Context

As June settles in, and summer feels like a reality rather than wishful thinking, we might be turning our thoughts to summer holidays – and for many that will mean a plane flight to another part of the world. With the advent of cheap airlines and bargain tickets the possibilities for travel, for going to new places, and looking at the world beyond our backyards, have grown and grown. We long to see things for ourselves. So, it’s fitting, at the beginning of the summer season, that travel is in the headlines as the Transport Secretary confirmed in parliament that the go ahead has been given for the building of the third runway at Heathrow.

Whether you agree or disagree with the Heathrow expansion plan, whether you think it will ever actually happen and whatever your opinions are about runways, planes and air travel in general, it’s difficult to deny that more and more of us want to see other places. We want to experience other cultures and interact with distant towns and cities, go to places that look and feel different to wherever we’re from.

There seems to be a real hunger to experience and see other things. It’s fair to say that the general consensus indicates that seeing and experiencing other places is an important thing to do. If you tap ‘Why should we see the world?’ into an internet search engine, around 3,780,000,000 results will pop up in 0.28 seconds. Many of the blog posts are almost evangelical about the way travel can affect our present reality and help develop us as human beings.

We want to see for ourselves.

 

Reflection

And whilst our desire to see things for ourselves is perfectly acceptable, it’s interesting that in 2 Corinthians 4.18, Paul puts the emphasis on exactly the opposite: not physically seeing for ourselves. With the debates around the Heathrow runway, and the opportunities to travel and view the places we read about, look at on screens or investigate on Google earth, it’s easy to slip into thinking we might miss out on something really important if we fail to see for ourselves. But Paul describes all of this as temporary, and encourages us to ‘look’ at what cannot be seen. All that we can see, however enriching, exciting or educational is all part of this world, and the point Paul is making is that this world is temporary. In all their beauty and complexity, the far-flung places we can see as we debark our planes, are temporary. They are part of a world which will eventually end. The things we long to see for ourselves as we hurtle down the runway are in fact provisional and passing. As Christians, we are invited to look for the permanent and lasting; to ‘see’ the eternal things; to see for ourselves the invisible and everlasting. As much as we desire to look at the wonders of this world, we lift our gaze and long to ‘see’ the next.

 

Prayer

Invite people to spend a few minutes carefully studying everything around them. Point out interesting aspects of the building, and encourage people to turn and look or even walk around, viewing the different features of the space.

Once everyone has looked and seen, and returned to their places, invite them to sit quietly, with their eyes shut for a minute, and allow the things they have seen to disappear from sight. Encourage people to ask God to show them instead the eternal things. After a minute or so of silence, encourage the congregation to keep their eyes closed and pray:

Eternal God,
help us to see your kingdom,
help us to look for signs of the eternal.
Give us vision that is focused on what is unseen and everlasting.
Amen.

 

Questions

• What does it mean for you, in the present, to look at what is ‘unseen’?
• How does the idea that this world is temporary make you feel?
• What do you think when you hear the word ‘eternal’?

 

All-age activity

On one side of the worship space put a large sheet of paper with the word ‘TEMPORARY’ written on it. At the other side put another with the word ‘ETERNAL’ written on it. Explain you are now going to read out a list of things and people have to decide whether they are ‘temporary’ or ‘eternal’. If you have the space, people can move to stand at the correct side, if not just encourage them to point to the right sign.

Words to read out could include: chocolate, gold bars, sand, rocks, carrots, this building, sheep, the game of chess, love, clothes, grass, forgiveness.

Invite people to discuss in small groups what sort of things are temporary and what are eternal.

 

Young people

Draw what you see
Provide each young person with a sheet of A4 paper and some crayons or pencils. Assure them that this is not a test of drawing ability, then invite each member of the group to go off on their own, find something in the building/room and to draw it. Give the group 10 minutes or so on the drawing, then ask them to gather together and display their pictures (you could stick them on a wall or lay them on the floor). Invite everyone to look at the pictures and to see if they can work out what the picture is of, and where the artist was when they drew it.

To finish, turn all of the pictures over so the ‘gallery’ is now a series of blank A4 sheets. Ask everyone to look at the blank sheets, and to think about the things they cannot see that also fill the building – love, peace, compassion, God’s forgiveness, etc. Invite them to dwell on these things for a minute. End by reading aloud 2 Corinthians 4.18

 

Fiona Dorman is currently an Education Officer at Bristol Cathedral, and a freelance writer and educator.

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