Feb 6-7, 2026
Grace Church | Eden Prairie, MN
There's something extra special about getting to GATHER on a Friday night for worship, teaching, and community — and again, on Saturday morning for breakfast bites and a special morning of worship and reflection.
Mainstream culture has a lot to say about what it means to be a woman,
but what does God have to say about it?
We don’t need to be confused by cultural norms that glorify or belittle womanhood. As Christian women, we have something more secure to center our identity in: Jesus Christ.
At this year’s Gather Retreat, featured speaker Abigail Dodds will help us look past the cultural noise and see what it means to be an (A)Typical Woman — one whose identity is rooted in Christ, not the world.
Whether single, married, mothering, suffering, or discipling, you’ll be encouraged and equipped to live out biblical womanhood in every season of life.
Get Your Gather Merch!
Don't forget to grab your merch at the Gather Retreat!
Stop by the merch table to shop or pick up your pre-ordered items.
Schedule
Friday, Feb 6
5:30p-6:00p
Check-In
6:00p-9:00p
Worship & Teaching
Panel
Reflection & Prayer
9:00p-10:30p
Optional: Late Night Gather
Saturday, Feb 7
8:30a-11:30a
Breakout Sessions
Coffee & Breakfast Bites
Worship & Teaching
Prayer Time
Breakout Sessions
Union with Christ
with Cindy Berglund
Location: Chapel
Do you find living the Christian life is difficult? Do you spend your time trying hard and find yourself failing? Diving into Colossians 3, Cindy will help us understand how union with Christ changes us from trying hard to living in Him.
Holy Exercise
with Mindy Heine and Nastassia Smith
Location: The Underground Auditorium
Taking care of our bodies and honoring God with them is biblical. Mindy and Nastassia will challenge you to think of your body as a tool to be sharpened for God’s glory, not a trophy to be displayed for self or others.
Discretion with Social Media in our Digital Age
with Stephanie Armstrong and Tavia Low
Location: The Gathering Room
What is the point of being on social media? What do our posts present about our lives? Are we seeking something more by posting? You will be challenged to be led by discretion over exhibitionism with your social media habits.
Habits of the Home
with Abigail Dodds
Location: Auditorium
Let’s ponder and celebrate God’s spiritual and physical provision in Christ through the hands-on art of bread making and homemaking. Abigail will help us to take up our homey weapons of warfare in the spiritual fight against sin.
Contact
Do you have questions about the event?
Email our team!
Daily Devotionals
Hello, sister!
We can’t wait to see you Friday night at Gather Retreat 2026. As you prepare your heart this week, we invite you to reflect on God’s Word through these five devotions that you will receive each day.
Our theme verse this year comes from Colossians 3:3: “For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”
Our theme, (a)typical, is tethered to this truth: being an atypical woman has everything to do with dying to self and living in Christ, and nothing to do with trying to stand out or be different for difference’s sake.
In many ways, this theme chose us. Last year, as I (Cheri) was searching for women writers who faithfully addressed the call to not be easily offended, I came across an article by Abigail Dodds. Her writing stood out because it was deeply biblical—clear and rooted in Christ rather than cultural reactions. I was reminded that years earlier I had read her book (a)Typical Woman, which had strongly shaped my understanding of what it means to live as a woman defined by Christ.
Naturally, she became the woman we hoped would speak at Gather this year. When she said yes, and as we prayed about our theme, it became clear that her heart aligned with the heart of the women at Grace—to be women shaped by our Savior, not easily offended, willing to lay down self at the altar of our hearts, and eager to live within God’s good design for biblical womanhood.
Coming on the heels of Gather 2025: Unoffendable, Abigail calls women to live from our identity in Christ—to live in freedom! Below, we’ve included a short excerpt from one of Abigail’s articles to help set the stage for this year’s theme.
“When we turn hurt feelings into offendedness, we go from vulnerable to impenetrable. When we’re hurt by someone else’s words or actions, it’s tempting to try to protect ourselves with anger or self-righteousness that masquerades as having been offended. It’s easier to imagine the ones who have hurt us as villains rather than own that our hurt often has to do with our insecurities and fragility more than with the objective sinfulness of others.”
Reflection
Where have you been easily offended or tempted to defend yourself instead of resting in your identity in Christ?
Write down any offenses the Lord is asking you to lay down and ask Him to help you live from a place of dying to self and trusting Him.
Being an (a)typical woman is not a declaration that says, “Look how different I am.” It’s not about standing out, trying hard for God, or doing things for the sake of being different.
When Paul says, “you have died,” he means we have surrendered our old ways of thinking, believing, and defining ourselves. We confess our sin and trust the promise of the gospel—that God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, so that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16). Salvation is not self-improvement; it is a supernatural work of God. Jesus doesn’t just give us life—He is our life.
Furthermore, when Paul says our life is hidden with Christ in God, he is reminding us of our secure and eternal union with Him. Eternal life doesn’t start someday—it starts now. We are fully united to Christ in His death, resurrection, and reign. We become His Beloved!
Sisters, we are forever in Christ and He is in us!
Meditate on Colossians 3:1-4: If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
Reflection
As you reflect on this passage, where is God inviting you to set your mind on what is true of you in Christ rather than what you feel or fear?
How might living from that truth change the way you respond today?
Get ready to see all that is yours in Christ Jesus! An (a)typical woman is one who understands her identity as a new creation in Christ. She is chosen, loved, and adopted. She is not defined by her past, her sin, or other’s opinions. She is fully forgiven and no longer condemned (Romams 8:1). When we understand that we are in Christ we will receive and appropriate all that is ours—all the strength, power, peace, and security for today. As you read this passage, notice all that is yours in Christ Jesus.
Meditate on Ephesians 1:3-14: Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.
In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth in him.
In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.
Reflection
When you consider all that is yours in Christ, how now will you live? An (a)typical woman doesn’t live loud, defensive, or exhausted.
What might need to change so you live more rooted, rested, and anchored in Christ?
Additional Resource
If you want to learn more about what it means to be walking in Christ, check out this message from Peter Reid!
This morning, we get to hear from a sister who has learned, perhaps the hard way, what it means for her life to be truly hidden in Christ:
I love words like grind and strive. I’m competitive by nature, and I want to go hard in every area of my life—including my walk with Jesus. There’s nothing wrong with any of that, and while Scripture does call us to perseverance and endurance, I eventually learned something important: there is a difference between striving in the Spirit and exhausting yourself in your own strength.
In my twenties, my passion for Jesus slowly slipped into performance. What I thought was spiritual zeal was often just me trying really hard.
That became clear to me when I decided to run a half marathon. I thought, I’m an athlete—I’ve got this. So I showed up and just tried to grind it out. But here’s the problem: I never trained. I tried hard, but I wasn’t prepared. And I didn’t finish.
That experience taught me something I’ll never forget—there’s a huge difference between trying and training.
Training requires a plan, patience, and daily discipline. And spiritually, training looks like regular time with Jesus in His Word and receiving what is already mine in Christ. It looks like beginning my day saying, “Jesus, You’ve promised me a rich inheritance. You are with me. My life is hidden in You. So I trust You to strengthen me for whatever today holds. I lay me down. You own me. I am yours.”
That posture is completely different from rushing into my day, skipping intimacy with God, and just trying to obey Him on my own.
This lesson became painfully real when my parents divorced. I tried so hard to hold everything together—to stay faithful, to be strong, to make sense of the pain. But my trying was in vain. My emotions spiraled, and out of my hurt I said things I deeply regret.
A mentor gently helped me see the truth: all of my efforts were my attempts to survive the trial. I was relying on myself. (Now that is for sure a TYPICAL woman!) I was even, in my own way, trying to hide from God, avoiding time with Him, trying to escape the pain rather than bringing it to Him…
And maybe you can relate. Maybe you’re in the middle of a trial right now—angry, overwhelmed, believing lies about God or yourself—while all along, your life is hidden in Christ. All along, Christ has not left you. All along, He has been holding you, offering wisdom, comfort, and strength you could never produce on your own.
That’s the invitation of these devotions—not to try harder—but to receive strength through the Spirit and through the Word. I think a woman is (a)typical when she learns to rest in the truth that because her life is hidden with Christ in God, she will not face suffering, obedience, or growth alone. She is secure; knows she’s loved, and that Christ Himself is her life.
Reflection
How would things look different if you truly believed and received that your life is hidden in Christ and that you are not walking through this season alone?
We cannot wait to see you tonight! We pray these devotions have been helpful for your heart preparation.
You’ve spent this week reflecting on what is already true of you in Christ—that you are not your own, that your life is hidden with Him, and that you belong to the Lord in life and in death.
These passages remind us that being an (a)typical woman is not about striving harder or becoming someone new by sheer effort. It is about living from a secure identity, shaped and renewed by God’s Word, and offered back to Him in worship.
As you walk into Gather tonight, come just as you are—not to prove yourself, not to perform, and not to pretend. Come ready to listen, to receive, to respond—and of course come unoffendable! The same Word that has guided you this week is the lamp for your feet and the light for your path. And the same Christ who has held you through every season is here to meet you now.
May we be women who treasure His Word, live surrendered lives, and glorify God—body and soul—because we belong to Him. Meditate on these passages and tell Jesus what is on your heart.
I Corinthians 6:19-20: Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.
Romans 12:1-2: I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
Colossians 3:5-10: Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.
Titus 2:3-5: Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled.
Romans 14:7-9: For none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself. For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord's. For to this end Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.
2 Timothy 3:16-17: All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
Psalm 119:105: Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.
