This past weekend I had the privilege of attending my church's women's retreat. My intent of going was to support my mother because she is trying to get more involved in the church and to meet more people. It is not as easy for her as she is a bit on the shy side, so she would never attend such an event without me.
I didn't think much of attending the retreat because I knew I was going to be the youngest one there and that I probably wouldn't fit in so much. But I was rather surprised by my experience. The first night we did some silly skits and that was really fun. By then we had met up with our small groups for the weekend and we were given a bag of wacky items to use in the skits. Some of the things in the bags were pretty crazy. Some of the bags even had bras in them! The next morning we discussed something that really spoke to me. The speaker was Rev. Dr. Mary Naegali, a well known pastor in my area. She spoke about how sometimes we feel too unworthy to belong to Jesus. She gave the example about how sometimes we will avoid praying because we feel we have done too much wrong in order to do so. I was startled because it was exactly how I feel, practically all the time. It's one of those sort of things where you feel like you're the only one who experiences that, but now I know I am not. This was an important thing for me to hear as praying has always been my weak spot spiritually, and now I have no reason not to pray, I just have to get myself to do it. For the final day we had a church service (essentially) and I got drafted to direct the "dramatic scripture reading" of 1 Samuel 17. It went rather well and the audience laughed a lot. The women playing David and Goliath got very involved and did a good job. My mother had a good time as well. She talked with lots of people and now knows a lot of names and faces. Hopefully going to church every Sunday will feel more like home for her. She particularly liked the arts and crafts. It was definitely all God's work having given us this opportunity to go on the retreat. |
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