Retreat

We finally held that two-person retreat in a local hotel that we’d been talking about for so long. For the whole weekend there were no guests, because we were not home. Luxuries not found at home – most noteworthy of which was a hot shower where you could even sit down in hot water – changed the pace of life. Layers of dirt and dust were washed away by the comings and goings of the bathtub tides. And so with the spirit.

In the hotel restaurant, I said some things that Hamroz said should be put in the blog. The blog has scarcely been written in this year, so here’s the material:

Everyone alive is in the process of dying. You can not keep your life, but you must choose what to give it up for – decision to be remade day by day and minute by minute.

When we visited the US last summer, we spent a lot of time in the parks. Hamroz is from the steppes (with encroaching desert), but the east coast USA is deciduous forest. She was awed by the quantity and height of the trees. Growing up in the parks is what kept me off the streets. I tried to describe the fall season to her, when the dying leaves put beauty everywhere. So it is with our spirit.

Psa 116:15 Precious in the sight of the LORD Is the death of His godly ones.

Joh 12:24 "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.
Joh 12:25 "He who loves his life loses it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it to life eternal.