The Holy And The Common

In my last post secular and sacred, we discussed the controversial concept that there is nothing so secular that it cannot be sacred, and that is one of the deepest messages of the Incarnation.

In regards to this, John Fischer suggests that it's all about connections. The more we learn to connect God's truth to the physical world and the culture that surrounds us, the more we will be able to live a life of worship. Worship does not consist in leaving the world to see God, but in learning to see God at all times in the world.

Fischer share about this through our Lord's example, which I found very meaningful:

Jesus busted the whole paradigm because he was the essence of the spiritual – God himself, to be exact – in human flesh and bone. He ate and drank and got dirty walking the road of life, and made it all sacred in the process. He told stories about vines and branches and farmers and merchants and kings and widows. He changed water into wine, sickness into health, death into life. He healed people's bodies and forgave their sins at the same time. He paid his taxes, helped his disciples fish, and cooperated with Roman rule. And even after his resurrection, he made breakfast for his little band of followers and ate with them.

To Jesus, life was a mixed bag of the holy and the common, but mostly the common made holy by his touch. In Jesus, the sacred and the profane meet, resulting in the realization that the profane can be redeemed. Our earthly existence can be given spiritual value. The physical world is not disconnected from the spiritual one, nor is it at odds with it, but the physical world can embody all that is spiritual. The Word became flesh, and since then nothing has ever been the same. Now work, play, recreation, entertainment, and even commerce can contain God's glory. Indeed, the entire physical world is merely a front for the spiritual realities it illustrates.