Seeking and Finding

So, I've decided that my best approach at this point is going to be to use this post to give a synopsis of the remaining events of our Saturday, and then spend some posts reflecting on some of the things that I personally took away from the experience. There was so much that was shared and heard, etc by everyone that I couldn't do it justice, and would likely wind up misrepresenting some other folks.

Anyhow, after the experience we had talking about how we had all heard from God, we began to transition into our primary purpose for the day, and that was... hearing from God. First we started with a "practice session", as suggested by my mentor Joe. Now, it seems a bit silly to talk about "practicing" hearing from God - what we were really doing was spending some time listening regarding something that was not the central topic of our time.

A technique that Joe recommended to faciliate a time of listening to God was to use a Scripture, describe the scene and read through the Scripture, having folks imagine themselves in the scene, and then using that to focus them on a picture of Christ as they seek to listen. That is what we did for our "practice" session, and I (at Joe's suggestion) used the story of Jesus and the little children, as appears throughout the gospels (I think I used the Mark account, but it's not really that important). We spent some time listening in that picture/scene, and then got together and shared. It was pretty clear that God was really ready to speak as we listened. Having had our "practice" session, we had a bit longer session on our topic du jour (what God's purpose of CrossWalk is), and then had our no-lunch lunch break.

While we were on our break, and many of us took a beach walk in like 40 degree sunshine, perhaps the most pivotal event of the weekend happened. One of our members got word that his niece had overdosed overnight, and was in the hospital with a less than stellar prognosis. As we reconnected, he shared this with us, and that they were getting ready to do dialysis, etc, etc. Of course, we prayed, and then we went into a time of worship in preparation for our afternoon session. As we were finishing up our singing, he got a call that whatever blood level (bad) they were monitoring regarding the decision for dialysis, etc (I'm not a whiz on the technicalities of what happened). had significantly dropped, and things were looking much better. More excitement.

For our final time of listening to God, I took a cue from something I heard sensed earlier in the day, and the verse I had done my devotional on back on Thursday, and we went into the Last Supper scene, to the point of John 14:12 ("I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing, he will do even greater things..."), and asked God what great things He had for each of us to do for His kingdom. Another great time of sharing and hearing from God followed. By the end of our time, it was clear that God had spoken to each person individually at least once during the day. So much more than I had hoped and imagined when dreaming of the retreat. (Hey, that sounds familiar.)

We closed our formal time by breaking our fast with communion - and let's just say we did it with a bit more than wafers and the little communion glasses :-) It was just a very special way to seal our time.

On the lighter side of things, the next order of business was to REALLY break our fast, and so it was off to Outback Steakhouse, where we wound up having to endure about a 25 minute wait before even getting a table. We had had menus at our disposal while waiting, so when the waitress came the first time, we ordered drinks, appeitizers, and our meals all at once. I really would have liked to have heard our servers honest opinions about what she witnessed at our tables in terms of our eating, because we were so ridiculously ravenous, and just inhaled a good portion of the meal. I'm sure we had to have been quite a sight. The rest of our evening was about relaxation and enjoying each other's company, and then we headed home on Sunday morning.

So, there's the story (although there's one final follow-up piece I'll hit when I'm reflecting on the lessons), and next, I'll start the good stuff - what did all mean, what did I learn, etc, etc.