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HOUSTON—Debbie Stuart, director of ministry initiatives at Hope for Heart, and Laurie Cole, founder of Priority Ministries, led women-only breakout sessions Sunday and Monday (Nov. 8, 9) during the 2015 Bible Conference preceding the annual meeting of the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention.
In keeping with the discipleship focus of the Bible conference, Stuart and Cole discussed the importance of moving beyond professing faith in Christ to actively seeking to live as a disciple of Christ. They both stressed that being a disciple also means being a disciple-maker.
Sunday evening
Stuart, who served as women’s ministry director at Prestonwood Baptist Church before transitioning to Hope for the Heart, spoke to a full room of women during the first breakout session Sunday night, encouraging them that they can be women “who change the course of history.”
Stuart shared how women in the local church came alongside her and invested in her when she lost her mother to cancer at 23 years of age. Those women, Stuart said, kept her from “going off the deep end.”
“It was women in the local church in Shreveport, La., who stepped into my life and changed the course of history for me,” Stuart said.
Now, Stuart leads efforts to reach other women, both inside and outside of the church. Pointing to Daniel 1:4, Stuart explained that the enemy actively pursues the “best and the brightest” and recruits them to his camp, teaching them and training them for his purposes. So, Christian women must actively teach and train other women in the ways of the Lord as a direct counter measure, Stuart said. She then offered insight into the “what” and “how” associated with that effort:
Multiply Ministry
“Don’t do it yourself,” Stuart said. “The Lord didn’t model that. You don’t have all the creative aptitude to be able to do that.”
Stuart advised women to recruit volunteers in order to help the church recognize and reach the diverse groups of women that make up the congregation and the community.
Mobilize women
“We stay in our own little worlds, our own little yards,” Stuart said, admitting that she wished she had done a better job ministering to the last neighborhood she lived in. She went on to urge the women to get out of their comfort zones to reach women. She said that while working at Prestonwood, the women’s ministry developed a requirement that before a woman taught Bible study at the North Texas megachurch, they would first lead a women’s Bible study at one of the local prisons.
Maximize Ministry
“Allow [women] to use what God has allowed in their lives,” Stuart said, going on to elaborate about a painful situation in her own family that the devil meant for evil but the Lord meant for good.
In a later breakout session, Cole, too, pointed to a crisis in her family that the Lord used to capture her heart and attention. That experience helped equip her to minister to other women, she said.
Mentor Successfully
Pointing to Titus 2, Stuart explained another admonition from God that women teach and train the younger women in the church.
“There is always a younger woman,” Stuart said, reminding those in their 20s that they ought to be pouring into the 19-year-olds they know.
Monday morning
Stuart and Cole, along with SBTC women’s ministry associate Emily Smith, discussed tangible ways to begin discipleship-focused relationships in communities, pointing to inviting women over for tea and sweets as an example. The SBTC has provided free online resources to take the guesswork out of inviting women to tea, including recipes, invitations, icebreakers, devotionals and other downloadable items.
“Girls, we are about multiplying,” Cole said. “We’re not just about staying ‘us four and no more.’ We’ve got to begin reaching out and going where they are.”
Monday afternoon
Cole continued the conversation Monday afternoon and pointed to Priscilla as a woman who first became a Christian, then a disciple and then a disciple-maker.
“If you choose not to become a disciple, what will happen is you’ll become what I call a casual Christian—a carnal Christian. You don’t just stay the same. You begin to drift. That is a dangerous place to be,” Cole said. “You become not only ineffective, but you become a stumbling block to the cause of Christ.”
