Day 3: Barefoot Walking

Slide Day 3 – The third week of our look at Celtic Christianity, as guided by Philip Newell’s The Book of Creation. (pp. 33-47)..

The focus for day 3 is looking at how God is a generous God.

The Celts see this generosity displayed through a connection between the gift of creation and the gift of God’s grace.

Emerging with this chapter of Newell’s The book of Creation, are themes echoed on the approaching Earth Day as well as themes lifted up in the national movement for pay raises.

There are challenges as we would hope and expect.

What I love about being in a community of faith is that we don’t have to shy away from challenges, but instead can listen with our own ears and share from our own perspectives what we are hearing.

There is a three level movement in this sermon.

The first is our connection with Creation.

The second, considering how this connection with creation results in the way we treat one another.

And the third, how the gift of creation relates to the gift of grace.

Let’s see what moves in us...

First: Our connection with Creation.

As many of you know, Trasie and I spent 7 brown and cold springs in the high desert of New Mexico before moving back to our home of Georgia…,

it's so wonderful to be back in the south for Spring

Greening all around. plants bursting forth!

The colors on the flowering trees!

breathe in the freshness—as long as you don’t have allergies

[SLIDE TWO VIDEO: IN case our experience of this spring has been damped a bit by recent rain, I came across a brief time lapse video of Nature bursting into Spring…

check it out.  ]

I absolutely love it.

Creation: God’s word spoken! as we see in Genesis.

What does it mean for us that God Spoke everything into being? Do we believe this?

“All things have come into being through the Word,” says the gospel of John.

The celts affirm all things at heart are a birth or embodiment of God’s word- Christ.

On day three seeds planted deep within the earth--fruit-bearing life hidden within…burst forth.

A clear sign of an abundance of growth and potential.

Born of God, “God saw all the life springing forth from the ground, and said,

It’s all good.’

Goodness is not just a characteristic…

goodness is the very source of life.

Goodness is the essence of life

Our lives and all of creation come from that which is good;

and therefore in essence are good as well.  

Everything and every person in essence is good?

Day 2 - Born to be Wild

Chapter 2 - Day 2 (Much of what is sighted here is adapted or directly quoted from Philip Newell’s: The Book of Creation..)

SLIDE: Genesis 1: 6-8 -  (as Translated by J. Philip Newell in Celtic Benediction)

"On the second day the storm kept stirring. It was the wind of new beginnings. God was

saying, “let there be a space for creation.” And the wind carved out a hollow in the deep

waters. It was a cradle for life. Above, beneath and on every side of it were the everlasting

waters. God saw that it was good. It was a place for birth and abundance. And there was

evening and morning, creation’s second day.  

Wild. When’s the last time you used the word wild....? In what context?

- to describe someone’s hair?

- a car ride

- a travel adventure

-  a tattoo  

-  the behavior of a three year old?

SLIDE: STEPPENWOLF

- maybe you were just singing along to a song on the radio...  

Like a true nature child

We were born

Born to be wild

We can climb so high

I never wanna die

Born to be wild

Born to be wild?

Believe it or not, Steppenwolf‘s not far from the aspect of Celtic spirituality we are going to talk about today...

This is week two of what will be our seven week look at Celtic spirituality, during Eastertide.

I feel qualified to talk about Celtic Spirituality because, I’ve seen Braveheart! And more importantly, fortunately there are many good teachers out there about the Celtic Tradition.

One of whom [SLIDE: J. PHILIP NEWELL And The book of J. Philip Newell entitled: The Book of Creation: An Introduction to Celtic Spirituality.  will be our guide]

I met Philip Newell about 7 years ago, and was immediately impressed by his work...

- an evangelist of Celtic Christianity which has come out of primarily the Islands of Great Britain, he hopes to offer a different perspective of Christianity from the the more influential  theologies of Rome and Western Europe,

- He believes it is necessary and helpful

And in reading, talking with, and hearing Newell, I’ve found that, the Celtic perspective to be a breath of fresh air in my own faith seeking understanding.

You may find the same...

Today’s focus--on Wildness! is just another example as to why.

Last week, day 1, God spoke light into existence, a light within, over, behind, beyond all things. The light that shines from all of creation; and Peggy, you captured this beautifully in your testimony last week as you described discovering the light within.  It’s not that foriegn of a concept, perhaps because we know it to already be true.

This week, Day 2 - Wildness of God.

Summer Rest and Stillness - Gen 2, Luke 10

Commerce Presbyterian Church, Commerce, GA

June 22, 2014  

Scripture: Luke 10:38-42; Genesis 2:1-3

Summer Rest and Stillness

I have selected two Biblical passages which speak of rest and stillness:

The passage from Genesis, the creation story, in which on day 7, God Rested.

And the passage from Luke which paints the scene of Mary sitting at Jesus’ feet.  

We begin with Genesis (a play on words):

God was busy about creating all that is in six days, and on the seventh..God rested.

Does it surprise you that God rested?

What do you envision when you think of God resting?

What did God do that day?  

Go to the golf course?

Spend a morning in church?

Walk in the majestic sanctuary of the great outdoors perhaps?  

Stroll along any of the recently created pristine beach shores…ahhh

On Day 7, God rested.  

Maybe God did nothing...for an entire day…

I wonder if God rested just on that one day, as it was God’s last chance.

It would only be a matter of time before the troubled human creatures would begin to bombard God with never ending petitions and problems.  

So, after passionately creating days 1-6, On Day 7 God rested.   

One of my teachers, Church of Scotland Minister, J. Philip Newell suggests God resting reflects a notion that stillness is part of ongoing creativity.  (All Newell references are from his book, The Book of Creation, Chapter 7)

Creativity is linked to rest.  

In the story of Creation we find a pattern of activity and rest:

“there was evening and there was morning...the third day...”

“The energy and creativity of the daytime emerge from the dark stillness and restfulness of the night”. (102)

The Celtic tradition seeks to find meaning and understanding by listening to and following the rhythms and patterns of nature:

We know these patterns....

Night is followed by day

sleeping by waking

Winter’s stillness, followed by spring’s energy and blossom.

A still seed when planted, followed by an emerging tomato plant, that eventually produces large juicy tomatoes, we hope.

Plants and creatures seem to understand the patterns of rest and vitality...seem bound by them in some ways

How well do we 21st century humans--created on Day 6, along with cattle--

How well do we sync with nature’s patterns of rest and stillness?  

What is our attitude toward rest as a society?  

In many ways we seem to resist it:

- We have access to energy and light 24/7.  

- Interestingly, as a global society we consume over 2.25 billion cups of coffee every day;

not to mention any variety of the latest and greatest energy drink.  

Is rest encouraged?

I certainly try to encourage my two year old to rest during the day. It’s getting more and more difficult these days as she’s discovering how much she might miss out on if she takes a nap!

With the five year old...forget it, days of napping are long gone!

As an adult, I find it unusual to be encouraged to get some rest….

Some time ago I visited a Monastery near where we lived in New Mexico; and upon my arrival in the morning, the guest master asked if I cared for a room in order to lie down and rest...

Taken aback by the suggestion, I quickly declined the offer....

I had things I had to do....I didn’t have time to rest…

On Day 7, God rested..

Cluttered Sanctuaries, Cluttered Lives

A message to our church, WPC, from J. Philip Newell's One Foot in Eden: A Celtic View of the Stages of Life:


Jesus' cleansing of the temple expressed his depth of inner passion. This was no superficial religious concern.  Its parallel today is not a fastidious protectiveness of our church sanctuaries from all noise and liveliness. Rather the Mystery that was guarded in the half-light of the temple, and the love of God that was taught in the Scriptures and ritual of the sacred place, pointed to the Holiness and the Love that are at the heart of all life.  Jesus' outrage was motivated not by a liturgical fanaticism for decorum in the temple but by a passionate desire to reclaim an awareness and a reverence for the One who dwells in the inner sanctuary of the Temple of Life itself.  Let us be passionate about recovering a sense of space and stillness in our holy places, but in doing so let us know that at the heart we are pointing to the stillness within ourselves and within all life that need be cleared out, uncluttered of all that opposes or obstructs our awareness of God's presence.

Physically our churches, if they are in a state of clutter, will speak of a lack of space and stillness.  The sometimes absurd hoarding of bits and pieces from the past, with sanctuaries strewn with unnecessary furnishings and a confusing assortment of papers and books, can convey an absence of inner composure. It may be that what is needed in many places is for most of our religious paraphernalia, including the great fixed pews of many sanctuaries, to be thrown out of our church doors.  We need to recover simplicity and uncluttered attentiveness. Think of the way, for instance, in which a bedroom will be prepared with nesting instinct before the arrival of a newborn child. Cleaned, freshly painted, and uncluttered it is a symbol of waiting and welcome.  Simplified and focused places of silence and prayer will similarly speak of yearnings in us to receive the life that is born from within.

More important than rooms and buildings are our minds and bodies, which as St. Paul said are living temples of God.  What are the distractions or obsessions that need to be cleared out if we are to be more aware of the silent mystery of God within us and within the body of creation?