As I type this, I’m sitting in my chair with bleary eyes from my 2:00 am arrival home last night. My body is stiff from flying over the Atlantic, but my heart… oh my heart is overflowing at what I just got to experience. After nine years of offering Velvet Ashes retreats, we did our first ever in-person retreat.
Women made their way from countries around the world, navigating through train labor strikes, into the hills of Tuscany, Italy. We rolled our suitcases into a villa surrounded by olive trees and breathtaking views. I wish I could show you the hugs that happened as everyone arrived. Women who had connected online for years were able to hug each other for the first time. No screens or borders between us, we were finally face to face. We kept looking at each other and saying, “Is this really happening?!”
What came next is beyond words.
One woman later said as she was departing for home, “When people ask me how my trip was, it’ll be easy to talk about the delicious food we ate and the beautiful things we saw. But the deeper things that happened on this retreat, I don’t even know how to talk about.”
That sentiment resonated for us all.
Here’s my feeble attempt to articulate a taste of what we experienced: We went on an exploration of God’s love. At first glance this might seem elementary. Afterall, we’re considered experts on God’s love. We’ve made it our job to go into all the world to preach it and teach it and extend God’s love to others in tangible ways. Yet we are the ones who needed to sit and experience the reality of these three words:
“God loves me.”
We opened to receive the Father’s love through the story of the Prodigal Son. We opened to receive the Lover’s love through the book of Song of Songs. And we opened to receive love through the River’s living waters.
As God so powerfully does when we step away to retreat with him, he poured into us. He awakened us to a deeper awareness of his love for us and his presence within us. Of all the beautiful moments we shared, there is one memory I hope I hold onto. There was a particular moment when multiple women’s faces displayed a look that can only be described as “overwhelmed.” Overwhelmed that God loves me like this.
Today my WhatsApp is pinging with messages and pictures of all the women arriving back to their countries of service. The word that keeps coming again and again is “grateful.” We feel this overwhelming gratitude for what God did among us in our time together.
As I hold onto that feeling of gratitude, there is another awareness that I’m sensing as I slip back into my everyday life of groceries and chores and to-dos. That awareness is this: God doesn’t need a trip to Tuscany to show me his love. The reality of his overflowing love for me is always present to me. The practice of stepping away from distractions, of finding space to open helps to awaken my awareness of his love. And that can happen anywhere.
You are invited to your own exploration of God’s love through our online retreat. The same content our Tuscany group received is available to you. We’ll be retreating as a global community this coming weekend (April 28-30), and we’d love for you to experience this with us from wherever you are. Your retreat access and God’s invitation to you lasts a lifetime so plan for whenever works for you.
Plus don’t miss the chance to save some money. If you purchase this retreat before the end of April you can apply the cost of the retreat to an annual membership to walk in this sweet community year round.
Register for your retreat here
Our Tuscany retreat group has a folder to dump our collective photos. As much as we want to hang onto these sweet memories, they will fade in our minds. But the transformation of receiving and experiencing God’s love changes us forever. How we view God and what we believe about how he views us, this intimate space of gazing face to face with God, this changes everything about who we are, what we do, and how we do it.
God, may the reality of your overflowing river of love for each one of us overflow from our hearts into all the world. Amen.
Tuscany ladies, what were some of your favorite moments from the retreat?
Who else has retreated this month? What was your experience?
Who will be retreating this weekend? We’d love to be praying for you.
Share with us in the comments.
Tuscany: God showing up in beauty, and in the stories of other women, and in spiritual direction among olive trees! Such an outpouring of His love. And belly laughs over card games!