The Gathering: Sunday Summary: Finding the Sacred in the Secular

Sunday's music was particularly enjoyable for Bob Dylan fans, as the guys started worship with "Knockin' on Heaven's Door."

Cody's message this week was about finding the sacred in our everyday, secular lives. He asked this thought-provoking question:

Have you ever had a moment of sheer wonder and awe?
A spiritual revelation...
A profound and deeply moving sense of clarity...
A realization that the world is bigger than you ever imagined...
A mystical experience of comfort or inspiration...
A flash of overwhelming emotion in the face of something supernatural...

Maybe it's a moment of solitude in nature, watching a sunset, holding your newborn baby for the first time, attending a U2 concert, watching a campfire burn late into the night... Everything in life can be sacred; it’s really a matter of perspective.

Sometimes it's about finding the holy in the midst of the mundane, ordinary life. These experiences aren't always overtly religious, but a facet of our everyday lives that isn't always seen. Earth is full of the weight of God's significance and, everyday, we are drenched in God's presence, even when we're not specifically looking for it.

Even people who don't know God can live the way God intended... it's hardwired into us. Some researchers speculate that we are born with a deep need to be transformed by God. According to the "God gene hypothesis," we have a physiological arrangement that produces the sensations associated, by some, with mystic experiences, including the presence of God or others, or more specifically spirituality as a state of mind.

Our scripture was from Acts 17:22-29 (The Message). The apostle, Paul, stood in the open space at the high court in Athens and laid it out for them:

“It is plain to see that you Athenians take your religion seriously. When I arrived here the other day, I was fascinated with all the shrines I came across. And then I found one inscribed, to the god nobody knows. I’m here to introduce you to this God so you can worship intelligently, know who you’re dealing with."

And then he explained, “The God who made the world and everything in it, this master of sky and land, doesn’t live in custom-made shrines or need the human race to run errands for him, as if he couldn’t take care of himself. He makes the creatures; the creatures don’t make him. Starting from scratch, he made the entire human race and made the earth hospitable, with plenty of time and space for living so we could seek after God, and not just grope around in the dark but actually find him. He doesn’t play hide-and-seek with us. He’s not remote; he’s near. We live and move in him, can’t get away from him! One of your poets said it well: ‘We’re the God-created.’

It can be argued that sacred and secular are one in the same. Everything in and of our lives is from God, and it speaks to us sometimes when we least expect it. Stand in awe of God, and claim the majesty of this world as that of the creator. If it is beautiful and indescribable, claim it as God's. Claim the holy. With awe, comes appreciation.