Sometimes the silliest palanca can become the most treasured. On Lorena Molzahn’s weekend, the reunion group speaker gave out cleverly decorated refrigerator magnets crafted from painted ice cream spoons. The words on the spoons read: Create Reunion Groups.
Lorena felt that she needed a reunion group, but she couldn’t imagine making it happen. Six months later, she served on team. Her community has a tradition in which each team member chooses a number representing an anonymous candidate, and the team member is to pray for that candidate months before the weekend and during the weekend. On Sunday morning, the match is revealed. It’s one of the high points of the women’s weekend.
She had chosen Number 31, but when the weekend started, she saw that there were only 30 candidates. “I wanted to cry,” she said. “I’d prayed for someone nonexistent for months!”
She soon discovered God’s very different plan. “After I whined my disappointment to the rector, she gave me some good advice: ‘Lorena, I think you have been praying for a Reunion Group.’”
Days later came an unexpected email — was she interested in starting a reunion group? “I hesitated to commit,” Lorena admits. “I didn’t even know this woman, but my heart ached to be in a group that understood the kind of support I had found on my weekend.”
At the last minute, she decided to show up at the coffee shop. Lorena, together with the woman who sent the message and that woman’s friend, chose a time, date and Bible study to work with, but had no central place to meet. “God kept tugging on my heart,” Lorena said, “so despite my reservations, I offered my house every other Saturday afternoon.”
And the women came. “We shared prayer and praises, sorrows and needs. We began to grow in God and in deep friendship with each other. The funny thing is, we had little in common. Some were young. Some were married, some had never been, some were divorced. We attended different churches, lived in different towns. None of it mattered. We all wanted to put into action what Tres Dias had birthed in us.”
Lorena admits that prior to Tres Dias her Christian walk was faltering. “I was not living each day wholly for God; I was not studying His word. I was not even attending church regularly. I had no accountability. The reunion group revitalized my spiritual life.”
For seven years now, Lorena has hosted her reunion group, open to anyone who wants to live a life with purpose. God is using her gift of hospitality to be a blessing to others. Her life has become an example of 1 Timothy 6:6, Fan the flames of the gift of God that is within you.
The ice cream spoon is still on her refrigerator. She smiles every time she sees it.
Editor’s note: This story is based on Lorena’s fourth-day rollo at a recent Northern California Tres Dias weekend. Jan Coleman is a member of that community and serves as secretary for the International Secretariat.
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