The Restory Retreat Centre

More About George If I want to tell more about myself, the very best might be to just start by saying "I love..." and then list things that I love. So: I love...... ....Tafelkop. The big world of which I am a part, silence and to walk. The Conversation ...time spent with my M. Where we talk for long stretches, and laugh, or are just quiet together for long periods of time. Elements From The Conversation ....our granddaughter, Ariana. Who loves books very much and keeps asking: "Oupa, tell me a silly story!" ....books. And dogs. And cats. And tea. ....a good conversation. Sculpting and woodwork. To write. ....poems. More so by the day. Basically impossible to pick a single one, but on my birthday, this one from Billy Collins. It talks about things one thinks about at 60. Design I pour a coating of salt on the table and make a circle in it with my finger. This is the cycle of life I say to no one. This is the wheel of fortune, the Arctic Circle. This is the ring of Ke...

  Just Beyond Yourself Just Beyond Yourself Just beyond yourself. It’s where you need to be. Half a step into self-forgetting and the rest restored by what you’ll meet. There is a road always beckoning. When you see the two sides of it closing together at that far horizon and deep in the foundations of your own heart at exactly the same time, that’s how you know it’s the road you have to follow. That’s how you know it’s where you have to go. That’s how you know you have to go. That’s how you know. Just beyond yourself, it’s where you need to be. David Whyte                                                 The Conversation Elements From The Conversation There is a road always beckoning.  With our love. George & Matilda

Please, Can I Have A God God is greater than God.                                                                                                                              Meister Eckhart The Conversation Elements From The Conversation Please can I have a God (after Selima Hill) not fossilized, hardened, stiff, unshaken, not contained in creeds and testimonies, judgments and stone tablets, but in the wound breaking open. Please can I have a God who asks me to worship at the altar of mystery, to lay aside certainty, and curl up in the hollow of a great stone down by the river, to hear the force of it rushing past. P...

  Kan  Ek Asseblief 'n God Hê God is groter as God.                                                                                     Meister Eckhart Die Gesprek  Elemente Uit Die Gesprek Please can I have a God (after Selima Hill) not fossilized, hardened, stiff, unshaken, not contained in creeds and testimonies, judgments and stone tablets, but in the wound breaking open. Please can I have a God who asks me to worship at the altar of mystery, to lay aside certainty, and curl up in the hollow of a great stone down by the river, to hear the force of it rushing past. Please can I have a God with questions rather than answers, who is not Rock or Fortress or Father, but sashays, swerves, ripens, rages at the rape of the earth. Please can I have a God whose voice is t...

  My Image Of God God is love.                                   1 John 4:8 The Conversation Elements From The Conversation The Worst Thing We Ever Did The worst thing we ever did was put God in the sky out of reach pulling the divinity from the leaf, sifting out the holy from our bones, insisting God isn’t bursting dazzlement  through everything we’ve made  a hard commitment to see as ordinary,  stripping the sacred from everywhere  to put in a cloud man elsewhere, prying closeness from your heart. The worst thing we ever did was take the dance and the song out of prayer made it sit up straight  and cross its legs removed it of rejoicing wiped clean its hip sway,  its questions,  its ecstatic yowl, its tears. The worst thing we ever did is pretend  God isn’t the easiest thing  in this Universe  available to every soul  in every ...

  Paasfees As Boodskap  Ek sê vir julle: As 'n koringkorrel nie in die grond val en sterf nie, bly dit net een enkele korrel;  maar as dit sterf, dra dit baie vrug.  Wie sy lewe liefhet, verloor dit;  maar wie sy lewe in hierdie wêreld gering ag, sal dit vir die ewige lewe behou.  As iemand My wil dien, laat hy My volg;  en waar Ek is, daar sal my dienskneg ook wees.                                                                      Joh 12:24-26 (2020-Vertaling) Ons Gesprek Elemente Uit Die Gesprek Daar is dood, vernietiging, rou, sugte en trane... Letsels van 'n oorlog, Kijif, Oekraïne, Februarie 20222 'n Ou, weemoedige lied uit Oekraïne: (Klik op skakel hieronder om daarna te luister) Plyve Kacha  Vertaal, lui die woorde: 'n Eend swem op die Tysyna [rivier] Moeder van my,...

    We are so self-centred. We bring every experience, all that happens, back to us,  me,  I. My creations, my world, my people, my job, my status. Somehow, in every conversation we end up at  Me.   We stroll in the vegetable patch, or in the veld, exclaiming: “Look, Chinese lanterns!”   Things can be so different if we look at the floating softness of Oriental lights, whispering under our breaths: “Look, gooseberries and flower-of-an-hour shaking their moorings!”   We live in a more-than-human world. George

The Hope That You Have   In these days   verse 15 in 1 Peter   constantly  announces itself  to me : “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. ”   ( NIV ‬ ‬ )   The people Peter  wa s writing to  we re  liv ing  dispersed as a small  minority in the northern parts of Asia Minor ,  nowa day s known as  Turkey.  They ha d  it difficult, because they just d idn’t   fit  into their society.  As believers they were seen to be different and such people  never have it easy.  For that reason Peter describes them as  forei gners and exiles.   And yet,  despite their difficult circumstances, they  possessed  something that fascinated those around them . Those people came up to them and said: “We know for a fact that you have a difficult life.  And yet,  you ...