Once a month, I used to write blog posts focused on personal prayers. Introspective tone. Trying to offer a bit of hard-earned wisdom or little nugget of realization.
I haven’t written one of those posts in a while.
Have you noticed? I hadn’t really, but recently, I’ve been rattling around with the weight of sharing what it looks like to live out faith when you aren’t feeling very faithful or holy (set apart, etc.).
I don’t feel very faithful. Most of my faith journey has been that of an emotional academic, where I have the head knowledge and a bunch of feelings too. Both are still very present in my life, but I’m wandering around in a different season than I’ve been in before.
My pre-conceived notions of faith were that I’d always be the Bible-studying babe who journaled long paragraphs daily. And yet, that’s not where I am now. I still read the Bible. I have a stack of books about faith too. And I still have a journal (I write in it about once a month, if that). And it’s weird and uncomfortable that I’m not who I thought I’d be.
Does that even begin to make sense?
I’ve always experienced God through words.
And yet, for the last year, I’ve found God in different places…yes, still words…but more in movements. I see Him when I’m climbing an aerial silk, when my breath burns my lungs during a CrossFit workout, and when my muscles tingle with soreness. This feels like worship.
God is meeting me in the physical realm in a way that I’ve never experienced before.
So much of my faith journey has been focused on the spiritual realm with an emphasis on intellect and a distrust for emotions and the physical. But did not God create every facet of the universe and me–from soul to emotions to brain to bone? Why do we ignore the physical?
It’s uncomfortable here, pondering how God shows up in the physical when most faith communities emphasize only the spiritual realm. Is there room for the God of physicality?
I think so. I hope so.
A few months ago, I asked for a spiritual book recommendation from a friend. Shout out to @beckijeangraves! And she suggested An Altar in the World by Barbara Brown Taylor.
I was not prepared for how Barbara Brown Taylor views the sacred through the perspective of daily living. She pressed into the phsyicality of experiencing God, The Practice of Wearing Skin. And suddenly, I didn’t feel so alone in my slow realization that maybe, just maybe, God could meet me in the physical too.
Very rarely do I reread a book, but I’m rereading through An Altar in the World for the second time because here are words that reflect the physical journey of faith that I’ve been tangled in for over a year. And there is room! There is room for experiencing God elsewhere than just intellectually.
The key with faith is returning again and again. It means staying curious and coming back. The dictionary says it’s a “strong belief” or “complete trust” or “confidence.” And maybe it is all of those things, but it’s also doggedly returning to something.
To the God of the Physical,
Though souls we may be, bodies You housed us in. Five physical senses frame our worldview, but why do we leave them out in the Godview?
Forgive us for relegating You to books and brain and losing sight of who You are in the daily living. Help us to experience more of You in the living, breathing, tasting, dancing, resting moments.
A few weeks ago a woman at my church was talking about Philippians 4:13: “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.” She talked about how it inspired her to feel that everything she did, she could do for Jesus–wake up for Jesus, eat for Jesus, go to work for Jesus–and how much that changed her perspective on the things she does every day. That thought has really stuck with me. I love how you express that God is meeting you in the physical, and I so agree. There can be deep spirituality in exercising and using these bodies that God created for us and feeling gratitude for them and taking care of them. There is spirituality in diving into the Bible, yes, but there is also spirituality in watching the perfect colors of a sunrise, or waiting for bare branches to burst into bloom, or watching your body heal itself from a wound. Thanks for sharing your thoughts. They reflect much of what I’ve been pondering lately.
Indigo, thank you so much for taking time to read these ponderings and muse over them yourself because it felt very…weird to try to verbalize this different side (yet very relevant) part of being a physical yet spiritual being. We live our lives in the physical! And still, it seems like a part that doesn’t get talked about…maybe because it’s so obvious?
The woman in your church reminds me of Brother Lawrence (The Practice of the Presence of God, his book). Have you heard of him? He’s a monk who basically just lived a very quiet life, doing every small task for the Lord. And I’ve always been so intrigued by that quiet simplicity.
I’ve never heard of him! I’ll have to look into his book. I think there’s a great deal more power in simplicity than people often believe. “By small and simple things are great things brought to pass.”