This Is Our October Newsletter ; It S Going to Be Very Long Because I Have Lots to Talk About
Hello Ladies,
This is our October newsletter; it’s going to be very long because I have lots to talk about.
Let’s first talk about some upcoming events.
November 16 at 7:00pm in the north commons, Londa Tanner will teach us how to make those beautiful mesh wreaths. We will be using a Christmas theme, and here is what you will need to bring: a 10”, 12” or 14: round, green wire frame found at hobby lobby for $6.99 (and right now they have a 40% off sale) deco mesh 21” x 10yd roll. If you chose to blend 2 colors, then you need both rolls in these sizes. Walmart has some rolls for $4.88, otherwise get from hobby lobby. Color coded pipe cleaners to match your mesh and any Christmas ornament you might want to place in the wreath. ******we need glue guns, so if you have one, please bring it along. The whole project can be done in 30 minutes. Just think, you could have a gift ready to give in 30 minutes.
November 22
Is a Sunday! and it’s the Food Pantry. I have had a couple of families ask if we were going to do another clothing/coat give away this year. What better way to share “thanks” but to allow our community pantry partners receive some clothing. Thus every Sunday in November you are welcome to bring in your gently used clothing/coats. Just drop the clothing at the north commons welcome desk.
Saturday December 5
We will all meet at the metro bus station, located next to the railroad tracks on St. George road. You can leave your car there and we will hop on the bus, which will take us to the University Park Metra train station.
- We must be at the metro bus station at 8:45 am. The metro bus will drop us off at the University Park Metra train to catch the 9:57am train.
- We will arrive at the Millennium/Randolph station in Chicago at 11:00am to shop till we drop. If you don’t want to shop, but rather sightsee and check out the store decorations, you are welcome to do whatever you’d like. We will reboard the Metra train at the Millennium station heading home on the 5:02 train. The metro bus will pick us up at the university park train station and bring us back to the Bourbonnais station to your cars. There will be no cost for the bus. The train ticket will cost $7.oo each way.
Thursday, December 17 It’s time to go see decorated Christmas homes. I am opening my home and i hope more will too. My home is in a major demolition job as of this writing, and i might not have many decorations up, and i might have lots of dust, but that’s not going to bother me. I’m more interested in having women come, relax, sip hot cocoa or apple cider, sing along to carol’s and just enjoy being together. So think about it, how about opening your door too???? Let me know.
Ladies i need you input. I have received a suggestion for an activity (I love getting those). The activity is having a “PAINTING PARTY” The teacher brings a real canvas, all the supplies, and walks you through the process of paining a real picture. This is not a paint by numbers. The cost is $35.00. You need no talent, to be able to do this. Before I arrange the teacher, i need to know how many women would be interested in doing this??????
Dr. Nita lee will be coming after the new year, to speak to women from 18 – 80 on gynecological cancers. The importance of pap smears, yearly gyn exams, because gyn cancers aren’t usually detected, until there are major symptoms. Dr lee is from the Univ of Chicago and loves to just share “around the table” keeping a very informal, non-threatening, non-embarrassing discussion. We have had to re-schedule dr. Lee, so look for her after the new year.
And yes we will be having another Saturday retreat. More details to follow.
Ladies, I need to switch to the other side of my brain now and discuss something very important. For some time now, our church, and many within the Nazarene denomination have been encouraging, boosting, and inspiring us to grow into a deeper prayer life.
We have Community Prayer meetings, Tuesday gatherings at the church and even fly to Dallas for the Prayer Awakening.
I want to share something I came across. It’s a book, based on the movie “WAR ROOM” which I have not seen. I was walking through the book section at Walmart and the book FERVENT, literally jumped into my shopping cart. Author Priscilla Shirer, who is part of the WAR ROOM movie, takes women on a battle plan for serious, specific and strategic prayer.”
Here’s a little exert from the opening….”. This book is not pretty reading because this is WAR, the fight for your life. A very real enemy (SATAN) has been strategizing & scheming against you, assaulting you, coming after your emotions, your mind, your husband, your children, your future. If we want things to change in our lives, we don’t have the luxury of “playing nice with prayer.” If we want things to change, if we want to be free from whatever is holding us back, if we want our hearts whole, thriving, grounded, if we want to experience God’s promises, if we want our kids & husband living out what God has called them to do, be and become; if we want protection around us, God’s favor upon us, then we need to send Satan and his plans back to hell where he came from.
BUT none of that happens as long as prayer remains an afterthought, a formality of what we “should” do, but don’t do, and many times it’s without meaning and confidence, and we waste a lot of time, we miss out on what God intended and we miss what really matters.” This book trains us to pray seriously, specifically and strategically. If we’re flinging words and emotions around in every direction, without real consideration for the specific ways the enemy is targeting us----and the promises of God that apply to us, we’re wasting our time. But here’s the deal. Despite what we may or may not understand about prayer, God has deliberately chosen this particular vehicle as the one that drives His activity in our lives. Prayer is the portal that brings the power of heaven down to earth. We pray because our own solutions don’t work.
We pray because we’re serious about taking back the ground that Satan has stolen from us. But know the enemy will seek to discourage us from praying. If he can keep us defeated, discouraged, tired, overwhelmed, devalued, he wins. As a matter of fact, here are Satan’s top 10 strategies:
#1 Attack your passion – he seeks to dim your desire for prayer, dulls your interest in spiritual things, and downplays the potency of our most strategic weapons (Eph 6:10-20)
#2 Attach your focus – he disguises himself and manipulates your perspective so you end up focusing on the wrong culprit, directing your weapons at the wrong enemy (2 Cor 11:14)
#3 Attack your identity – he magnifies you insecurities, leading you to doubt what God says about you and to disregard what God has given you (Eph 1:17-19)
#4 Attack your family—Satan wants to disintegrate your family, dividing your home, rendering it chaotic, restless and unfruitful (Gen 3: 1-7)
#5 Attacks your confidence – Satan constantly reminds us of the past mistakes and bad choices, hoping to convince you that you’re under Gods judgement instead of His blood (Rev 12:10)
#6 Attacks your calling—Satan amplifies your fear, worry, anxiety until they’re the loudest voices in your head causing you to deem the adventure of following God too risky to attempt (Josh, 14:8)
#7 Attacks your purity – He tries to tempt you towards certain sins, convincing you that you can tolerate them without risking consequences, knowing they’ll only wedge distance between you and God (Isa 59:1-2)
#8 Attacks your rest-- Satan hopes to overload your life and schedule, pressuring you to constantly push beyond your limits, never feeling permission to say no (Deut 5:15)
#9 Attacks your heart – He uses every opportunity to keep old wounds fresh in your mind, knowing that anger and hurt and bitterness and unforgiveness will continue to roll the damage forward (Heb 12:15)
#10 Attacks your relationships – Satan creates disruption and disunity within your circle of friends and within shared community of the body of Christ (1 Tim 2:8)
So now, if Satan can strategize against the strength of God’s women, then we must recognize and cry out against Satan’s attacks. We need to be specific about our prayers, write them down, study them, be deliberate, date them, keep them where you will notice them often and not forget. By keeping them in your presence, you become more specific about the need to pray, how you want to pray-how you want to praise, how deliberate your thoughts are.
You and I can come to the Father through the name of Jesus, and we can pray like victorious saints of God that we’ve been empowered to be. Let us join arms and begin winning the war with our serious, specific and strategic prayers.
My love to you my sisters in Christ
Chardell Smallwood