What a difference a week makes....

Posted by Lisa Laree to Beer Lahai Roi

I'm going to be processing for a while, I'm sure, and there's no way I can begin to sum up the week in a single blog post.

So I thought I'd just share some images from the week...there will be more later, I'm sure, but for now, here's a glimpse of  a week that has changed my life.

The first hint of what was to come was waiting in the hotel room.  I honestly nearly cried when I walked in and saw the gift bag with my name on it.   I know that our church does gift bags when we have special guests come in for the women's conference or other events...but for such a bag to be prepared for me nearly undid me.

It was a few hours later when I began to wonder how I would get the books and other goodies that were in that bag packed into my already crammed suitcase for the trip home...so thankful for that extra 2" I got from unzipping that little fold. ;-)
 



Rita has a really cute reception space on her front porch; you wouldn't think I'd be surprised to see my name there,  but I did have a moment when I saw that I was listed along with all the others.  The icing on the cake is that royal blue is my favorite color in the whole world.





Being as how there were 14 of us at this event, we were a perfect van load.  Driving it around the Dallas area is NOT something I'd ever want to do; so grateful for Janelle, who not only drove us everywhere but made sure we had food delivered, picked up ice cream, prayed over us all week...you name it.  She was a huge part of the success of the week.





One of the most powerful moments  happened on Wednesday night; Rita had special guests Kristene DiMarco and Kalley Heiligenthal come in and share on Wednesday.  In the course of the day, a story came out about Kristene smashing a pumpkin as she was making declarations of things that needed to be broken in her life.  Someone mentioned that perhaps we should go get pumpkins and all smash them as we declared that we would not carry those lies back home with us.


Before the night was over, there were pumpkins procured and each one of us declared what we would see broken...what we were done with...as we smashed a pumpkin (yeah, that's a whole blog post by itself...). 
 







It was amazing to watch how everyone developed, changed, broke free, opened up as the week progressed.  I knew what to expect from Rita...she's been to our church several times to minister and I knew that she would not let anyone retreat into what was safe or stay where she was comfortable.  But what surprised me was that all the other ladies were so awesome.  Such talent, such depth, such promise on all of them.  I kinda think in 5 years, there will be 13 ladies that I will be able to point out and say, 'Hey, you know, she was in my Dive class.'

Thanks to Rita Springer for investing so much in so many.  Love, love her!

If you're curious about the DIVE  school...here's more info.