One of the absolute best things I get to do as an author is to talk about faith at conferences and retreats. Here’s some relevant pre-retreat dialogue:

• Unsuspecting pastor or men’s leader: “Wow, this Derek Maul guy’s a pretty good writer; let’s ask him to come talk for four hours over a weekend.”
• Me: “OK. I’m in. Just tell me when and where.”
• Me (to myself): “These people have no idea!”
• Men’s group to unsuspecting pastor: “You’d better hope this guy’s not a dud…”
• God to me: “Got your back, Derek; just leave this in my hands… but you’d better start praying hard…”

So I spent all day Friday driving to North East, Maryland. Sandy Cove Ministries. It wouldn’t be more than a six-hour drive… if I didn’t have to go through Richmond, and Washington, and Baltimore – on a Friday afternoon.

But I enjoyed the “motoring,” and arrived in good time to walk around the delightful community here, before spending the evening preparing for Saturday morning’s first talk.

Instead of more words, this morning’s post features some of the beautiful images I captured during the day – especially as the sun went down over the North East River estuary.

It’s not hard to experience the presence of God in a place like this. The challenge this weekend is to encourage a group of men to return home Sunday afternoon with the same quality of spiritual intention they brought with them to Sandy Cove.

Privileged to be anywhere on the Master’s business – DEREK

20 really cool images: