Sometimes pastors need to get away. There comes a point when you have handed out word, sacrement and counsel, and you find little left. Sometimes in sharing all the vision and encouragement you can, you need to refresh. If we as people give only from ourselves, we will burn out.

Jesus withrew to lonely places. He prayed. He refreshed. When we give from our soul what is God’s, we draw from a well that will never run dry. It is on us to find the patterns of life to replenish.

I am out in the Boulder, Colorado area at a retreat center called Chautauqua. It is an Acts29 event where a bunch of lead pastors get together and share. No one is really expected to give, prepare, or manage. People from the network have taken care of that. They even provide speakers like Mark Driscoll of Mars Hill Church in Seattle (our sponsoring church, so be nice). He spoke today from the heart about burn out and ministry. What a great thing for a person who is sucessful in career not to fall behind a facade of preparedness and postured strength, but to be honest. It was not for recording, he told us, but my stock in Mark as deeper than just a funny or edgy preacher went up.

Ed Stetzer, Amazon.com search his name if you want to see what he wrote, is also speaking here. He will be out at Terra Nova for the Church Planters bootcamp we are hosting in October.

Generally, I have been spending time with Diane walking trails, praying about the future, and trying our best to plan out the next 3 years of our lives together. We are working from what we have. I am a big believer in the strategic thinking i have learned from poker. You have to play the cards you are dealt. You can’t cry over hands past, wish for better cards, or waste your hand cahsing after impossible odds. The strength for us strategically is recognizing what God has “dealt” us- what he has given us as gifts, history, resources, calling, placement, etc. Please pray for us as we do this time of personal reflection, prayer and planning.

We also spend time just hanging with other planters. Sitting under a “picnic shelter” having a cold drink and conversation with a planter from Philly, Eric Mason, and a pastor from California, Scotty West, is the stuff that makes the retreat a time of peer connection and makes A29 a network.

So I am blogging now, I’ll have a coffee @ an italian cafe with some church planters who are hoping to head to Italy. We may even cap off the night with a Limoncello. Then I will read through Acts 16 write on it, pray for my brothers and sisters @ TErra, thank God for lonely, quiet places, and go to sleep without an alarm clock being set.