Making Space

Matthew 26: 36-41

36 Then Jesus came with them to a place called Gethsemane, and said to His disciples, “Sit here while I go over there and pray.” 37 And He took with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be grieved and distressed. 38 Then He said to them, “My soul is deeply grieved, to the point of death; remain here and keep watch with Me.”
39 And He went a little beyond them, and fell on His face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will.” 40 And He came to the disciples and found them sleeping, and said to Peter, “So, you men could not keep watch with Me for one hour? 41 “Keep watching and praying that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”


"To live a Christian life is to live in the world without being of it. It is in solitude that this inner freedom can grow. Jesus went to a lonely place to pray, that is, to grow in the awareness that all the power he had was given to him; that all the words he spoke came from his Father; and that all the works he did were not really his but the works of the One who had sent him. In the lonely place Jesus was made free to fail.
In solitude we can listen to the voice of him who spoke to us before we could speak a word, who healed us before we could make any gesture to help, who set us free long before we could free others, and who loved us long before we could give love to anyone.... In solitude we discover that life is not a possession to be defended, but a gift to be shared.
When you are able to create a lonely place in the middle of your actions and concerns, your successes and failures can slowly lose some of their power over you. For then your love for this world can merge with a compassionate understanding of its illusions. Then your serious engagement can merge with an unmasking smile. Then your concern for others can be more motivated by their needs than your own. In short: then you can care. Let us therefore live our lives to the fullest but let us not forget to once in a while get up long before dawn to leave the house and go to a lonely place."
-Henri Nouwen


One of the interesting aspects of Henri Nouwen's teaching, which is very relevant to me, is his confidence that accomplishing goals or tasks is rarely a way to move closer to God.

When I am feeling like a particularly lazy Christian (quite often, frankly); my first inclination is to go do something about it. Maybe take over a Sunday School; maybe go fill a missionary position locally.

The problem with this attitude is that my inclination to take on these new tasks is not a response to God's call...it is a response to my own insecurity in the faith. Volunteering for church tasks is a GREAT idea; but, should be responsive to God's will..not an effort to shore up your spiritual resume.

That said, feelings of distance from God shouldn't be shrugged off...Henri's suggestion for what to do is non-intuitive. Henri suggests that we connect more when we retreat...when we dwell in our area of weakness and allow His love to fill where we are not full.

A famous story involves the questioning of a rabbi by a nonbeliever. He asked the rabbi that, if before the universe all there was was God, then how was there any room for the universe to be created? The rabbi responded that God withdrew and made space for the universe...we were allowed to exist because God sacrificed the space for us.

Indeed, when we are looking for the faith to have more presence in our lives, we have to withdraw and sacrifice the space for it to come. So much of our culture teaches that if you are feeling bad, then you should motivate yourself to create something new.....the thought of retreating to gain more is a foreign concept.