Looking In The Space Between Us

"Twenty-three." That was number she yelled at her dad as she threw a baseball at him with all of her might. 

Up until that moment my focus was on the squirrel that my dog had been staring at for what seemed like the last twenty-three minutes.

The park is full of squirrels, which makes walking the dog a spiritual exercise in patience.  But the park is also full of all kinds of life doing all sorts of things.

It was the number twenty-three that pulled my attention away from dog and squirrel to daddy and little girl. What I learned was, every time one of them caught the ball, they would take one step backwards before returning the ball back.

By the time I noticed them, they were twenty-three consecutive catches away from each other. 

The more successful they were, the further apart the were. This struck me as odd because we often think that the better we are at something the closer we are to achieving our goal. 
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As I watched this duo push one another further away, I started to see how they were filling that space between them with purpose and joy. The wider that gap between them came, the more space they had to fill with happiness, laughter, and love. 

It seems the distance between them only made them closer. 

I noticed this to be true about the relationship with my daughter who is away at college. Now that she is 123 miles away from home, we seem to talk more. And engage in one another's lives differently. I like to think she agrees that we have grown closer because the distance that separates us.

It's not easy being apart from those you love or desire to be around. I think we all discovered that during the height of the pandemic when we were isolating at home, or keeping our 6 feet of distance from one another. It's harder still when you want a hug but can't because of the distance. ​

The question for me during the pandemic was "How can we remain close, even though we are apart?" And this lead me to think about that space between us. The space I call Anamesa.

Unlike liminal space, where one is passively standing in the doorway of a significant change in life -either between two different locations, or states of being, Anamesa is an active space of doing.

Like a father and daughter playing catch, the space between them is full of all sorts of stuff happening. The ball is moving. Wind is blowing. Joy and laughter is being had. Squirrels are staring down dogs.

At Anamesa, we are always looking for ways to be closer because we are far apart. But what if we started looking at the distance between us as nothing more than a bigger space to do the work of the church? Like casting a wider net to reach more people to love. 

Many struggled with this when their churches went into lockdown. But they didn't have to. They just needed to rethink they way they do things by embracing that space instead of rejecting it. ​

While it seems counterintuitive for a church to be further apart than closer together, it makes sense to expand our viewpoint and widen the gap between our hearts so that more people can come discover God’s grace and glory.

Anamesa is more than just a space we occupy. It's a way to live into that space as a bridge between this world and the one to come.

I often use this example to explain it in simple terms. Let's say you see someone hungry, and you are moved to feed them. It could be a homeless woman whom you give money to, or a family down on their luck that you buy groceries for, or it could be a friend who's homesick that you prepare a meal for. That's Anamesa. Filling the space with love and joy by living out the gospel in real time.

Between the number twenty-three and twenty-four there was nervousness and fear of failing, or having to start over again. But there was also courage and commitment to try. For me, it's what happens in that space and to that space when we try to do something beyond standing there hoping for someone else to act.  

I think what makes us stronger as a community and as a people isn’t our proximity but our willingness to walk together with the love of Christ, who brings us together as one body no matter how far we are apart. 

I hope this helps you rethink the space you are in - physically, mentally, emotionally, or spiritually.