Ladies´ Mother´s Day Tea

For the last 6 weeks, our church ladies have been planning a Mother´s Day Tea. Actually, I should say, a few of the ladies and I. As a missionary my ¨job¨ is to work myself out of a ¨job.¨ Anyone in leadership should be focused on teaching and training the next generation. Yes, I know I am MUCH younger than many of the ladies in our church here, but spiritually and many times practically we experience MUCH more in the US that then has prepared me to be in this position.

Therefore, as I try to duplicate myself, I decided that I couldn´t plan this tea alone. I needed a committee. Here in Chile there is a phrase, ¨Every Chilean LOVES a good dictator.¨ (This is a throw back comment in regards to Pinoche the man who ¨ruled¨ here in Chile for 20 years.) Because of this phrase and mentality, it was interesting to see the reactions to having a committee. Pastor wasn´t sure it would work, but in the end...

I chose 5 ladies to help me. Each one is FAT. (Faithful, Available, and Teachable) Sandra, the pastor´s wife was in charge of set up and tearing down. She had the option of doing it all herself, or getting others to help her. She was in charge of directing all of that area. Patricia and Rossanna were in charge of the kitchen. They had to plan what we were going to eat for our little snack, along with recruting and organizing the servers. Maria Georgina and Leticia are both older ladies. They helped to make some of the gifts/decorations. I was in charge of decorations, the schedule, invitations, and running the event itself. Jennifer Rubin my fellow missionary at the church, willingly took over responsiblity for getting the guest speaker and arranging her transporation etc.

I was absolutely amazed. Out of the 3 other churches we invited we had 2 of them show up. (The other church was having their own event that day.) We had set only 34 place settings, but planned for 50 with food figuring we could add people as we went. Adding we did!!! We had 41 ladies there!!! What a blessing to have to keep moving closer at the tables to fit everyone in!!!

However, the MOST exciting thing was that we had 2 ladies raise their hands to receive salvation. GOD IS GOOD!!

I still have to do a ¨debriefing¨ with my committee, but only to demonstrate how to complete the process with evaluation. I still am looking for a lady to take over my ¨job¨ of leading the ladies´ ministry. Who knows, maybe one of these ladies.....

Here are some pictures of our WONDERFUL event!!

Our youth group teens were the servers. They also did a WONDERFUL skit for our entertainment. Our youth are SUCH A FABULOUS group of young people!!! I truly can say that without our young people, our church wouldn´t function!!