I attended a Festival of Preaching in Nashville last year and stayed at a motel about 1 mile from the sight. Each day to and from the conference site I would pass this church. And it intrigued me. It was not a huge church but it was closed…abandoned really. The grass was growing up around it…the doors were shuttered tight, the grass was tall and uncut…it seemed like another abandoned building on my way to and from. But I knew it was a church, a house of God who no longer gathered here.
But when I looked closer I could see beautiful roses growing to the left of the church…what appeared to be an orange rose bush and in front there were red rose bushes kissing the front doors. It was such a contrast to where I was heading…a huge Baptist church close to the downtown that could hold hundreds and maybe a couple thousand as well as huge Presbyterian church which could hold hundreds. But this little church was closed and tugged at my heart.
I wonder if might be how the spiritual journey is for some…a desire for something deeper, but unsure of how to get to God. Maybe our relationship with the Holy, with the sacred has been distant, un-kept and even abandoned. Maybe there is a feeling of something that is grown up, closed off blocking us from returning to God or even finding God. Yet God blooms like a rose inviting our curiosity, daring us draw closer…to walk toward the Holy to be open. And the more we dare walk…the more the grass shortens…maybe the more we see the doors to God are not boarded up but the way to open the door to the Sacred, the Holy One, the “I Am” is hidden among the climbing bushes against the door touching our senses with delight. Each day is a new start, a new chance to find our way to God, to be attentive to see how God might be reaching out each day.
And so as we rise and stretch out our arms to embrace the day, this is my prayer…
O Holy One,
You reach out to us in subtle ways
to catch our eyes, our ears, our smell, our hearts.
May we move to you and embrace in love. Amen!
