Creating Space
Practice
Set a Time. Schedule in your day or week where you can create space to remove distraction and choose discipline of creating space.
Choose a Text. Choose a Gospel, Psalm, or Devotional Reading to read and reflect over the 40 days of Lent.
Keep a Lenten Journal. Write a brief reflection or your words to God about the experience, questions, and hopes for this season.
Partner with Others. Share how you are creating space with others to cultivate both vulnerability and accountability.
“If we create space in which God can act and speak, something surprising will happen.”
The 40 days of Lent provide an annual rhythm and reminder for the practice of creating space. Lent is a historic season of the Church. It is a season for reflection and repentance, beginning with Ash Wednesday. It is a season of intentionally cultivating disciplines for the spiritual life.
“A Spirituality of Living” is a book of collected wisdom from Henri Nouwen. He provides a valuable definition to the practice of creating space. “In the spiritual life, the word discipline means, ‘the effort to create some space in which God can act.’” The practice of creating space may be giving something up or taking something up. The purpose is to replace distractions with disciplines. The aim is to focus our attention on how God is speaking or acting in our lives.
The state of being constantly digitally connected and over-committed in our calendars has become our cultural currency. The practice of creating space is a counter-script to the dominant narrative of our cultural moment. “If we are not occupied, we are at least preoccupied.” Nouwen writes. He correctly confronts the distracted nature of our minds, motives, and calendars.
Nouwen writes, “When we create an empty space, we make room for something to happen to us that we cannot predict, something that might be really new and lead us to places we would rather not go.” Creating space prioritizes hearing and responding to what God is doing in and around us. It is an intentional way to open ourselves to receive the extravagant love of God, and then extend that love to our neighbors and neighborhoods.
