Iron Rose Sister Ministries

After the fog rolled away, we packed up the car and headed to the river. The initial chill of the water faded as we splashed, swam, threw rocks, and floated in the gentle current. After spending the morning at the river, we headed home to clean up and make lunch.
But in a nearly five-year-old’s mind, we had just taken a bath, so why would we need to take another one? His mom gently explained that his body was just as dirty as the swim trunks he had just removed, marked by the grime of the river.
As soon as we returned to the house, I bounded upstairs to clean up quickly, then fix lunch for the hungry crew. But as soon as I stepped in the shower and allowed the clean water to wash over me, the sentiment of “quickly” washed away with the dirt. I felt renewed and refreshed. I did not want to get out and I never wanted that feeling to end.

You can truly have too much of a good thing. For three months, there was no part of Michelle that was not IRSM. There was no Sabbath. No margins. And I was done.
I never want to reach the point at which I am resenting my job. No one does. But I was there.
Honesty is the best policy and confession is good for the soul. So, here I go...
Some of the safeguards that we had put into place as a ministry seemed to have crumpled. We are still unsure how some of it happened. But my schedule was taxed to the point that I was not taking care of myself. And one cannot pour out from an empty cup.

Written by Débora Rodrigo de Racancoj
It is easy to find some guidance tables that doctors and other professionals make available to parents and educators that show how many hours of sleep a day are needed for an average child, according to his or her age. Professionals know and insist on the importance of rest for people, especially for children. It is a key piece in their development. It makes them grow healthy and develop properly.
We, as Christians, are also in constant growth and development (Phil. 1: 6). Rest for our spirit is also fundamental for us, just as physical rest is for children.

In many of the classes I teach, we do something called laughter therapy and use the vowels to practice laughing together. Through the exercise, we recognize the physical, mental/emotional, and relational benefits of laughter. God created a natural remedy in laughter, which some call the best medicine.
I always find it interesting to see who is more ready to participate in the activity—to laugh with me—and who is more hesitant. However, once I get started and laugh in a ridiculous manner, their guards come down and many of the women can’t help but laugh with me.
Laughter is contagious. And the genuine belly-laughter of a baby or small child is the best!
When my niece, Zeni was six months old, and coming into her own personality, she started learning to laugh. Her older brother, Kadesh, loved to make her laugh and one night he really got her going. He even ran over to Pops (my dad) to make sure he knew that Zeni was laughing (all of which dad captured on video).
Laughter unites us. The shared memories and moments create a lasting impression of love and joy. And that night, we spent several minutes laughing together and delighting in the simple things that create laughter for a child.
Laughter is good for the soul. In that moment, nothing else mattered. I felt renewed by that time of laughter and pure joy. We relished the moment and, thanks to modern technology, can relive it with the click of a button.
Take a moment to laugh today. Find joy in the simple things and if you can’t find anyone to laugh with, message me and I’ll share with you the contagious laughter of my nephew and niece!

What is it that refreshes your spirit? For me, one of those things is hiking. I miss living in Colorado. I could just pop over into the mountains and go for a hike—breathing the fresh air, communing with our Creator, and stepping away from the noise of life.
Here in Arkansas, Petit Jean mountain is the closest I can come to hiking in the mountains. And I love it. Pictured here is the waterfall as seen from the bottom of one of the hikes—my view during a picnic lunch.
When I can’t get away for a hike, I enjoy looking at pictures of the mountains, waterfalls, and other scenes in nature that remind me that the Creator is the ultimate designer and that He is in control.
This refreshment does not come exclusively in nature...
A student who attends a weekly devotional that I facilitate texted me the other day, bummed that she was not going to be able to join us for the study that day. “I will miss the Bible study today. It always fills my heart.” She, and the other girls, leave each week refreshed.
There are three key elements that we share in together, providing that spiritual refreshment:
• Time in the Word of God, discussing, learning, and reminding ourselves of God’s truths.
• Fellowship with other Christian sisters.
• Prayer.
Make an appointment with God and with a Christian sister today for a time of refreshment!

And renew a right spirit within me...
Squeezed in the middle of David’s psalm of repentance, we hear him ask God to renew a right spirit, a steadfast spirit, a willing spirit, to sustain him.
Renew means to make new. It is not a brand-new thing, but rather a returning to what it was before, or making it even better.

This month will be divided into two different themes. The first half of this month, we are going to look at the theme of Rest, Renew, and Refresh, leading up to our Destination Retreat, Called to Listen, September 15-17.

If you have not yet signed up, we would love for you to join us in this opportunity to step away from the noise of normal life and be renewed by time in communion with God and with one another—listening! There are still remaining spots in the cabins for housing, and we welcome you to just come out for the day on Saturday, if that is what your schedule allows.
At times, we need to hit “pause” and make physical rest, spiritual renewal, and mental refreshment a priority.

The retreat will also serve as a springboard for the theme through the second half of the month and October. We will walk together through forty days of listening, using Called to Listen: Forty Days of Devotion. These posts will continue for forty consecutive days, not only Monday through Friday, as we normally share the blog posts.

This book contains forty interactive listening guides and six Weekly Reflections to be done in a small group setting. Each week emphasizes a different way we can listen:
Listening to the Good Shepherd
Listening to the Creator
Listening to the Father
Listening to the Son
Listening to the Spirit
Listening through the five senses

The Destination Retreat will be the kickoff for forty days of listening together. The IRSM blog posts for the forty days following the retreat will be the same listening exercises as found in the book. Here in Searcy, for example, we will meet on Thursday evenings, starting September 21st, in order to share in the Weekly Reflections together.

And we want to encourage you to invite other women to participate in listening together, specifically through the book Called to Listen: Forty Days of Devotion. Join with us, starting on Monday, September 18. Additional copies of the book will be available at the retreat, or you can order a set of books through our website ahead of time: http://ironrosesister.com/index.php/resources/store/called-to-listen

A good night’s sleep can cure many ills. A power nap can revive someone to be able to fulfill the day’s responsibilities.
In college, we talked about our all-nighters with pride. And the other day, I heard a grown man boast of pulling an “all-day-er,” highlighting the arduous task of making it through the day.
We are constantly tired. Busyness is seen as a sign of importance. And rest gets pushed down among the lowest priority tasks.

Written by Nilaurys Garcia, volunteer with Iron Rose Sister Ministries in Canada

Has it happened to you that after a vacation you need to rest? In other words, you need another vacation to rest from the holidays, it may be that you want to spend all day lying in bed reading a book, binge watching your favorite series, sunbathing on the beach, walking in the park or whatever activity that you like the most.

I can imagine several people laughing and commenting that the days off are to do the things you can't do while you work or are in your daily routine, and why do I know this? Because my mind also works like that. But a day after a small mental breakdown that led me to faint on the subway on the way to work, both my family and my boss decided to have an intervention, and very kindly forced me to take a few days off. I wish this story ended here, and I would love to say that after the break I learned to relax, connect with God and live in a peaceful state, but no. Six months later it happened again. After medical studies and results that only indicated one thing, stress. This intervention was no longer so kind, but this time I did learn.

There was an internal struggle within me in living these two experiences, after being oversaturated with good things like multiple Bible studies, ladies and youth meetings, children's classes, social activities and more, I completely drained myself. There was nothing left to give. Some will think, “but that's the life of the servant and it's part of the task to do all that, plus how are you going to get tired if all those activities nourish and transform you, help you connect more with God and make you grow?” All that is true, but if we exceed our limits, there are consequences.

What led me to understand that rest or stepping aside was necessary was to see the example of Jesus, in Luke 6:12, when after several miracles, days of teaching, and having to deal with the Scribes and Pharisees He retreated all night to pray “and He spent the night praying to God.” It is not the first and only time we see Him doing this, He also did it after He had walked on water, had fed a crowd and before being betrayed. In Luke 5:16 the Bibles states that "Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.”

Since I understood that it was necessary to dedicate moments, days, or seasons in this action of recharging, I understood that I had much more to give, but it was only possible if I made these conscious pauses to return to the Source that would allow me to breathe deeply and talk to the Source, beyond the daily interaction. I have learned from Jesus to retreat and breathe for a few moments. I learned to identify the symptoms that indicate that I need to pause and regain strength, and I spend conscious time doing so.

Depending on your tastes and personality, retreating can look like sitting in the park while you study your devotional, taking a couple of hours to journal, taking the long way to work while praying out loud if you're driving, or saying no to a church study or activity, but it should be a conscious decision. You can also invite a friend if you wish. In my case it works best when I'm alone and I pray out loud, so if you ever see me on the street speaking to myself, you already know what I'm doing. You don't need to go to the middle of the forest for a week to be alone with God and your thoughts, but if that's your way, great! I just recommend that you don't wait to collapse to retreat, breathe, and recharge. Remember Jesus spent time resting and recharging directly from the Source.

#IronRoseSister #HIStories #retreat #recharge #breathe #rest #guestwriter #blog

Written by Johanna Zabala, volunteer with Iron Rose Sister Ministries in Ecuador 

The beautiful biblical passage in Galatians 6:2 encourages me to continue fulfilling the Christian mission of bearing the burdens of my sisters in Christ, my family, and others with whom I have relationships. Based in the love of Christ, this scripture is an exhortation of obedience, bonding, communication, and fellowship with each other.

When I say "burdens," I mean the various difficulties and adversities that as human beings and followers of Christ we will encounter in each stage of life, both physical and spiritual.

Over time, we may realize that some burdens began in our childhood. This affirms the great importance of a healthy childhood, starting as early as conception. Early childhood is the foundation of our adult lives. All along the way, we are soul, body, and heart, made with love and an existential purpose.

When thinking of ourselves as a soul, we have a spirit of life that we do not see, which makes it challenging for us to care for and understand. We dedicate a little more care to the physical or external body. However, we take only minimal care of our internal organs. We also have feelings, which flow from the human heart. The word of God says that they are deceitful, as Proverbs 4:23 tells us. We must keep our hearts pure in accordance with Matthew 5:8.

These three areas of life need to be attended to and cared for equally to achieve the first of the greatest commandment of the Lord Jesus. Faced with this need, structuring soul, body, and heart to achieve their complete harmony will present certain challenges or difficulties toward the harmony between the three. Therefore, it will take experience, acceptance, strength, and above all, a lot of wisdom and love to overcome this challenge.

Overcoming the difficulties to achieve this harmony requires walking together through each experience, obstacle, and blessing. We can turn this process into an opportunity, rather than a burden, to understand the reason for the way we interact with our peers. In interpersonal relationships, we can choose to understand, see, and recognize in others our own weaknesses and strengths, which will allow us to be better people.

Furthermore, Matthew 11:28-30 teaches that we can all go into Jesus’ presence. In Him, we learn and rest. We are invited to bear the yoke of Christ and to learn of His meekness and humble heart. The purpose is to find rest for our souls through full dependence on the Lord. Jesus helps me to observe my surroundings daily and share important challenges and sufferings with my physical and spiritual family. These are clusters of constant personal and spiritual growth.

By working with, getting involved with, and getting to know each member of the Church, we reflect the great need we have to help, build up, and love one another, as Jesus Christ Himself taught.

The Lord Jesus calls us to salvation but also invites us to heal the soul. Heal! From what? It may be from an unsuccessful way of living taught by our earthly parents, from which are called to be purified and transformed, as we read in 1 Peter 1:18.

As someone once said, “We see faces; we do not know hearts.” The prophet Isaiah, in chapter 1 and verse 5, emphasizes that "Your whole head is injured, your whole heart afflicted"(NIV). This reminds us that, despite having been born again in the waters of baptism for a new life, there may still be situations that have occurred but not yet been consciously healed.

I know adults with significant wounds from their childhood who still show significant gaps in their relationships. One study states that approximately 89% of people with voids in their relationships were abandoned by a parent. Therefore, within the home and the church it is urgent to help understand the importance of forgiving our earthly parents for:

1. Being completely absent

2. Being very harsh in parenting

3. Not exercising authority or not being there, especially in the early stages of childhood

4. Being unloving

5. Not paying attention

6. Demonstrating immaturity

Sadly, those who suffer emptiness in interpersonal relationships agree that the wounds they feel result from not having grown up with a strong family nucleus. This results in difficulties raising their own children and even more so, an inability to assert themselves in communication with parents, spouses, colleagues, friends, and even with our Heavenly Father.

In conclusion, as daughters, let us wholeheartedly forgive the inexperience and the hurts caused by parents or caregivers as soon as possible in order to be healed. And, if we have children, let’s not hurt them. A commitment like this requires constant prayer and wisdom in the love of Christ. Let’s help each other in sharing and forgiving.

Weary would be an accurate description for several members of my family.
Weary from chronic migraines.
Weary from job loss.
Weary from navigating a “new normal.”
Weary from the physical, mental, and emotional demands of serving special needs children at work.
Weary from travel.
Weary from heartache.
Weary from two-year-olds.
Weary from _________.
Weary from life.

Thankfully, there is an end to that weariness. I have often joked that “This World is Not My Home” is one of my theme songs, in light of the variety of places I have lived and cultures I have come to know. I have proclaimed that song as a badge of honor that transcends the borders that this finite world develops and maintains.
However, I have been convicted about a truer meaning of the lyrics and title of that song.
This world is not my home, I’m just a-passin’ through. My treasures are laid up, somewhere beyond the blue. The angels beckon me from heaven’s open door. And I can’t feel at home in this world anymore...
I’m not supposed to feel at home here. The weariness I dread is part of the groans of an imperfect earth that longs to go home.
I am going to claim a new perspective on my weariness: a reminder of my true home...
Where we will rest.
We will have eternity to enjoy the transformation into spiritual perfection.
No pain.
No more physical, mental, or emotional demands.
No more travel, except to cross the streets of gold and hang with other Christians.
No more heartache.
No more frustrations.
Eternal life.
True home.