The Springs

Something from the tackle box:

       After the apostles returned to Jesus, they told him everything they had done and taught.  But so many people were coming and going that Jesus and the apostles did not even have a chance to eat.  Then Jesus said, “Lets go to a place where we can be alone and get some rest.”  They left in a boat for a place where they could be alone.   (Mark 6:30-32 CEV)

        In the rolling hills of southern Indiana, near the town of Oldenburg, there is a place called The Springs.  It is a Christian retreat center owned and operated by a wonderful couple named Dick and Sibyl Towner.  A small complex of charmingly beautiful cabins is clustered on one hundred and fifty acres of undulating woodland, meadow and pasture, far removed from the noisy bustle of even a small town like the place I live in. It is a wonderful place to rest and grow in heart, mind, soul and strength.  If you seek a quiet place to meet and converse in your heart with God, I cannot recommend a better one.  And you can do it with a fishing rod in your hands as well, if you are bent that way, like I am.    

a fish caught with the rising sun

       I’ve been the pastor of the little Congregational church in the town of Lake Odessa for over a dozen years now.  I love my calling and I love my life as a small church pastor, but my heart has been in a state of transition for several years now.  While I still enjoy preaching, teaching and leading the worship services at the little congregation of nonconformist Christians in this small town, I’ve come to realize that I love being with people one-on-one, listening to their stories and to their heart’s deepest desires, as we explore the spiritual life in private, just two people together in the presence of God, who makes three. 

       This newer aspect of my pastoral calling is part of what prompted me to pursue a Master’s Degree in Spiritual Formation and Leadership from Spring Arbor University several years ago, and after that to take up a course of study in the practice of Spiritual Direction through an organization called Sustainable Faith, which is where The Springs comes in. 

       Sustainable Faith runs its school of Spiritual Direction through teachers at a number of locations around the U.S and Canada.  The training involves a lot of independent work and study from home, but also times to gather in residency for a few days at a time and receive in-person training and review in community with your teachers and classmates.   The cohort I joined, over a year ago now, is under the tutelage of Sibyl Towner and her colleague Linda Holmes.  When we meet together for a residency, it is at The Springs, where Sibyl lives. 

       Going to The Springs for school in Spiritual Direction is different than going simply for quiet time with God.  Obviously, we have to squeeze a lot of listening and learning into the time between our community meals and other group work.  The daylight hours are pretty well filled with scheduled activity for the three days and two nights I’m there for a cohort gathering.  However, a good fisherman knows how to get up early!

sunrise over the water at The Springs

       If I get up, clean up and get dressed before sunrise, I can enjoy about two hours of fishing from just before sunrise until called to morning devotions during our residencies in September and May, and weather permitting, for an hour or so in November and March as well.   This has become my standard operating procedure at all of my visits to The Springs to work on learning the art of providing Spiritual Direction. 

       Some may say that this is an unproductive shift in my focus, a deviation from my purpose in being at The Springs in the first place.  Perhaps I would be better served by spending this extra time, that I give myself by rising early, in contemplative prayer, or meditative bible reading, Lectio Divina, and that sort of stuff.  I have one friend who takes delight in reminding me that fishing for fish is the very first thing that Jesus got his disciples to stop doing upon calling them to become fishers of men! 

       The point is well taken and, to an extent, I agree.  Those higher spiritual disciplines are all well and good, and I often engage in them.  I am one who genuinely appreciates spending time meditating and talking with God alone in an otherwise empty church sanctuary or chapel, praying the psalms and that sort of thing.  I get a lot out of that kind of intentionally spiritual activity, but it isn’t quite the same.  Not that fishing is always a spiritually uplifting experience, sometimes it’s just fishing, but it can be completely other than just fishing. Completely different than just praying, too. 

a little mist on the lake is a good thing

       My answer to the occasional objection to my fishing, is that fly-fishing, especially on a mist covered lake in the hour of sunrise, with no one else but God around to watch, is my preferred method to truly get what those higher disciplines are all designed to accomplish in a heart and soul.  In that time I spend on, in, or by the water, fly-line weaving it’s way through the mist before and behind me, I rarely fail to contemplate God’s presence with me, and meditate on his love and goodness towards me, as it is shown through the good creation within which he has placed me.  Fly-fishing, for me, is often the most joyfully intimate form of privately communing with God in prayer that I have yet found.  I have come to know that fly-fishing, by myself, away from all other distractions, is God’s gift to me, as well as my act of loving devotion towards God and his creation.  In short; fly-fishing is rest, peace and nourishment for my soul, and The Springs is one of those places where it can happen by design.

       And by design, I am speaking of human design working in partnership with God in his creation.  Although fed by spring water that flows from a nearby hillside, and larger than most man-made ponds, the fishing hole at The Springs is not a natural lake.  It is the result of both initial human ingenuity and lots of continuing and caring maintenance. 

       All kinds of people have fishing ponds.  Off hand, I can think of half a dozen friends, neighbors, and relatives who have, or have had, a fishing pond that I’ve spent time on.  For the most part, they have been little more than big holes dug in the ground, pumped full of water, and then had fish dumped into them.  Some of them have looked OK, none of them has been beautiful, and a couple of them have been downright ugly.  Not so at The Springs.

       Once dug and filled with fish, most fishing ponds I know of are poorly maintained.  They weed up, algae up, muddy up, and the fish don’t do well in them, if they manage to last more than a year or two at all.  Not so at The Springs. 

       Most people who put in a fishing pond don’t want to learn about properly maintaining a fishing pond, or it’s fish population, for the long haul.  It's too much work and expense.  They just want a place to go and catch a meals worth of pan-fish or trout without having to go to a lake or trout stream from which they might return empty-handed.  Not so at The Springs. 

       Have you ever seen an indoor aquarium in the home of someone who doesn’t take good care of it, and doesn’t even care to learn how, let alone do it?  That is what a great many fishing ponds are like, just bigger, and out-of-doors.  Not so at The Springs. 

       At The Springs they both care about, and then do, what needs to be done.  At breakfast after I’ve been out fishing, which does get noticed but never interrupted, I’m often quizzed by Dick on the experience.  ‘What did the water look like?  The algae levels?  The number of fish I’ve caught and released?  Their species, and their relative sizes?’  Such information as that.  If I’ve caught a dozen bluegills I might be asked what was the ratio of those under six inches long to those over six inches long, that kind of thing.  It’s more than just curiosity on Dick's part.  He’s thinking; ‘what do I need to thin out?  What do I need to restock?  What do I need to do to keep this little lake healthy, or make it even better than it is right now?’ 

       The whole eco-system of the pond is both considered and taken care of with love and wisdom.  The water, the fish and plants that live in the water, the surrounding landscape, as well as the critters and plants that make their homes near the water, all are taken into account when making the decisions, and doing the work, that goes into making this little lake a delight rather than a blight.  I’m sure that it takes a lot of time and effort.  I’ll bet it’s not cheap either.  It is one great work of stewardship on the part of Dick, Sibyl and their staff to keep it this way.  At The Springs our spiritual life is the focus, but that doesn’t mean that matter doesn’t matter!  In the beginning creation was declared to be good by the Creator, and despite our proclivity to forget that fact, it still remains so.  We were created in God’s image, at least in part, so that we could take good care of  God’s good creation, no less than this good old world was created, by that same good God, for us to live in.  The bible says so. 

       I give my friends at The Springs a lot of credit for remembering that.  It makes my early morning devotional time with God, fly rod in hand, all that easier to come by while I’m there.  

Something to take home in your creel: 

       If you want to see more pictures and learn more about The Springs, you can visit their website -  www.thespringsindiana.org   If you decide that you want to spend some time there yourself, I would recommend that you call and schedule next year’s visit now.  It is such a nice place that they are often booked full for weeks on end well ahead of time.  However, if your schedule is flexible, they may have openings come up at any time, so go ahead and give a call any time.  If you do book a cabin for a visit, please remember that it is a retreat center, a place to meet with God and others in the peaceful setting of His creation.  Whether other visitors are present or not, you should not go there if you like to be loud, irreverent, or otherwise behave obnoxiously.  It is a Holy place. 

     While it is a place to go and intentionally be with God , season and weather permitting, you can fish as well, or better yet, as part of that, while you are there!  You can fish from a boat, from the dock or from shore. Whatever tickles your fancy in the way of tackle, you can use it.  You can fish with a bobber and worms, crank baits, or even go fly-fishing like I do.  Depending on what's going on with the lake, you might even be able to clean and cook some of the fish that you catch.  There is a cleaning station set up right by the dock, if you like doing that.  You just have to ask Dick what species and sizes he’s currently allowing to be harvested for the health of the lake.  

       The Springs is a wonderful place to be, a wonderful place to pray, a wonderful place to enjoy God’s good creation.  Whether you fish, walk the trails, or just look out the window of your cabin during your stay, it is well worth the visit.  If you do fish, may God meet and bless you in your time on the lake.  You can know that you posses a kindred soul with my own.  That water is well prayed over. 

       Oh, - by the way, - watch out for the power lines that run across the northwest corner of the lake.  I wouldn't want you to end up adding another bait or bobber to the interesting display that already hangs there.