This is a post I started right after our 2022 Grateful Girl Gathering Women’s Conference but never posted. It’s exactly what I talk about in this post from last year….wondering if I post my thoughts if someone will be judging me and my intention. After writing this post I didn’t say Yes and hit Submit. I let my feelings of inadequacy and fear of judgement allow me to just leave this post in draft form. But here I am… saying Yes.
If you are here reading this, I hope you don’t think I am talking about me or what I did. I pray that you hear what God did with my Yes. With the Yes of the women on our planning team, the Yes of the speakers and presenters and musicians and sponsors and everyone who said Yes when called on And what He will do with your Yes too.
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It’s been over a week now since our second Grateful Girl Gathering Women’s Conference, and I still can’t seem to put together the words to describe how I feel.
The day was filled with a gathering of women from across our region, from different churches, denominations, some with no denomination, different races, backgrounds and burdens…coming together to hear from powerful speakers, worship with an amazing praise team, learn fun new skills with talented DIY instructors and so much more! So much more.
Throughout the day, from the speakers to the music, I just kept hearing….Let God search your heart, Let Him truly know you, Let Him show you what He wants from you and then give Him your Yes.
As I prayed to begin the day, I said….we are so thankful that God uses flawed people for His glory. Isn’t that the truth. Flawed people who just say Yes. But that isn’t always so easy is it? For me, it isn’t my desire to serve God that is the problem, it’s the thoughts that follow. “You aren’t enough.” “People are thinking I’m not good enough…or a good enough Christian…to do this.” “People are judging my intention.” “Why me?”
That’s how the Grateful Girl Gathering began. With God speaking into my heart and me not saying Yes, but instead saying “No, not that. Not me.”
I had been praying for months for God to show me how to use my gifts for His kingdom. I had been working and living using the gifts He had given me to serve my work, my family and myself. But I had a void in my life, and I knew it was because I wasn’t doing anything to further the Kingdom.
This consistent prayer was happening in the last half of 2019. I began to feel an urging in my spirit that God was speaking to me about a women’s conference. Every time I prayed, I kept having this thought cross my thoughts. And of course, I said “Um no Lord, that’s not what I meant when I prayed for you to show me how to use my gifts for You. I’m sure that’s for someone else. I will wait on your calling for me.”
But I kept praying and the thought kept coming and I kept pushing it gently behind me.
Then on December 30, 2019, I began to get a strong feeling or urging to contact a pastor in our community. Pastor Tom Anglin was the pastor of The Bridge Church, and while we knew each other and were what I would call friends, I didn’t go to his church and couldn’t imagine why I should contact him. That just didn’t make sense. So I didn’t respond with a Yes and instead pushed that thought behind me too. And kept praying. And I had not said a word to anyone about these promptings about a women’s conference.
Then on January 5, 2020, while scrolling Facebook, I saw a live recording of The Bridge Church’s service. This was in the height of Covid and many churches had turned to online services. Pastor Tom’s son was preaching and sharing and I lingered on the video. Ryan began praying and his prayer was a prayer over those in our community with business ideas and goals. He prayed for those to be bold in their faith and to make a change in our community. He said what God is doing in this land has to do with the church. He said God will begin to give abundance of favor, to release the dream in your heart. he said that these dreams will be bigger than our county. it would be a year of encountering interesting things and knowing God. He ended with Deuteronomy 28:10 and prayed Purify our motives, our hearts and do something awesome in this place. Pastor Tom came up to the front of the church and said “The Spirit has said, I am opening many doors.” At that moment I felt a confirmation in my spirit about the idea of a women’s conference. But I went on about my days without saying a word to anyone. (Why couldn’t I just see and hear what God was saying and just step out and do it?)
A week later I had lunch with my daughters and shared with them what had been stirring in my heart about the conference. I was nervous to share it with them, to have the words come out of my mouth. I was expecting their support and excitement about my story. They listened and came back with “But you aren’t even committed to attending your own church every Sunday.” Thump.
It was like I had been hit in the throat. I immediately went into defense mode, but I knew they were right. It was true. I went to church, but really wasn’t faithful every week. And immediately my thoughts went to “They are right. What are you thinking? You aren’t good enough or Christian enough for God to be calling you to organize a Christian women’s event.” “You have been mistaken…those thoughts weren’t from God.” “That’s just your thoughts.” You are too flawed for God to want to use you like that.”
At this time in my life, I was also fighting some pretty serious anxious and depressive thoughts due to conflict in my work. I was in a place where I felt like rocks were being thrown at me from several directions, intended to bring me down, and I couldn’t understand why. I felt attacked many times and that led to depression and anxiety and thoughts of failure. Hearing my daughter’s response to my sharing about the conference after holding it inside for so long, felt like another confirmation….but this time that I was crazy to even have these ideas of a conference. But I kept praying.
And the urging to reach out to Pastor Tom Anglin grew even stronger. To the point that I would wake up with the thought that I was supposed to call him. And when I thought about calling him, I got so nervous. My stomach would do flips. Which didn’t make sense because we were friends. But I really pushed it away now after feeling like I shouldn’t even be thinking God was calling me to start the conference.
But those urgings wouldn’t go away. So I finally said, “Ok God. Yes. I will reach out to him. And then I’m done.”
I pulled up Pastor Tom’s number in my phone and I was a nervous wreck. (Totally out of character for me by the way). But I typed out a text that said something like ” Would you and Tammy (his wife) be willing to meet with me for coffee to share something that is on my heart?” He texted back something like “Of couse. We would love to.” And then my nerves went into overdrive. What was I supposed to say when we met?
On January 20, 2020, I headed to the local coffee shop to meet with Pastor Tom and Tammy. After pleasantries, I said “I’m not sure exactly why I am here, or what I am supposed to say, but I will share what’s been on my heart lately, you can listen, we can enjoy some great coffee and then I will feel like I have done what God wanted me to, He will leave me alone and I will be on my way.”
I began to share about my prayers for God to use me and all that had followed in the previous months. When I got to the part about a women’s conference, Pastor Tom said “Hmmmm”. I wasn’t sure if that was a good Hmmm or a bad Hmmm….but I kept talking. When I finished, I said “That’s all I’ve got. I don’t know what else I’m suppose to say.” He smiled and said let me show you something. He pulled out his phone and showed me a text he had sent his wife that week, right after I had texted him about a meeting. The text to his wife said “We should talk about a women’s conference for our area.” Hmmmmm. My heart stopped. Then leapt. That was the ultimate and final confirmation. We smiled, said a lot of wows and then Pastor Tom and Tammy offered their support and prayed. What God had placed in my heart was meant for me. Flawed me. And I knew that there was no denying, pushing aside or turning back now.
The very next day I began researching Christian women speakers and found Cherie Nettles. She is a Christian comedienne and travels across the country to share at conferences and events. At this point, I had no budget for the conference and had committed in my heart that if I needed to fully fund it on my credit card, then that’s what I would do. I knew that I was suppose to do it and was committed to do whatever it took. On January 21st I tracked down Cherie Nettle’s contact information and reached out. We arranged a phone call and honestly I was doubting I could convince her to come. But God was all up in that conversation and before I knew it we felt like fast friends and she was telling me “I’m coming! I understand you have no budget, so I am coming for half my normal speaking fee. We are going to make this work!” I knew God had made that whole thing work out and that we now had our first speaker and it was starting to feel real.
Keep in mind, at this point I think the only people I had shared this journey with was my family and Pastor Tom and Tammy.
One week later our pastor preached from 1 Peter 4:10. “Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms. And yet another confirmation for me. Was I reading too much into every sign? Most would probably say so. But I was seeking. As I was taking the steps that I thought God wanted me to take, I was still doubting. Doubting that I was the one He really wanted to do this. So I was seeking and searching for His signs and directions every day. And I held on to each one for dear life!
On February 4, 2020 I had a meeting with our Pastor Randy Bonner. At this point, covid is beginning to become more serious in the US but we had no idea the toll it would take and the years it would take from us. At the meeting with Pastor Randy, we were also joined by Carolyn, a dear church member, the church secretary and a lady that had worked on a previous women’s conference at our church. I began to tell them of the prayer journey I had been on and all of the ways God was showing me the next steps. Carolyn shared with me that the church ladies group did not plan to have a women’s conference that year and began to share her insight and suggestions on the planning of a conference. She shared honestly of the difficulties of planning an event like this. I expressed to her that if the church ladies decided to have another conference, I would set the conference I was working on aside and help them. She explained that she felt that just didn’t have the interest to continue hosting it and gave me her blessing. Pastor Randy offered his full support and told me to go big! I explained to them that I felt a strong pull to have the conference not be organized by one church but to be planned by women from different churches across the area. He was in full support of that idea and offered anything Western Carolina Church could do to help. Our three hour meeting ended with Pastor Randy praying over the event.
It was then that I finally began to cautiously reach out to my closest friends first to ask for their support and help with the conference. I asked for their suggestions of other women in the area that might like to help. And through prayer, a date was set for March 20, 2021, one year away.
On June 8, 2020….in the height of the Covid pandemic, a group of women met via Zoom to begin working together to plan the Grateful Girl Gathering. (That name came about during the meeting with Pastor Randy. I have a blog titled A Grateful Girl and adding the word Gathering to that came about from Pastor Randy’s meeting). I gave the group the background of what had brought us to this point and explained that I was feeling this pull to have a new kind of conference, to address the craving women were having for connection, to equip and encourage women to bring about change in our communities and I suggested the idea of adding in DIY sessions. That was something a bit unusual I admit, but my thought was that women would be attracted to those and they might serve as a unique way to invite friends who are not in church at the moment. We also added a boutique area for the attendees to shop with local businesses.
Over the next several months our group members met via Zoom and in some cases in person at coffee shops and local parks to set about planning and coordinating an event to bring women together to hear amazing speakers, experience moving praise and worship, find fun DIY presenters and to create an atmosphere and experience to make women feel seen, and loved.
I worked on social media, created a website, researched registration software and payment portals as our team members worked on the various aspects of the conference. It was decided we would launch tickets for sale on January 4, 2021. At this point, covid is surging. Numbers are increasing. But we still thought surely it would be over or greatly subsided by March.
We continued to pray about speakers and began to reach out to them. We were blessed with a great line up of amazing speakers including Cherie Nettles, Brooke Maratta and Jill Dasher. We also were blessed with a praise and worship team made up of musicians and singers from different churches in our community. That urge to have a conference planned by and led by people from different churches throughout our community was coming together. We were also blessed with a lodging sponsor, Springmaid Mountain, which allowed us to offer lodging to our speakers. (and they loved it!) We were blessed with a venue sponsor, church sponsors and so many people praying for our event.
As March 20 approached, covid was still moving throughout communities, but we knew we should move forward. We made all of the precaution plans that we knew to do and went forward. Registrations began to come in and we were amazed at the number of women and church groups making plans to come.
On the morning of March 20th our planning team joined early before our attendees arrived to pray over the event. As I began to pray, all I could do was cry. I was so overcome by what God had done. What He had done in spite of our flaws. How worthy He was of all of our efforts.
As the day progressed, there was just this overwhelming feeling that God was doing something. That He had taken our Yes and brought a group of women together to make connections with each other and with Him. It was humbling.
It was an incredible day and as we cleaned up at the end of the day, even though our bodies were tired, our hearts were full and there was no doubt we would plan another conference for 2022.
But the devil wasn’t going to go silently into the night. He was not happy with our Yes. As the time for planning the 2022 event rolled around, the devil sure began to work on me again. Incredibly I listened to his words. I still felt that no one would want to have the conference again, that I shouldn’t even try to plan another event… and on and on and on. And it went right through the Spring of 2022. The only way I could fight back was prayer. And God’s urgings again to remind me of what He will do with our Yes. We don’t do anything on our own. We can’t. But it does take the first step of saying Yes….and then watching God take it and create something amazing.
And that’s what He did with our 2022 Grateful Girl Gathering. Again…the speakers…wow! And the praise and worship…so amazing! And the DIY presenters, boutique vendors, lunch providers, volunteers….. it was just amazing once again to see what did with not just my Yes, but the Yes of each of our planning team. The Yes of the women who attended the conference…and on and on and on. We were also blown away by so much support from local businesses and churches for the event! Their Yes made so much possible in planning the conference.
And here we are, March 2023….planning for our next and third Grateful Girl Gathering. God is good y’all. And He wants to use each one of us to magnify Him and build His Kingdom. We don’t have to have amazing talents, know the Bible from front to back, be a pastor or teacher….we just have to give Him our Yes. And then be amazed to see what He can do with that simple act.
