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Harrison Women’s Connection meeting notes

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Chair Rita Brown greeted the group with a joyous welcome to see everyone again since Harrison Women's Connection had not met for a year because of the COVID-19 pandemic. After a few announcements door prizes were awarded to Phyllis Larrimore, Barbara Potteroff and Nancy Sharp. The Special Feature was a short testimony from several of the attendees about their interesting experiences during the pandemic lock-down. The group was favored with a variety of hymns presented by the lovely voice of Rhonda Matthews. The featured hymns were "Blessed Assurance," "He Knows My Name" and "I Surrender All." The project of the month was about the "Late Winter Friends of Stonecroft." This past year, the pandemic forced the Stonecroft Christian Women's Club in Bartlesville, Oklahoma to change the way they had reached out to women in a correctional facility. They had been providing weekly resources with a faith-based monthly life lesson and practical life skills to the hurting women there, as well as weekly small groups. But when COVID-19 stopped the visits, the CWC had to regroup to keep the impact going. They didn't want to lose the contact they had made with the women in the jail, so the team rallied and dedicated themselves to prayer. They adjusted their activity to writing inspirational pieces to get to the detainees. Their efforts were blessed and they were able to keep their connection with the women in the Correctional Facility. The HWC Project this month is support for the Ozark Share and Care which is a community sponsored non-profit emergence services and thrift store. They are currently providing food for an average of 750 or more households each month, at a cost of over $14,000 per month to purchase the food. Their needs are: diapers, formula for babies, laundry soap, toilet paper and other paper items. Volunteers are needed. Call, 870-741-3130. Keynote speaker, Harriet Ford, announced her message, "Let's Get Real," and opened by saying, "I'll begin with a disclaimer. Some of you may have heard that, I'm....well... perfect. As much as I hate to disappoint anyone, you don't have to look too far to uncover my faults. I've got them all! You’ve heard the term, ‘Getting real.' I'm so glad I don't have to live a faultless life to earn my salvation." Ford went on to say, "You know how we women do whatever we can to make ourselves attractive? We put on false eyelashes, fake nails, and color our hair. We put on one of those torture devices to make our figures look slimmer. How real is that? I put on one of those spandex shapers once to flatten my middle. It had a hole in it and I thought for a few minutes that I had a tumor!" She continued by admitting the Bible told her that she didn't have to make herself beautiful and acceptable to God, because Jesus already did all that for her when He washed her sins away. She noted that she got a complete spiritual makeover. She pointed out that she wanted to tell everyone how all this happened and how God wove people into her life she never expected to meet, including a police woman, two men convicted of murder and how He performed a miracle in each of four lives. Ford told the attendees that first she wanted to relate how Jesus made Himself real to her. As a school teacher, she, like so many other people, had always claimed to be a Christian after she had accepted Jesus in the sixth grade. She admitted her only prayer life, as a child, was “Now I lay me down to sleep. If Jesus comes before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.” Her idea of spirituality was attending church once in awhile (when you really needed Him), and God would answer your prayers. She said that was as real as she knew Him to be until something happened to change her priorities. Ford said she and her husband had waited for almost five years to start a family and were so disappointed when she miscarried. She said a verse she learned as a child kept whispering; “When you seek Me with your whole heart, then you will find Me.” She admitted that then the Bible became her daily bread. She wasn’t asking for a child at the time, she just had a hunger to know God and feel His presence. Her first thought was, “Wow, nobody ever told me that the Lord is real!” She began to pray, “Father, it’s alright if I never have a baby. You are all I want and everything I need for a lifetime.” She said she found peace when she began to seek the Giver and not the gift. She claimed God’s promise that, “He would do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or imagine.” She wanted to sing the “Hallelujah Chorus” when nine months later she had a ten pound daughter, and two years later God miraculously gave them another one. She said that not until twenty two years later did she realize how miraculous this was, when she had a hysterectomy and the surgeon told her, “My dear, you had everything wrong with your reproductive organs that could be wrong, and you were born that way.” Ford testified that for several years she enjoyed God’s blessings raising her children and pursuing a teaching career. She soon was given a reporter’s position which she had always wished for. Because of her newspaper job, God began to weave the lives of three unlikely people together to reach one troubled young man. She recalls the lives of two men both convicted of murder and a young police woman. Ford related the supernatural encounter with a woman police officer who was shot five times while sitting in her police car. Ford said that, Sherry, the police woman told Ford her story later. Sherry was still alive, but unconscious while bleeding to death. Ford heard her story about what she experienced during her state of unconsciousness. Sherry said she heard weeping, wailing and deep groaning and wanted to help these people, but she was in deep sorrow herself, (though unrepentant) sorrow herself. Sherry said, “It was too late for me to repent. What an unspeakable and horrible realization.” Sherry said she heard a Great Voice, “Yes, there is someone evil out there, but I am mightier.” Inside she cried out to Jesus and started repeating the Lord’s Prayer inside, but couldn’t open her mouth. Ford listened to Sherry as she told of a fellow officer who came and rescued her. The doctors didn’t expect Sherry to wake up from surgery, but she regained consciousness the same day she was rescued, returning home five days later. Ford said, “A miracle? I think so.” Sherry remembered Psalm 33:3, “You have kept me alive that I should not go down into the pit.” Sherry had experienced resurrection. Ford recalled that several years later, while reporting on homicides, she heard of Ted Kuhl who was wrongly convicted of shooting his girlfriend. She said she continued investigating Ted’s conviction and had a fan club of convicts cheering her on. She received a letter from Johnny White, the leader of Satan’s Disciples, who was in prison for a drive-by shooting, hinting that he knew who killed Ted’s girlfriend. Ford asked herself if she should continue to communicate with this extremely dangerous man who still had contacts with his street Gang? God gave her peace and she continued writing to Johnny, became friend of his, and they began to trust each other. He told Ford that he was acquainted with Sherry, (the police woman who was shot,) and she was the only officer he ever trusted, because she always treated him with kindness. Ford shared Sherry’s powerful story with him and eventually he became of Disciple of Christ - not of Satan. Ford refereed to God’s Word and declares, “No sinner is beyond His mercy.” Ford further gives testimony how her husband was healed of esophagus cancer through their interceding prayers. While he was going through radiation and chemo therapy, she meditated on healing words and each morning was impressed with a new understanding. She said she wrote down all the verses and is sharing them with others in her book, “Faith Says What God Says.” She is praising God that her husband is cancer free. She testifies, “That’s the power of a Wonderful God!” Ford says, “God cared enough to heal my malformed and barren womb and made me a joyful mother of children. He called a police officer back to life and through her story, He reached Satan’s Disciple in a hell hole. Ted and Johnny are still in prison, but free from the prison of doubt and rejoicing in the hope of eternal life.” Harriet Ford is a Faithwriters award winner, and author of two books including “Faith Says What God Says” and “Move Over Harry Potter,” ( there’s a greater power than witchcraft,) which are recommended by Home School Book Review. She was once considered for Ann Landers job at the Chicago Times. She became a reporter/columnist and leads Bible Study groups. She is a Stonecroft Ministries speaker and a board member for Dr. Marla Woodmansee’s Kingdom Xperience ministry in Branson, Missouri. —Submitted by Twyla Cramer

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