FDM’s Women’s Ministry – Ministry update from Sharm King

My husband (Dr Jonathan King) has been teaching a group of pastors from South India for the past one and a half years, teaching through Discipleship takes Vision and Strategy, Christian Foundational Truth, and now the Marriage is a Ministry series. Over this time there had been many requests for classes to be conducted for their wives who would benefit from being discipled in the area of marriage, an area not commonly addressed in churches. By the grace of God, after a period of being trained directly by Pastor Craig, I was able to begin teaching classes for women in September this year.

For the past few months, 13 women have been faithfully meeting with me over zoom once a week. We pray and worship together, and then study through the unique companionship needs of men and women in marriage. FDM’s workbooks are all biblically-based with much reflection and meditation on God’s word. I take great joy in expositing Scripture, explaining the context behind texts and passages and encouraging women to pick up the Bible for themselves to read. We work on setting up a good foundation for discipleship and marriage, which is essentially our identity in Christ and obedience to His Word. We discuss many cultural issues and we learn to discern between God’s ways and the ways of the world – an important exercise for every Christian.

In many cultures, the purpose of marriage as designed by God and the roles of men and women has become increasingly obscured and the Indian culture is no different. The area of intimacy in marriage is especially affected – what God had designed to be good and holy is often taboo and not spoken of in this culture, and that adversely affects the relationship between husbands and wives. We have begun to address some of this in my classes and will continue to do so. We hope to raise women who will be able to mentor and disciple other women in all areas of discipleship and marriage including the more sensitive areas, women who would stand firm in God’s word. Opportunities are continuing to multiply for pastors to teach on marriage and family discipleship in churches and through conferences or seminars, and now the Lord is paving the way for women to teach other women in these same things alongside the men. The Spirit of the Lord is on the move through all these ministry labors, so please join us in praying for a revival of discipleship to spread throughout the body of Christ for men and women alike, and husbands and wives together.