2026 Women's Retreat Booklet by Centenary United Methodist Church

GEOGRAPHY OF THE SOUL

Centenary United Methodist Church 2026 Women's Retreat

Lake Junaluska, NC April 24-26, 2026

Welcome...

On behalf of the Women's Retreat Planning Committee, we are delighted and blessed to share this weekend with you. We have been planning for months for your arrival, praying over every detail with you in mind. It is our greatest hope that as you step away from the busyness of everyday life, you will find this a sacred space — a place where you can breathe, be still, and open your heart to what God has for you. May this weekend be a time of spiritual growth, meaningful fellowship, and deep, restorative rest. You are so loved, and we are so glad you are here.

OUR SPEAKER

Rev. Lara "Willis" Greene is a Dallas, Texas native and ordained United Methodist minister with over 30 years of experience. She holds a BA in Psychology from the University of Texas at Austin and a Master of Divinity from Emory University. Willis has served in ministry contexts across North Carolina, including Lincolnton, Gibsonville, Newton, and High Point, in both associate and co-pastor roles. She now serves as Senior Minister of Centenary in Winston-Salem. She and her husband David, also a UM clergyperson serving at Jamestown UMC, have two adult children, Elizabeth and Carter.

SUNDAY MORNING SPEAKER

Amy serves as Assistant to the Bishop in the Western North Carolina Conference. A graduate of UNC-G and Duke Divinity School, she has pastored churches in Trinity, High Point, and Shoals, and previously served six years as a district superintendent. A lifelong United Methodist, she is deeply passionate about helping bring God’s Kingdom to life on earth as it is in heaven. A devoted aunt and guardian, Amy finds joy (and a bit of unpredictability) walking alongside her young adult nephew, Brandon Estrada, and niece, Mei Coles, as they navigate adulthood.

OUR PIANIST

Carolyn “Boo” Poole is a longtime resident of Denmark/Barnwell, SC, where she has lived with her husband for over 50 years. A lifelong friend of Ann Monroe, she joined the church as pianist and built a rich career in music ministry, serving as organist and directing chancel, youth, handbell, and children’s choirs at Bethel Park UMC. Since retiring 16 years ago, Boo has continued her ministry by founding Singing with Grace, a monthly program that brings music, devotion, and fellowship to residents of an underserved assisted living community. She enjoys life at her country home with her husband, one dog, and five cats—and loves spending time gardening.

OUR ARTIST

Lee has been creating since she first discovered crayons at age 2! She’s from a family of quilters and learned everything from her mother, affectionately known as The Guru. She loves all things fabric—from zippy pouch to queen size quilt—and everything in between. With a love of color and bold graphic shapes, Lee enjoys designing patterns and teaching all types of classes, while sharing her adventures on her blog. Lee lives in beautiful North Carolina with her dog, Agnes Piper.

REV. LARA "WILLIS" GREENE

REV. AMY COLES

SUE STEPHENS

CAROLYN "BOO" POOLE

LEE MONROE

Our Schedule

FRIDAY

Start Time End Time Activity Location

4:00 PM 5:30 PM Check In Lambuth Inn Lobby

5:30 PM 6:30 PM Dinner Dining Room

6:30 PM 7:00 PM Gather & Welcome International Room

7:00 PM 8:30 PM Keynote Session 1 International Room

8:30 PM Refreshments & Games International Room

SATURDAY

St art Time End Time Activity Location

7:30 AM 9:00 AM Breakfast Dining Room

9:00 AM 9:15 AM Gathering Music International Room

9:15 AM 10:30 AM Keynote Session 2 International Room

10:30 AM 10:45 AM Break

10:45 AM Noon Arts Session International Room

Noon 5:00 PM Free Time (Lunch on your own)

5:00 PM 6:00 PM Keynote Session 3 International Room

6:00 PM 7:00 PM Dinner Dining Room

7:00 PM Free Time International Room Open for Informal Gathering

SUNDAY

Start Time Duration Activity/Point Person(s)

7:30 AM 9:00 AM Breakfast Dining Room

9:00 AM 10:30 AM Check Out/Free Time

10:30 AM 11:30 AM Session 4 - Worship International Room 11:30 AM Adjourn

Our Women's Retreat Team

SPEAKERS AND WORSHIP LEADERS

Rev. Amy Coles - Preacher and Celebrant

Rev. Willis Greene - Keynote

Rev. Marilyn Weiler - Liturgist

RETREAT PLANNING COMMITTEE

MUSIC LEADERS

Holly Gilliam - Music Leader

Anne Morgan - Music Leader

Boo Poole, Pianist

ARTS & MEDIA

Lee Chappell Monroe - Arts Instructor

Sue Stephens - Committee Chair

Rev. Marilyn Weiler - Altarscape Team Leader

Peggy Klinger - Table Captains & Altarscape

Nancy Sherrill - Hospitality

Debbie Kiser - Hospitality & Altarscape

Ann Monroe - Music Team Leader & Altarscape

Stacy Holley - Everything Else

Doug Peninger - Media Design (Love Y'all!!!)

GAME LEADERS

Katie Allen, Kristy Ernst, Lynn Paterson

The Altarscape

“Altarscape” is a word used to describe creating a multi-dimensional display as a way to engage God’s Word visually and enhance the worship experience. This practice goes beyond the traditional elements of Cross, candles, and liturgical paraments to more specifically illustrate the specific Scriptures that are the heart of every worship experience. It can incorporate sight, sound, smell, touch, and taste to bring about a fully sensory experience of worship. Early examples of visuals used to illustrate the Scriptures are stained glass windows like we have in our Sanctuary. Later examples include banners which have been created to make those visual links. Most recently, digital images and videos have been incorporated to deepen the worship experience.

During our retreat, each session will include an altarscape that will hopefully help you prepare to hear, receive, and process God’s word for that session as it is read, sung, and proclaimed. When you enter each session and begin to find your new table companions, take a moment to notice the altarscape and other changes to our worship space. Allow these multi-dimensional displays to lead you into worship. — Rev. Marilyn Weiler

SETTLED LAND: PSALMS OF ORIENTATION

Friday Evening Session

opening prayer

God of mountains and valleys, wilderness and homeland, You have walked every terrain of our souls before us.

As we gather this evening, some of us stand on solid ground. Some wander in the wilderness. Some glimpse the horizon of a new land. Wherever we are, meet us there.

Give us eyes to see the landscape clearly. Give us courage to name where we actually stand.

Give us hope that no terrain is permanent, that wilderness leads somewhere, and that You are our guide for the whole journey. Through Christ, our companion on every road. Amen.

SETTLED LAND: PSALMS OF ORIENTATION

Dates in Biblical History

DATES ARE APPROXIMATE

2000 BC Period of ancestors – Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph

1700 BC Jacob’s family enters Egypt

1260 BC Moses leads the escape from Egypt

1220 BC Joshua leads the people into Canaan - Period of the Judges

1020 BC Beginning of the monarchy - Saul, David, Solomon

922 BC Division into Northern & Southern Kingdom after the death of Solomon

722/721 BC Fall of Samaria to Assyria

587/586 BC Fall of Jerusalem to Babylon - Temple destroyed, Exile into Babylon

539 BC Persian Period – Edict of Cyrus

538 BC Return of the exiles

515 BC Temple rebuilt

333 BC Greek Period – Alexander the Great

63 BC Romans capture Jerusalem

37 BC Herod the Great appointed king over Palestine

4 BC Birth of Jesus

AD 29-30 Crucifixion of Jesus

AD 10 Paul’s birth

AD 30-31 Paul’s conversion

AD 44-49 Jerusalem Council

AD 46-47 Paul’s 1st, 2nd & 3rd Journeys

AD 60-61 Paul’s Voyage to Rome

AD 62-68 Paul martyred

AD 70 Fall of Jerusalem - Temple destroyed by Romans

AD 70-100 First Gospel (Mark) written

• BC - before Christ & AD - anno domini (in the year of our Lord).

• There is no 0 year.

• Christ is born in 1 AD and the year preceding it is 1 BC.

• Jesus most likely born in 4 BC and lived until AD 30.

Settled Land

Songs of Creation:

• Praise God as creator & sustainer of the universe

• The world is God’s way of bestowing blessing, so the proper response is gratitude.

Psalm 8, 33, 104, 145

Songs of Torah:

• Torah = God’s will & purpose

• These Psalms praise and celebrate God’s law as a guide for living a faithful and righteous life.

• They emphasize the wisdom, goodness, and importance of following God’s teachings.

Psalms 1, 15, 19, 24, and 119

Wisdom Psalms

• Contain lessons about how to live wisely and faithfully according to God’s ways

• They often contrast the outcomes of the righteous and the wicked and encourage trust in God.

Psalms 14 & 37

Occasions of Well-Being

• Psalms that testify to God’s regularity and reliability.

Psalms 131 and 133

SETTLED LAND: PSALMS OF ORIENTATION

closing responsive prayer

I lift up my eyes to the hills - from where will my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.

He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber. He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.

The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade at your right hand. The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.

The Lord will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life. The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time on and forevermore. Amen. (Psalm 121:1-8 NRSV)

WILDERNESS: PSALMS OF DISORIENTATION

Saturday Morning Session

opening prayer

God who meets us in the wilderness, God who heard Israel cry out of Egypt, God who found Hagar weeping in the desert, God who fed Elijah under the broom tree, God who walked with Jesus into Gethsemane,

We come this morning to the hard terrain. Some of us are there right now –lost, threatened, abandoned, afraid. Some of us have been there and bear the scars. Some of us dread going there and resist with all our might.

Give us courage to name what is true. Give us language for the landscape we would rather deny. Help us to trust that you walk this terrain with us –not to rescue us from the wilderness, but to companion us through it.

Help us to learn what the Psalms know: that wilderness is not the absence of faith, that lament is not the opposite of trust, that breaking silence is how healing begins.

We lift this prayer in the name of Jesus who cried from the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Amen.

Wilderness

Personal Complaint Songs

WILDERNESS: PSALMS OF DISORIENTATION Lament

• An individual cries out to God for help during suffering, trouble, or injustice while still expressing trust in God.

Psalms 13, 35, and 86

Communal Complaint Songs

• Prayers in which the whole community or nation cries out to God for help during shared suffering, disaster, or oppression, asking for deliverance and restoration.

Psalms 74,79, and 137

Writing

1. Address — My God…..establish intimacy

2. Complaint — I am in trouble because … be specific

3. Petition — Therefore I ask you to … tell God what you need

4. Motivation — You should do this because …give God reasons

5. Expression of Trust — I trust you to hear me, to be with me ….defiant confidence, even in the wilderness

6. Payment of Vow — When you deliver me, I will ….. what will you do? You can give thanks, tell others etc.

7. Praise — Words to celebrate & honor God

WILDERNESS: PSALMS OF DISORIENTATION

closing responsive prayer

God, who hears the cry of the oppressed, thank you for the gift of lament: for psalms that refuse silence, for prayers that summon you into our wilderness, for language that names what is true.

Help us trust that wilderness is not abandonment. Help us believe that you walk this terrain with us. Give us hope that the wilderness will lead somewhere, that the turn will come, that we will sing again.

Through Christ, who cried, “Why have you forsaken me?” and who rose bearing wounds that became signs of grace. Amen.

PROMISED LAND: PSALMS OF NEW ORIENTATION

Saturday Afternoon Session

opening prayer

God of exodus and resurrection, God who brought Israel out of Egypt through the sea, God who brought Jesus out of the tomb into new creation, God who makes all things new.

Meet us wherever we are.

Help us trust that wilderness leads somewhere. Help us receive new orientation when it comes, not as a return to innocence, but as a gift of transformation. Help us remember the darkness even as we celebrate the light.

Through Christ, who was crucified, dead and buried, and on the third day rose again. Amen.

PROMISED LAND:

Salvation Oracle

How do we transition from "save me?" to "God has rescued me?" This passage from Isaiah is an example of a trusted leader reminding the Israelites that God is with them.

But you, Israel, my servant, Jacob, whom I have chosen, the offspring of Abraham, my friend; you whom I took from the ends of the earth and called from its farthest corners, saying to you, “You are my servant; I have chosen you and not cast you off”; do not fear, for I am with you; do not be afraid, for I am your God; I will strengthen you; I will help you; I will uphold you with my victorious right hand.

For I, the LORD your God, hold your right hand; it is I who say to you, “Do not fear, I will help you.”

Do not fear, you worm Jacob, you maggot Israel!

I will help you, says the LORD; your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel.

(Isaiah 41:8-10, 13-14)

Promised Land

Enthronement Songs

Psalms 29, 47, 93, 96, 97, 98, 99, and 114

Personal Thanksgiving Songs

Psalms 30,34, 40, and 138

Community Thanksgiving Songs

Psalms 65, 66, 124, and 129

Songs of Praise

Psalms 100, 103, 113, 117, 135, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150

The Spreading

Sometimes a seed of compassion slips into my brain and lands in a place where before only anger could grow.

These seeds appear when I stop seeing humans as only our actions and start seeing all of us as walking wounds.

They appear when I see others finding ways to be generous, to be kind.

If I offer the seed the barest scrap of attention, it begins to grow roots. Then a stem. Then seed leaves. More leaves. A bud.

But what allows for this growth is far beyond me— rather some gift that comes through when me and my story get out of the way.

This is how I sometimes come to find a whole field of inner daisies thriving in a place I once torched to the dirt.

At first, they needed my constant care. Then they reseeded again. And again. They spread into such unpredictable places. Sometimes outside my inner world. The same way the seeds arrived in me.

Through kindness. Through love. It’s beautiful.

— Rosemary Wahtola Trommer

RESOURCE

Journal Activity

Create the three landscapes using symbols, words or drawings.

Rarely are we just in one place.

We might be in a settled land in one area of our life and wilderness in another.

• Where do you currently experience settled land/ orientation?

• Where are you in the wilderness?

• Where have you experienced promised land / new orientation?

What’s been transformed?

If you’re in the wilderness, what would it mean to believe that it leads somewhere?

If you’re in the promised land, how does the memory of wilderness shape your joy?

What “new song” are you learning to sing?

RESOURCE

How to Pray the Psalms

HOW TO BRING THE PSALMS INTO YOUR PRAYER LIFE

Read the Psalms with these questions in mind:

• What emotions does this psalm give me permission to feel?

• How does this Psalm connect me to God and others?

• How does this Psalm connect my story to God’s story?

• Ask: Whose Psalm might this be today? Who might want to pray this particular Psalm or might want me to pray it for them?

This extends our prayer life to people who are in circumstances different than our own.

JOY! HALLELUJAH!

Closing Worship

GATHERING

WELCOME & OPENING WORDS

CALL TO WORSHIP

(Based on Psalm 150)

OPENING SONG

OPENING PRAYER

SCRIPTURE

Psalm 150

REFLECTION

PRAYER OF THANKSGIVING & INTERCESSION

Praise the Lord! Praise God in the sanctuary.

Praise God in the mighty heavens!

Praise God for mighty deeds.

Praise God according to surpassing greatness!

Praise God with trumpet and harp.

Praise God with tambourine and dancing!

Praise God with strings and cymbals.

Let everything that has breath praise the Lord!

Hallelujah! Praise the Lord!

#89 Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee — HYMN TO JOY (found on page 24)

INVITATION

(Following the reading, particpants are invited to respond.) The Word of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God.

“Joy Is Our Response to God’s Goodness”

Joyful God, we thank you for this gathering of women, for friendship, laughter, and shared faith.

We thank you for the gift of breath and life.

Help us live as people of joy and praise.

We pray for those who need encouragement, for those who carry burdens, and for those seeking hope.

Fill us with your Spirit so that our lives may proclaim: Hallelujah!

Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

HOLY COMMUNION

Christ our Lord invites to his table all who love him, who earnestly repent of their sin and seek to live in peace with one another. Therefore, let us confess our sin before God and one another.

PRAYER OF CONFESSION

WORDS OF ASSURANCE

Merciful God, we confess that we have not always lived in joy and praise. We allow worry, fear, and busyness to silence our hallelujahs. Forgive us. Restore the joy of your salvation within us. Teach us again to praise you with our whole lives. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.

Christ died for us while we were yet sinners; that proves God’s love toward us. In the name of Jesus Christ, you are forgiven.

In the name of Jesus Christ, you are forgiven. Glory to God. Amen.

THE CIRCLE OF GRATITUDE

THE GREAT THANKSGIVING

WORDS OF INSTITUTION

PRAYER OVER THE ELEMENTS

For all these gifts…Hallelujah! Thanks be to God!

The Lord be with you. And also with you. Lift up your hearts. We lift them up to the Lord. Let us give thanks to the Lord our God. It is right to give our thanks and praise.

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Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might, heaven and earth are full of your glory. Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.

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Amen.

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SHARING THE CUP & THE BREAD

PRAYER AFTER COMMUNION

CLOSING SONG

BENEDICTION

SENDING FORTH

The body of Christ, given for you. The blood of Christ, given for you. Hallelujah!

Joyful God, we thank you for this holy meal. You have filled us with grace, renewed us with your Spirit, and reminded us that we belong to you. Send us out to live lives of praise and joy, proclaiming with every breath: Hallelujah! Amen.