on developing a sacramental vision

pay attention; autopilot kills spirituality.

First of all, welcome to the Sacramental Substack! I’m excited you’re here and excited to have a place to share some of what I’ve learned in study and ministry. I hope it encourages you and sparks conversation!

I am absent-minded. I forget simple things and often can’t recall the most essential details that make every day life function. I lose track of time and forget to eat or space out while driving my car and end up taking a well-known path in the opposite direction of my destination. My loved ones regularly mock me when I go on autopilot like this. When they do, I shrug my shoulders and take it. I know I’m ridiculous; I’ve come to accept it.

I live too much of my life on autopilot.

The problem is that that absent-mindedness is a spiritual stumbling block. The world in which we live and its daily rhythms and tasks and the stuff that makes up most of life are not so much background noise to be ignored so we can get to the real stuff we care about—ideas or accomplishments or whatever. This physical world we inhabit is an essential means through which God has chosen to reveal Himself to us.

everything is sacramental.

Everything in creation was made as a means to know and commune with God. Orthodox theologian Alexander Schmemann wrote, “The world was created as the ‘matter,’ the material of one all-embracing eucharist, and man was created as the priest of this cosmic sacrament.”¹ After all, the heavens declare God’s glory (Ps. 19:1), the rivers clap for Him (Ps. 98:8), and in His presence the trees sing for joy (Ps. 96:12).

I was struck by this recently in Brother Lawrence’s little book, The Practice of the Presence of God. This 17th century monk and spiritual sage was converted one winter day while “looking at a barren tree.”

Although the tree’s leaves were indeed gone, he knew that they would soon reappear, followed by blossoms and then fruit. This gave him a profound impression of God’s providence and power, which never left him. Brother Lawrence still maintains that this impression detached him entirely from the world and gave him such a great love for God that it hasn’t changed in all of the forty years he has been walking with Him.²

He describes elsewhere that it was difficult for him to believe in God's love. But then, looking at that barren winter tree, the rush of wonder at who God is and of His great love for His creatures overwhelmed and carried him the rest of his life.

a sacrament of God’s goodness, beauty, providence and power

attentiveness helps lead us to a sacramental vision.

The tree Brother Lawrence saw was sacramental. God worked through creation by capturing his attention through his bodily senses. As the monk gazed on the tree, he saw something of the character, goodness and wonder of the Creator. Under the Brother’s grateful gaze, the tree was caught up in the “all-embracing eucharist” of praise and glory given back to God.

Brother Lawrence saw the same tree everyone else did. But by grace he was captivated by a sacramental vision that allowed him to see, not only the tree, but all things in this world as having the potential to reveal God.

My hope in beginning this newsletter is to cultivate that same sacramental vision, both for myself and for anyone else who would join me for the ride. Developing a sacramental vision requires that I pay attention—to God, to my surroundings, to others, to myself. You don’t autopilot your way into it. You committedly, intentionally, perseveringly give yourself to seeking God in the things of this world. And He promises to show up when we do.

How about you? Have you had an experience like Brother Lawrence? Where / when do you find yourself enjoying a sacramental vision of the world around you? I’d love to hear from you!

1. Alexander Schmemann, For the Life of the World (Yonkers, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2018), 22.

2. Brother Lawrence, The Practice of the Presence of God (New Kensington, PA: Whitaker House, 1982), 11.