Women’s Weekend Recap

“I delight greatly in the LORD; my soul rejoices in my God.…”

Isaiah 61:10a

Women’s Weekend 2025 was a time of encouragement - full of deep conversations, yummy food, fun crafts, and amazing teaching and worship. It was such a joy to spend the weekend with you all, and I wanted to share a few takeaways from our time together.

Our speaker, Mary Henderson, opened our time on Friday night by sharing her powerful testimony. She spoke of the hardships and trauma she endured while growing up. She expressed, “I longed so deeply for love. I longed for security, and stability, and stable joy. I was just longing for Jesus.” Of course, life after coming to know Jesus was not perfect, and she shared about the intense physical and mental struggles that she suffered, to the point where she was unable to care for herself. Ultimately, these trials led her back to the feet of Jesus.

Mary pursued a license in counseling so she could help others (including us) to learn to retrain our brains and more fully experience God’s presence in our lives. Mary spoke from both personal and professional experience about what it means to truly delight in the Lord and how He delights in us.

Session 1 - Delighted 

Mary opened our first session with this question: “What if you could go through your life with significantly more joy than you have been?”

I’m sure we all perked up at that. Because isn’t that what we all want to experience, more joy? 

She then shared a quote that struck me: “Two men looked out through iron bars, one saw mud, the other saw stars.” And went on to say, “We all look out through our own prison bars in life, what do we train ourselves to focus on?”

If you’re like me, then you often see the mud, but desire to see the stars. Thankfully, Mary laid out practical steps and examples of how we can seek to do this more.

Two important life skills she shared with us are noticing (to become aware of) and savoring (doing something slowly, enjoying to the fullest). We went through an exercise together, that I would encourage you to do regularly, of closing our eyes and taking a moment to notice the sounds around us. Or throughout your daily life, you can stop to notice and savor the little things all around you that bring you joy, and write them down in a notebook (ie. a ladybug, a flower, a sunset, etc.) and then think about them at the end of the day.

One of the most fascinating things to me was the topic of neuroplasticity and how we can literally change our thought patterns by noticing and savoring things that bring us joy. 

She reminded us that even in hard times, we can find joy in the Lord, but it does take time, intentionality, and forming healthy habits that we choose over and over. As well as having compassion on ourselves when we fall short.

Mary shared examples of things that rob us of our joy like intense schedules, comparison, people-pleasing, performance and physical joy-robbers like hormone levels, brain chemistry, etc. 

She shared tips that are helpful to combat joy-robbers:

• Have compassion and grace toward yourself

• Make a habit of giving thanks every day, even in hard times

• Become aware of your own negative default filter and lenses, then proactively incorporate God’s Biblical perspective on it

• Include activities in your week that are life-giving

• Include life-giving friendships in your schedule

• Exercise consistently—research shows this increases our joy and peace

Session 2 - Delightful 

During the final session, we discussed how to experience God moment by moment in our daily lives. Mary reminded us how amazing it is that the Creator of the universe wants to have a relationship with us. Yet we sometimes struggle to believe how much He loves us.

We have to learn who God is and what the Bible says about Him instead of relying on our thoughts and feelings.

How can we do this more? By asking Him our questions and being honest about what we believe about Him. Our (often inaccurate) thoughts and feelings about who He is can actually distance us from Him.

Mary reminded us that faith is not about our feelings. It’s an inner confidence/conviction that we develop, and that God is infinitely loving and kind, and views us through the work of His Son.

Things that grow our faith/confidence that God is with us:

• Spend time with God through His Word

• Talk to God throughout the day like we would with a friend

• Prayer - write down your prayers and take note of how He answers

• Act upon the fact that you know God is with you - pause and give thanks that He is with you and meditate on it

Specific ways we can develop and nurture our experience with God:

• Talk to God throughout the day about what you’re thinking and feeling - share anything and everything

• Tell Him things you don’t like or don’t understand, things you’re struggling with

• Devote a day or a couple hours specifically to spending time with God

Mary’s Friday night testimony and her Saturday sessions are available on our website under Media Library. 

I would highly encourage you to go back and listen to them in full. Listening back to them ministered to me, and I gleaned even more from them.

During the free time on Saturday, I asked a few people for their thoughts on the weekend and I consolidated a few of the responses:

• “I cannot overstate how encouraged I have been this weekend. I love the women of this church!”

• Many people enjoyed the practical “how-to” tips and attainable examples that Mary shared during the session times, noting that they are excited to start implementing them in their lives. Also, specifically how Mary mentioned finding ways to “give, give, give” and finding things to be grateful for was encouraging.

• Small group times were very enjoyable and enabled people to get to know one another in a safe space.

• It was amazing that the Women’s Weekend was multi-generational.

• The discussion questions helped facilitate intimacy with one another and helped with getting to know people more.

• The powerful testimonies - a way we can get to know each other in a deeper way, and learn things that we may have never thought to ask about. Then, we can connect and relate to them and see amazing ways that God works in other people’s lives.

• A few mentioned that a room full of women singing the Doxology was beautiful!

These are just a few of the takeaways, and I’m sure there were so many more! As we go forward and seek to delight in Him, let me remind you, friend, that He delights in you.

A BIG thank you to Bincy, Debbie, and our retreat coordinators, Claire and Ronni! We are so thankful for you, your servant’s hearts, and the way you love the Lord and the women of SWBIBLE. Thank you for making Women’s Weekend happen!

Here is the link to our “theme song” of the weekend - “I Delight in You”