One of the special responsibilities I have at the camp is to tend to God's Mailbox, a mailbox that is in the south woods. It is always stocked with paper and writing utensils, so anyone at any time can write to God.
The letters had accumulated in God's mailbox in the interim between the departure of the previous site manager and my arrival. Tonight I mailed the letters to God by using the pentecostal power of fire. I began by praying a decade's worth of Our Father's, and offering incense. I used a bit of sage at the beginning for cleansing, then frankincense, both for the Biblical connotation and to honor the frankness that I hoped was contained in these letters.
I offered a few words of prayer, then I added cedar and pine to the fire. I would add the letters one by one. Occasionally, I would pray while adding them, or express my well wishes for the author, especially if they signed their name. I was leaving space for the spirit, wondering what prayers and thoughts would come through.
I continued to add more cedar and pine during the course of the burning. The cedar I offered in hope that the faith of those who wrote the letters would become as strong as the cedars of Lebanon. The pine I offered as a reminder of place. These were pine needles from Tower Hill and had been blown down in a recent rain. I was reminded of Ezekiel (?) looking for God and sheltering from a storm in a cave. It wasn't in the storm that he heard God, but in the silence, just as these letters were written and delivered in silence.
It was moving adding the letters one by one to the fire. They were written on all kinds of paper and in all kinds of writing. Some of the letters were sealed in envelopes, others were folded tightly, and others were left exposed for all to read. Some were written on construction paper, others on pages ripped from a spiral notebook. Some were cards, some were sealed in heavy weight legal envelopes. Some were on index cards, and one was written on a used dryer sheet.
Though I resisted the urge to read the letters, there were some phrases that were revealed. Those that I recall covered a broad range of topics, including wishing to have God more present in their day to day lives, and one wishing for cotton candy. Some of the pages would appear blank until I added them to the fire, then the ink would become clear. One paper simply said "Dear Go," as if the writer had been distracted and hadn't come back to finish talking to God, something we've all had happen to us. I found some of the cards most interesting, as the envelope would burn away before the cards did, almost as if God was opening them like a gift. Some of the letters were drawings made for God. At the end, I offered more cedar, pine and frankincense, then extinguished the fire with water, washing the remains of the letters back into the soil.
All in all, I was reminded again and again that we are to all be like children to enter into the kin-dom of God.
I think next time I'll need to write my own letter too.
This entry was posted
on Tuesday, June 9, 2009
at Tuesday, June 09, 2009
and is filed under
Bible,
faith,
good news,
worship
. You can follow any responses to this entry through the
comments feed
.
About Me
- Bushel Basket
- Chicago, Il, United States
- A non-traditional seminary graduate. Interested in sustainability, embodying spirituality and faith, interfaith practices, and using humor as a method of truth telling.
Categories
Blog Archive
- October 2011 (1)
- August 2011 (1)
- June 2011 (1)
- April 2011 (2)
- February 2011 (1)
- November 2010 (2)
- October 2010 (2)
- May 2010 (1)
- March 2010 (2)
- December 2009 (2)
- November 2009 (2)
- August 2009 (4)
- July 2009 (1)
- June 2009 (3)
- May 2009 (3)
- March 2009 (1)
- February 2009 (3)
- January 2009 (7)
- December 2008 (8)
- November 2008 (5)
- October 2008 (3)
- September 2008 (8)
- August 2008 (1)
- July 2008 (5)
- June 2008 (6)
- May 2008 (5)
- April 2008 (5)
- March 2008 (12)
- February 2008 (1)
Other Websites Worth Visiting
- Anti-Advertising Agency
- EcoGeek: Technology for the Environment
- illdoctrine.com
- Life Hackery: Useful, Unusual, and (sometimes) Ironic Tips and Tricks to Hack Your Life into Shape
- Ship of Fools: The Magazine of Christian Unrest
- Skeptic's Annotated Bible
- Superuse.org: Where Recycling Meets Design
- The Brick Testament: The World's Largest, Most Comprehensive Illustrated Bible
- WikiHow: The How-to Manual That You Can Edit
Subscribe
Subscribe to Email Subscription
My Blog List
-
-
Bestway Frame Pool 412X201X1222 years ago
-
kiddos and call5 years ago
-
Hello world!5 years ago
-
2015 Fic Year in Review8 years ago
-
What To Fear8 years ago
-
-
-
Fishing on Morrison Lake13 years ago
-