If You Build It

I’ve decided that after I recover from my surgery in a couple of weeks, I want to build a prayer labyrinth in my backyard.  My backyard is small and the grass is already spotty.  It is filled with chunks of concrete, rocks, trash and years of neglect both in its time as a vacant lot and also during construction of my house. 

I won’t give up on it, but with a church across the street and google map rumors that a church may have also been on this property at some point, I want to make sure the ground around here is filled with spiritual life.  I want to saturate it with something holy. 

One of the things I miss the most about Florida is walking the prayer labyrinth at my friend Laura’s church weekly for years.  And while there are labyrinths a short drive from where I live now, I have, for the first time, my own yard and therefore the ability to make this land whatever I want.  I want it to be a place you take off your shoes.  I want this to be holy ground.

That’s the backyard.

In the front yard, I want to fulfill another dream and put in a Little Free Library.  The thing I miss most about being a Language Arts teacher is providing books for kids to read, curating a classroom library filled with books so loved their pages were falling out.

There are children in my new neighborhood.  They have in the past been fascinated with my house—I’m not sure why except maybe it’s the newness of it or the mystery of whoever lives there.  They love my Ring doorbell.  And they are like little detectives searching through my mailbox for evidence that yes, someone lives here.  They get a kick out of ringing the doorbell or knocking on the door and running.  They’re very fast; their giggles are still in the air long after they vanished down the street.

Summer is coming fast, and I don’t know what these kids will be doing, but I want them to know that in my front yard there is a magical place that is never empty of books.

A labyrinth and a library—these are things I want to do and yet, for a while this past Saturday afternoon, I questioned if building either was wise.

I was sitting in the recliner with Pippin on my lap, watching a Yankees game, when out of nowhere there was large thunderclap outside the window.  The window shook.  The wall shook and flash of a white shirt ran past the window, barely visible with my curtain blocking most of the view.

Pippin fled from my lap as I leaped from the chair.  I was halfway to the window when I realized that the sound I heard was a gunshot and that running to the window might not be the best move.

I have heard gunshots before in real life—not just on TV, but up until this past Saturday, the only gunfire I had ever heard was from a hunting rifle.  I had never heard a handgun up close.

A handgun does not sound like a rifle.

I would describe a rifle as like a thundercrack.

A handgun is more like a thunderclap.

You may wonder what the difference is and all I can say is that if you heard them both, you would know.

For all the time that gunfire is compared to the sound of firecrackers, I can tell you that a handgun does not sound at all like a firecracker.

And if you remember my sermon from a few weeks ago, a handgun definitely doesn’t sound like oranges falling from a tree into the bed of a truck.

This gunshot was so close, I thought the house had been hit and when enough time had passed, when I had heard the running footsteps fade and the sound of screeching tires as the person peeled away in a car, I went outside to check on my house.

The house was fine so far as I could tell.

The story is that apparently this past Saturday a group of teenage boys had gathered just a few houses down from me, near where that car had hit the house a couple of weekends ago.  Words were exchanged and shots fired, including the one that I heard by my living room window.

When I walked outside to check on the house, once again the church across the street was worshipping, but this time instead of emptying at the sound of a car crashing, there were only two men standing out front to check on the gunfire.

A teenage boy walked down the middle of the street past us and one of the churchgoers asked him if he was okay.

The boy didn’t even look his way, but mumbled, “yeah.”

The churchgoer continued.  “Because if someone is hurt, we have nurses inside.”

“Nah,” the boy said and continued on.

Though I had not been the target of the gunfire, I had almost been caught in the crossfire and this made me wonder for a moment if building a prayer labyrinth in my backyard was a good move, if even being outside sitting on my back patio was a good move, if there was a chance I could be shot.

I wondered these things, but only for a moment because then I decided that building a labyrinth, installing a Little Free Library—doing these things was more important than ever.  My goal had been to saturate this land with holiness and after the shooting on Saturday, I realized this goal was more important now than ever.

There are only a few short years separating the children who rang my doorbell and ran and the boys who shot at each other on Saturday.

What happened in those years to turn laughter into fear?

I don’t know and I don’t have answers on how to fix something that has been ailing society for a long time now.

All I know is what I can do in my little patch of earth.

And that is saturate the ground with divine love and grace.

In today’s reading from Matthew 11:16-24, Jesus is addressing the people and chastising them for ignoring important signs.  He says, “But to what will I compare this generation?  It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another, ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.’”

Woe to whoever ignores what is right in front of them, who turns away from the children when they are laughing or when they are crying.

Woe to all of us who turn away when Jesus comes knocking.

Jesus was knocking this past Saturday. 

Where you might ask?

I saw Him, in those two churchgoers offering comfort and healing to the boy walking down the street.

I saw Him, in their calm presence.

And I felt Him stir with my own spirit.

This ground is Holy Ground.

Amen.