After 5 years it is really encouraging so see the women’s personal growth in the Lord, and their zeal as they reach and train other women. In each city there is multiplication to at least four generations of women reaching women. The greatest increase is among the poor, the down cast, the outcast and the broken hearted.
Personal experience and the opportunity to experience six years of ministry among women I see more and more how God seems to allow brokenness to pierce the hard shell of our hearts, so that He can plant the seed of His word and His Spirit in hearts ready to acknowledge their brokenness, their inability to fix themselves and their total dependency on the Lord.
When hidden brokenness and pain is revealed, acknowledged and confessed, bondages are broken, healing can begin and restoration follows. Circumstances may not change, but wounded hearts are freed from pain and discouragement, freed from the life draining hopelessness which destroys our purpose and hope in God. We are all broken in some way. Hearts broken and restored in Jesus are drawn to Him alone. Nothing else matters. Life lived is for Him alone. There is a new understanding that pain and sorrow are part of this world. Our weakness is exposed, our lack of faith is exposed, our fear is exposed, our hardness of heart is exposed. We are no longer the same. We have a choice to remain bitter, hard hearted, prideful and angry, or to confess our pain and emptiness to the only One who understands. Only in Jesus do we find healing. He alone has the supernatural power to heal our cold or broken heart. Some pain and wounds will only be healed in heaven where there is no more sorrow and no more pain, but understanding our wounding, acknowledging it and bringing it to Jesus the healer allows us to enter into deeper intercession with Him, allows us to understand some of His suffering, allows Him to turn our pain into purpose, allows us to be used by Him to minister to others who are broken.
This brokenness, healing, transformation and multiplication is the testimony of our Indian Butterflies…..
Sarah, a pastor’s wife, summed up her experience of transformation and multiplication; “unless God works in us we cannot do it. Only brokenness brings us to the heart of God and His heart in us. When we are broken into pieces can God fill us and use us to reach others.”
Mavis is one of our Lead Butterfly Coordinators and a Women’s Ministry leader of the Methodist Churches in this district. Addressing Butterflies in the Methodist church she urged them:
“Keep speaking to your women, keep meeting with them. They are either too busy or have too many excuses. Don’t worry. All you need is one woman in your church to shake the rest up. One woman surrendered to Christ can do it. Only when we are surrendered to Him can the Holy Spirit pour Himself into us and use us. Confessing our own brokenness opens the doors for freedom to others who are hiding their brokenness behind a mask. It was as I shared my own testimony of sexual abuse as a child that God gave me boldness. I exposed the things hidden in my life even from my husband. As God gave me courage to share these things with my church, the bondages, shame and fear fell off me and I was free. He filled me with an outpouring of His Holy Spirit even as I was speaking and the whole church caught fire. Now we are experiencing revival in our church which is spreading to others. Our pastor asked me to teach LUV lessons in the church. For many weeks I was teaching until some men were upset with the teaching. My pastor said, never mind he would teach it. So now he is starting every sermon using a lesson from LUV and using it to lead into teaching on the Holy Spirit for the first time in our church. Liz, Martha and I have prayed for my church for 3 years. Now, in answer to prayer, God is doing a mighty work and it is spreading to others. I had to be willing for God to break me and use me. I had to be a door He could come through to enter my church. I praise God for all He is doing. My vision is to train 50% of the women in our churches all over the city and that God would use them to reach the others in and outside the church. We are experiencing revival in our churches and believing God for great things.”
Butterfly Leader Rebecca is a pastor’s wife in a slum church in a city of 23 million people where over 40% live in slums. Rebecca joined LUV leaders training in 2010. She and her husband invited Martha and I to visit their home in the slum and commission their new church building in 2011. Ninety percent of the church were young women, converted from Hindu families. Their families still practice Hindu worship. Many of the girls asked for prayer as their families were at that moment with the witch doctor praying with him to curse the girls while they were meeting with us in church. They were young in faith and young in age. They knew Jesus was the true God but they knew very little else. Today these young girls are a testimony all over their slum and into other slums as to the power of the Word and the Holy Spirit transforming them and giving them boldness to reach others living round about them. Here are some of their testimonies.
Rebecca: “I praise God for this ministry. After the first LUV workshop in 2010, I was anxiously waiting for the next training. I had known about the caterpillar, but until this training I had no idea that there was so much beauty stored inside it. I used to think life was just struggle and suffering but God has helped me understand that He has a different plan. He has set me free. He has kept His hidden Spirit in us. When we get set free inside His Spirit helps us to tell others. Now I reach out to my women and let them know how much God loves them. God does not want me to sit in my house all day so now I am out telling other women in the slum that God loves them. One woman saw a man speaking about the caterpillar and butterfly on TV. I was able to tell that woman that is what God wants for her, to live like a butterfly. Our women are learning the truth of God’s word now. That is setting them free to live above their circumstances. Today I have brought women from three other churches with me. We have been teaching them about the Butterfly and Jesus word is setting them free.
Lydia, Rebecca’s Butterfly: “I understood in the first workshop that God has chosen us as women. We are important to God. Jesus has brought us out of the cocoon but we keep crawling thinking only about the needs of our husbands and families. But we are not called to sit at home but to be in gardens. We need to be out of our homes to reach other women. So many are in pain. Now I go out and reach them. I tell them about the Butterfly and I share God’s love for them and teach them His word.”
Urmila, Rebecca’s Butterfly “I learned many things from Rebecca and now I understand the gospel and have boldness to share it with other women. Before this we were only knowing about the caterpillar. We did not know that it becomes a beautiful butterfly. When I saw that God wants to transform our lives to beauty, that God has a plan for our lives to live in beauty and joy I was surprised. Now I tell others this good news.”
Rani, Rebecca’s Butterfly: “So many women are in pain in our slum. The Butterfly story is helping me to reach them. My husband lost his job twice and we have had no money. I had no money to come here today but our Butterfly group in Rebecca’s church collected money for me to come. As I was coming here today I prayed God would bless me so that I can bless others the same way.”
Savita: “I find freedom in our Butterfly group and coming to these meetings. I have learned that when I have freedom I love to reach others. So many women are in pain and I want to reach them. As Liz and Dawn have come to reach us from so far, we are encouraged to go and reach others.
Mangala. In June we finished our three year LUV training. Still today God is transforming us and now we have the role to share with others. It’s my desire and it’s what we have been told, to multiply, to reach and make disciples among other women. We have to follow Jesus and tell other women about His love.
Meena, Pastor’s wife, Butterfly Coordinator. “I’ve learned, unless you know and live God’s truth in the freedom of His Spirit you are in captivity.”
Preeti, Pastor’s wife, Butterfly Coordinator. “LUV teaching has shaken me up. I did not have a burden to teach the word but now I see how important the word is for freedom and transformation.
What a blessing to hear these women who have been healed, transformed and set free to multiply God’s love and His truth, making disciples…..!!
Thank you for joining me on this mission around India and S.E Asia!
In His Love
Liz