Living Our Faith: 2020 Women's Retreat
On Sunday, November 24th, Lindsey Stack shared some thoughts about the City Church Women’s Retreat. Our 2020 retreat is on January 25th and 26th. Learn more here.
When Meg asked me to share about the Women’s Retreat, a lot of disqualifiers came to mind. My relationship with the Lord often feels distant, awkward, “shelved” in this stage of life—and I’ve been saying that now through an embarrassing number of life stages. I feel disconnected from Him much of the time. I also have been feeling disconnected from people. Far from being a poster-child for church involvement, life logistics and recent personal struggles have ushered in increased experiences of isolation and loneliness.
I spoke all of these disqualifiers to myself, but as I thought about it more, I realized maybe it’s not such a bad thing to have someone who feels like a mess share about the retreat. In reality, these broken, lonely places are precisely where the Lord has met me in past retreats. This has indeed been the beauty of the retreat—the reminder that we are all often messy in our own ways, lonely in our own stations, and broken whether our lives look neat and tidy or not. The retreat is a space to come to Jesus together in the midst of all that. It has provided space for me to pause and listen to Jesus, or sometimes a space to confess that I’m too scared or angry to listen to Him. A space to come together with women who I too often misjudge as having lives that are less lonely, wardrobes that are more awesome, and a need for Jesus that is less messy than mine. I am instead reminded that we all have our need for Jesus in common. Bound together by that need, we get to stand humbly in a room of brave, broken women and be encouraged as we laugh, sing, ugly cry, and generally fumble along toward Jesus.
I invite you to join us for this year’s Women’s Retreat in January. If you are lonely, come lonely. Flourishing, come flourishing. If you are doubting, come doubting. Strong, come strong. Exhausted, come exhausted. Come as you are and be reminded of Jesus’ love for you, just as you are, and for all of us, together.