PWOC Christmas Brunch

This year, I am involved in a women's organization on base called PWOC (Protestant Women of the Chapel). My job description is the VP of Spiritual Life, which basically means I oversee our weekly Bible Studies. I serve on the board with some incredible women including my good friend Christy Jenkins (who also happens to be the one who takes all of those incredible photos of my family... she is very gifted!).

Anyway, Christy and I had a vision this year to have a Christmas Brunch. For both of us, the churches that we left behind in Maryland would keep this annual tradition as a way for the ladies to get together for some food and fellowship, and to get our hearts right for the Christmas season. The PWOC board decided that our theme for the brunch would be "Daughters of the King," which sent Christy's and my imaginations into full-speed!

Christy did so much work organizing and advertising this event. She is also incredibly gifted at decorating. With the help of some other women, she transformed our chapel annex into a masterpiece with tapestries and lovely decorations throughout. It really was beautiful.As for me, I got to work right away on writing a short script for a skit to be performed. The title was "Daughters of the King," and the story line basically was about 4 daughters who each prepared for their father's (the King) return from war. One decorated the kingdom, one prepared a feast, one made a gift, and the other prepared her heart.... you see the analogy. Sometimes when reading the script, I felt like a fourth grader could have written it, but I suppose that didn't matter.

I also was responsible for giving the main message for the morning. I am realizing that preparing a message is quite a process, and I've been learning so much through it. Basically, my message was about what it means to be a Daughter of the King. I focused on looking at God with the characteristics of being a king, and following with the analogy, what it's like to be in His kingdom instead of the ones we've made for ourselves. I was really pleased at how it came out. Ethan helped me work through a lot of it, and it was a great experience working together.

Our brunch was last Saturday (12/5), and it was a true success. We had about 50 women attend, which was wonderful. (A few weeks prior, we only had about 20 women signed up, so to have that many there was so encouraging.) Different women set, decorated, and hosted tables (here's a picture of my table). We had a delicious brunch, some gorgeous music (with piano, violin, flute, and singing), some door prizes, a pinning ceremony for our new members, the skit (by the way, that's our chaplain playing the part of the king), and the message.I was so pleased with how well everything went for our first attempt. All of the women seemed to leave encouraged and re-focused on the Christmas message, and I suppose that's what's it's all about.