Women of Faith

Mom and I had another fantastic time last week at Women of Faith.

Sandi Patty, Carol Kent, Robin McGraw all where guest speakers... Then the amazing core speakers; Marilyn Meberg, Thelma Wells, Pasty Clairmont, Sheila Walch and Dramatist, Donna VanLiere. Avalon was supposed to be there but Janna & Greg Long had a baby on Friday and Melissa Greene had Laryngitis. So it was just Jody McBrayer... And that boy can sing!!! And one of my favorite music artists, Kathy Troccoli, sang for us on Friday night. Luci Swindoll had taken the weekend off.

The Rose Garden had 15,000 women in attendance. It was an awesome experience to see all of these women from so many different walks of life come together and sing "Jesus Loves Me"... I wonder if that is what Heaven might be like. Gave me Goosebumps.

Carol Kent’s story was amazing! It’s about raising her one and only child. A terrific son that seemed to glide thru life doing everything perfect and easy. He joined the Navy and loved being apart of the Service. He met a woman that had two children and feel in love. After they married the Bio-father was starting to become threaten and trying to take the girls away in court, etc. This was the same time Carol’s son started diving program for the service. He became very agitated and scared for his stepdaughters. The Drs think it was the gases they used during diving that made him angry. One night he became enraged and shot and killed the girls’ Bio-father. He is in a Florida State Prison for the rest of his life without the chance of parole. After many years of this crisis God has given her son a purpose. He has started the prison ministry within the prison and has seen the worst of the worst come to know Christ… Her moral of the story is that God is in EVERYTHING! He puts us thru certain circumstance to glorify Him. She said it was like Abraham laying Isaac down before the Lord… Thus the name of her new book “When I Lay Isaac Down”

Sandi Patty talked of her disgrace of adultery many years ago. How the sin brought her such despair and shame. The love of Christ brought thru depression and forgave her of her sins and brought joy back to her heart. She is now remarried. She has four children, he has three and they adopted a son six years ago. She wrote a book to help blended families understand one another, “Life In The Blender”. And can I just say that woman’s voice is AMAZING!!!

Robin McGraw I enjoyed! I know some of you will roll your eyes and think she is just another Hollywood want-to-be… But she is not. She has taken her roll as Mother and Wife seriously all of these years. She reminded me that I do have a job and I do have a purpose in life. It was my answer to the “job” question… We all need to be the best we can be, no matter where we are in life. God is shaping us for something bigger and better that will happen in our future. She is a BIG advocate of taking care of yourself. We are no good to our loved ones if we are not happy. She said “If you love your children, take care of their mother!!!” She calls the following her Big 4: Accept Jesus, Make a positive personal truth, Take care of yourself as much as you take care of others and choose an accepting Spirit. She also spoke about Dr. Phil. She said she isn’t married to “Dr. Phil” she is married to a man, just like the rest of us. We need to accept our husbands for who they are and be blessed that God has given them to us. When she was finished speaking he came out of the back and told us how proud of each of us he was that we had taken the time to come together and worship Christ together. He also said that Robin has walked him out of his show for more than 800 shows and he will return the favor and walk her off. You can just see the love they have for one another. He really is a good guy. And he said that he will try to use his stage as a forefront for the Lord has much as he is able. Praise God!!!

Friday morning at the Pre-Conference Seminar we found seating on the floor. I was happy that this picture of Sandi Patty turned out as well as it did.

Friday evening and Saturday we had assign seating. As you can tell we where in the nose bleed section. But I wanted to take this picture because the awesome sight of seeing 15,000 women together in the Rose Garden singing praises to Christ was awesome!!!