Sketching as Prayer Retreat January 4, 2025

We’re fast approaching the annual turning of the calendar. For many, that’s a night for staying up late, playing games, watching the New Year’s Eve ball drop, and toasting the New Year. In my home growing up, we would open the back door to “let the old year out” and the front door to “let the new year in” right at the stroke of midnight. These days I tend to be sound asleep long before midnight, preferring to rise early on the first day of a new year. For me, that first morning is like the sparkling of sunlight on a fresh snowfall, as yet unmarked by footprints, or like the first page of a new sketchbook or journal, waiting for me chronicle my days in words or images.

As I start a new sketchbook, I like to look back through the previous one, smiling over the pages I was happy with, and considering others with some evaluation, carrying some aspects into my new sketchbook, while deciding to leave others behind. What about the start of this New Year? What do you look back on with gratitude and a smile, what do you hope to leave behind, and what would you like to take forward into 2025?  

I find that periodic times of reflection help me live more intentionally, and I want to live with attention to all that is most important to me in the coming year, as well as to look back and perhaps see where and how God has been at work in ways that I may not have noticed. Recognizing God’s handiwork retroactively can help us become more aware of his presence in the present and the future, which can lend a whole new perspective on the events of the coming year.

We all have hopes and dreams, and perhaps fears for the coming year. Much is unknown to us and beyond our control, but there’s also much that we can know and some that we can influence. We can have the certainty of knowing we are in God’s loving care, and that all our days are known to him. But with health concerns, a challenging economy, and general world and societal turmoil it can be easy to feel at loose ends and anxious about what lies ahead, unless we allow ourselves to slow down and take time to draw into God’s presence. Sometimes that’s easier to do with others who are also seeking God’s presence, so you are invited to a day of retreat and reflection, a day of looking back with gratitude and forward with hope.

You have searched me, Lord,
    and you know me.
You know when I sit and when I rise;
    you perceive my thoughts from afar.
You discern my going out and my lying down;
    you are familiar with all my ways…
all the days ordained for me were written in your book
    before one of them came to be.
How precious to me are your thoughts, God!
    How vast is the sum of them!   (Psalm 139:1-3, 17)

Every aspect of creation bears marks of its Creator, signs pointing to the ongoing presence, stability and love of God, who is still watching over and sustaining this world through all the turmoil of this present time. I find that sketching or writing as I observe creation can be one pathway to being present here and now, seeing God’s fingerprints in the world around us, and becoming aware of his presence. And when we become aware of God’s presence, we are drawn into prayer, either with words or in silent communion with and worship of the Master Artist and Author of our faith.

In this retreat we will open our eyes and hearts to God’s presence and look with faith into the world around us to see his fingerprints, as we draw apart for a few hours from our schedules and responsibilities. We will alternate brief times of sharing with periods of silence and solitude.

Details:
Saturday, January 4, 2025
9:45 AM – 3:00 PM
Wappingers Falls, NY
All are welcome, men & women, artists or writers, or others who long for a quiet day of prayer and reflection. We will be meeting in my home, so space is limited. Email me (melissafischerartist@gmail.com) to let me know you’d like to join us or for more details.