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Chapter 1:
Surely the Presence
Then he said, “Come no closer!
Remove the sandals from your feet,
for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.”
Exodus 3:5
Thursday, May 10, 2018 - 6:00 AM: I packed up my small basement Airbnb in Raleigh, NC, stopped off for a coffee, and pulled into the church parking lot for the final day of a spiritual writers’ conference. The preceding days, as is true for most conferences, felt like drinking from a fire hydrant.
I am not a morning person, but my mind had been racing with ideas that kept me up much of the night and I had to get it all on paper before the next wave of information and inspiration washed over me. I intentionally arrived at the conference with more than enough time to spend an hour in the quiet sanctuary with my journal before the morning worship and keynote session began.
To my surprise, I was not the first one there, or even among the first twenty. The presence of other people was not a concern, but their choice to turn that quiet sanctuary into a social hall quickly put a damper on my quiet reflection time, particularly since the church also had a large fellowship area and entry hall available outside the sanctuary doors. Had I known the sanctuary walls would be reverberating with the chatter of a half-dozen other conversations, I would have stayed at the coffee shop to write and process my thoughts. Instead, it was all I could do to keep from unintentionally eavesdropping on those who had gathered early for fellowship.
While I wasn’t able to write down anything that had been on my mind through the night, I did have nearly an hour to reflect on a new thought, specifically, what has become of sacred space?
One church I visited in Florida understands the need for sacred space. They begin their worship time with what they call soaking. They carve out sacred space where people can be still and quiet to “soak” in the presence of the Holy Spirit. It is a simple concept. Before worship, the fellowship hall and the large entry halls are open for conversation and catching up, as people often like to do on a weekly basis at church. Everyone understands, however, that silence is to be kept once they enter the sanctuary. The large altar table, modeled after the Ark of the Covenant, was meticulously hand carved out of a single tree trunk and serves as a reminder that this space is holy ground. As soft worship music plays half an hour before the service, the invitation is much like God’s invitation to Moses to draw near (Exod. 3:4-6). Nobody is required to take off their shoes, though some do. Nevertheless, this is holy ground. This is an expectant silence.
In Louisville, KY, a friend serves as the pastor of Grace Kids, an inner-city church specifically designed for children living in the surrounding neighborhood.[i] While many of the kids have little to no church background, they understand that the purple doorways over the sanctuary and the prayer room represent holy ground and have learned to honor and appreciate these rooms as set apart places where they are truly safe to bring their whole selves before God.
Entering the well-used prayer room on the upper floor, one is struck by the beauty and intentionality of the hand painted murals of the cosmos covering the walls and the glorious starry night sky on the ceiling. In the middle of the floor sits a sandbox filled with rocks in the sand. Most of these stones are etched with various symbols or images. The pastors and counselors invite children to find a symbol or image that speaks to them, and they can attach whatever meaning they want to it. A spiral, for example, may speak to a child who feels like their life is spinning out of control or it may offer comfort, revealing that though they feel like they are going in circles, they are always moving closer and closer to God in the center. In this room, kids who have never stepped foot in a traditional church begin to see and feel the presence of God.
As we walked through this sacred space, Pastor Corey shared the story of a young girl who came alone to the Friday night church program. While holding her rock in the prayer room, she was able to share the trauma of witnessing her mother’s murder earlier that day. She walked to the church that night because she knew it was the only safe place she could go. She knew God would care for her there. At Grace Kids, neighborhood children and youth with an endless array of traumatic experiences truly find a place of shelter and sanctuary.
Many tears are shed in that prayer room. Many emotional and spiritual breakthroughs occur as they kneel beside that sandbox, tracing the symbols on their chosen rock with their fingers and expressing the pain and brokenness of their lives in a safe place before God, often for the first time.
Prayer rooms, when used well, can serve as powerful reminders of God’s presence. One church I attended had a prayer room adjacent to the sanctuary where a team of two or three would pray during the entire worship service. Worshippers knew there was always someone praying for them. Walk to Emmaus, Pilgrimage, and other similar retreats rooted in the Catholic Cursillo movement, always have a prayer room where team members are praying for each retreat participant and leader by name throughout the weekend. At the same time, other members of the community sign up for a 30-minute window on the 72-hour prayer banner when they will take their place praying for the participants and team around the clock. These are powerful experiences. They are not like public miracle prayers on a stage where the crowds expect God to answer specific requests on the spot in a visible way. The power instead comes from the knowledge that God inhabits the prayers of God’s people and that, where two or three are gathered, God is in their midst (Mt. 18:20). It is all about God’s presence. What makes the difference in these prayer rooms is the intentionality by which people enter that holy presence and call upon the Spirit to move freely in and through the hearts of the people gathered.
The truly miraculous, transforming and healing work of the Holy Spirit in the lives of those who have entered such sacred spaces is undeniable. I recall the importance of setting apart sacred space from my own childhood in the Roman Catholic church. We had a tradition of dipping our fingers in holy water and marking our foreheads with the sign of the cross as we entered the sanctuary. We would then kneel and offer the sign of the cross again before entering the pew. As a child I did not understand or appreciate the meaning or value of such practices. I confess that they felt overly ritualistic. Looking back through the lens of the noisy sanctuary at the writers’ conference, I am grateful for the intentional setting apart of that space as sacred.
No matter the form or the means, a recovery of sacred space is essential in today’s over-stimulated world…
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When Every Space is Sacred
Cultivating an Awareness of God’s Presence in Everyday Life
[i] “Grace Kids Church (Website),” Grace Kids Church, accessed April 29, 2020, https://gracekidschurch.com/. Since the writing of this chapter, Grace Kids has sadly been forced to close their building due to an extreme increase in neighborhood violence and the inability to keep children and volunteers safe. The kids are still well loved and cared for as the pastor and other leaders have cultivated sacred space to meet with them in various homes, restaurants, and other public spaces.