This past November 10-12, our Young Adults gathered at Green Oak Ranch for Exhale 2023, our third year of retreat. Exhale is a weekend space in the Fall for college-aged students and young professionals to exhale stress, exhale burdens that we carry in our workspaces and schools, and for us to breathe in the goodness of God through community, play and biblical truth. This year we asked the question: “What does God do in the Wilderness?”
Our speaker, Lisa Liou, took us on a journey by asking questions such as: what did the Israelites need to keep learning in the desert? And how does the wilderness serve as a training ground for the work that God invites us to do in this life? For three days, our young adults worshipped together, explored listening prayer, spent an afternoon with crafts, volleyball and archery, made s’mores, and wrestled with what the Lord was challenging us with in our life stage. The conversations that I have with our Young Adults (same with many of you) continually minister to me and remind me that God is in full control of the spaces that we occupy and the interactions that we have. His invitation is for us to listen and submit to what He wants us to do in His Kingdom work. Their intentionality and deep desire to love God and love others well, and to ask the hard questions of what that means for the spaces that they have been called to occupy (whether at work or in school), and the tension that comes with that, is not just changing them, but is also changing the people and places around them. Keep praying that our encounters with the Living God continue to change and to refine us into the persons that He wants us to be.