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A Word About Our Approach to Global Missions
What are “Global Missions”? For women who’ve been involved with Women Ministries for some time, it’s almost synonymous with the denominational Special Interest Missionary (SIM) program, sometimes called “Sisters in International Mission” here in the East Coast. The Global Mission Handbook published by our denominational WM does cover the SIM program, but it also includes several other programs/options. But Global Missions has a broader meaning. For one thing, the Covenant’s VERITAS process for church vitality identifies “global involvement and engagement” as a critical feature for any healthy missional church. And Christ himself gave the great commission to Go and Tell and Make Disciples. For those of us who can’t “go”, support has always been a priority.
Here in the East Coast Conference, how are we addressing global missions? As Global Mission Chair on the WM conference leadership team for several years I see two major thrusts. First, global concern is an integral part of what we do on the national and conference level. National special projects frequently emphasize global issues such as human trafficking. At the conference level the leadership team tries to communicate denominational thrusts and support conference ministries. Secondly, individual women are making themselves available to God’s work and are finding and getting involved in “a cause.” At the conference level the leadership team doesn’t always see or know about all these “causes.” But the few I’ve heard of are exciting and have transformed those involved. More people need to hear about them.
As this website is the “official” East Coast Conference Women Ministries communication tool, the leadership team is going to use it to showcase options and opportunities for you and your friends to be involved in God kingdom work in the wider world. Part of our purpose is to serve as the communication channel to and from the denomination offices, so we always include national WM emphases. To take a look at some of the areas East Coast women are involved in, click on any of the following:
- Children’s Home of Cromwell
- Cross Cultural Opportunities
- New Day for Children
- Partnership with Alaskan Bush Church in Koyut, AK
- Pilgrim Pines Conference Center
- Triennial
- Raise the Flag
- Rip and Roll
- Special Interest Missionaries (Sisters in International Mission)
- Support of Missionary Cottage Industry efforts
- Women’s Seafarers Friend Society
- World Relief
We’d also like to spotlight some of the “causes” Christ has revealed and moved women in the conference to be involved with. We’ll try to share them with the larger WM community through this website. If you have a “cause” Christ has led you to, consider talking about it here. Please contact me, Olinda Young.
Mission Opportunities
Here in Alphabetical Order are programs, projects and partnerships your East Coast Conference Women Ministries Leadership Team has or is supporting.
The Children’s Home of Cromwell (CHOC)
The women of the conference have had a long association with this organization, from its beginnings as an orphanage for Covenant kids. Two years ago we collected bagpacks and school supplies for the residents at a Pilgrim Pines retreat. For more information see their website at www.childhome.org .
Cross Cultural Opportunities (CCO)
Nationally Women Ministries offers Cross Cultural Opportunities (CCO) for groups of twelve to fifteen women to travel in countries with which the Evangelical Covenant Church has a mission partnership. Following the PACE (prayer and cultural education) model, Women Ministries’ CCOs are characterized by two verbs: learn and pray. Participants will learn about the culture, the obstacles to presenting Christ in that culture and how mission partners are overcoming them. Prayer opportunities are a major part of each trip. Pending opportunities include the following:
- Mexico, possible departure of January 2012, led by Jo Ellen Reeves
- Mexico, possible departure of mid September to mid November 2012, led by Jo Ellen Reeves
- Alaska, possible departure of February 2012, led by Mary Putera
New Day for Children
This effort is fruit of the final year of the denominational WM’s Break the Chains Project. We supported the outreach effort of a Covenant Church in Los Angeles as they established a home for teenage girls rescued from the sexual trafficking industry in the US. See the home’s website for details: www.newdayforchildren.com . There is also more information about Break the Chains on the denomination web site.
Partnership with Alaskan Bush Church (Koyut, Alaska)
For over 100 years the Covenant denomination has served various ethnic groups throughout Alaska, with special emphasis on the remote communities of rural Alaska. Of the 19 Covenant Churches in Alaska, 13 are in Western “Bush” Alaska, where there are no roads in or out. Of these thirteen, ten are small and unable to support a pastor without some help. Alaska exerts many challenges and hardships on those who are called to minister to the peoples of the Last Frontier. In addition to serving in a remote location with long dark winters, pastors and youth workers ministering here are confronted constantly with issues of teen suicide, extreme substance abuse, domestic violence and sexual abuse. Also, many serve communities that lack the basics of modern sanitation and housing.
We, as a conference, have committed to help one of our sister churches in Alaska. Our adopted church is located in Koyuk, 90 air miles northeast of Nome. Koyuk has a population just under 300 at last census. The pastor and his wife, Wass and Jean Mute, will appreciate any assistance we can give them. But just what can you do? Here are some ideas:
• Encouragement: Write a letter (Pastor Wass and Jean Mute, P.O. Box 53098, Koyuk, AK 99753) or email (jg_mute@yahoo.com) or place an occasional telephone call (907-963-2016) to let them know you are praying for them. Find out their birthdays and anniversary and let them know we care.
• Care packages: Since everything must be flown in, simple things are very expensive. You can send anything that is non-perishable (nuts, dried fruit, brownies, bread mixes, paper products, toiletries, etc.) Be creative. The post office has fixed rate boxes which you can fill up and ship for less than $15 depending upon the size you choose. • Mission teams: If you would consider being part of a construction work, contact East Coast Conference Koyuk Work Teams c/o rrsatterberg@juno.com for more information.
• Financial: Most of the bush pastors must find other means of supporting their family because the church is unable to provide a sustaining salary. This is the case for Wass. If your church has a mission committee, perhaps they would put the Koyuk church in their mission budget. Or maybe, as an individual or family, God will lay it on your heart to send a donation.
• Donate Air Miles: Many people accumulate free air miles. Please consider donating some to ECCAK to help a bush pastor and their family get away for R & R.
Pilgrim Pines Conference Center
“The Pines”, one of the Conference’s ministries, has had a place close to the hearts of East Coast Women Ministries for many years. This lovely campground and conference center has hosted many fall retreats for us over the years. Our former three-year special project was a fund raiser to acquire a multi-seat “people mover” cart to assist mobility challenged guests. For more information about the programs, facilities and plans for the campgrounds, see their website: www.pilgrimpines.org .
Triennial
Sponsored by national Women Ministries, this every-three-year conference of all Covenant Women moves around the country. In 2010 it was held in Washington, D.C. and centered on the theme “Reflecting God’s Glory”; in 2013 it will be in San Diego, CA. Planning has already begun. It’s time to start saving so you can attend! Fun, powerful, moving and unforgettable are just a few words to describe what you can expect.
Raise the Flag
This is a Compassion, Mercy and Justice project to provide monetary support so a foreign sister in Christ can attend Triennial. Coordinated by national WM, each conference gets involved as a sponsor. The East Coast leadership team budgets an annual amount so there is less “shock” in the year of the event; however, we never know from what country our guest will be traveling until very late. Usually we invite the guest to visit the conference after the event, so there are opportunities for hospitality, touring, etc. In the past we have also gifted our guests. For 2007 and 2004, we collected quilt squares from each church and created handmade quilts. Contributions from churches and individuals are always welcome and can be noted “Raise the Flag fund.”
Rip and Roll
This is a denomination WM effort and is described in the Global Missions Handbook, which is available for download online at www.covchurch.org/women . There is also a slide show called The Journey of a Bandage that can be downloaded. By repurposing old bed sheets and creating cloth bandage rolls, participants provide the equivalent of more than $140,000 worth of medical supplies annually. This is an ageless activity. Even small children can help with some of it, however there is sewing involved. The women in the southern part of the conference have a Rip and Roll workshop every year at their retreat at Black Rock, PA. The conference has a handmade bandage roller that can be borrowed, if you contact the Global Mission Chair.
Special Interest Missionaries (SIM) aka Sisters In International Mission
Conceived and coordinated by national WM, this effort provides the opportunity for local church groups and individuals to partner with Covenant women missionaries, both active and retired. The goal of the SIM program is for every Covenant woman missionary – single, married, active, retired, or project missionary – to be partnered with specific Women Ministries affiliates in local Covenant churches.
The crucial networking between missionary and home support group begins when each Covenant woman missionary is linked with one of the ten Conferences for a three-year period beginning and ending the January after the Triennial International Women’s Conference. Every three years, SIMs are connected with a different conference. This way the network of relationships grows as each affiliate experiences the breadth of our global mission. Dynamic relationships between our women missionaries and local affiliates are built as they get to know the SIMs and support them.
The East Coast Conference WM team has assigned an active and two retired SIMs to every church in the conference. The announcement mailing included contact information, family information and a word about a special project they would like to have funded. Every year we get updates on their project. Each missionary is profiled in the annual Covenant Prayer Calendar available from Chicago and most have web sites which can be accessed through the national covchurch.org website. The exception is for people working in “restricted” countries where being a Christian or doing “church work” is dangerous. Because of this danger the East Coast’s SIM names are not included here. We are supporting 6 active missionaries in Japan, Spain, Ecuador, Southeast Asia.
Your contributions towards small gifts for SIM birthdays and their projects can be sent to the WM Conference Board Treasurer no later than December of each year at this address:
Cathy Fredlund
WM Financial Secretary
298 Valley View Road
Thomaston, CT 06787
The Global Missions Chair, Olinda Young, is also available for questions and comments about our SIMs through the conference web site at www.eastcoastconf.org (Select “Women Ministries”), the Women Ministries website at www.eccwomen.org or by email at Olinda.3@netzero.com .
Support of Missionary Cottage Industry Efforts
This is a wonderful way for folks to express their love to family and friends and also support missions. At the 2010 Pines fall retreat we sold “unplaced” brocade handbags (left over from Triennial) made by the rescued women served by the Abundant Life Mission in Thailand. We also provided outlets for both the “Sisterhood of the Traveling Scarves” (to support an outreach effort in Muslim Turkey) and Your women’s groups can easily conduct this type of mission work by providing family and friends the opportunity to buy “alternate gifts” for holidays and significant events. Oxfam, Heifer Project, and countless others can be located by a quick Google search.
Women’s Seafarers Friend Society
Women of the East Coast have long been involved in the work of this 117 year old organization which supports the work of the New England Seafarers Mission (in Boston, Ma and Providence, RI.). Their main thrust is sewing, knitting or donating materials for “ditty bags” given to merchant and cruise ship crews when they visit. Necessary information and patterns for knitting caps, assembling mending kits or sewing the bags are available at the seafarers website: www.neseafarers.org . They had a display at the 2010 Pilgrim Pines retreat. The Society held its 2010 Annual Meeting at the Attleboro, Ma Covenant Church in April 2011. Several years ago at the Pilgrim Pines retreat we collected ditty bags and supplies for their annual effort.
World Relief
The denomination’s Covenant World Relief effort is an active partnership with the international World Relief organization. Check out the denomination website at www.covchurch.org for details about Haitian relief work and African drought relief among other things. Then check out the international World Relief website at www.worldrelief.org . They conducted a bike-across-America fund raiser for a new program to support the victims of systematic rape in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (formerly Zaire).
If you have any questions about Women Ministries, do not hesitate to email these members of the East Coast Conference Women Ministries Team: Karen Grant at KJGCool [at] gmail.com, Susan Falcetta at SFalcetta [at] trinitycovenantchurch.org, Barbara McKay at bmka [at] sbcglobal.net , Emily Montfort at EMontfort209 [at] gmail.com, Sue Van Hoewyk at sue.vanhoewyk [at] gmail.com , Olinda Young at olinda.3 [at] netzero.com, Courtney Crowder at Courtneycrowder [at] yahoo.com, Cathy Fredlund at cbfredl [at] optonline.net Lisa Olsen at sundell4 [at] optonline.net , or Barbara Barnes at BABarnes [at] aol.com .
Devotionals Blog
Please visit the Women Ministries devotionals written by Emily Montfort...