Presence

If you’re watching this video it’s probably safe to say that at some point in your life you’ve lost someone – either through death, a breakup or breakdown in relationship, or simply the natural drifting away that happens in the majority of the friendships we’ll have over the course of a life.

It’s likely even that you’ve experienced all of these at one time or another. And if you haven’t yet, you will.

But when a presence in a life turns to absence, it typically doesn’t happen all at once. Of course, there are always those tragedies where life and death turn in a moment. A car accident. A sudden unexpected fatal heart attack. Violence. The shock of these reverberates differently than the more typical norm of a death that takes time to occur. Trust me, I know.

But more frequently we get some time to adjust to the fact that a loved one is retreating from us. We get to sit by their bedside and say our good-byes. Sometimes we get a few chances to try again and again to get those good-byes right.

Whether someone’s absence happens in a moment or is protracted, though, their presence tends to linger on – not physically, of course, but maybe spiritually, via memory, via the traces of them that reside in us. Conversations we still have with them in our heads before we remember they’re not around to have that conversation anymore. They might show up seemingly randomly in a dream. A scent on the breeze can trick our senses to thinking they’ve just walked by. A story or a song will draw their absence close.

Because that’s how absence works. It’s palpable. Just as palpable – if not more palpable – sometimes as presence. And this means that when God is absent, that absence is palpable too…somehow mysteriously present in some strange way.

Until the absent presence turns to actual presence once again – or, perhaps, even, if it never does – faith means abiding in that space left vacant. So in this devotion, we’re holding open a sacred space that’s vacant. We’re holding sacred space for God’s return.

We’ve got three scripture passages to accompany your journey with this transgressive devotion of presence. Genesis and John affirm the ways in which the Divine is embedded in creation. The way in which God holds all things together. God is somehow immaterial and en-mattered all at once. When you enter that place, the place where the immaterial and material meet, shadows will follow you: shadows not yet lit by light. And you can’t know how long those shadows will want you to stay in them. So, listen.

The reading from the Song of Songs is more wild, desperate even. Unable to sleep, I feel that my sacred lover is closeby, but when I call there is no answer. But the lover’s return is as shocking as their retreat. The key, it turns out, was not to stir the love that bound us till it was ready to return.

Whether you choose to engage with Genesis and John or Song of Songs or all three doesn’t really matter for our activities. Go with your gut. Each meditation can take you on a different journey or all three might draw together journeys you’re already on.

Then, after you’ve engaged the meditations and activities around presence, you’ll have the choice of whether to head over to the devotional on Fear or on Risk. If you’re on the fence, I recommend heading over to the Fear. But if Risk is calling you, go there instead. These meditations and activities are designed to attune your senses to palpably present absence of God. And God is waiting somewhere along this path for you, luring you towards Divine embrace. If at some point the lure draws you away from where I’m sending you, don’t fight it. Just relax, release, and enjoy.