My morning prayer takes place in our garden room which looks out over our garden through a wall of glass held by large oak beams. During Advent my usual chair had been moved to face the glass/garden to accommodate a large Christmas tree. On the first morning of Advent I sat down as usual with a cup of tea, my daily missal and a new Richard Rohr book for Advent. I looked out into the pitch black early morning and saw hanging in the sky above the Annexe at the bottom of our garden a huge star. No ordinary star but one of seven points that looked exactly like those in a children’s story book. I was dazzled. As I looked in awe, I saw with my own eye the star explode and scatter in every direction what appeared like silver dust and then reform to it’s magnificent original shape. No telescope or binoculars needed to witness this extraordinary event which repeated several times, one after another. I reached for my phone to try and record this moment of fabulousness in a photo. The picture was abysmal and I quickly realised that this beautiful piece of stellar activity could only be stored in my own memory. My heart repeated over and over ‘awesome God, praise you God’ and my prayer that morning focused almost entirely on the wonder and mystery of the God I worship. A particular line of scripture resounded in my mind
‘…and then He made the stars.’ An almost throw away line in the Creation account of Genesis which captures my imagination to envision a God who filled the night sky with these heavenly lanterns. I can only think WOW.
Each new morning of Advent saw the star waiting for me in an inky pre-dawn sky and I was totally fascinated by it and curious as to God’s purpose in allowing me this momentous experience. I read in Richard Rohr about a Cosmic Christ and I felt a special communion between God, myself and another servant of Christ all knitted together by the heavens and in particular, a star. I also found myself looking at the three kings with new understanding and how absolutely compelling their star must have been. Not unlike the one I shared my prayer time with right now, it rendered me silent without need of words to commune with God, simply eyes raised up and a heart swelling at the sight of it.
I woke later on Christmas morning with my family and of course daylight had hidden the star from view. I opened a gift from a girlfriend and inside the wrapping a star shaped box with the words ‘The Star’ printed in gold. It contained a small bottle of oil with the words ‘inner strength’ written across the label. Once again I felt God at work – moving people, things and experiences into my path with a divine purpose that I neither understood nor needed to understand. The mystery of it all was enough. Threads, connections, union across countryside, continents and cosmos.
On 12th January my son was preparing to leave for a posting to Bahrain with the Navy as a diver. He would be away for 6 months and had to leave in the early hours to be at Brize Norton by 4am. He assured me I didn’t need to get up to see him off. I, on the other hand, felt it to be essential to put my arms around him and plant a kiss on his cheek before he left for distant shores. As I marched down the garden in pyjamas and slippers to the Annexe to hug my boy, I happened to look up and found myself standing beneath a velvet sky so heavy and glittering with stars, it took my breath away. They hung so low above me I felt I could reach out and touch them. I felt once again God’s full presence in that instant. We made our good-byes under that sky and afterwards I stood alone, appreciating personally Mrs Morel’s experience in Sons and Lovers, a paragraph I have always adored for it’s passionate lyrical description. More connections asserting themselves, between past and present, literary genius and physical experience, memory and real life, mother and son, me, God and the universe. All intertwined, interconnected but completely separate. It felt as though I was present in the whole of eternity from beginning to end. God offered a moment in a ‘thin place’ where the whole of everything existed in a single flicker of time.
Our priest has spoken of the guiding star on the celebration of the Epiphany at Mass and I listened intently to his words about the 3 kings representing the whole of God’s gentile children – Jesus for all mankind, just as the shepherds symbolised His chosen people, Israel. I have learned that a hectogram, a seven pointed star has been used in Christianity to represent the 7 days of Creation and is the symbol of perfection for God in many Christian religions. Recently the media has been filled with the news of David Bowie’s death, the lyrics of Starman have played themselves out to me: ‘There’s a star man waiting in the sky, he’d like to come and meet us but he thinks he’d blow our minds…….’ Stars, stars and more stars……
Are we ready to meet with the creator of the stars, of the universe? Am I ready? This part of my journey in faith is not over, we are only half way through January and right at the start of the church year, but already I feel completely overwhelmed by the breadth and intensity of a God imprinting Himself upon me as I am soft wax to His creative hand. Lift up your eyes to the night sky and breath in the heavens of a holy God. Look, wait, listen for your own connections and don’t be surprised if they are written in the stars. If there is any God purpose in all of this at all then I believe it is that we are all connected intrinsically and intimately through all eternity. We are part of His story.
At our MSA team meeting last Friday I was taken to task by one of my colleagues for saying that one of my goals here on Godspace is to give voice to those who have no voice. All people have a voice, he reminded me. We don’t need to give them voices, we need to learn to listen to what they say and allow it to reshape our faith. He is right.
In Globalizing Theology: Belief and Practice in an Era of World Christianity, we are reminded that “Christianity is increasingly at home in many cultures and will not be imprisoned by a single culture.” Christianity has become a world religion not because everyone worships God in the same way, but because everyone worships the same God in their own culturally specific way. “Christianity is a world religion because it is a local religion”. The wonder of Christianity is that it is adaptable to any culture. It is at its strongest not when we all think and worship in the same way but when we all bring the diversity of our cultural expressions of faith to worship God together in unity and respect in spite of our diversity.
What many Westerners are oblivious to is how much our theology is shaped by a Eurocentric viewpoint that arises from the place of power and privilege that our cultures have held for so long. We are also oblivious to how strongly we have excluded other theological perspectives, wanting to invite others to sit at our table and adopt our Christian cultural viewpoint rather than allowing them to invite us to create a new global Christian table together.
In a post colonial, post Eurocentric Christian world those of us from European backgrounds need to become good listeners and learners and learn to ask questions rather than provide answers. We also need to allow the theological perspectives of other cultures to shape our theology, humbly seeking forgiveness for the wrongs of the past and working for reconciliation and justice.
What is your response?
How do you feel we have imprisoned Christianity in Western culture and taken advantage of our power and privilege? Think about your own Christian worldview. how much of it has been shaped by people of other cultures, ethnicities and viewpoints? How willing are you to engage in theological discussions with those who see Jesus differently and grapple with the possibility that your world view needs to be reshaped by them?
In Foolishness to the Greeks, Lesslie Newbigin states:
The fact that Jesus is much more than, much greater than our culture-bound vision of him, can only come home to us through the witness of those who see him through other eyes.
It is twenty years now since I first read Lesslie Newbigin’s books and was challenged to read African, Asian and South American theologians. I still remember how dismissive many of my colleagues were of liberation theology which grew out a culture of oppression, of Indian theologies that grew out of cultures of poverty and of South African Black theology which grew out of a culture of apartheid. Reading authors like Gustavo Gutiérrez and Cornel West has forced me to ask uncomfortable questions that have begun to liberate me from my culture bound vision of Jesus. Listening to my friends at NAIITS and indigenous peoples in Australia and North America has even more deeply impacted me and I know I still have much to learn.
Each time I work cross culturally I try to listen for new perspectives. Often I find myself back at the drawing board wondering how I need to reshape my faith so that I am not excluding those whom God embraces. Jesus’ parables often focus on God’s inclusion of those whom the Jewish culture excluded – Samaritans, women, lepers, sinners, were all included in his embrace. I am sure that as he told these stories the worldview and the culture of the people who embraced his message was slowly changed too.
God’s family is drawn from every culture and tribe and nation. We are on a journey together learning to understand and walk together in partnership with our sisters and brothers from around the world. When we know we are all part of God’s family, we will willingly seek for understanding, reconciliation and new ways of sharing life so that we all become one community as God intended us to be.
What is your response?
We live in such a divided world. What do you think it will take for us to sit down with people of all races and cultures and create a new theological table together? Sit quietly in the presence of God and allow the Spirit to guide you. Watch the video below with images and music from different cultures. What are one or two action steps you could take to broaden your understanding of other cultural perspectives?
~This post is old. Please check out our lastest for Creative Lent Ideas here~
Lent is only a few weeks away and many of us are already thinking about what we will give up for the season. Once only practiced by catholic and liturgical churches, Lent is now popular amongst churches of all traditions. To be honest however, I get sick and tired of people telling me they are going to give up chocolate or T.V. for Lent, not because I don’t think this type of self sacrifice is important but because I feel it trivializes Lent.
There are two types of spiritual practices we need in our lives – those that restore and those that transform. Lent was meant to be a season of transformation, but we have made it more into one of restoration.
Restorative practices, are the daily, weekly and yearly habits that anchor our faith and reassure us of the importance of what we believe. Practices like daily prayer, Sunday church, Easter and Christmas, reaffirm our sense of order and meaning in the universe, our community and our own lives. Most importantly, they intentionally connect our daily activities to the life, death and resurrection of Christ.
Transformative practices are characterized by a high degree of creativity and have little repetitive structure. They cut through the established way of doing things and restore a measure of flexibility and personal intimacy. They stop our restorative practices from becoming boring and stagnant and enable our faith to grow, adapt and change.
Lent was specifically designed for transformation. It was once about preparation for baptism and our entry into resurrection life, but for most, it now focuses more on sacrifice and death, often with little expectation of ongoing change in our lives. The focus has moved from Easter Sunday to Good Friday and our entering into Christ’s crucifixion and death.
So how do we invite the spirit of God into that creative process? We need to bring about transformation so that we can enter the resurrected life of Easter?
Take an Artist Date.
In Restoring the Wellsprings: A Lenten Retreat into Creative Practice, the authors suggest taking an “artist date” each week in Lent.
Once a week, it’s your job to take yourself out to have fun for an hour or two. Do it alone, and choose something that you might not normally allow yourself: an excursion to a gallery to look at art; a trip to a fabric store; a walk in a public garden you love, or have always wanted to visit; a ferry ride to explore the Island. This should be gratuitous and self-indulgent. In short, you are to give up self-denial for Lent.”
The place we need to start is with more fun and creativity. Experiences like this free our minds to think outside the box and restore that flexibility we so desperately need to reshape our spiritual lives and draw closer to God.
Get Out and Take Notice.
Over the last few years, I have been encouraged by fellow journeyers to get out and take notice of my neighbourhood, God’s creation and the people who populate it. I have learned to take the practices of Lectio divina and Visio divina, out into the world around me. I love exploring the neighbourhood graffiti, murals and garden art. I love observing the people Tom and I pass as we walk and taking notice of the new plants emerging and the migratory birds on the lake. This has freed my spirit to listen deeply and observe all that happens around me, inspiring me to incorporate new practices into my spiritual life in ways I could never have imagined even five years ago.
Give Free Reign to Creativity.
I think that by now, most of you realize that I am a strong advocate for free form creative practices like doodling, walking a finger labyrinth, and painting on rocks. Even crafts like knitting and woodworking can spur creativity and improve our problem solving ability. Consider setting aside time for one of these practices each week during Lent. Perhaps you would like to knit a prayer shawl or craft a toy for a disabled kid you know. Such practices are guaranteed to inspire new creative spiritual practices too.
Get Out and Have Some Fun
We all need to play. Making a mess, getting dirty, colouring, playing sports, are all rejuvenating practices that free us from inflexible thought patterns and routines. In our hectic, modern lives, many of us focus so heavily on work and family commitments that we never have time for pure fun. Just because we’re adults, doesn’t mean we have to take ourselves so seriously and make life all about work.
Perhaps Lent is a time to let go of control over what we do and hand the plan of celebrations over to our kids. I mentioned in my last year’s post Five Ways to Foster Creativity In Kids During Lent, how meaningful it was to give five-year-old Catie control of creativity for Easter. We underestimate the creativity of kids and their ability to shape their practices as well as our own.
Focus on Life Not Death.
As you walk through Lent, are you hungering for life or death? Are your practices focused on the cross or the kingdom? How would it change our Lenten practices if our goal was resurrection living rather then Cross walking? Lent is a time to daydream, to imagine new possibilities for the in-breaking of God’s new world.
What are the aspects of God’s longed-for new world that gnaws at your heart, making you want to respond? A few years ago, I did a series of posts on What Does the Kingdom of God Look Like? that you might like to read through as you contemplate this question.
Or read through these inspiring words from Isaiah 65:17-25. This is one of my favourite passages of inspiration and hope about the kingdom of God. I read it frequently as a way to keep myself focused on God’s purposes not just for me but for the entire creation.
Lent has become a popular practice for people of all Christian traditions in the last few years. I hope that you will consider observing it this year and walk with us into God’s kingdom ways.
You might also like to check out some of my Lenten resource lists – I am in the process of updating these so if you know of “must add” resources, please let me know.
Apps and More for your Lenten Journey
Ash Wednesday Prayers – with links to those from previous years.
I have also added several posts this year on creativity and Lent:
5 Ways to Foster Creativity in Children for Lent
Get Creative and Play Games in Lent
Seven Tips for Creating Sacred Space in Lent
Please check out our complete list of Godspace resources for Lent through Holy Week
This pattern of icy ripples around rocks in a stream really captured my attention this week. Water never flows straight yet it is the essence of life. Life doesn’t flow straight either. God never creates straight lines and can fashion beautiful patterns out of even the most challenging situations and incorporate them into a beautiful river if only we have the eyes to see.
“Like a page that aches for a word that speaks on a theme that is timeless.”
~ Neil Diamond, Be, from the score of Jonathan Livingston Seagull
The blank page
Both beckons and mocks
For who am I to think
I can take on such a call?
Many thoughts scream,
Yet seem nothing new
Will ever escape from
This word-laden spider web.
The dew of the web
Drips of promise and tears
As I long to write something
Meaningful and inspiring.
I mean, that’s
What writers do
Is it not? However,
I do not feel worthy.
In the midst
Of such doubt
My voice can not
Even pray aloud.
My eyes alight
Upon the well-worn book
Awaiting my surrender
To yet another blank page.
This one private
The confidante who holds
My deepest thoughts
To which I seldom give voice.
Reverently, I remove
It from the shelf of
Many others, dog-eared
By my revisiting
Other doubt-filled days…
Pages filled with
Prayers and rants
Begging, ideas and phrases.
What began within
The pages of these journals
Often found its way
Trickling through the spider’s web
Splashing onto many
Other blank pages
Meant to be shared
As a kiss to the Beloved.
by Joy Lenton
I feel fierce wind dragging at my clothes while freezing rain lashes my face as I pop briefly outside the back door.
This isn’t a day to linger. We’re beginning to experience the icy grip of winter and I sense it invading my soul.
Ground is hard, unyielding, frosting over, and I fear I am becoming likewise.
My desires and dreams have lain dormant for so long they seem to be withered on the vine.
I sit with a weight of sadness at the cusp of another year, trying to resist discouragement’s tug.
There is so little energy within that I can barely summon enough to hope for better things.
And yet…
My spirit whispers softly: Keep the faith. Keep believing. Keep hope alive.
It is only possible when I remember to stay rooted to the Vine, seek His strength to survive and see beyond the confines of each day.
And remember that no matter how lengthy and forbidding these cold, dark days may feel, light is still present and warmer weather lies ahead.
God draws my eyes to the small, quivering shoots of life appearing in soil.
Their tender green vitality is a sign of better things to come, of hope made visible to eyes willing to see.
He reminds me anew that seasons come and go but His love is always the fuel and fire my soul needs.
And it never wanes or grows cold. It’s new every morning, always available.
My lethargic soul shakes itself inwardly.
These are hard days for many who are afflicted as I am with SAD and the distinct lowering of mood it brings, or those who deal with depression on a daily basis.
I haven’t set resolutions for January because I know I would likely despair with the inevitable breaking of them.
But I have got a focus to sustain me throughout the year. I’m leaning into ‘love’ as my given #oneword365 and already learning how little I know about it and how much God needs to reveal its depths to me.
One of the ways in which God has shown forth His love to me over the last few years has been to whisper words to my heart during times of prayer.
Here’s a word I received a while back but which rings fresh and true for me today. My hope and prayer is that it may offer you some soul solace too, especially if you’re also feeling less than lively.
Prayer Whisper‘:’Green shoots’
“All plants must wither and die. But rooted to earth as they are, they receive of My life-giving power. Death precedes new birth. A grain of wheat must fall to the earth and die before it produces much fruit.
All the dry, arid places in your life, all the bleak and barren wilderness spaces will be watered again. Green shoots indicate Spring, new life, birth, and hope rising. Look for the green shoots I place on your pathway. They are portents of promise.
Take heart from their appearing. Mighty oaks grow strong from tiny acorns. Do not despise small beginnings. They are a sign of further life to come.
Yield to the season; observe the signs. Watch and see the harvest I am about to bring forth in your life. Water it daily with affirmation from My word, with faith, trust and praise for the promises waiting to be fulfilled.”
Lord,
May we see and sense Your comforting presence through the darkness. Root us so firmly in You that we can remain calm as we wait for promises to be fulfilled. Grant us the gift of hope rising phoenix-bold from the ashes of our experiences. Fill us with love and light enough to stay at peace and to be a beacon for others who are struggling. Amen.
Do you have a specific focus word for 2016?
How is God helping you to deal with depression or sit with sadness in this season?
It is summer in the Southern Hemisphere right now, and Christmas in New Zealand for many is traditionally followed by an exodus to the beaches, or the mountains and lakes, to take in the scenery and sun. Each year for the last few years my husband and I have taken the children to a different spot in the most basic but stunning locations. Long drops and cold showers; but beaches, and walks, native bush and views.
Each year I am aware that I come away slightly weighted down by the year that’s been. Carrying different longings, griefs, joys, memories, vestiges of experiences from the months past, that need sifting through and placing down. My time away becomes one long prayer. I watch it change from, “God, I’m sorry…” to “God, I need…” to “God, I miss….” to “God, I hope…” to “God, thank you!”, “God, thank you!”, “God, thank you again!” It soon becomes, “God, although you are here in this place, you have also been with me in the year past, and you will be with me in the year to come. You have never left me, and this place of beauty, and quiet and majesty only reminds me of this truth.”
My prayer becomes a poem that I sit and write on a rock by the beach, and another rock on the beach over the hill. And perhaps it’s sitting on these rocks that I find myself praying for a heart-shaped rock to return home with, as a reminder of God’s love. Walking on one of the beautiful beaches of the magnificent Kari Kari Peninsula just before departing, I look down and half hidden by sand I find my rock. A clearly defined heart but with a slightly jagged corner which I feel with my hand as I hold its solid weight. I like the jagged corner because it reminds me that love and life isn’t smooth, but a little rough at the edges sometimes, where we like rock can be worn down. But the centre of the rock is solid, warm and firm in my hand, and trustworthy. Like family, like friends, like God. I sit it in my bathroom when I return, where I can see it every day. It will carry me into the year ahead, as will the memory of this precious time away.
Poem: Come
Come home to yourself.
Home is sand under your feet.
And sun glinting silver on the sea.
Home is the waves and the birds.
Warmth on your skin.
The solitude that brings you home,
to your soul.
Forgo the crowd, which leaves you lonely.
And come away for a while.
Come back to yourself.
Survey the view.
And you’ll remember,
that you’ve never been away.
Just been wearing something ill-fitting,
waiting for the day you can disrobe.
And run barefoot.
Dishevelled, wind in your hair,
but free.
Come take a walk.
To the hill where the sky is large.
See the evening spread like a curtain across the day.
And feel yourself small, but wide.
If you still yourself you will hear,
your heart beat along with the earth’s.
And you will know yourself a part of the whole.
No separation at all.
A particle of life.
Which can seem lonely, unless you recall that,
your footprints leave a mark on the sand.
You make a track where you choose to walk.
Every action has a reaction.
No, you are not swallowed up
by the majesty of this breath-taking earth.
You share its beauty,
because of your living, breathing
part in it.
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