Making Space
Genesis 2:4b-7; John 20:19-22
Rev. Dr. Deborah L. Clark
August 17, 2014
The email arrived in early June, while I was still recovering from our wedding and trying to get all my ducks in a row before sabbatical. “Recommended Reading for Yoga Teacher Training,” the subject line read.
At the top of the list was a collection of books on human anatomy. I groaned. When I signed up for Yoga Teacher Training in Costa Rica, I envisioned philosophy by the pool and yoga on the beach. I hadn’t thought about having to learn about bones and muscles and the nervous system. I’m sure I must have had a unit on human anatomy in 10th grade biology, but it never took root in my brain.
“How boring,” I thought, as I picked one of the options and ordered it from Amazon. When it arrived, I tossed it on my sabbatical travel pile without a second glance. A week into my sabbatical, I reluctantly retrieved it from the pile and forced myself to sit down and start reading.
I couldn’t put it down. The human body, I began to realize, is incredible, intricate, resilient and mysterious.
The first chapter was all about breathing. The authors described the workings of the diaphragm–the main muscle involved in breathing, the lungs, and the thoracic and abdominal cavities. I struggled to match the words with the diagrams. And then I came upon a section entitled, “The Universe Breathes Us.” [Okay, now I need my assistants: Breathe. Now, as you breathe in, are you actually pulling or sucking air into your body? ] That’s what it feels like, but it turns out that’s not what we’re doing. What we are really doing when we think we are inhaling is simply creating space in our bodies–using our diaphragm muscles to open space in our chest area and also in our bellies. When we create that space, the air around us comes into our bodies of its own accord, because the air pressure outside us is greater than the air pressure inside us.
We can’t make ourselves breathe in the oxygen we need to live. All we can do is create the space for the air around us to do its own work of bringing life-giving oxygen into our bodies.
I circled the paragraph, starred it four times, and then–don’t tell any librarians–turned down the corner of the page. This is about so much more than human anatomy! This is about what it means to be human–body, mind, and spirit.
Sarah’s reading from the book of Genesis tells one story of the creation of humankind. God fashions a human being out of the dust of the earth and then breathes life into that new creature. The Hebrew word is Ruah. It means breath–and it also means Spirit. The ancient Hebrew people recognized a deep connection between breath and spirit.
So did the early Christian church, especially the community that wrote and received the gospel according to John. Just as God breathes into Adam to give life, so the risen Christ breathes on the disciples to give them the Holy Spirit–new life.
Breath and Spirit are so intricately intertwined that ancient peoples used the same word for both of them. What we know about breath can point us to truths about Spirit: Breath is both inside of us and around us–God’s Spirit is both within us and beyond us. Breath is dynamic–always moving, always changing. So is the Spirit. Most of the time, our bodies make space for the breath without our consciously trying–and yet, as we discovered in our yoga class, there is power in bringing that unconscious process to conscious awareness. And so it is with the Spirit: God’s Spirit moves through our lives whether or not we are paying attention–and when we do pay attention, our lives are richer, fuller, deeper.
That is why I circled and starred that paragraph; that is why I even turned down the corner of the page. The anatomy textbook’s insight into how the breath moves in our bodies points us to yet another truth about our spiritual lives. We don’t–and can’t–make the Spirit move through our lives.
It’s a sobering truth. We all want to be in control. We’d like to think that if we pray in just the right way, or if we perfect our meditation technique or our yoga postures, the Holy Spirit will swoop in and inspire us on command. But we can’t make it happen.
It is a sobering truth, and it’s also a freeing one. Thank God the Spirit’s movement isn’t dependent on our doing exactly the right thing. Thank God the Spirit’s faithfulness to us isn’t dependent on our faithfulness to the Spirit. The Spirit is like the air around us–always there, always ready and eager to move into any space we create.
We cannot make the Spirit move. What we can do is create space in our lives for the Spirit to move more freely.
I like to be busy. I get great satisfaction from accomplishing things–little things, big things, anything. I can easily get so focused on the pleasure of checking items off my to-do list that I don’t leave much space for the Spirit to move. One of my challenges during this sabbatical time was to step away from my to-do list and create that space. Sometimes in my life I have done that by meditating–purposefully setting aside time when I am not doing anything.
This year I had a sense that I needed to do something a little different to create that space. So I drank tea. When I was at home, I got up in the morning, took the dog out, and then made a pot of tea in my great-grandma’s tea pot. I picked out a favorite mug and sat on the back porch with Jeannie. I didn’t bring the morning paper; I didn’t bring my laptop to check emails; I didn’t even work on my to-do list. I just sat and drank–the entire pot of tea. I wasn’t exactly meditating; I wasn’t exactly praying; I was just being.
Other times, I drank tea with Fran–or with an old friend, or a new friend I met on the trip. A different way of making space for the Spirit, for the Spirit often comes to me through other people.
It was wonderful to have time simply to drink tea. There were no grand profound insights, just a sense of spaciousness. Can I do that–will I do that–now that I am back to work?
Carving out time in our distracted busyness is perhaps the most obvious way to make space in our lives for the Spirit. But there lots of other things besides busyness that constrict the movement of the Spirit.
Sometimes we try to protect ourselves from the pain of our world by closing ourselves off from it–and in the process we close ourselves off from the Spirit. Sometimes we become so focused on disappointment or anger that there is no room left for anything else. Sometimes we purposely block the Spirit because we are afraid she will challenge us to change–and we don’t want to.
What are the barriers that constrict the movement of the Spirit in your life? It takes thoughtfulness and insight to identify them. What do you need to do to begin to dismantle them? Maybe the first step is to set aside time to pray for the world’s troubles–a conscious choice to acknowledge them and trust God can hold the pain with you. Maybe the first step is a conversation with someone you are angry with–or a prayer for the grace to stop trying to make them be who they are not. Maybe the first step is simply to declare your intention to live with gratitude rather than resentment.
It takes creativity and courage to begin to dismantle those barriers–and it takes help from God. Blessedly, God is happy to help. Blessedly, the Holy Spirit is eager to move through our lives, and will joyously slip through even the tiniest hole we make in those barriers.
We need oxygen to live, and we can’t make that oxygen come into our bodies. What a gift that the air around us does the work for us; all we need to do it make space.
We need the Spirit to live, and we can’t make that Spirit come into our lives. What a gift that the Spirit is with us, yearning to move through our lives. Let us respond to that gift by making space.