One evening Jana Riska remembered a particular Young Women leader in her life. Now in her 30s, Sister Riska was humbled as she pondered the direction her life had taken as a result of such women. Kneeling, she thanked her Heavenly Father.

Her prayer then took an unexpected turn. "I can't say thank you for Jolene without saying thank you for Marilyn," she recalled saying to herself. "Then, what about Lisa? Then what about Suzie? Next thing I knew I had been on my knees for hours. Tears were running down my face. I couldn't think of a sister without seeing the image of a Primary teacher, a Young Women leader or Relief Society sisters.

"I can't forget the feeling I had as I sat on my knees and cried because I couldn't stop image after image coming to mind of women who had blessed my life."

Women throughout the Church — be they in North America, Central America, South America, Africa, Europe, Asia or the isles of the sea — can relate. Whatever the language, background or customs, they can all speak of a sister in the gospel who has influenced them, served them or simply befriended them. It is through this sisterhood that women are strengthened in keeping their covenants, in serving their families, Church and communities, they said.

And it is through this sisterhood that women can feel the love of the Lord in their lives.

That is the hope of Relief Society General President Bonnie D. Parkin and her counselors, Kathleen H. Hughes and Anne C. Pingree as the annual General Relief Society Meeting draws near.

"We want the women to feel the Lord's love for them," Sister Parkin said, in speaking of the meeting to be broadcast from the Conference Center on Sept. 23.

Sister Parkin expressed her heartfelt desire for women throughout the Church, wherever possible, to gather side by side in wards and branches to view the broadcast — for even two sisters to sit by the computer and listen via the Internet. And she hopes they come as "not only hearers of the word, but doers, that they'll feel encircled in His love because of what they've heard."

"As women gather for the General Relief Society Meeting, their faith will be bolstered. They won't walk away saying, 'I loved her talk.' They'll say, 'This is what I'm going to do because of what I heard."'

Coming together to hear testimonies from Church leaders and to bear their testimonies to each other "increases their ability to go home strengthened; they go home more determined, more buoyed up, more committed," Sister Hughes added. "They are covenant women of Christ and they are remarkable women."

And they all have a part to play in Relief Society, said Sister Pingree. "They belong, whether they're in a small branch in a remote area of the world or a large metropolitan city. They belong to the Lord's organization for women; they're part of an army of righteous women, almost 5.4 million strong in 170 nations."

Six such women spoke with the Church News recently, talking about their roles as covenant women, and the strength other Relief Society sisters offer in their lives.

Jana Riska of the Idaho Falls 16th Ward, Idaho Falls Idaho Stake, said her "temple covenants are about consecration, and in my personal life that has meant to have a life of service."

The 32-year-old returned missionary has even made her career one of service; she is a social worker for LDS Family Services, working with birth mothers. She serves each Saturday as an ordinance worker in the Idaho Falls Idaho Temple. Though knowing loneliness and disappointment as she watched friends marry and have children, she has found peace in her life from realizing "I still have a role to play in God's kingdom."

She recalled one Mother's Day when her father was visiting. During the sacrament meeting program about families and the roles women play, "My dad said, 'I just realized you're building families, too. That's your motherhood right now."'

Sister Riska was touched by her father's realization of the importance of her work with Family Services. "I have been encircled in the arms of His love. As I look back now, I realize that throughout my life I have been surrounded by tremendous women who have loved me and who have taught me."

She hopes to do the same in the Cardiff (Wales) Branch, where she will be moving after her marriage on Oct. 14 in the Idaho Falls temple to Andrew Shakespeare.

"I've always said my life started when I was baptized," declared Adriana Sepulveda of the Villa Norte Ward, Villa Alemana Oeste Chile Stake. The wife of Elder M. Gonzalo Sepulveda, an Area Seventy, and mother of three grown children, Sister Sepulveda was baptized when she was 17 years old. She married her husband in the Sao Paulo Brazil Temple on March 7, 1979, and received her endowment earlier on the same day.

Likening her membership to the "pearl of great price" in Matthew 13:46, she said her covenants increased her desire to serve others. She belongs to a community service organization, "Friends of Villa Alemana," which serves in orphanages and nursing homes in the area.

Finding strength in the sisterhood of Relief Society, Sister Sepulveda said she enjoys going to the meetinghouse for the General Relief Society Meeting each year and sitting by her sisters in the gospel. "I can visualize the other sisters sitting in chapels in different parts of the world. We all, as the hymn says, stand in the same cause, to enlarge the Lord's kingdom on earth and to help our families."

Catherine Anne Askham of the Sheffield (England) 2nd Ward joined the Church in 1976 and went to the London England Temple a year later. The mother of three and grandmother of five finds some of her greatest joys in family history research and has submitted her Church papers for a family history mission. She especially recalls the day proxy baptism was done for her deceased father.

She had been told the work would not be done until the next day. However, she said that as she sat in a temple session she could feel her father's presence. "I could feel my dad. The hair was prickling on my neck and I thought, 'My dad's here."'

She later found out that the baptism had occurred the same hour.

Ada Nmeribe of the Okpu-Umuobo Road Ward, Aba Nigeria Stake, finds her greatest joy in caring for her husband, Francis, and their three children, Ochulo, 6; Dinah, 4; and Oluchu, 3. But the tall, athletic woman will never forget using gospel principles in her former job as a sergeant with the Nigerian police force. One day she especially remembers. A woman and infant came into the police station. The woman had been abandoned by her husband and left with no money. The man was found and brought into the station, where Sister Nmeribe met with him.

"I said a prayer to know how the Lord could help me in this matter. I explained to the man that the baby is dear and is a spirit daughter of God and that God trusted them to take care of her, that he should try as hard as he can to accept responsibility for his baby and wife."

The man became repentant and returned home with his little family. The last she heard, they were doing well.

Ellen Reyes of the Taytay 1st Ward, Taytay Philippines Stake, supports her husband, Walfredo Delgado Reyes, as the bishop of their ward and is the mother of five children and grandmother of eight. They joined the Church in 1978 and were sealed in 1985 in the Manila Philippines Temple.

Sister Reyes found in the gospel and her covenants the strength to help her son in the aftermath of a tragic accident and to set an example of forgiveness. In 1991, just before his 14th birthday, her fourth child was severely burned in an accident, causing a permanent disability.

"Keeping covenants protects us every day in our lives," Sister Reyes declared. "There are sad things that happen in life, but because of the gospel in our lives, when bad things happen, they only strengthen us."

Diane Blom of the The Hague (Netherlands) Ward said seeing her three children go to the temple to be endowed prior to missions and marriages "just got through to me how special that is. It made me very humble."

Also humbling to Sister Blom is sitting with her sisters of Relief Society during Sunday meetings and elsewhere. "I'm always so impressed with how different people are, yet (there is) the common ground of the gospel. I enjoy the fact that we can all be together being so different but having this common denominator and knowing that no matter what, they would do anything for me and I would do anything for them — that love and support you feel."

Such love and support are common denominators in Relief Societies throughout the world.

E-mail to: julied@desnews.com