The Dorcas Room

My sister's family and mine got together with my parents at my Grandmother's house one more time this Christmas. My niece asked my sister a question on the way: "Will my cousin and I get to sleep in the Dorcas room?"
It took my sister a minute to figure out what she was talking about. She meant the sewing room. Once my grandmother's children moved out, she took over the front bedroom and Grandpa built her fancy shelves to hold all her fabric and patterns and other needlework and crafting things. For as long as I can remember, she had several projects going, with pieces scattered all over the room. The couch under the front window made out into a bed that held lots of late night giggles between my cousins and me through the years. And in the recent past, my daughter has gotten to sleep in there whenever we visited. The picture above is from a few years ago when my mom and daughter were "sewing" together -- my daughter's machine is a pretend one that my mom found at a thrift store for 50 cents.
The congregation my sister worships with has a room in the building called "The Dorcas Room." It has sewing machines and fabric where the ladies make teddy bears to give to the hospital to pass out to families with sick babies. My sister has always taken my niece with her to Dorcas class where they basically do a ladies' Bible study and work on projects like that. My niece made the connection that if it was a room with a sewing machine, it must be a Dorcas room.
It's a neat assumption, huh? Can you remember the story of Dorcas? It's in Acts 9. Basically, she passes away, and Peter finds all the widows in the town distraught, holding up various pieces of clothing that Dorcas had sewn for them. We don't know much about her besides that. Peter sees what great works she was doing and brings her back to life. Can you imagine that? She was doing such a good work that God let her come back from death to continue doing it. That's the true spirit of it.
I don't have a room dedicated only to sewing right now, but I do have a corner set up in my bedroom where I have my machine and several other things stashed, usually an incomplete project nearby. And I think about it. When I am sitting at that machine, am I doing so with a heart like Dorcas? You know what? I know my Grandma did a lot of times. She was constantly doing for others, making sure people were taken care of, lovingly sewing items for people she cared about. I think my niece was right. It was a Dorcas room.
I hope mine can be, too.