Seven Aglow women gathered in Holland, MI, during their annual Tulip Festival to pray for the city and look for divine appointments.
Although we didn’t know each other in the beginning, we left for home woven together by the
time spent praying, sharing, laughing, eating and conversing with others. While there, we
watched two parades, learned much about the original Dutch windmill and the folks who
used it, saw myriad number of tulips (the sun came out big time on Thursday and the tulips
decided to open their blossoms. BEAUTIFUL), enjoyed the peacefulness of Lake Michigan, the channel
and light house and the grains of sand between our toes and even got in a short amount of
time to shop. HA!
All in all, we learned more about ways to approach people, how to begin short conversations,
how to be directed by the Holy Spirit and how intricately HE planned out footsteps, how to get
past our fears and awkwardness and much more. Basically we just prayed for the city and the things
that we were involved in and let the conversations develop. A number of examples are;
1.) when shopping, talking to the clerks,etc., about how we could pray for their business, their city,
and any other concerns and being received warmly 2.) during the Children’s parade when others would talk about some of the
difficulties for children in our culture today, we were able to offer encouragement to them, 3.) at a time
when we were not sure what to do next, God used a shop manager who overheard our conversation to make
it clear what was next and very emotionally told us numerous times “we were needed to pray for the children.”,
4.) a young mom watching the parade who overheard our rather hurried blessing of our sack lunches and said”
it’s been a long time since I’ve heard that on the street”,
5.) lastly the police sergeant who, when told that we were there praying for the city and the police , immediately said
let’s pray then, took off his hat and bowed his head as we seven gathered around him and prayed aloud on the street corner with people everywhere.
So much more could be shared. We went home thankful for the privilege of being able to share God’s care with so many and to see Him at work.
by Cheryl Erbes
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