sacred spaces and other environmental thoughts

People have no peace in the world, but they have no disturbance when they are with God. — Bernard of Claiveaux

For more than 3 years, I’ve been a part of a group of folks at FirstLight who create a sacred space for worship each Sunday. This effort takes people and time to transform a cafeteria into a place of worship. Tables are rearranged, chairs added. Signs for where things are place around the worship area, screens and sound equipment put together. Then the Ambiance team sets to work with table coverings, candles and the like, all to create a space for worshiping God. In the end, FirstLight the church plant, the mobile church, opens it doors to all seeking God.
There is a Celtic saying that heaven and earth are only three feet apart, but in the thin places that distance is even smaller. A thin place is where the veil that separates heaven and earth is lifted and one is able to receive a glimpse of the glory of God. A contemporary poet Sharlande Sledge gives this description:

“Thin places,” the Celts call this space,

Both seen and unseen,

Where the door between the world

And the next is cracked open for a moment

And the light is not all on the other side.

God shaped space.

Holy.

What the roadies do on Sunday is very important for worship, but it is not the full story. You see, sacred spaces exist outside what we can create for FirstLight. We often compartmentalize our spiritual practices, our spiritual existence by defining them by place or time. We come to ‘worship’ on Sundays and read Bibles in the morning. We have a ‘workplaces’ and an ‘family life’ all defined by spaces or locations and times in the day.

The kicker is that this perception is very far from the truth. The presence of God exists outside of the Sunday mornings, outside of Bible studies, outside of Prayer chapels. Family. friends and work all blend together in a myriad of everyday life events and our spiritual lives themselves are an outflow blanketing all our activities. God’s presence is in our homes, our workplaces, with friends, at the supermarket, in an open field, and driving to work.

The carpenter can do better work if he talks quietly to God about each task, as Jesus surely did when He was a carpenter. — Frank Laubach

There is a saying that you get what you measure. I think this is the case with God as well, but should be rephrased. Where you look for God, you see God. Where you feel or see God at work . . . that is a sacred space.

Tuesday, April 22 is Earth Day. Take some time this week to find ways to improve God’s world. Take time, also, to thank God for the world around. After all, no matter where you are this sacred space is probably less than three feet from you right now.

Deana

He is your praise; he is your God, who performed for you those great and awesome wonders you saw with your own eyes. Deuteronomy 10: 21

flushed away

Visionary science fiction television show writer Gene Roddenberry inspired our generation ideas for ‘furthering’ our society with auto-opening doors, laser beams, colored screens for computers, walkie-talkie communicators (cell phone and blue tooth), and a variety of medical tri-cordery thingies for scanning the body. We all benefit from these futuristic visions.

Often, society creates new inventions and processes that improve our lives in the name of progress. Take the dishwasher for instance. This tool is a way to get around dishpan hands, hours washing dishes, while also efficiently sterilizing our plates and forks using less water. Truly something that helps us and helps the environment. A win/win.

The same can not be said about auto-flush toilets, the bane of today’s restrooms.

I never gave these inventions much thought until the past couple of years when my daughter went from preschool to the new elementary school in town. The preschool was ‘old school’ with the standard flush handles on your basic institution toilets. No problem there. The new elementary school has auto flush toilets and auto towel dispensers. I guess in the designers mind, this is considered 21st century restroom design. And, perhaps, it also helps keep the bathrooms clean with less, er ‘waste’.

As for you, my flock. . . Is it not enough for you to feed on good pasture? Must you also trample the rest of your pasture with your feet? Is it not enough? Ezekiel 34:17-18

What is also did, unfortunately, was train my daughter not to flush toilets anymore. Now, home bathrooms with none of the auto-amenities are left un-flushed for the next family member. What concerns me even more is that is also teaches my daughter that messes she leaves in her wake are not her responsibility to clean up, that something or someone else will clean it up for her. And if these messes aren’t her responsibility, how will this affect her understanding of her role in how to restore our earthly environment? I wonder if we are teaching the next generation that using what is there and leaving the mess behind is an acceptable way to live.

The land is mine and you are but aliens and my tenants. Throughout the country that you hold as a possession, you must provide for the redemption of the land. Leviticus 25:23-24

In a country where consumerism is king, where we are given every opportunity to take and use and not encouraged return in kind, what is the best way to teach responsibility for resources, land and animals? Unfortunately the U.S. is #1 in trash producing countries, creating about 1,609 pounds of trash per person per year. From my standpoint, responsibility starts at home, how I live my life, how I teach my daughter to live. It’s one step, one recycle can, one commode flushed at a time. In any event, for the progress of convenience, comes a price. And we, my friends, have just begun to pay it.

I brought you into a fertile land to eat its fruit and rich produce. But you came and defiled my land and you made my inheritance detestable. Jeremiah 2:7

Take a step today. Do something to give back what you take from the earth.

In Christ,

Deana