My church is not made of brick and mortar. It does not have hard wooden seats or songbooks. My church is not contained within four walls of a building. The music is not from a choir or a church instrument. My church is vastly different from a conventional one.
The fall air was crisp, but there was still warmth to be felt sitting in the sun. I was surrounded by the changing seasons. The trees were covered in their bright colours, yellow, orange and brown. My hands rested on the fading brown grass. I could smell the grass beneath me. I looked up and saw the bright blue sky amongst the colours of the trees. I felt so tiny. So insignificant within its vastness. Birds could be heard chirping amongst the hidden branches. Somewhere far off within the tree line, a chattering squirrel could be heard. The wind blew softly through woods—a soft whisper of promises to the one that can hear it.
This is my church setting. It’s where I feel most comfortable talking to the Creator.
The birds chirping in the bush and the wind blowing through the trees are my choir. The woods are the walls and the blue sky with the clouds are the tall ceiling of my church. The colourful sunset or the sunrise are my stained glass windows. The warm ground beneath me is my wooden bench that I sit on. I feel so free sitting out in my church.
This is where I talk with my Creator. Sometimes it is in a smudging ceremony, where the scented smoke of the smudging bowl goes up to the sky to offer my prayers. Or there are times when I talk openly to my Creator. My words echo in the openness of the woods. I don’t feel alone as I sit on the ground or on the rock, or as I like to refer to it, my pew. Instead I feel a closeness with the elements around me. My words, my prayers are connecting with what I feel around me. A oneness with the nature around me.
There are times I don’t talk at all. I sit there and enjoy the scenery. I bask in the beauty of the dimming colour of the flowers in the fields or enjoy the sound of the songbirds. Overnight it seems the world has burst into colour or song as the season comes to a close. The fading colors of the trees show the Creator at work within my church.
The sermon is before me if only I listen closely and open my heart to what my church is telling me. The season of life is ending, but listen to how the birds sing in the trees or how the trees display their finest foliage in the coming cold weather. Nature does not fear the end of the season, but rather celebrates in it.
As I sit there in my church, alone with my thoughts, the sermon goes on before me. One only has to listen and be still for the message to be heard. Sometimes I come to my church to be comforted and to seek answers. There are moments in my life when the rain mingled with the tears on my face. I had lost a loved one and sought answers in my church. No real answers as to why death came to the ones I loved, but I was comforted. Maybe that was what I needed at that time.
I feel free within my church. Free to express my beliefs and my faith. My church is alive. As I sit amongst the trees and the rocks, I know who I am. I have a sense of true belonging. Faith is knowing the trees are going to lose their colourful foliage, but a season will come again where they will bloom in their green finery. The birds will come back and the circle of life resumes. Each season has its own sermon to teach me.
Yes, my church is different from the conventional one with bricks and mortar, but it still a place I talk to my Creator. A place where I go to worship and pray.
