What's Going On - Annual Leadership Retreat - December 3, 2025

What’s Going On? Annual Leadership Retreat

For the last four Novembers, the staff and council of Mountainview have gone away overnight on a retreat.  This year we made a move from Camp Shalom near Cambridge and instead went to Jericho House in Wainfleet.  The move included changing from managing our own food and bedding to having hosts who cooked for us and showed that they had a call from God to serve at Jericho House.

Our event this year was led by Pastor Brady and Pastor Jolene with Ruth Ann guiding our worship times.  The training was shaped by Pastor Brady’s experience at GOHOP (Greater Ontario House of Prayer) where he learned a particular kind of listening prayer.  The central experience of the retreat was being in a small group where we asked the Holy Spirit to give us a word, image, verse, thought or feeling for the person we were going to pray for and then taking one minute to receive.  What we received we wrote down and gave to the person.

As you can imagine, this was a stretching exercise.  So, by way of preparation, Pastor Jolene led us through some exercises designed to expand our comfort zone.  The one most will speak of is when she had us pair up with someone and say back and forth with them repeatedly “I could be loved by you”.  She claims her husband Timothy uses this exercise with his High School drama students.

Along with preparation before the main event, we also had time for fun and connection.  Games were played, conversations took place and some people slept long while others stayed up late.  It is always amazing how much good stuff takes place apart from the scheduled events.

And after the listening prayer we were given time to reflect and wonder and process.  We could enjoy the Jericho House property and go for a walk.  We were encouraged to journal.  We spent time discussing together what we had experienced and learned.

I am a strong proponent of stretching people to help them grow.  I am also intrigued and interested whenever there is an opportunity to let the Holy Spirit be the one doing the stretching.  This retreat gave us some meaningful experience of these truths.

Pastor Erick Schuringa