Spending a Day with the Lord

One of my favorite perks of working with Cru is that once a month our staff are encouraged to take a day to really connect with the Lord and “do business” with him. This day can look different depending on what our needs are at the time or how we sense the Lord is leading us. Usually I’ll find a corner in a coffee shop and journal, pray and read Isaiah or one of Paul’s letters. There’s something about those books of the Bible that really remind me of how grand the Lord is and it puts everything back into perspective for me.

I’ve not been as disciplined in taking these “Days with the Lord” as I would have liked this past year. So I decided that this time I would really focus on it and make sure to clear time to really enjoy the Lord and create space for him to work.

So I went to McDonalds.

That might not seem like the most ideal place to go to meet with the Living God, but McDonald’ses(?) are ubiquitous here in Moscow and you can usually find an affordable cup of coffee ($2 compared to the $8 at Starbucks) and a place to sit unperturbedly for a while. I found a table on the second floor with a view and sat down with my journal and Bible. That’s when the homely cleaning lady decided it was too peaceful and quiet for 10 am on a Monday and she cranked up the Ke$ha on the overhead speakers. I tried to make my mp3 player overpower the obnoxious monosyllabic squeals on the radio by having Charlie Parker and his soothing saxophonic rhythms soothe away the musical pain. But alas, it was all in vain. Admitting defeat I packed up my things and headed into the welcomed chill of the Moscow Morning.

Realizing that I was at Tretyakovksaya metro station and that the Tretyakov Art Gallery was just around the corner I thought that this would be a wonderful way to spend my day with the Lord. Some jazz music, some fine art, a journal and a Bible; I would finally be able to use my education in the humanities! So I quickly turned right, crossed the street and in step with Charlie Parker’s drummer I headed toward the museum. That’s when I got to the front gate and realized it was a Monday…in Russia…and Europe…where museums are closed on Mondays. Bummer. Now it was time to come up with plan C.

I perused my iPod and noticed that I had some sermons that I hadn’t yet listened to. I found one that caught my eye and began listening and walking.

Downtown Moscow is a great city for walking. There are hidden parks tucked away in between busy four-lane roads and bridges with great views as well as plenty of benches to sit and rest on. After wandering and listening to the sermon I decided to walk along the river and take in the view. I began listening to Chris Tomlin’s “Arriving” and sang along.

Suddenly I was behind the “New Tretyakov Gallery” and noticed that there was a massive art sale lining the river. Art dealers from all over the world and Russia had come to sell their work for a week and today was the last day. It being 11 am and a Monday I was one of the only people there. With Chris Tomlin leading me in worship I found myself taking in paintings of landscapes, portraits, abstracts and still-lifes. It wasn’t a world-class art gallery, but it was still beautiful.

As Chris Tomlin belted out “Indescribable” I noticed a landscape painting of a forest with a winding path. The leaves were green and yellow, the light soft and warm and the path leading somewhere unseen off to the right. I looked closer and saw that not all, but many individual blades of grass were illuminated by the rays of light streaming through the leaves of the birch trees. A verse from a David Crowder song came to mind and I sang quietly “every ocean, every sea, every river, every stream, every mountain, every tree, every blade of grass will siiiiing…make a joyful noise to the Lord all the Earth.” All at once I was wrapped up in what felt like a hug from God. A smile, broad and toothy, spread across my face as I closed my eyes and savored the moment.

“You are one of those blades of grass, and I am illuminating you.”

That was all I could hear though it was inaudible. The moment lasted for a second or two and then it was gone. That was ok with me, it’s been a long time since I’ve sensed God’s nearness and adoration in such a powerful way and I was grateful for the moment.

As I continued on through the art collections I noticed paintings of Moscow that looked sort of like Moscow but something was off. I would look at a scene of the river or of a famous street brightly colored, clean and ideal, then I would turn around and see Moscow as it really was. It was busy, grey, and drab, almost like a zombie: not dead, but not fully alive either. I turned back to the brightly colored, idyllic paintings and wondered why there was such a contrast between what was painted and what really was. Why would someone take something that is real and repaint it in a way that wasn’t real, but was better?

It struck me that that is what much of what art, literature and music is. It’s an expression of what should be rather than what it is. It’s a retelling of something that is better than what we can currently see, hear, taste, smell or feel. I have no idea what the worldview of the artist was who painted that Moscow street scene, but what his art was inadvertently saying when contrasted to the current reality is that something can be more beautiful than it currently is. This made me wonder why it is nearly universal that we as humans know that things can, and often should be better than they are. Is it because we’re naturally gifted at seeing what’s wrong with things? Or is it because we were born for a place where things really are better?

As C.S. Lewis said “These things [beauty, nostalgia] are good images of what we really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of the worshippers. For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited.”

The idyllic images displayed haphazardly on the embankment that afternoon were a reminder to me that God has asked us to tell his story with the talents he has given us. For the artists, whether they knew it or not, they were telling the story of the once perfect and one-day-to-be-redeemed world. The musician creates harmony out of chaos; the writer retells a story that is at once his own and begotten from another time; the painter expresses an understanding of beauty beyond herself.

The ideal great city, struggling to be expressed in that Moscow street scene, will exist on the other side of Heaven. In the meantime he has us here in the not-so-ideal, the fallen city in order to tell others and remind each other about the one who will redeem it and his (and our) incredible story.

That day spent with the Lord was a valuable reminder to me of the truth that God is active in all kinds of ways and that his attributes and character can be known, felt, understood and retold even if the teller does not personally know him. Solomon said that God has written eternity on the hearts of men and Paul echoed that by saying that what can be known about God is plain to all people, because God has shown it to them. When we read literature, or look at art or enjoy music or even watch a story told in a sitcom or through a documentary are we doing so simply hedonistically - for our own pleasure - or is something in our soul crying out to connect with the Great Artist and his great story?