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Amy Spreeman and I had such a wonderful time teaching and fellowshipping with the ladies of Green Bay, Wisconsin and the surrounding area at the A Wise & Discerning Heart women’s conference hosted by Bethel Baptist Church.
If I have to be up before dawn to catch a flight,
I’m grateful for the blessing of seeing the sunrise from the sky.
Random, but I saw this in the Appleton airport, and I thought it was funny.
Since this conference was so close to Amy’s house, I stayed with her, and we made a long weekend of it. I was thrilled to have the opportunity to spend some time with my precious sister and friend (not to mention her awesome husband, Bob, who was so kind to welcome me into their home).
The day after I arrived, Amy showed me around Appleton and Seymour, Wisconsin. First we checked out the History Museum at the Castle, which houses exhibits on prehistoric Wisconsin (aka: evolution and dinosaurs), the history of the Appleton, and Harry Houdini, one of Appleton’s most famous residents.
When Amy told me Harry Houdini was from Appleton, I’ll be honest — I nerded out a little. When I was in about the third or fourth grade, one of my favorite books was a biography of the iconic magician and escape artist. I even wrote a book report on it. I probably drove Amy crazy telling her facts I could still recall about his life, death, and amazing escapes.
(For instance: Many people think Harry Houdini died during a failed underwater escape, but this is actually not true. Houdini had to build up his abdominal muscles to perform his escapes. You could say he had the original “abs of steel”! He frequently challenged fans to punch him in the stomach as hard as they could. One day, a man asked if he could take Houdini up on this challenge. Houdini agreed, but before he had a chance to tighten his abs to take the hit, the man punched him. Houdini’s appendix burst, and he died of sepsis shortly after.
Are y’all amazed that I still know this, or what?😀)
Something I didn’t know that impressed me about Houdini is that he had a passion for exposing spiritists of the early 20th century who preyed on the grief-stricken. Many had lost family and friends in World War I, the Spanish Flu epidemic, and other tragedies, and (sinfully) wanted to contact their loved ones who had “crossed over”. It seems, at that time, there was a medium or psychic around every corner just waiting to separate the vulnerable from their money. Houdini made it his mission to put a stop to this. He even helped the government convict some of them of fraud.
We walked through the prehistoric Wisconsin exhibit audibly (well, if anyone else had been in there, anyway) correcting the placards touting evolution, and stopping briefly to play with the sand box contour map, where we stuck all the dinosaurs’ heads in the sand – which we felt struck an ironic and symbolic blow for biblical Creation.😂
The history of Appleton captured my interest as well, particularly a small COVID exhibit. It was almost spooky to think back on that recent period of world history and see it put in its proper place — behind glass in a museum — to remind us never to return to those dark days.
The relief map is actually a light image projected onto a sandbox. The contours change as you move the sand around. 
Anyone who believes the fairytale of evolution has his head in the sand like these dinosaurs. God created the world just like He tells us in Genesis 1-2. 
Harry Houdini (center) isn’t the only famous Appletonian. There’s also (clockwise from bottom right corner): Edna Ferber, Willem Dafoe, Greta Van Susteren, Cory Chisel, Joseph McCarthy, and Rocky Bleier. 
To round out our little tour, we drove by (it was raining) the “Hamburger Charlie” monument. Did you know the hamburger was invented by Charles Nagreen in Seymour, Wisconsin?
In 1855, 15 year old Charlie wanted to sell his homemade meatballs at the fair. But, as you might imagine, it’s kind of hard to eat meatballs while you’re walking around at the fair. So Charlie came up with a great idea. He mashed his meatballs flat (so I guess he invented the smashburger, too!), put them between two slices of bread, and the hamburger was born!
The “Charlie Grill” (across the street from the monument) where the world’s largest hamburger was grilled at Seymour’s annual Burger Fest in 2001.
Friday and Saturday, we were warmly welcomed by the gracious and kind ladies and pastors of the lovely Bethel Baptist Church.
The ladies found beautiful and handy gift bags waiting for them upon their arrival.
(Sorry, but we do not have conference
video/audio available to share for this event.)
Friday night, Amy and I taught our first tandem session, Foundations of Discernment. We have to be grounded in the Word of God and faithful to the Bride of Christ if we’re to have any hope of being discerning.
We started each session with a lovely time of worship in song.
Many thanks to our delightful hostess and emcee, Brenda!
Saturday, we kicked things off with our second tandem session, What the Bible Teaches About Discernment. Discernment is based on and governed by Scripture, so it’s important that we understand exactly what Scripture teaches about discernment.
Amy’s solo session, Discerning 7 Lies Christians Believe, was next because we not only need to be well versed in Scripture, we also need to learn how the world and false teachers are twisting Scripture so we can avoid being deceived and warn others not to be deceived.
Lunch time! The ladies feasted on delicious chicken salad croissants at their charmingly dressed tables.
Lunch was also a great time to visit the book table and mingle. Our hosts and some of the attendees had some very thoughtful gifts for us.
After lunch was my solo session, Discernment 101. We looked at several tell-tale signs that someone is a false teacher and discussed practical ways to vet teachers and their materials.
We finished the day out with a whirlwind Q&A session, helping the ladies apply what they had learned, and supplying information we hadn’t been able to cover in our teaching sessions.
Pictures with the ladies is always a fun time!
We had a phenomenal weekend with a wonderful bunch of ladies! Thanks so much to Pastor Keith and his wife Nancy, who worked so hard for over a year putting this conference together, making it an event that focused on sound doctrine for the good of the ladies of their church as well as the many other attendees. And thank you to the other pastors, ladies and men who helped and made us feel so loved and taken care of.
After the conference was over, Amy and I enjoyed just hanging out at her house and around town for a couple of days. She showed me her chickens and her incredible garden, and even made an apple cobbler from apples she picked while we were walking the grounds. We had the joy of worshiping together Sunday morning, and watched the Packers game Sunday night.
These are some of the chickens you’ve heard Amy talk about on the podcast. 
The delicious apples Amy picked and made into a cobbler. 
In honor of Amy’s husband, Bob, we had to watch. 
Amy is demented and likes pickles with peanut butter. She not only canned these pickles herself (and they were AWESOME), she also made this peanut butter (equally awesome!). She wanted me to try it, and I did, because that’s how much I love and trust her. It was gross.
All too soon, it was Monday, and time for me to go home. It was such an incredible time of worship and fellowship I hated for it to end.
If your church or organization is ever in need of a speaker for a women’s event, I’d love to come share with your ladies as well. Click here for more information, or to find an upcoming event near you!
Photo Credits
All photos by Michelle Lesley, Amy Spreeman, and other conference attendees.
