Shoved to Them
This weekend, our parish officially unveiled and blessed our new pulpit/ambo/thinga-majiggy. It is gorgeous and is an important step in the renovations our priest is making in the Sanctuary. With small steps, he is wiping out the ugliness of 80’s architecture and restoring to us the beauty of Sacred Space. I am so very grateful to him.
The change in our parish is forcing me to take a hard look at the space around me. We like to think that our home is a place where God is welcome, where we invite Him into our family and our lives, but can He be found in the cluttered chaos which is my home? Not “Is He here?” but can He be found? Or does the mess and the chaos shield His calming presence from us?
Messiness is very tedious and exhausting not just to my soul, but to my eyes and mind as well. In all of that fatigue, where is God? He is ever-present, to be sure, but who has the energy to seek Him? I know that I do not.
I have spent to whole of Lent fasting and praying in an effort to purge from myself that which is not “of God.” I have left this part alone. It is the most difficult because it is not just myself but the whole of my family which has fallen into this trap. I am truly beginning to see it as a trap of the Evil One. There is a reason behind the cliche “cleanliness is next to godliness” I have scoffed at this saying many times, but now am seeing it with clear eyes at last. The mess is a barrier to the sound of God. It is a wall between my Creator and myself.
I will be spending Holy Week in penitential cleaning. Sweeping the cobwebs from my house and the clutter from my soul. We will celebrate the Resurrection in a house which has been prepared to welcome the Lord to enter in, because if He knocked on my door today I’d be too embarrassed to let Him inside.
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