July 17th 2011 was an awesome day, as several hundred people attended the four hour service highlighted by testimonies from the various people involved from the inception of the church. Visionary ideas of a few years ago came to completion on this day. Since our last trip in November, the church as been painted, the name is on the front and a church full of benches have been built.
Reverend Montreuil Milord, pastor of South Dade United Methodist Church in Homestead presided over the dedication. It was a great pleasure for us to have him there.
The church leaders were very proud to take their part in the dedication ceremony. The Mission Church of the New Jerualem has a strong council of five men and two women. They have shown good accountability and they sincerely want to be leaders not just in their church, but in the community.
Aunl Bellany's team from Homestead, Florida attending the dedication included Vicky Ballany, Maria Milord and Ipomene Valbrun. This team put on a two day medical clinic for the community.
Three weddings were held on Saturday!! What a blessing as these couples made the commitment to each other with God's blessing. The ceremonies were beautiful, as were the brides.
The ladies two day Bible study was well received by the 35 women who attended. We studied lessons that were applicable to the issues in their lives. We all had a very spiritual time sharing with these wonderful women. A talk about serving ended with the women on our team applying hand cream to all of the ladies attending. It was a bonding time that focused on our similarities, and not on what makes us different. We taught the use of the Evangecube for witnessing for Jesus, and gave several to each church represented. There were women from eight different churches present. A real ecumenical gathering!
The team from North Naples United Methodist Church, Janice Coffey, Linda Scott and Sally Ritter with the ladies Bible group.
