August 22, 2011 (Excerpt from the Women's Ministry Leader's Training Camp Series)

Impact = the action of one object coming forcibly into contact with another.

Football is a game of powerful players, so of course it is a game of impact. When we think of football players, we don’t normally think of scrawny little guys. We think of those large tough fellows. Football players are big! When you get to the national level of the game, the weight and height of those players equal bruit force. As those big brawny players from each team with shoulders spans as wide as barns, and arms as large as tree trunks, begin running down the field from both directions; it’s inevitable that impact is coming. It’s part of the game.

Impact is also involved in women’s ministry. When we come running out on the field of service, there is eventually going to be impact. What we need to consider is what kind of impact will your women’s ministry make?

1.  A Positive Impact

Making a positive impact with your women’s ministry is one of the best ways to accomplish things for Christ. When things are staying positive, there is less of a likelihood that the work of your women’s ministry will slow down or come to a halt. In football, or any game, teammates have to get along or it will show up in how they play the game.

Are your ladies making a positive impact by their examples? Is bickering and arguing creeping into your meetings and events? Are there noticeable rifts between your ladies? Are bad attitudes becoming a problem? Are things running smoothly? Are your ladies growing in their relationships with the Lord? The more they know Christ, the more they will lead pleasing lives.

1 Peter 3:4 talks about a “meek and quiet spirit”, so making an impact for us as Christian women isn’t bowling people over and tackling them, but living our lives gracefully as the Lord intended. That’s what helps makes the impact with a force that runs deep.

But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price. I Peter 3:4

What about the impact your ladies make by what they say? Is the speech coming out glorifying to God and your women’s ministry?

Even so the tongue is a little member, and boasteth great things. Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth! And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity: so is the tongue among our members, that it defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire of hell." James 3:5,6

The opposite of positive is negative and that is not something that we want our women’s ministries to portray. It cuts into our service for Christ and hinders being fruitful.

2.  A Powerful Impact

Is your women’s ministry powerful? Is it a force to be reckoned with? Not in a bad way, but are your ladies, for example, able to easily take on a tasks that will further the work of your church and community? Are they workers and helpers? Do they get things done?

Are they strong in the Lord and in His Word? Is their faith strong? Are your ladies ready and waiting to be a driving force for the Lord? Is the impact being felt at all in lives and in your community from your women’s ministry?

Love

We of course won’t be slamming into people and tackling them to the ground, but we are given direction in God’s Word of how to impact the world. Remember what Christ said people will know us by? They’ll know us by our love.

By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another. John 13:35

The Gospel

He also told us what to impact people with when we go running out on the field. We’ve got to carry the Gospel with us and share the knowledge of God’s love and how others can accept Him for a life in Heaven.

And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. Luke 16:32

The Word

Not only that, but we have what we need to go running onto the field of service in order to make that impact. The Word is what gives us our strength to meet the world head on.

For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Hebrews 4:12

Do the ladies in your women’s ministry read and study the Word? Is it an important part of your women’s ministry?

3.  A Prolonged Impact

Is your women’s ministry running in such a way that it is making a lasting impact? Are your ladies learning things that will carry them through life? Are they memorizing and studying God’s Word so they can depend on it? Are they becoming better wives and mothers? Are you meeting needs and changing lives? Are you accomplishing anything that has eternal value? Are you infusing your women’s ministry with teaching other women as the Bible admonishes us to? (Titus 2:3-5)

The aged women likewise, that they be in behaviour as becometh holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things; That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed. Titus 2:3-5

This passage of Titus isn't about organized women's ministry, but it can still be such a great biblical guide for women’s ministry because it is what we are to be doing out on our own anyway. To teach other women all those things mentioned ---- To love their husbands--To love their children--To be discreet--To be chaste--To be keepers at home--To be good--To be obedient to their own husbands. Those are things that women can use in life and to make them better Christian women for the long haul.

Are your ladies bearing fruit? Are they using their spiritual gifts? Is their faith increasing over time? We don’t want to allow our women’s ministries to become just phases. We want them to be grounded so that they will bear fruit to the ladies of the next generation in our local churches.

Conclusion

We have to get our ladies playing the game and moving forward so that they will impact families, church, and community in a positive, powerful, and lasting way. Your local church women’s ministry can impact the world!

Copyright ©2011 Julia Bettencourt

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