Women in Christ is a ministry I started about a year ago. After several conversations with a few of my girlfriends separately I realized that a lot of us had gone through similar situations but didn’t know that about one another. I thought to myself, wouldn’t it be great if we can share those experiences and testimonies with each other to not only help ease the pain but also to let each other know that we are in this together. I immediately started thinking of ways to get everyone together at the same time. One evening I was watching Iyanla: Fix My Life and she had a special series called the “house of healing”. The premise of the show was to bring a bunch of women together from different walks of life, and put them in a house so that they can not only heal as individuals but as sisters. Women leaning on each other. I remember her saying, “it’s not enough to just be my sister’s keeper, but I AM my sister”. It allows us to be empathetic instead of sympathetic. It was a powerful series and a light bulb went off in my head. I said to myself, this is what I want to do. I told a few people about it and decided that I was going to start praying on it. I didn’t know where I was going to get the resources to fund something like that, but nevertheless I placed what was on my heart before God. While I was waiting for an answer from God, I began to notice that a lot of my friends and I were all in the same place/rut when it came to dating and finding lasting relationships. Some were getting out of long-term relationships and marriages, others couldn’t get it right and had difficulty finding a great partner. Some of us were single mothers and wanted to find good role models and life partners to help raise our children, while others wanted to find someone so that they can get married and start a family. I began to think, what are we doing wrong? We are beautiful, strong, educated women; why is it so hard to find lasting relationships? I decided that we should pray and fast about it. The fast began September 1st, 2016 and was 28 days long. I chose 28 days because I came up with 4 topics that we would pray and fast about and for each topic we would fast for 7 days as 7 is the number of completion. I decided that we should fast from sex, and anything else that’s distracting us from getting to where we needed to be  and hindering us from hearing God’s voice. I personally chose to not only fast from sex but from social media as well. The first week we prayed that we would be filled with the Holy Spirit and for discernment.  The second week, we prayed that we will find God-fearing men who would not only love and honor us, but also love and honor our children and our families. The third week we prayed for happiness. Happiness within ourselves and happiness that wasn’t conditional on our circumstances. We prayed that we will praise and serve the Lord in the good times as well as the bad times. The fourth and final week, we prayed for health. Healing for our minds, bodies and souls; spiritual healing, physical healing and mental healing. At the beginning of each week I would send out a small devotional message coupled with a biblical text and a song to meditate on. At first I was just doing it because at that point I’d tried almost everything else, so trying God couldn’t hurt. I must say, It was the most refreshing thing that I did. It not only cleared by mind but it solidified my purpose and reasons for wanting to start this ministry. It was such a success that I decided it would be an annual fast. A renewing of the mind, body and soul. A special time to be still and reconnect with God.