shhh...

If any of you ladies are in the Little Rock area March 28-29 and are craving a chance to get away, I would like to invite you to a Silent Prayer Retreat. The retreat is for women of all ages and stages, and is simply a chance to get away and listen. The cost is only $29 and the deadline is Wednesday.

Ines sent a reminder today:

Hello sisters!

I am reminding you of the amazing Silent Prayer Retreat that will be taking place on Mar.28-29 (Friday evening 5:30pm - Saturday afternoon) for all the ladies! We had fun times last time, we quieted down, God spoke, and we proved to the world that we could spend 4 hours in silence, yet listening. :-)

Come for the fellowship, for the stretching of your "listening muscles" in prayer, for the silence & rest, and for worship at this beautiful camp only about 35 minutes from here (on the way to Hot Springs).

I've been reading Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and today I was reading about meditation. I thought some of what he had to say was good prep for the retreat:

The time of meditation does not let us down into the void and abyss of loneliness; it lets us be alone with the Word.

Often we are so burdened and overwhelmed with other thoughts, images, and concerns that it may take a long time before God's Word has swept all else aside and come through. But it will surely come, just as surely as God himself has come to men and will come again.

Above all, it is not necessary that we should have any unexpected, extraordinary experiences in meditation. This can happen, but if it does not, it is not a sign that the meditation period has been useless.

It is one of the particular difficulties of meditation that our thoughts are likely to wander and go their own way, toward other persons or to some events in our life. Much as this may distress and shame us again and again, we must not lose heart and become anxious, or even conclude that meditation is really not something for us. When this happens it is often a help not to snatch back our thoughts convulsively, but quite calmly to incorporate into our prayer the people and the events to which our thoughts keep straying and thus in all patience return to the starting point of the meditation.