I got up at 8ish and started to get ready. My roommate was gone for the weekend, so it was nice to make noise for once when getting dressed. I got dressed and headed downstairs to the ministry office. Claire Bain and Don Markovitch were down in the lobby with Fr. Mathew. There were several familiar faces along with several new ones. There was the awkward small talk followed by the awkward laughter that accompanies bad-awkward-small-talk-I-don't-know-you jokes. Well, we, when united, left for the St. Francis chapel, not really a retreat in my mind, but it was doing something new, (not that new was a new thing in welcome month!) We walked into the chapel and proceeded to make small talk, not that small talk was not overdone by this point. In all truthfulness, I am being a little harsh. We gathered into a circle and received handouts that detailed our retreat, all seven hours of it. The focus of the meeting was to look at our strengths and talents, those highlighted by the StrengthsFinder book, in the light of God's plan for our lives.
The meeting began formerly with the usual: stand up and introduce yourself and tell us your favorite food. Then we heard Don give an introduction into the strengths that he had as an example that we were to follow. The papers we had had an opening prayer, (a concept new to me, seeing as prayers are general a spontaneous exposition to God about certain topics) followed by several questions which we were to ponder. These "reflection" questions became a focus of our meetings. Don, Claire, and Jean read some of the questions and a portion of Scripture that talked about gifts, then set us loose to ponder the questions. We were to meet fifteen minutes later to discuss our answers.
These questions were pretty much about how we viewed our futures and where we saw ourselves in the future. I had read the questions during the preliminary portion of our meeting, so I was in for fifteen minutes of boredom. These minutes were not total boredom, though. I prayed that God would let me shine as a light in that meeting, so as to demonstrate that Christ saves through faith and that our own works do not earn us salvation. That was the major conflict point that I was trying to get across. It became overwhelming to me that the sole point of our gifts was that God gave them to us, and that since they were given to us, we were use them to the best of our abilities so we can do good works. There was a lot of "me" in the vision that they were trying to get through to us. That it was all about my good works. Whatever. Well we reflected, then came back to talk about what we learned from reflection.
We talked, then began our next part. It was about our strengths. My strengths were: Competition, Strategy, Input, Belief, and Connectedness. We told what our strengths were and began the next reflection theme, goody. I guess that's a little critical again. I did get to pray, a lot. We talked again, and closed in read prayer again. Then we went to lunch, then came back, read prayer, "reflected", then discussed. I was getting good at "connecting" my "beliefs" into exact words, that defined my feelings. It was interesting, though, that my "good" analogies were not my analogies, but were from Paul. I would read through scripture and find passages that supported the concepts that we were discussing. 1 Peter provided me with references to "living bricks" that supported the concept that we were to use our gifts to become the body of Christ, the Church. It was interesting to be praised for being Peter.... All in all, it was a good meeting. A little long, but the concepts were good enough to define my future plans in light of the talents that God has given me.
Sunday brought a relief, Baptist Doctrine! I had to get up early, again. It was good, though, because I got to hear Truth from God's Word. The message was not exactly encouraging, mostly highlighting the Romans 8:28 adage "All things work together for the good to them that love God, to them that are called according to His purposes." Now, I have used that concept in encouraging others in their tragedies and pain. Saying, "It will be alright, God's hand is in all of this, it works out for the good." I guess that's wrong. The verse says "for the good to them," not, "for the good." It basically meant that God is using problems and pain to mold "our" good not good. I tell people it will be "alright" but cannot justify that due to the fact that the person's good may or may not leave them feeling "alright". Our good is like parents disciplining us to help shape us for adulthood. A good swat on the can can save us from the slam of prison cell doors when adults. A sore seat doesn't feel "good" and doesn't seem "alright" at the time, but we become "good" and are "alright" later in life. I learned what advice to give in the future.
The night service highlighted the the jealousy of Joseph's brothers and the selling of Joseph into slavery. There was a twist, as usual with Dan, that talked about how screwed up Joseph's family was, and how it was not a surprise that Joseph had an ego problem that Jacob played favorites. The fact that Joseph was sold into slavery became a defining moment that worked out for "his" good. It was a "good" Sunday after all. It was also a good way to end/begin a new week.
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