Carrying a Bucket of Dry Ice?

[The Midweek Encounter is a ministry of Encounter Church in Kentwood, MI. These posts are a reflection on Sunday's message, which can be heard here each week: http://www.myencounterchurch.org/#/messages-media]

Midweek Encounter 9.17.14

On Sunday at Encounter Church the worship space was full of carbon dioxide (and this is no dig at the preaching)—but in an unusual state—carbon dioxide as a solid. You probably know it as “dry ice”.

Dry ice is really cool stuff. It sublimates as it warms, meaning that it goes directly from a solid to a gas while skipping the melty liquid state. Really cool. Surrounded by these vapors, Dirk encouraged us to think about what it would be like to carry the visible glory of God with us everywhere we go. The metaphor was simple enough—the gas as a visual and physical reminder of the glory of God—but as I thought more about it, it became increasingly complex.

What would it be like to carry a bucket of dry ice around for a day? Think about the gas that would accumulate in your car during your morning commute. At some point, you might have to open your windows to let some of the gas escape. What does that mean for us metaphorically—having to open the windows because the glory of God is too powerful to be contained within the car? I happen to be a teacher, so I imagined what it would be like to bring my bucket of dry ice into my classroom. Students, of course, would all want to know why I was surrounded by fog. What would I say to them? And then I imagined myself picking up a few groceries on the way home, or taking my kids for a walk to the park, or going for a run after dinner—all while carrying a bucket of dry ice. At the very least I would get a few strange looks, but more realistically, strangers would ask me why I was carrying around a bucket of dry ice.

Without my bucket, nothing changes. I don’t remember to acknowledge the power and the presence of God more frequently; strangers don’t stop me to ask me about my faith; students are not wowed by the power of Christ within me; everything remains unchanged.

It’s probably unrealistic to carry this tangible reminder of God’s glory with us, but it’s easy to carry the metaphor into our lives. There are a number of references to the glory of the God appearing as a cloud in the Bible, and you can read about some of them here: http://biblehub.com/exodus/13-21.htm. God speaks to his people, leads them, and protects them, all in the form of a cloud. In John 17, where the passage from this past Sunday is found, the cloud of the Lord or the glory of God settles on his people to unify them—not to extinguish their differences, but to use those differences to bring an even more diverse population of unbelievers to Christ. God sends us with his power to reach new people, to live markedly different lives, to bring the cloud of his glory into our every day situations.

So, should we start a #dryicebucketchallenge? Sorry—I literally couldn’t resist.

[Kristin vanEyk lives in Kentwood, MI where she attends Encounter Church with her husband Dirk, and two kids, Lily and Colin. Kristin teaches high school English and otherwise passes the time reading, writing, running, and enjoying all that Michigan's West Coast has to offer.]