Lessons of Advent: Season of Inward Preparation

A couple of months ago I was asked to help plan a retreat for The Well for the Journey organization in Baltimore.  (I’ve been a part of their Women At the Well group for the past year so they are aware of my work here with Journeys.)   The topic was “Listening to the Heartbeat of God During Advent”.   I responded to their request by saying that while I would be happy to participate in the planning, I knew very little about Advent and very little about Christian music, so I wasn’t sure how much help I would be.  They responded by saying, “Just bring your creative spirit.”  So I agreed to help. Well, then I got sick for several weeks and unfortunately missed the first two planning  meetings.  Two weeks before the retreat, I attended the last planning session - my first.   You can only imagine my surprise when I was handed an outline of the schedule of events and saw my name beside the last hour of the retreat - the Closing.  When I asked if this was a typo or was there another Michele, they laughed and so “no, we thought you’d be the perfect person to do the Closing.”   Whatever gave them that idea I do not know and despite my protests they continued to think this was a good idea.

Two and a half hours later, after I had them take me through the entire retreat experience and answers all my questions, I said “Okay, I’ll do it.”
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