My name is Natalie and I love retreats! This past weekend God blessed me with helping put one on for around 60 teenagers. Ever since my first retreat as a 14 year old Natalie i could not get enough of them. I had never before then felt so immersed in love and Gods grace before. This past weekend I felt the same exact thing. I had a chance to listen to these kids talk about God and who they see him as. The retreat had our theme face to face, we had our verse, “But who do you say that I am?” Mark 8:29. We even had a hashtag #nofilter. The weekend was great, fun but also an amazing way to spend time with God. There were s’mores, there was human hunger hungry hippos, praise and worship. There was also pollen raining on us 24/7, also inflatables, tons of prayer and bible verse coloring. The weeknd was amazing but not only did these kids learn more about who they see God as, but I got a chance to reflect as well, which leads me to the important part of this blog.
Who do you see Jesus as? It is the ultimate question, the Jesus question. however for a long time I only thought of Jesus as that one dude who died for me. But it wasn’t until recently that he was something more, yes dying for me was a pretty big deal but there is so much more that God can be. Right now Jesus is my tour guide, he guiding me in where I should be going for his will. He is guiding me to follow the plan he has for me. He is also my savior, and my friend. THe coolest thing about this answer is that it is purely my own. In Mark 8:27 Jesus asked Peter who others say he is and Peter replied with, others say you are a prophet or Elijah. Then Jesus asked Peter the Jesus question showing how important it is to have your own personal answer to this Jesus question. Peter called him Messiah, I cam him guide, others call him light to their life.
The other cool part of this retreat is that it was possible to a change in that answer, that is the coolest part about it, our answer is constantly changing, Jesus is still Jesus, but he can be many different things to us in a specific time in our life, plus we are allowed more than one answer. Before when I was going through a hardship in my life and felt myself turning from God he was a friend. He bled and died for me yet after it felt like I wasn’t following his will, he was telling me turn around, come this way you will be happy and I don’t care if you turned to sin for that bit, I still love you.
So I challenge you to answer the Jesus question. WHO DO YOU SAY HE IS?
