If I had to name the one thing that has the greatest potential for leading people in the church to being open to change, it would be the experience of a silent retreat. Here is where the Holy Spirit works on a person in a way like nothing else I know. I say this not only because of what I have observed in the lives of others, but what I have personally experienced in thirty years of participating in and leading silent retreats. 

            Yet even though it is the Spirit that makes this experience transformative, it is the silence itself that creates the space in which the Spirit works in this special way. I think this is the case because our lives are filled with noise, with busyness, with demands on our time and energy, and with the relentless pressure to do something. A silent retreat is that period of time when all of that comes to a halt. It is time when any noise that is present is actually heard because we are listening to it, perhaps for the first time, noise outside of us and noise inside us. It is a time when busyness stops, demands cannot be made on us, and moments of just being a person replace the pressure to perform and produce. The power of silence lies in the fact that we are freed by it to attend to what the Spirit is bringing us that we need. It may have been there all along, but we were too busy to pay attention to it. 

            A silent retreat is also an experience of learning that we really can trust God. The Spirit ministers to us. We may feel stretched in uncomfortable ways during the retreat. We may go through periods of restless, even serious struggle as thoughts are brought to the surface we have tried to push away and feelings we have denied flow freely. But in the end it is knowing that we have been held by a Presence beyond ourselves that becomes dominant, and we also know that it has been the Presence of God. What a wonderful thing to experience the Presence of the Holy and live to tell about it!

            A silent retreat is also an experience of learning the power of community. Individual retreat and retreat with others are very different experiences. In silence the Spirit welds a group together in oneness much deeper than what is found in the daily life of a congregation. I think one reason this happens is that when we are not talking we are more attentive to one another. We actually notice each other. When we are in our regular routines we are focused on what we need to do next rather than being present to ourselves and others, or even that we are with others.

            All of this is part of a transformative experience in which retreat participants see what is really important and what is secondary to life together. This invites new thinking about how to be a genuine community of faith in a more effective way. Thus, the status quo becomes an obvious point of evaluation. Is it serving our needs? Is it helping us to be open to the work of the Spirit and to building a relationship of meaning with others? Structure begins to be seen for what it is - a means to an end rather than an end in itself.

            Silent retreats are not magical, but they are powerful. It takes people away from daily concerns and gives them permission to be a person rather than a producer. We speak of importance of structure in TJC. Silent retreats prove this point. They structure people in such a way that good always come out of it. Reason is a powerful tool to help people see the need for change. That said, the Presence of God in silence takes people beyond and deeper than reason, and the deeper they go the more open to change they will become.        

             - Jan Linn - Spirit of Joy Christian Church, Lakeville, MN