Last week we celebrated our 25th Christian ladies retreat. This seminar takes place in a different city of our corner of the country every year. The goal of these seminars is to provide a special time of fellowship and uplifting messages for women from several congregations of the Northeast region of Brazil. Most of these ladies only see each other once a year when they go to these gatherings. This is especially precious for the women that come from small congregations and don’t have the opportunity of seeing so many sisters together.

The “Women’s Seminar” had its humble begging twenty five years ago in the small city of Belo Jardim, when some ladies decided they would like to meet other sisters in Christ and spend time together to learn about the Bible and encourage each other to continue on their Christian journey. These pioneer women were all new Christians but with a strong need for fellowship and learning about Jesus. The Lord blessed them and their dream. Since then, the seminar has been a huge blessing and it has continued to improve throughout the years. Every year the ladies look forward with a lot of anticipation for this special moment.

For me it is like a therapy for the soul. Besides the messages we also have the opportunity to minister and be ministered one on one and getting away to retreat from our busy lives is an added bonus. This is an excellent opportunity to hear about each other’s challenges and victories and to pray for one another.
I pray the encouragement we gave and received has an effect on our soul for a long time or at least until our next seminar!

“Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another; not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord; rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer; distributing to the needs of the saints, given to hospitality.” Romans 12:9-13