Women's Ministry

A Glamour magazinevideo asked a number of girls and women on advice they would want from an older person in their life. Here are some of the questions these young women asked:

How do you become who you are today?

What should I not stress about at 14-years-old?

What is the best way to make a decision?

Looking back on your life what did you find most valuable?

What do you do when you realize that your dreams are not actually going to happen?

How do you manage having kids, being married, and having a career?

What is the secret to living a happy life?

Is having children really worth it?

(What are the) secrets to a long and happy marriage?

You can watch the entire 2:30 minute video here.

Possible Preaching Angle:

It is important for mature women to be accessible to answer questions and serve as role models to the young women in our churches. “Older women, likewise, are to be …. teachers of good. In this way they can train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, managers of their households, kind, and submissive to their own husbands …” (Titus 2:3-5).

For ten years, once a week, I waited outside abortion clinics, offering help to the women and men going in and coming out. Most of the hours I spent outside the abortion clinic are now a blur of defeat and despair: an obscenity hurled by a passerby; an occasional clash with clinic workers, or abortionists; freezing snow; sweltering heat; pouring rain.

However, punctuating all this failure every once in a while, a woman would change her mind and decide not to have an abortion. I saw at least 2,500 women go into the clinics. Roughly a couple dozen of them told me upon leaving the clinic that they had decided to keep the baby. And how many more changed their minds without ever speaking to me, I will never know on this side of heaven.

I received such a glimmer not long ago. It arrived—just a message on Facebook:

I’m not sure you remember me. I met you 20 years ago outside of Women Services on Main St. … I was only 15-years-old. You saved my son’s life. I was alone, there to start a two-day procedure. … However, that night I felt my son move. The next day on my way into the building I met you. … I believe you read me some scriptures and made me aware of other options. So, I decided to … continue with the pregnancy. ... You were truly a blessing to me. Today my son is almost 20 years old. … (H)e’s the best thing that ever happened to me. When I think of him, I often think of you.

During those years of waiting in front of abortion clinics, I trusted that God would bring forth from my small efforts the fruit he saw fit. And being offered just a sliver of that reward now, I am encouraged all the more to be faithful even in times when I don’t see visible fruit. (Now) a 19-year-old college student is bringing his faithful mother a harvest of love and joy. How much more love and joy we bring our Father as we patiently await the fruit only he can bring.

One day I had a speaking engagement in Florida and I shared a table with three elegant young women. I felt fat, forty, and somewhat futile.

Suddenly and unexpectedly God inquired of me, "Why do you think everyone is so tense?"

"Competition," I replied with sudden understanding.

I distinctly heard his next words: "Jill, you'll never be competition."

For the first time I thanked God for my ordinary good looks. I could be a big sister to women, a friendly mother, an aunt. I could relax, knowing I would never threaten anyone. God had made me just right for my ministry of teaching women, and that was all that mattered.

Men have the tremendous privilege and responsibility to take women seriously, to call forth all their gifts.

Mary Webb (1779-1861), frail and confined to a wheelchair, nevertheless was the driving force behind the formation in 1800 of the Boston Female Society for Missionary Purposes, the first missionary organization for women in America. The Female Society engaged in both city mission work and the support of foreign missions, and was a forerunner of the national women's mission societies formed later in the century.

It's not true that women are more religious than men. It's just easier in our society for them to express religious interest outwardly.