The Story
Perhaps you heard how Stitching Your Story became a sewing story, and I told God that was a crazy idea. Sewing and teaching a deep level of peace with God and inner healing just didn’t seem to go together.
BUT GOD….
Graciously, He continued to push me in that direction.
Last year, after publishing the book, I sent copies to a few sewing ministries I found online, just to bless them—one seamstress (sewist) to another.
Then this winter, a phone call from Kathie, the founder of Come and Sew Ministries International (CASMI), with a request to translate it into Albanian. I was speechless and in tears. It was a defining moment. Until that phone call, I really did not know why God had made the book a sewing devotional. Even though it had won several awards (and in fact just won a third award—this time a Bronze Selah award) I really didn’t see any greater purpose in God’s distinct directions for writing the book.
But in one phone call it made sense; I felt seen. That God saw me, behind the sewing machine, like the boy who came with the loaves and the fish, I came saying all I have is this sewing, some writing, and a little time.
Over the past few months, I have gotten to know more about CASMI and their model of sewing discipleship classes, which they operate in local churches, a women’s prison, and in a home for abused women. Through these classes, the women learn a skill, which can provide income, and hear about Jesus, often for the first time.
As CASMI is a faith-based, donor-funded organization, they will wait until the project is fully funded. If you would like to be a part of the translation work or would like to find out more about their mission, this is a link to their latest newsletter.