Paul

Teachers Who Make a Difference: Lois and Eunice

Posted on by Laura Savage-Rains

Do you have a favorite coffee mug? Does it have a story? I have several, but today’s mug is my Starbucks Cyprus mug given to me by my good friend KayLyn. She used to live in Cyprus when she was a missionary to a Near Eastern country. Her mother and I got to travel together to go visit KayLyn on that beautiful island country in the Mediterranean. Several years later, KayLyn gave me my Cyprus mug because she knew I would enjoy it and the memories it would conjure up.

Some of those memories are of the many things KayLyn taught me about being a missionary. She is my “shero” for being willing to go live and work in the Middle East as a single Christian woman. Much of what I have learned about living and working cross-culturally I learned from KayLyn because I watched her live out her principles in some very difficult places. I believe I had such an easy transition living in Romania because of the things KayLyn helped me understand years before I ever went to live overseas. She wasn’t purposefully teaching me and I wasn’t intentionally her student. Yet within the context of our friendship and mutual encouragement, I learned things that I never would’ve picked up from a book. Thank you, KayLyn!

Which brings me to the biblical women I want to talk about this week: Lois and Eunice. Do you know who they were?

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A World Traveler: Phoebe

Posted on by Laura Savage-Rains

Did you know that Sunday, March 8, is International Women’s Day (IWD)? Most of the world celebrates it while the US hardly notices. In many countries, March 8 is celebrated like the US celebrates Mother’s Day, yet in most places, all women are honored–not just mothers. I like to celebrate IWD by donating to one of my favorite organizations: Global Women, a Christian nonprofit striving to bring positive change to the lives of vulnerable women around the world. You can learn more and donate online at http://www.GlobalWomenGo.org. Your gift to Global Women will help:

– stop sex trafficking in Moldova

– birth babies in Haiti

– educate girls in Zambia and India

– develop sewing skills in Romania, Myanmar, and Uganda

– bring clean water to Zambia

– and more!

While thinking about the needs of women around the world, I also watched a few TED Talks this week on various women’s issues. If you have not discovered TED Talks yet, you are missing out! Go to TED.com and spend some time learning some incredible things on just about any topic.

Then my mind started wondering which biblical woman I wanted to tell you about this week. I decided on one who traveled internationally herself. Her name was Phoebe. She is only mentioned in two verses in the New Testament. You will find her in Romans 16:1-2, the famous text ascribed to the Apostle Paul. While the verses may not be very enlightening about the details of her life, the context and a historical understanding of these verses reveal a great deal about the role she had in the church and Paul’s support and encouragement of that role. Read on . . .

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