Madeline L’Engle and Barbara Brown Taylor suggest that God can be found “in the work” and “under our feet.”* God is present, incarnate in everything around us and everything we do. The Creator of All is ‘new every morning’ but we can forget that as we go about our daily tasks. We often think that what we do can’t be important or part of the ‘big picture’ of God’s plan, because it isn’t ‘religious’. Taylor says that it doesn’t “matter whether or not our work is considered secular or sacred.” L’Engle teaches us that “qualifications don’t matter”. As long as we are obedient and serve our work with humility, we become co-creators with God.
Jesus tells us to become as children in order to enter the Kingdom. “And he said: "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 18:3). Children naturally are incarnational. A child doesn’t like to fit into a routine. Try to get a toddler to quite playing just to accomodate your schedule and you will hear a wail of distress. He doesn’t care if you are ready to leave; he is in the middle of bringing the imaginary to life. Without knowing it, the toddler is serving the work and making it an incarnational experience. The little ones are closer to their true nature and less constrained by ‘getting it right’ or ‘being on time’. L’Engle points out that we are “either creators, or as participators, we are helped to remember some of the glorious things we have forgotten.” She insists children haven’t forgotten what it is like to walk on water.
L’Engle says, “If Jesus of Nazareth was God become truly man for us, as I believe he was, then we should be able to walk on water, heal the sick…” St. Iranaeus of Lyons (c. 125-210) agrees. He reminds us, “The tender flesh itself will be found one day…to be capable of receiving…capable of embracing-the searing energies of God…for even at the beginning its humble clay received God’s art…” (Capable Flesh as translated by Scott Cairns in An Altar in the World by Barbara Brown Taylor)
How can you and I become more aware of God and less bound by routine. As I start, list everything you do in a day. How many of them are the same every day? The same route to work, the same way of starting the day, the same place for lunch…?
What difference would it make if you actively lived as if these words of the hymn by John Keble were true?
New every morning is the love
our wakening and uprising prove;
through sleep and darkness safely brought,restored to life and power and thought.
Would it make a difference in how I live if I remember that God’s love is really ‘new every morning’ and that I have been ‘restored to life and power and thought’?
Maybe for the next week I will try to remember that verse each day and see if it makes a difference.
Next week, we’ll take a look at how to be intentional about how we ‘walk on the earth’ as a way to make our lives more aware and less full of blind routine.
