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Women's Retreat...Prayer and Fasting

Bless the Lord my soul
And bless His holy name
Bless the Lord my soul
He leads me into life

Cabarete Beach
Through singing this repetitious chorus as a way of prayer and worship spoke volumes to me.  Is my soul blessing my Lord?  Allowing all the distractions around me and in my mind to really stop to listen to my soul blessing my Lord.  His name is holy, holy, holy.  He demands my worship.  My all.  Am I giving Him my all, even in worship?  He is the one who leads me.  He leads me into life.  How often am I the one who is wanting to lead me and Him?  Where am I leading myself?  Destruction?  Death?

Going into this retreat, the question was asked of how we are coming into this retreat time?  I am coming into this retreat drained.  Other words shared were tired, overwhelmed, peaceful, I am, ungrounded and some said yet excited to be here at the retreat.

We listened, meditated, prayed and contemplated through two well known verses to start off our time together.
"My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me."
John 10:27

"I am the vine; you are the branches.  If a man remains in me and I in him,
he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing."
John 15:5

Prayer and Fasting
The phrase that God spoke to me through Lectio Divina was "apart from me...nothing."  How many times do I want to fix things or help people through things?  How many times do I get in the way of what God wants to do?  How I run ahead of God because I think I know best.  Yet God tells me, "Shannon, apart from me you can do nothing."  The symbol that God gave me to remember this phrase is my Bible.  Not spending time with God daily then nothing.

We listened to David Platt's podcast on Prayer and Fasting.  After listening we had time by ourselves to reflect on what it is God wants to speak to us directly regarding both prayer and fasting.  We also split into small groups to discuss questions regarding prayer and fasting.  Where God challenged me is that if I am not praying it is saying that I do not need God.  My deepest need and longing is to know God, the point of prayer.  God really challenged me regarding fasting since it is a spiritual discipline that honestly I have not really practiced at all.  Jesus states not if you fast but when you fast.  One of the reasons for fasting is anticipating, achingly longing for the return of Christ.  Wow!  I have talked about Christ's coming but I really have never anticipated it or achingly longed for His return.  Oh, how I want this.  Below is the video that we used.


Cross-cultural Relationship talk
During the weekend we had time to celebrate as well.  We had two ladies, Briana and Taylor who will be getting married this summer so we had a bridal shower for them.  We have one, Kelsey who will be giving birth to her first daughter in May so we had a baby shower for her.  It was really amazing to see our women be Titus 2 women to our younger women.  Encouraging them.  Instructing them.  Edifying them.

We had some time of solitude with God as we meditated on John 17, the prayer Jesus prayed for himself, his disciples and future believers.  We came back together and worshiped together.   We prayed together using ACTS.  This was such a special time for me as so many times I desire that we just spend time in prayer and the Holy Spirit led
Solitude-Quiet time
us into this time of prayer together.  Such a sweet, sweet time of communion with God.  We had a time to share what God spoke to us regarding John 17 or a take away from the weekend.  What God spoke to me through John 17 was different than when I was preparing for it.  Jesus said, "Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began" (verse 5).  Jesus longed for being in the presence of the Father.  How I need to anticipate and long for being the presence of the Father.  I live in desperate need and need my Father's protection, forgiveness, leading, deliverance, unity, and His full measure of joy.

We were asked to share how we are leaving our retreat time.  I feel filled and challenged.  Others stated challenged, work to do, and still need to process.  We closed our retreat praying one for another.

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