We encourage girls third grade and up to join us! This conference is for ALL women—young, single, married and “more seasoned,” as well as your treasured friends. So, gather the women in your circles, plan a special weekend away, and we will save you some seats!
There will be a Saturday morning special session for girls in Grades 3-12 to attend Created for a Purpose. During the other sessions, everyone will be together in the Sanctuary, and we have designed each session to be engaging for all ages.
God’s WORD tells us we are
MADE FOR MORE…
MORE Purpose • MORE Value • MORE Mission
MORE Hope • MORE Belonging
…than the WORLD could ever offer!
Charlotte, NC – Jan. 31-Feb. 1, 2025
Dallas, TX – April 4-5, 2025
Naperville, IL – May 2-3, 2025
Past Conferences:
Birmingham, AL – September 13-14, 2024
San Diego, CA – September 27-28, 2024
Colorado Springs, CO – October 18-19, 2024
Naples, FL – November 8-9, 2024
Annapolis, MD – November 15-16, 2024
Early Registration Cost: $75/person; $30 for girls Grades 3-12 and college students
Price includes registration, supplies for Created for a Purpose, and lunch on Saturday
Come join us as we explore how God MADE US FOR MORE because of our creation design, gospel identity, and inter-generational friendships.
Schedule:
Friday, 2:00-5:00 pm – Pre-Conference Trainings (See specific locations for options; below is an overview)
- Women’s Ministry Training – Presented by a Women’s Ministry Trainer
- Thinking Biblically and Living Covenantally – Our Women’s Ministry Training gives women a framework to think biblically about who God is and who He is calling women to be in the context of home, workplace, and church. It also provides tools to help women cultivate a Word-based and relationally-driven discipleship culture that can help establish, reinvigorate, or tune-up a Women’s Ministry that will strengthen the entire church.
- Children’s Ministry Training – Katie Flores, B.A. Snider
- Investing in the Covenant Family – “Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised!” The Psalmist says God makes His greatness known through stories of His mighty deeds (Psalm 145:1-9). The good news of salvation becomes real as we declare the things He has done. The message and method of sharing God’s mighty deeds changes over time, though the privilege (and duty) remains. This preconference considers the opportunities and challenges of telling the next generation the great deeds of the Lord in the various chapters of our lives. If you desire to gain confidence in sharing the glorious deeds of the Lord with the next generation, come join us for this interactive workshop. Walk away with tools in your toolbox for engaging children of all ages.
- Navigating Sexuality and Gender: Biblical Truth and God’s Compassionate Wisdom – Ellen Dykas
- Parents’ and Youth Leaders’ Track – Practical guidance on understanding God’s design for sexuality and gender, why and how kids are struggling, and how we can help them grow up living faithfully in Christ while also resisting worldly influences and teaching. Moms and youth leaders: God has given you everything you need to engage this important ministry, as you learn what God has already put in your ‘discipleship tool belt.’
- Created for a Purpose – Ingram Link (This will be held from 4-5 pm on Friday)
- Created for a Purpose Ministries exists to train, equip, and resource churches to host creative arts camps for 3rd through 8th grade girls! Daily art projects serve as tangible reminders of biblical truths, and a day-camp structure allows high school, college, and adult women to participate in intergenerational ministry. This pre-conference workshop will share what it looks like for a church to offer Created for a Purpose to its own congregation and larger community. Specifically, the workshop will:
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Introduce the ministry, presenting an overview of what Created for a Purpose is and how it functions;
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Walk through big picture logistics: the team you need to assemble, spiritual curriculum, project curriculum, and camp organization;
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Outline resources host churches have access to when partnering with Created for a Purpose Ministries.
Our prayer is that through this ministry, God would draw ladies both young and young at heart to himself. We hope you will join us for this workshop!
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Main Conference: Friday, 7:00-8:30 pm
- Session 1, Creation Design with Paula Miles: Why am I here? What is my purpose? If we are honest, these are questions that women everywhere (including you and me) are asking. Many of us are weary of the world’s answers. We find them empty and unsatisfying. So what do we do? We look to our Creator, the One who fashioned and formed us. He has provided answers for us in His Word, full of hope and deeply satisfying. We are created in His image, uniquely designed female, with great love and purpose. Though distorted by sin, He has provided through Jesus a way for us to daily live out our creation design and purpose. As the Spirit grows us in our understanding and ability to walk in light of these truths, we will experience real joy and freedom as women, being exactly who we were created to be. You were made for more!
Saturday, 9:00 am to 2:30 pm
- Session 2, Gospel Identity with Ellen Dykas: Who are you? Who am I? These important questions get at the heart of identity. The Bible has a lot to say about our identity as girls, women and…people made in God’s image! The world’s voice (and maybe friends, books, music artists, etc.) tries to convince us that our body size/shape, feelings, likes/dislikes, or friend group, or personal ideas are what identify us, God says that we only know who we really are when we understand who Jesus is and what He can make us to be. Our identity as loved, unique, chosen and delighted in daughters of God is better than anything the world has to offer…and it will never change!
- Session 3: [Girls will go to Created for a Purpose and Adults will go to Ellen Dykas’ second talk]
- Created for a Purpose (for girls grades 3-12): Created for a Purpose will be a time for girls to worship and sing together, have fun, and learn to create something new! We will begin our time just like we would at a Created for a Purpose camp: dancing and singing together to worship songs! Our founder and Director of Created for a Purpose Ministries, Ingram Link, will lead a brief teaching time, encouraging them from the gospel of Matthew. We will think about reasons why we might be anxious, and how we can take comfort in the love and provision of God, our Creator! After worship and teaching, the girls will spend time creating as they learn the art of Iris Folding! Using one-of-a-kind, original patterns developed by Created for a Purpose staff, girls will complete a keepsake art project to take home. It is our hope and prayer that our time spent with the girls plants seeds of truth that continue to grow in their hearts, reminding them that they are created for a purpose!
- Jesus, Women, and Sexual Faithfulness: What This Means and Why It Matters with Ellen Dykas (for adults and girls Grades 9-12 with special permission from adult bringing her): What is sexual faithfulness, as unmarried and married women, and what does Jesus have to do with it? Jesus didn’t shy away from these topics and the gospels reveal our Savior as a gentle, pursuing, seeing, and healing Lord who cares about women in their experiences of brokenness. This break out time will show how our faithful Lord is what women need regarding sexual integrity, healing from painful relational experiences, and a living hope to grow towards wholeness and transformation.
- Session 4, Walking Each Other Home: The Joy of Intergenerational Friendships with Karen Hodge: Who or what is profoundly shaping your life? Where are you headed, and who are you following? In a world plagued by an epidemic of loneliness and isolation, we were made for more meaningful connections than the world can offer. We invite you to take a step on this journey of cultivating intergenerational friendships with those a few steps ahead of you and those alongside us as we live shoulder-to-shoulder. We were not made to be alone but rather created to experience the rich joy that can be found along the way as we share the gospel and our lives together.
Speakers
Ellen Dykas received her MA in Biblical Studies from Covenant Theological Seminary and a graduate certificate in biblical Counseling from the Christian Counseling and Education Foundation(CCEF). She serves as the Director of Equipping for Ministry to Women for Harvest USA, a national ministry focused on gospel-centered discipleship and teaching regarding sexuality and gender. Ellen loves ministry to women and is most passionate about mentoring, teaching God’s Word and spiritually nurturing others to walk deeply with Jesus. New Life Presbyterian in Dresher, PA, is her home church.
Karen Hodge serves as the Coordinator for PCA Women’s Ministry, where she seeks to connect women and churches to one another and to sound resources. She is also having the time of her life serving alongside her husband, pastor and best friend Chris, at Village Seven Presbyterian Church in Colorado Springs. Chris and Karen have two adult children, Anna Grace Botka and Haddon Hodge. She is the host of the enCourage podcast and along with Susan Hunt, authored Transformed: Life-taker to Life-giver and Life-giving Leadership.
Ingram Link serves as the Director of Women’s Ministries at Covenant Presbyterian Church in Birmingham, AL. She is also the founder and Director of Created for a Purpose Ministries. She and her husband, David are recent empty nesters who enjoy cooking and hosting people in their home. They have 3 grown children, Lucy Anne (Dallas), Hank (Auburn), Elizabeth (NYC) and Sallie James is a student at Ole Miss. Ingram loves to read, especially in a beach chair on 30A, hike and visit with friends. You can follow her on Instagram @the.hospitality.link.
Paula Miles is wife to Kevin, a ruling elder at Clemson Presbyterian, and mother of Wimberly Johnson (married to Charlie), Janie Gotfredson (married to Duncan), Clary (married to Elli), and Judy Livingston (married to Evan). She is also grandmother to 3 boys and has another grandchild on the way. Paula grew up in Anderson, SC and graduated from Clemson University. She has experienced the joy of being a full-time homemaker and public school teacher. Studying and teaching God’s Word is her passion, as well as coming alongside women to encourage them to understand their unique design and fulfill their individual callings. Paula is on staff at Clemson Presbyterian as women’s ministry coordinator since 2014, is a conference speaker, and serves on the PCA’s Discipleship Ministries (CDM) National Women’s Ministry Team as a trainer. She enjoys regular exercise, a good cup of coffee, watching sporting events, and investing in the lives of her family and friends.
Click on the individual location for more details and to register for the remaining conferences.
Charlotte Flyer WHO SHOULD ATTEND THE MADE FOR MORE CONFERENCE? We encourage girls third grade and up to join us! This conference is for ALL women—young, single, married and "more seasoned," as well as your treasured friends. [...]
Dallas Flyer WHO SHOULD ATTEND THE MADE FOR MORE CONFERENCE? We encourage girls third grade and up to join us! This conference is for ALL women—young, single, married and "more seasoned," as well as your treasured friends. [...]
Chicago Flyer WHO SHOULD ATTEND THE MADE FOR MORE CONFERENCE? We encourage girls third grade and up to join us! This conference is for ALL women—young, single, married and "more seasoned," as well as your treasured friends. [...]
Would you like to learn more about the Made for More Conferences?
Contact Kathy Wargo, kwargo@pcanet.org
Made for More Ambassador
Would you help us gather a group of women from third grade up from your church to attend?
Top Ten Things to Consider:
- Get permission from your church leaders to promote the conference and set up a table for registration.
- Use the social media pieces, as well as the save-the-date cards, to spread the word.
- Consider making the Made for More conference your church’s annual retreat or conference. Hey, we already have the speakers, food, and recommended hotels.
- Make a note of the conference date nearest you and begin at least four months prior to advertise the conference.
- Make a note of the early and regular registration dates and prices for your city. The prices go up, and sometimes conferences sell out. Early registration prices are $75 for women and $30 for third grade to college women.
- Share how this could be a unique weekend for mothers and daughters, grandmothers and granddaughters, and spiritual mothers and spiritual daughters. Brainstorm about how you can carpool and make this a special get away weekend for the women in your church.
- Take note that there are special pre-conference workshops for women’s ministry training, children’s ministry training, and one from Harvest USA.
- Pray that this conference will just be the beginning of having these types of conversations across the generations with the women in your church. We will give you resources to continue cultivating this type of intergenerational culture in your churches.
- And don’t forget the snacks. What are you going to pack in the car for your road trip?
- Anything not covered above? You can email Kathy Wargo. kwargo@pcanet.org
We are partnering with:
What do the children in your church believe about God? About themselves? About their purpose? About their role? About others?
God has designed each of us for a unique PURPOSE and PLAN.
Are the young girls in your church hungry for something other than what the world offers them? Do they have an opportunity to experience what God has to give them?
Created for a Purpose began because a group of mothers wanted to make a difference! We believe that every girl deserves to hear that she is clothed in the righteousnessof Christ and a daughter of the Most High King.
Click here to find out more information for Created For A Purpose 2024.
For more information visit createdforapurpose.org
Ingram Link, Founder and Director
ingram@createdforapurpose.org | 205.447.4646
We long for the covenant children in our churches to be shaped by worship and to grow to be lifelong worshippers. Unfortunately, research shows that American churches have failed to do that. According to a Barna Group study in 2019, nearly two-thirds of American 18- to 29-year-olds who grew up in church have withdrawn from involvement as an adult. But how do we correct this? The same Barna Group study found that “belonging” and “‘connectedness” were seen as the driving factors for those identified as “resilient disciples.” The really great news is that this already fits into the PCA’s belief in Covenant Theology that shapes the worship and prayer practices of our congregations.
Teach Us to Worship will help churches consider the Biblical call to worship as a covenant family. Our prayer is that God will use this program to create a culture shift in our churches where children feel more welcomed in worship by equipping and encouraging elders, children’s ministry professionals, parents, and multi-generational congregations. We want to support churches in this endeavor by providing training resources that will help our covenant children grow to be lifelong worshippers.