How to Create Your Personal Spiritual Retreat

“Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.” Mark 6:31

This world is getting noisier and noisier. And that noise is more and more moving into our homes and into our places of quiet.

We have phones that notify us of constant activity, places to chat, snaps to watch, and messages needing a reply. My phone, with its lights and bells and buzzing, is within reaching distance during my morning devotions and lies on a stack of books next to me at bedtime.

More than ever, I need to turn off the cacophony outside and steal away to meet with God in quiet. To reset. To refresh my soul. To get away and to hear from One voice alone.

I’m so excited to share an amazing resource with you: the Be Still: A Personal Spiritual Retreat Guide. These downloadable pages are filled with scripture, prompts, questions, and plenty of journaling space to help you create a full spiritual retreat.

This retreat guide grew out of my own experience, in the months after my husband’s sudden death, when I desperately needed to get my footing and get some sense of God’s future for me. I needed to press pause and take stock of nearly every area of my life, surrender it to God and seek where He was speaking and leading me.

If you’re looking to create your own personal spiritual retreat, you’ll need at least one full day away. But a weekend is best! I’ve done it as a single-mom where I leave early in the morning and stay local, heading to a quiet spot in my favorite park. Getting out of your home will help you stay focused and not get distracted by the pile of dishes or laundry calling your name.

Be sure to turn off your phone, quiet all notifications and find a place without a television. Worship music can be helpful but don’t let even the lyrics of an amazing song keep you from hearing God’s still small voice to you.

Finally, you’ll need your Bible, a favorite pen or two, and a copy of this personal spiriual retreat guide. Each area of the guide is intended to help you clear the clutter from your mind and heart as you connect deeply with God through prayer, scripture and journaling.

The sections of the guide allow you to:

• Thank God for Who He is and what He’s done
• Take a spiritual assessment
• Focus on the attributes of God
• Confess known sin
• Evaluate your biggest needs and challenges
• Seek God’s direction over your life.

Maybe you’ve been craving just this kind of time away.

If you’re longing to push pause and get away with God . . .
If you’re overwhelmed by unrelenting demands . . .
If you’re more poured out than filled up . . .
If you’re stuck and need to seek God’s direction in your life . . .

This Be Still Personal Spiritual Retreat Guide can help you refresh, refill and hear the One voice that matters.

Use it yearly or as often as you need for a deep-down, soul-filling spiritual reset. I pray that these pages help you deepen your walk with God as you seek Him first in all things.

“Peace does not dwell in outward things but in the heart prepared to wait trustfully and quietly on Him who has all things safely in His hands.” Elisabeth Elliot