Ministry Spotlight - Miriam Neff

Miriam Neff is the Founder and President of Widow Connection, a ministry that serves widows all over the world. She joined The Matt Friedeman Show to discuss her ministry. Below are the "CliffsNotes" of her interview.

What are you trying to do?

First of all, no one wants to start a widow ministry. 

I was married for 40 years to Bob Neff. He succumbed to Lou Gehrig's disease. 

When I was dealing with that, I couldn't find anything to help me.

I could clearly see from my faith walk that I was supposed to help widows. So now, 24/7 widows can go to my website and get help.

Then I began to look around and ask where the widows where who needed help. I had traveled to Africa with Bob, and seen the poverty there.

So what we do is we help the widows there, we teach them to sew, and they graduate with a certificate to be a tailor. They can hold their heads high again.

You have seven tips for helping widows. Tell us about that.

One of the important things is to stay connected. It seems so simple. But often a widow will kind of disappear from the picture. 

And I understand, because I am one, that you kind of want to fade away.

But as a friend of a widow, you have to realize that she's not going to pick up the phone and call you.

You have to take the initiative. That's a simple thing that anyone can do.

Is there a drop in finances when you are widowed?

Widows often end up in a much worse financial situation than they had when they were married. 

The income goes down with the loss of the husband. The need goes down some, but not as much as the income.

Is the local church doing enough to help?

In my situation when I became a widow, I could not find any ministry to widows in any church.

I had friends, but many of them did not understand what I was going through, which is normal.

I do think we're seeing an increase in churches waking up to what they need to be doing.