Adventures in Spiritual Play

During this season of Lent I will be offering two events which focus on spiritual practices. “Adventures in Spiritual Play” is a series designed to help us expand our prayer repertoire and experience new ways of connecting with the sacred presence of God. These events will take place in the Fellowship Hall at 12:15pm on Sunday, March 15th and Sunday, March 22nd. Soup will be provided at the beginning of each session.

For many people “spiritual practices” consist primarily of praying and reading the Bible. And the prayers are often limited to a “thank you God for . . .” or “please help me with . . .” They tend to involve words (sometimes lots of words) directed to God. There is certainly nothing wrong with such an approach to prayer, except that it can be limiting. When we broaden our horizons with regards to the forms our prayers take we open up new possibilities for experiencing God’s presence in our lives. Because our culture (and often our religion) tends to be very “head” centered, with lots of emphasis on what we think and what we believe and the particular words we use, it can sometimes be helpful to engage in spiritual practices which get us out of our heads and into our hearts and our bodies.

With that as our goal, the two “Adventures in Spiritual Play” events will provide us with resources to experience God in new ways. The first session will be based on the book “Praying in Color: Drawing a New Path to God” by Sybil MacBeth. I sometimes refer to this approach as “Spiritual Doodling.” Using colored pencils, pens, crayons and markers, we will spend some time in God’s presence playing with colors. The experience may surprise you. The second session will provide an opportunity to experience labyrinths as a form of prayer in which our whole body gets involved in the process. Labyrinths are an ancient form of walking meditation. The experience is ripe with metaphors and opportunities for fresh insights and powerful awareness of spirit.

I invite you to join me for one or both of these events. They are my Lenten gift to you.

- Pastor Roger

(keeping my feet firmly planted in the flow)