There is a reason this quilt wasn’t like the others – why it didn’t end up in a tote box in Carol Honderich’s sewing room in Goshen, Indiana. For this particular project, a quilt based on the women of the Bible, God provided Honderich with confidence, encouragement and purpose.
The quilt took Honderich three years to complete, and since then, it has traveled from coast to coast hanging in exhibits and quilt shops. The quilt has even generated several online Bible study groups, which currently have about 1,000 members.
"This was all the hand of God," Honderich said, "bringing people and ideas together, blessing the lives of women as they discovered the stories of the women of the Bible."
Honderich first had the idea for the quilt 17 years ago during a workplace Bible study at Mennonite Mission Network. When she started it, finishing projects wasn’t necessarily her strong suit, but her colleagues in the Bible study encouraged her and pushed her to keep going.
The project was not for beginners, and Honderich sometimes had to learn new quilting techniques in order to achieve a block that truly symbolized a particular woman from the Bible.
The block for Queen Esther, for example, was especially difficult. "Esther" means star, and Esther was the queen of Persia. There was a traditional block technique called Persian Star that Honderich knew would be perfect to depict her, but when Honderich saw the design, she thought it was too hard. "So I kept looking, but I couldn’t find anything that was as perfect as that block," she said.
But she prayed the same prayer through the entire project – that it was God’s project to direct her through. She broke down the project simply, learned to trust her sewing skills, and the design flowed from there.
Each story Honderich studied was a celebtration of how God worked in the lives of the women. "They weren’t nobodies," Honderich said. "They started out nobodies, but their sotries are recorded in the Bible and we’re still looking at those stories thousands of years later."
Honderich believes the stories are there for women, and that something special can happen in the heart and soul when they’re studied.
"I think it’s such an encouragement and hope, that God cared so much about these women who were slaves, servants, nobodies, and young girls," she said. "Something about studying those stories really gives women hope and a different attitude toward faith and the Christian walk and how God cares for us."
Part of Honderich’s prayer at the very beginning was that a ministry would be built that went beyond her lunchtime Bible study. "I asked God to bless the project and to give it a life and ministry beyond me," Honderich said. "It never occurred to me that I could be part of that ministry. The online Bible study that developed was also something that would never have occurred to me."
In addition to managing the online study groups, Honderich has also had the oportunity to speak to seniors groups, women’s groups, and quilt guilds. She teaches workshops and retreats all around the country.
In a way, Honderich says, the quilt study became a movement because women from a variety of congregations – not just Mennonite – have held classes in their churches and local quilt groups to make their own women of the Bible quilts.
"It’s kind of a lesson for me to have a little faith in the process and to have faith in the blocks that I thought God was leading me to," Honderich said. "It has been a wonderful, lifegiving experience for which I thank God every day."
*This article was first published by Mennonite Women USA in Timbrel: Women in Conversation Together with God, Spring 2017.
