No Longer Desolate- Recap of Women's Fellowship at Christ Tabernacle

I've been attending Christ Tabernacle for two years and have never attended one of their women's fellowships. I finally got to go to one on Saturday and it was awesome! A great outpouring of praise, fellowship and healing happened that day.

I went with my Mom and my Titi Nilka. We arrived early to enjoy the free breakfast they were offering. Little did we know that we should have gone into the main worship hall to save seats first! But it worked out because we were able to sit in the choir seats on the platform! Best seats in the house!!!

The title of the fellowship was No Longer Desolate. The theme was healing from all types of abuse, including sexual abuse. They highlighted Isaiah 62:4 and 62:12

⁴ No longer will they call you Deserted,
       or name your land Desolate.
       But you will be called Hephzibah,
       and your land Beulah ;
       for the LORD will take delight in you,
       and your land will be married.
¹² They will be called the Holy People,
       the Redeemed of the LORD;
       and you will be called Sought After,
       the City No Longer Desolate

There was great worship music and Oraia (a Christian spoken word artist- you can hear some of her work here) did this beautiful piece about being beautifully broken. I wish I could find it online but to summarize her spoken word she said that our scars can be used to help others like Jesus's scars have helped us, his scars gave us salvation and were left on Him as proof. I wish I could do better justice to her piece! It was powerful and gave me goosebumps and my tears were flowing. And this was just the beginning!

One of the many points that were made through a video presentation, Maria Durso and the main speaker was that abuse has long term lasting affects and affect not only the abuser but those around them for a long time. Our kids are affected even if we don't realize it. Sometimes we think we have dealt with our past but something will pop up and if we don't deal with it head we can end up hurting ourselves and others.

The healing process is one step at a time and as Maria Durso said we need to push through and heal from our pasts. Then we can start to help others.

The main speaker's story was so heartrenching but this woman's strength, courage and resiliency was inspiring. She was sexaully abused by her Uncle and by age 14 was pregnant with his kid. She had the baby after many attempt by the Uncle to rid himself of the "problem". He did not succeed and the story that unfolded was amazing. I won't go into too many details because again I won't do her story justice. But I will say this was her first time sharing her testimony in a public setting. Yet she was so natural, so raw and so honest. Her story was one of pain, sadness, joy, redemption, healing and forgiveness. Her words have impacted me in a great way. I came away with such insight and clarity.

She highlighted the following verses and I want to leave you with these powerful words from: Psalms 139: 13-16


 ¹³ For you created my inmost being;
       you knit me together in my mother's womb.
 ¹⁴ I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
       your works are wonderful,
       I know that full well.
 ¹⁵ My frame was not hidden from you
       when I was made in the secret place.
       When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
 ¹⁶ your eyes saw my unformed body.
       All the days ordained for me
       were written in your book

What precious words to here!  God bless you all! The next Women's Fellowship is October 17th so if you are in the NY area and like to attend a Women's Fellowship at Christ Tabernacle keep this date in mind!

Fitness Friday and One Weigh at a Time

It's Weigh in Day! I was dreading getting on the scale this morning. So here it goes: I was 181 last week and this week.... 179.8.  a 1.2 loss! Not so bad! I thought I had gained because I messed up!

I have been tracking calories using Livestrong.com's app on my Itouch. I can also update my weight on the app. I thought this would automatically update the amount off calories I needed for weight loss when updating my weight. But it doesn't! I couldn't find my Itouch the other day, so I had to jump on the computer to log what I ate and I checked the calories and noticed an update button. I was curious so I hit the button, and with the weight I had input, the calories went down! So for two weeks I was using the wrong calorie goal while logging. I thought I would have another gain this week... a week bigger gain! But thankfully that didn't happen! And I am so happy that I am under 180. I'm under slightly but still under ;)

I also tried switching up my exercise routine midweek. I love using my Wii Fit and My Fitness Coach but I also like exercise that incorporates dance. So I checked my cable's free on demand channel and found a bollywood dance workout. It was a 30 minute workout and it was great! I had fun and felt the burn! Today I think I'm going to try the Brazilian dance workout. I also want to see if I get the Dancing With the Starts Latin Dance Cardio DVD.

Starting June 1st I will be participating in the EA Sports Active 30 Day-Challenge! EA Sports Active is a new fitness game that is being released for the Wii next week. I'm hoping to receive the game sometime next week and can't wait to try it! Anyone else getting the game and participating in the challenge? I know a few people who are participating in this challenge already and they have gotten some great results!

Wordless Wednesday- Mother's Day Edition