….How does the women’s team build on what is being done? Are there new ways to cast the vision? How do we reach more women?

Regardless of the challenges, we stay on our knees, and take any new idea back to the purpose statement as the foundation to be sure it furthers that purpose:

In prayerful reliance on the Holy Spirit, we seek to help women cultivate a Biblical worldview that:

• Integrates our faith into all areas of life
• Challenges us to understand and embrace our unique God-given design and purpose as women in today’s culture
• Fosters commitment to authentic life-on-life relationships, especially between older and younger women
• Compels us to serve our church body and reach out to our community

…through a vital and transforming relationship with Christ and for His glory.

2010 General Assembly Women’s Program and Activities

You can download and print the entire Women’s Program for GA by clicking here.

Seminars Designed Especially for Women Attending GA

Parenting the Way God Parents,Tuesday, June 29, 2:00-3:00 p.m.

Kids will be kids, and we parents will be . . . just like our own parents. Unless we adopt a completely fresh perspective on parenting, we will unwittingly default to raising our kids just as we were raised. Good, bad or ugly – it’s not what God had in mind for our children. God your Father provides everything you need for parenting your children in the grace, discipline and love with which He parents you. Child development and learning specialist Katherine Koonce comes alongside to offer you original insights into His ways of parenting His children throughout the ages and the application to us as parents today. Learn how to discern valid rights from selfish wants in this age of entitlement; how not to avoid anger, but instead actually plan for it; how to take an active, prayerful role in seeking God’s vision for your family; and how to focus not on shaping your children’s behavior, but on shaping their hearts.

Speaker: Katherine Koonce has worked for 23 years in school and community settings as a learning specialist, counseling families regarding educational and behavioral concerns. She currently serves as Academic Dean at Christ Presbyterian Academy in Nashville, Tennessee.

---

My Grandmother is. . . Praying for Me, Wednesday, June 30, 8:00-9:00 a.m.

Based on a new prayer devotional written by Kathy March, Pam Ferriss, and Susan Kelton, this seminar will discuss the “journeys” of the three authors: the Journey of Faith teaches how to weave our personal story of faith within God’s larger story of redemption and responding to God’s call in our lives; the Journey of Writing tells why and how this book came to be written along with stories of grandparents impacting their grandchildren for Christ; the Journey of Application will give an understanding of our responsibility to the next generation, embracing our opportunities to influence them, and how we can be intentional in our prayers and interaction with them, specifically our own grandchildren.

Speakers: Kathy March, Pam Ferriss, and Susan Wright Kelton began their journey of writing a devotional for grandmothers in 2008. The book encourages grandmothers to be involved in the lives of their grandchildren and to pray intentionally and persistently for them. The Lord placed a passion in each life to leave a legacy of faith through prayer to their grandchildren. The desire of the authors is that the Lord would use the ideas and encouragement in their book to draw the next generation of believers to Himself and that they would reflect His character and walk in His power and strength.

---

Women’s Ministry 2.0: The Hows & Whys of Incorporating Social Networking, Technology, and Culture into Your Ministry, Thursday, 8:00-9:15 a.m.

Relevant. Authentic. Current. Missional. These ministry terms are bandied about to describe culturally relevant ministry. Yet how does our women’s ministry balance a biblical world view with understanding and engaging our post-modern culture to reach Millennial women and involve them in ministry? This seminar will explore cultural tools like online social media networks (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube), book/film clubs and more as well as how involvement in those things as Christians does help us to fulfill God’s cultural mandate.

Speaker: Melanie Cogdill is a Women’s Ministry Trainer and the managing editor for the Christian Research Journal. She and her husband Dwayne are members of Christ Covenant Presbyterian in Charlotte, North Carolina.

---

No More Wasted Sorrows: Helping Women Go Deeper with God in Grief, Thursday, July 1, 8:00-9:15

Women who are grieving a loss-the loss of a marriage, or the loss of a child or spouse-often find that their heretofore casual faith did not prepare them for the significant emotional, relational and spiritual challenges that accompany deep grief. They find themselves undone by sadness, questioning God’s goodness, alienated from friends they feel “don’t get it” and empty in their search for meaning. Nancy Guthrie, who has faced the loss of two of her children, will provide insight into the real needs of grieving women, and how to minister to them in a way that will help them to emerge from their sorrow convinced of God’s goodness and equipped to comfort others.

Speaker: Nancy Guthrie is an author and speaker. She and her husband, David, are the hosts of videos used for Griefshare, a small group ministry to those walking through grief and are attend Christ Presbyterian in Nashville, Tennessee.

---

Other seminars of special interest to women:

Justice, Mercy, and Faithfulness in Action: Changing our Ministry Mindset from Crisis Care to the Daily-ness of Disability by Stephanie Hubach, Tuesday, 2:00-3:00 p.m.

Attacks on Men in Ministry from a Wife’s Perspective by Carol Arnold, Tuesday, 3:30-4:30 p.m.

2020 Vision: Growing Your Church Through Children and Youth Ministry by Danny Mitchell and Sue Jakes, Tuesday, 3:30-4:30 p.m.

Stepping Out – In Faith by Barbara Barker, Wednesday, 8:00-9:00 a.m.

Creating an Effective Orphan Care & Adoption in the Local Church by Greg Moore, Scott Roley, Arlin Troyer, Wendy Cosby, Wednesday, 8:00-9:00 a.m.

Great Expectations: The Role Relationship of the Pastor’s Wife and Church by Michael Milton, Wednesday, 8:00-9:00 a.m.

The Minister & His Wife: Functioning as a Team in Kingdom Building by Dr. & Mrs. Frank Barker, Wednesday, 9:15-10:15 a.m.

Loving and Teaching the Poetry of the Bible by Kathleen Nielson, Thursday, 8:00-9:15 a.m.

Women as Helpers & Protectors: The Role of Women as Counselors to the Next Generation by Andy Lewis and Debbe Mays, Thursday, 8:00-9:15 a.m.

Please see www.pcaac.org for the many other seminars being offered during the week.

Go to:
Seminars designed especially for women attending GA…

Wednesday’s and Thursday’s program speaker’s bios…

PCA Bookstore meet and greet schedule…

An introduction to Nancy Guthrie, Thursday’s speaker…

Believing that present and future generations need to know what God has been doing in the PCA’s ministry to women, this edition of the PCA’s Women’s Ministry Resource Quarterly introduces a new look and an opportunity to share more information by using the web. But, to appreciate “the new,” it’s important to have a quick look at the history of our publication:

• It all began in 1978: The Committee on Christian Education and Publications (CEP) began to print a WIC newsletter, An Occasional Newsletter from
  the Women’s Advisory Sub-Committee.
  

• Some years later the name was changed to The Local President’s Resource Letter with five issues per year.

• 1993: The WIC Resource Letter was published six times a year.

• In 2002 a newly titled The WIC Resource Quarterly was moved to a quarterly format.

• This first issue of 2010 marks a significant milestone for us. The PCA Women’s Ministry Resource Quarterly comes to you through the mail as a four page, four color publication and a link to our website with more articles and resources.

Throughout the changing names, the purpose has been constant: to help CEP carry out the mission of training, encouraging, and networking PCA women in leadership in order that they might use it to equip and disciple others to love the Lord through His church.

We hope that you will celebrate this “coming of age” in this equipping piece! We pray that it will continue to connect us to one another, across lifestyles, geography, and generations as a covenantal community of sisters in Christ.

Warrior Presbytery covers West Central Alabama and consists of 24 churches, many of them with small congregations and most of which are not geographically close to any other sister PCA church. However, distance does not hinder the service and fellowship of the Warrior PresWIC women. (See the “WICK” section of this issue to get an idea of the many things they do). One anticipated annual event is a day planned to focus on and honor the pastors’ wives of the presbytery. The main planning is done by the PresWIC council, but the execution of the event (cooking, decorating, serving, etc.) takes many willing hands.

The original purpose of the event was to provide a venue for pastors’ wives to be able to gather, visit, fellowship, pray together, and to share the joys, sorrows, triumphs and trials of ministry. Even though the women still do those things, the purpose has been changed a bit over the years. The guest list has expanded to include the local WIC presidents so that pastors’ wives do not have to travel alone when the event is in a town other than their own. Presently the event is more of a “retreat” for the pastors’ wives (and local presidents) where the purpose is to encourage them, lift them up, and honor them as they are treated to a morning of being served. It is a “thank you” for the many personal sacrifices that are made for the sake of the kingdom.

We asked several honorees how they viewed the event. The responses speak for themselves:

• “This is the first time (in many years) that I have been honored as a pastor’s wife. It is a welcome gift.”

• “The luncheon has sometimes given me the opportunity to bear the burdens of a sister who has had personal or ministry difficulties through prayer, advice, and just loving on her through emails, letters and cards. (I’ve been able to) rejoice with those who have had major blessings in their lives. I look forward to this time with my sisters in ministry each and every year. It’s a great time of fellowship!”

• “The luncheon has been a wonderful source of encouragement, fellowship, and fun. It’s wonderful to be remembered and treated so specially.”

• “It does strengthen the pastors’ wives’ relationship with each other. We know that we are being prayed for, and for our husbands and ministry.”

The Warrior PresWIC is a very important part of its churches’ ministries. “Our elders are very supportive of the PresWIC’s ministry,” one pastor’s wife told us. The PresWIC provides quality programs and speakers and probably serves as the greatest connector for the churches in the area apart from Presbytery.

By Ashley Hall

Click here to read Part 1 of this article

In the last Resource Quarterly, you began setting the stage for us, as to why the conversation about intergenerational relationships is important. In this issue, we would like to continue the conversation with a few more specific questions about those relationships and their importance in women’s ministry.

Why does it seem especially hard to establish intergenerational relationships? What are the challenges?

Boomers value resolution; Generation Me values the dialogue. For example, Boomers, when asked their opinion on something, will state what they believe to be true and that is exactly what they mean. Generation Me, does not want to know the “final answer” first but wants, rather, for you to talk with them through all of the options. There is a tendency for both sides to shut down when their way of relating is not valued or received or understood. But we need both perspectives and both need to be more willing to engage the other.

Boomers are more likely to plan a program; Generation Me is more likely to plan a service project-both need help learning how to relate to one another in those venues. The venues don’t need to change. You need both, but you need true fellowship centered on Christ to be happening at both of those venues. The end goal is not the service project or the program, the goal is growth in Christlikeness, which most often happens when two sinners bump up against and relate to one another.

Generation Me values relationships. Boomers see the reality of how painfully introspective those relationships can be and Generation Me sees the reality that the Boomers do not easily engage on topics of personal intimacy and spiritual growth, as perhaps they would like. The reality is that Generation Me does need to learn that introspection is not the highest of all virtues and quite often creates self-centeredness. Equally the case, Boomers need to see that the younger generation does have a right longing for conversations of depth, where lives are shared, and more than the news of the day is discussed – that’s how Biblical world and life views are formed. Yet, the younger need the older to understand how to have those conversations without making the sharing of your deepest darkest sins the goal.

Boomers are more likely to want to mentor; Generation Me is trying to find out how to be mentored but how to also have friendships with their mentors. Perhaps one of the most challenging elements of intergenerational relationships is for both sides to relinquish their roles. It is easier for the older ladies to understand their role of “mentoring” a young person as opposed to befriending them without a role or agenda. While mentoring is good and necessary, not every older lady can relate to every younger lady as a mentor. That expectation is unrealistic. Yet, Scripture calls us to love and be in relationship with those in our church body. So yes, there will likely be one or two along the way that you develop a strong and good mentoring relationship, but this cannot be the goal for every young lady you meet. What does it look like to be a friend to the younger or the older…without any view of what you can give or receive from the relationship? What does that love look like? What would those conversations contain?

Why do we long for relationships with those outside of our stage of life? And biblically speaking, why do we need those relationships?

From the very opening chapters of Scripture, we learn that we are hard-wired for relationship – relationship with God and relationship with each other. First, there is a longing within all of us to know and be known. We understand intuitively that we have a likeness with other people that could be shared and we desire to learn and grow from their differences. We treasure relationships because we have so few that endure; we want to be heard because so few ever listen to us, we want to connect because we are so lonely; and we think that we are superior to every preceding generation. These and many other such attitudes, we are likely to bring into the church. But each of these reasons, though understandable and though true, are based largely in our own sin, insecurity, instability, and weakness. Genesis 3 speaks to these realities, reminding us of a significant problem that we can never overcome with finality in this lifetime. Because of sin, our desire to know and be known now competes with the desires of the flesh that seek to gratify ourselves and build up our own pride. Knowing is no longer about sacrificial love. Knowing now has a selfish, self-serving component that competes with you each time you try to love someone as better than yourself. Sin alters relationships from the way that they were intended so that they become all about “me.” You see it in your relationship with God. How many times daily do you catch yourself wrestling through sin because you want it your way, not God’s way? Obedience becomes about you rather than obeying a Holy God. This is not the way it is supposed to be.

So then, our great expectations that go unmet in all relationships – intergenerational, same generation, with spouse, and with children – is that we expect others to meet our needs rather than seeking to serve them and lay our lives down for them. We make idols out of ourselves and to some degree, we know this to be true, we know that it does not provide satisfaction, and we want to change…and we don’t know how. So, we turn to those outside of our own generation, thinking, “surely this is something that can be figured out…surely they have ‘arrived at the answer.'” But these great expectations must meet the Gospel reality that we need a Savior, not an intergenerational relationship, to deal with our sin problem and with the idols we have created and are now serving and worshipping. Unless Christ be central in our lives, our relationships will be all about us. Each generation is going to struggle with this reality differently and will need help from the others – Scripture continually tells us that each generation has its own particular sins. It’s not a question of whether we will have them, but rather, what they are and whether we will choose this day to serve God. That’s why we need intergenerational relationships.

Secondly, we need someone outside of our perspective to shed light on our need for a Savior, the centrality of the cross, the depth of our sins, the weakness of the flesh, and encouragement to grow in the fruits of the spirit. The longing for relationship is foundational to being made in the image of God. The realities of those relationships are a long and continual fight against sin, a running to Christ, and a willingness to serve and lay our lives down for others so that we can learn from them. Unless this be our perspective, our great expectations for Gospel friendships will be only frustrations.

What do healthy intergenerational relationships look like?

1. For the Older: Begin by doing a lot of listening and asking a lot of questions. Let the younger generation know that you want to hear, want to talk, want a relationship, and that you want to know where they are, how to get them involved, and what ideas they might have on life and ministry, marriage and family, free time and work, gardening and sewing. Make it a small goal to listen and give wisdom and feedback that is not always and only in the form of answers and resolutions. Leave the conversation at a point that makes you both look forward to talking more, rather than having everything nicely resolved.
2. For the Younger: When you are sought out and in conversation with ladies older than you, continually seek to take steps toward them in love, affirmation, and encouragement of the ways they are reaching out to you. Also, it is just as much in your court to initiate conversations and relationships with those who are older. When so doing, seek to lay aside your agenda and expectations and ways of communicating and instead, love her better than yourself. Ask questions and show interest. Defensiveness and self-centered conversation are not the best motivators for developing friendships.
3. In Ministry: As you plan programs, think about the people that you want to attend who are not already doing so and contextualize your plans around those people. You do not want to be reactive, but rather, proactive. If you would like to see more young ladies involved in your programs, find ways to include them in the planning and be ready to listen to and act on some of their ideas – if you want them there, contextualize your planning around them. The goal is to go and seek them out – this is being proactive, as opposed to tossing a program out there and expecting them to come. In contrast, being reactive would mean that you wait until the younger ones voice discontent that nothing is available for them in ministry before thinking through a different approach – this is not the goal.
4. To Both: Be approachable in your humility and pray that your life would be attractive for Christ.

5. To Both: The Goal is NOT Best and Right…that’s not the Gospel; instead, the goal is Christlikeness. The goal is that we would count ourselves less. The goal is that we would grow in our humility, and that we would grow in our ability to love those who are different than us.

6. To Both: The Goal is NOT deepest, darkest sins and struggles, though at times that will be a component-but it is not the goal. We are all sinners coming together; the goal must not be to “uncover” the sins because that immediately makes her (older or younger) the project and you the solution. The goal is esteeming her as better than you; it’s a posture of assuming that you have more to learn from her than she does from you. As you grow in your friendship, you will uncover those sins, but there will be a deeper relational context that allows those sins to be dealt with “normally” rather than as a crisis.

7. To Both: The Goal IS Christ in every conversation – blessing, struggle, ordinary, extraordinary…every conversation affords the opportunity to make that topic sweeter and better by infusing Christ. From laundry to CEO jobs, every part of our lives is lived under the Lordship of Christ. Can we talk about those realities with one another?

8. The Goal IS Gospel friendship – commitment (you belong to each other) to bear one another’s burdens and sins, commitment to spur one another on to love and good works, commitment to living a life of holiness with one another. The goal is friendship, not purely mentoring. This means that you make fun, ordinary, and non-programmed life on life situations possible. For example, intergenerational relationships need to include at times, trips to the grocery store, watching a movie, a cup of tea on the porch without an agenda to talk about anything, a spontaneous phone call invitation to come over – effectively showing an interest in all parts of her life, not just for the serious and intentional conversations.

9. The Goal IS 1, 12, and 4,000 … both/and, not either/or…our challenge is understanding what it looks like to put Christ in the midst of each setting with its own particularities. Jesus ministered effectively to the crowds of 4,000, to the group of twelve disciples, and at times, to one person at a time (woman at the well). Do our lives reflect His incredible willingness to meet the needs and minister to whomever and how ever many the Father gives to us?

continued on page 2…