Dog Retreat

I am back from my annual Dog Retreat. This is year 21. 21 years ago (actually in March) a buddy suggested we get together and go fishing. He said his father was part of a hunting club that had a “cabin” near a watershed. So began our yearly and at times bi-yearly meetings. The purpose was to get away together and have some fun fishing and fellowshipping. We wanted this to be a spiritual retreat – a time to connect with each other and Father. Little did we know that we would still be getting together 21 years in the future. I don’t recall anyone at that time thinking we could do this yearly. It did evolve into to that. It became especially important to us as we started going our separate ways after graduation.

I enjoy the goofing off we have done over the years. I suppose that we have caught literally hundreds of fish and shot a similar amount of skeet. We have hiked the woods around that area and I even got lost once. This was before the advent of the two mile radio and the GPS. (Both of which I have now.) We have four-wheeled the terrain. We have eaten until we’re stuffed. We’ve fought each other in games of Risk or Dominoes. However, the thing I have appreciated most about these times is the connection established with each other and the Lord. We have talked about unsubstantial as well as major issues in our lives until the wee hours of the morning. There have been several times that each of us had need for special support and prayer. Some of my favorite memories consist of kneeling around each other with hands lain on praying for God’s special intervention.

The thing I need most from our times together is connection with my brothers and with Father. I expect us to relax and dial down. I expect us to get together and have a good time, but most of all I expect us to be open and real with each other, to have time to speak out of our hearts to each other – to connect. I feel at times that there is not the depth of the spiritual connection I would like. There is spiritual connection but what I’m talking about is that it seems that we are not all on the same page. This year we missed the opportunity to pray with one of our brothers regarding his need for direction related to some future decisions he was seeking the Lord about. (I didn’t even think about this until I was writing. See what I mean?) My desire is that at the forefront of all we do is the spiritual focus. I want Jesus to be at the Retreat. Now I know He is but I would like to see us converse with Him as He is sitting in the room with us – to be conscious of His presence. I want a time of worship and spiritual focus. I want to know what is Father saying to each of my brothers and what is their heart felt need. I want to support and be a part of their success. I want to hold up the weary arms as Joshua did for Moses. And I need this from them. This is the only agenda I want. I think to accomplish this we need more time together – three days is not enough. I think we need an evening of share, prayer, and worship time. I think if we did this, I would be 100% satisfied with the time.

Overall, the key ingredient has been time together, a spiritual wrestling, if you will. It is true that iron does sharpen iron. I have experienced this. One of my brothers said that he would be really frustrated if he didn’t have the Dogs. I concur whole-heartedly. However, since I do have the Dogs, my frustration is the lack of the quantity of time together. I want more.