God Space
When working to plant a church one finds themselves in extraneous circumstances. From leadership meetings in a cramped dorm room to praying over the sound system I feel like I’ve done it all. However I have not even come close to touching the tip of the iceberg when it comes to planting churches or really church leadership in general. Regardless one of my favorite experiences that came along with planting a church was a prayer walk I and two others took through the neighborhood surrounding our church building. It was the spiritual conversation that took place that I will never forget.
We were talking about how easy it was to discuss God in that moment but so hard to talk about Him to others when one of the people simply said “That is because we have created God space.” Intrigued I asked what he meant by “God Space.” He explained that there was a book by that title by Doug Pollack with the catch phrase “Where spiritual conversations happen naturally.” Ever since that talk where we created such a space I have been searching for more opportunities to have natural spiritual conversations.
Now I would argue that this topic is important for believers and non-believers alike, so if you do not believe in Jesus Christ as your savior and are about to give up on reading this post, read on, persevere. God space is important to relationships and places because it really does matter. It is important to talk about life’s enduring questions! Ever since the dawn of man, whether that was ten thousand years ago or ten million, we as a species have been pondering the existence of a greater power. Regardless of what the media will tell you, atheists make up just over two percent of the entire worlds population, non-religious about nine percent more. Therefore most people believe in some kind of a god, so if there is a god and he is obviously more powerful than us it is imperative we should find out what he is like and what he wants from us.
This is where God space plays such a heavy part in our relationships. My father has recently started to run, he has gone from couch to 5k running shape in about two months. So how do we go from couch to 5k spiritual shape? we talk about it. If we know absolutely nothing about God or any gods at all we need to ask questions to other people who do know. Whether the information we get is truthful or not it is still valuable as we search our own hearts to find truth. Not that truth lies within us, but rather that truth is revealed to us by the one true God.
So the next time you are sitting in a coffee shop or a bar or perhaps at home with your parents try to make space for God and have a purposeful conversation. Find out what others think and pray to the God that 98% of you believe in to reveal himself to you. As I go out into my night to create my own God space with close friends I pray that wherever you are as you read this you reflect upon your own life and search for God.
-sam
