Pain and suffering are unfortunate, yet critical components common to all who seek services at Shepherd’s Canyon Retreat. Suffering, of course, accompanies life and is especially true for those who serve in the Church.

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People come to Shepherd’s Canyon Retreat with complaints of overwhelming personal, marital, and congregational conflicts, ministry burnout, depression, marital discord, infidelity, and struggles with addictive behavior. As is common for us all, when we are in physical or emotional pain, we attempt to remove ourselves from it as quickly as possible.

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At Shepherd’s Canyon Retreat, while we strive to help people alleviate their suffering, we also strongly encourage them to both describe their agony and, even more importantly, to learn from it.

A useful scriptural passage regarding this difficult issue is Romans 5:3-5: “…we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.” This scripture makes it clear: suffering, while not to be sought after, is, nevertheless, purposeful and has the enormous potential to deepen our relationship with God and with each other. This is at the heart of what occurs at Shepherd’s Canyon Retreat.