Tami and I have been together for over 10 years now and we've been married for almost seven of those years. Outside my salvation, she is the greatest gift God has given me and by His grace I can say that I love and enjoy her more now than I ever have before. Over these last ten years I've learned many things. One thing in particular never ceases to amaze me, namely that I don't always understand her. She thinks differently than I do, she responds differently than I do, and she feels differently than I do about many things. This is both a blessing and a challenge.

Four years ago I instituted a semi-regular retreat day into my schedule for the purpose of prayer, fasting, and personal planning. Few things have grown and blessed my soul, my family, and my ministry like regularly withdrawing to engage with Jesus in this way. This practice started for me when I heard another pastor at a conference mention that he took a regular retreat day as one of his spiritual rhythms, so I decided to give it a shot. It was uncomfortable early on, as I didn't really know what I was doing and didn't have any real plan. Some of my retreat days were fruitful and some of them were, quite frankly, awful.