Why You Should Take a Personal (or Family) Retreat

Forgive me for my leave of absence from this blog the past few weeks. Reasons are in chronological order as follows: One of my daughters got sick, the next daughter got what the first daughter had and we left for a 10 day vacation to North Carolina. On the vacation I had no access to internet nor did I want it (something I will be blogging about today). Then, when we got home, I read this great little eBook by Jeff Goins and immediately responded by starting a new book. So far, by God’s grace, I have been faithfully rising around 6:30 each morning to put in an hour worth of work on the book. In the process, I have completely neglected my little blog here!

So this morning, instead of working on my book, I decided that I must write a blog post. I mean, I know that all of you have been biting your fingernails in anticipation of my next post and all 😉 But I do have many thoughts and ideas swirling in my head at all times (I am not exaggerating, ask my husband – it wears him out sometimes), and this blog is a great venue for me to share some of those and flesh them out on paper.

As I mentioned, our family took a vacation the first week of August to a cabin that my grandparents built more than 50 years ago. It is nestled in the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina in a tiny town called Cashiers which now boasts two (yes two!) touristy coffee shops that I have grown to love. It seems that more folks have discovered this hidden gem of a place in the last decade or so.

Our family goes to this cabin for many reasons – to relax, to unwind, to unplug from technology, to escape from the demands of the city and our lives at home (which never seem to just “stop”), to explore and recreate in nature, to engage in ample  quality time together, and to reflect on our last year and pray about our priorities for the year ahead. At this point, this last part is done exclusively by Joel and me, but we very much intend to make the children a part of this yearly ritual once they are old enough to do so. Every year since we got married, Joel and I take the week of our birthdays and anniversary (yes, they are all within an 8 day span) to spend time thanking the Lord for the specific ways He has worked in and through our lives the previous year and to pray through our commitments, responsibilities, dreams, and vision for the year ahead.

Needless to say, this is a week I look forward to with great anticipation every year. I am someone who really loves my 8 hours of sleep a night, but the morning we leave for the Cabin each year, I seem to pop out of bed around 4:30 or 5am, ready to make our 10 hour cross country drive to my favorite place on the planet.

So you might say that our annual vacation is also a personal and family retreat. We each spend quite a bit of our time reading, reflecting, journaling, and sitting on the front porch watching the finches and hummingbirds, who neither sow nor reap and the flowers that neither toil or spin.  We think and discuss what is important and unimportant for this season and in view of eternity. Before we had kids, we would spend time in prayer before the Lord as to whether this was the year to begin trying to have a child.

I will personally begin this fall season with an almost 4 year old, an almost 2 year old, and an almost newborn 🙂 (Yes, they are all three girls, yes, they are all exactly two years apart, yes, their birthdays are all in October (if the newborn cooperates!)). What this means for me is: I will have much on my plate. In addition, I have made the decision to homeschool Grace this year. Being that she is only going to be four this year, I am only planning to spend 30 minutes or an hour each day with her maximum in teaching. My goal for the year (which I worked out on our trip) is simply one thing – to teach her how to read. If this can be accomplished this year, I will be a happy momma, because I know how the world can open up to a child once they can read for themselves.

There have been other commitments on my plate this past year that I have decided to back away from for at least a year so that I can work through the shift from 2-3 kids and discern as I go where I am needed the most. Being someone who is always active and involved  in church and community, I plan to stay involved but on a scaled-back level. This is a year where I have prepared my heart and my calendar for family to be the recipients of the large majority of my time and energy. And I am at peace with that!

I have found that preparing for the year ahead (before it hits you over the head like a ton of bricks) with some time away for a personal or family retreat really helps in the following ways:

1) It alleviates stress – once you have prayed about and discerned together with your spouse and sometimes children if they are older what your top priorities and commitments will be, you can be at peace about the things you have said ‘no’ to and why you chose to say no. You don’t have to worry that you should be involved in something you aren’t. You know you have chosen to focus on what the Lord has revealed is most vital for you in this season of your life.

2) It cultivates creativity – when you have the ‘vision’ plain before you for the year, you can begin to focus in on what you are called to and explore how you can creatively manage those responsibilities and opportunities.

3) It fills you with hope and momentum for the year ahead – when you have a vision, you are filled with inspiration to fulfill it. That is why in Scripture it says that where there is no vision, the people perish – or as the Message Version of the Bible says “If people can’t see what God is doing, they stumble all over themselves; but when they attend to what he reveals, they are most blessed.”(Proverbs 29:18)

4) It keeps you focused and on track – we all have goals in life and only one life to fulfill them. We also have been given the time necessary to do all that God is calling us to do. This is truth!! Even though we may think we never have enough time, perhaps the main reason is because we are pulled in a hundred different directions instead of focusing on and sowing into the area(s) that we are actually called to work and serve.

5) It simplifies and makes practical the pursuit – prayerful planning aligns us with the heart of God for our own life in this season and cuts out complications that come in when we are pouring our energy into areas we shouldn’t. It also helps us when we practically write or think through how we are going to accomplish the goals in front of us.

So – what is stopping you? I would challenge you to take at least one 24-hour period by yourself or with your spouse (and kids, if they are old enough) for a retreat to prayerfully lift up to God this next year or season of your life. Lay everything you are doing and wish to do (or have been asked to do) before Him. Discuss these responsibilities with your spouse as well. Once you have reached some conclusions, talk and pray though how you can make the most of your time to accomplish the goals that are before you. You (and your family) will be glad that you did!!

The Glory of the Overlook

“Good sense makes one slow to anger and it is his glory is to overlook an offense.” – Proverbs 19:11

I have been reading a book called The Respect Dare, which is a 40 day devotional/workbook on growing to improve your relationship with God and your husband through understanding the language of respect. I read “Dare 9” yesterday, which was “Project Overlook.”

When we seek to grow into the image of our Heavenly Father, we learn that He is “a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness” (Exodus 34:6)

Our God, who knows all things, including the justness of any wrath He may feel, chooses to be calm and to wait in exacting that wrath and punishment. Why? He is abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. He is merciful and gracious. His mercy causes him not to pretend my sin does not exist, but to deal kindly and gently with me in it, bearing long when I find myself stepping into the same pit again and again, eager to hold my hand and help me out.

His mercy shows me that the last thing God would do to me as His child is say, “Well, you deserve that pit. and I knew you were going to fall into that pit. So just stay there awhile and soak in the shame and embarrassment of it all – it will be good for you.” No, He wants to lift me up and out as soon as possible, to lift up my face towards Him and Heaven once again so that I see Him and all He offers as so much more desirable than that pit.

For me, often, that pit is having to be right. Can anyone relate to this?

I have learned that I like to be right – sometimes I spiritualize it by saying that rightness equals justice (which it does in some circumstances, of course) but when it comes to relating to my husband, kids, and the guy who cut me off in traffic or the woman who came up to me in the store to instruct me in my parenting, I justify my wrath. I am also much nicer and only inwardly fume when strangers wrong me (like the driver or the woman in the store), smiling curtly and moving along my way, but when it comes to those I’m closest to – I often let my thoughts be known when I should simply pause, wait a spell, relax a minute, and see how things sort themselves out.

Another Proverbs I read yesterday backed this up: “A food gives full vent to his spirit, but a wise man quietly holds it back.” – Proverbs 19:11

It is my job to correct, discipline, and instruct my children in the ways of wisdom. It is also my job to make sure that when instruction or correction is needed, it is not done in a harsh way, with a harsh tone, in a condescending fashion which lets them know that “if they just would have listened to me in the first place, they would have never gotten into that mess – again.” God doesn’t deal this way with me!

It is my job to communicate with my husband when I have been hurt or need to talk something through. But before I vent all my frustrations to him, I ought to take a moment to examine the situation. “Is it worth creating conflict?” “Will it blow over on its own?” “Is this an isolated incident where it would serve me well to believe the best that nothing negative or wrong towards me was intended?” The large majority of the time, my major offense actually shows itself to be small and insignificant with the reality of time and a steadfast relationship to wash over the rocks of my offense.

What happens when we overlook a wrong that someone has done to us?

Firstly, and most important, we please God by obeying His Word and following His example.

Secondly, we don’t engage or embroil ourselves in unnecessary conflict but instead choose the way of peace.

Thirdly, we learn to hold our tongues and our feelings (in a good way) before the Lord, watching and observing how things will pan out with a heart full of hope in a positive outcome.

Lastly, when I thought about what it means to “overlook” offenses and wrongs, I thought of a view I have seen almost every year of my entire life on the way to our family cabin in Cashiers, North Carolina. After a long car ride through winding hills and up a mountainside, we stop to stretch our legs and take in the view. And it is glorious (as you can see from the picture above).

So it is with our Christian walks. When we place our feet upon the mountains of our offenses and anger and choose to look up and out at the glorious view of our lives, framed by gratefulness, we stand in awe of God’s majesty and handiwork.

Praying for you today, friend, as you choose to overlook offense and into greatness.

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