Why I made the Divine Windows.

There is something very emotional within me that occurs when I see old abandoned church structures and they’ve always impacted me. Sometimes what wells up inside of me is a kind of sadness and a wondering of why it was no longer used.

I’ve seen a lot of these abandoned church buildings in my life. I know many of the smaller ones like we have here in rural Florida were built well away from city centers because they were not accepted dominations by the masses in cities at that time.

They built them to worship God in their way without any outside influence or persecution.

Most of these church buildings for many known and unknown reasons are now and have been abandoned.

They are mainly abandoned because the sprawl of those cities they avoided, came to them.

Lately though I have noticed an overwhelming amount of Church buildings for sale that are directly in the city’s centers. These are huge structures that housed very large congregations who worshipped there and were accepted by the city they were in.

They are not being sold to be church buildings any longer either, but rather to be used as large residential homes.

Some of these churches have stood in these city centers since those cities were founded two hundred years ago.

Once again, that sadness wells up inside of me seeing this. It can even give you a hopeless feeling.

Why am I sad to see these vacated buildings when I have not walked into a Sunday church service in over 8 years?

Because, just maybe, I knew that I could walk into one whenever I felt I needed to.

I understand that lock downs really affected that option 3 years ago for many people. And for many, it has now eliminated the option to walk in there on and Sunday morning.

For us, the last 8 years our church has been our home and especially in the barn where we make crosses.

We have said to anyone that enters here that this is a safe haven where we don’t let the outside world influence how we worship God and we don’t tell others how they should worship him either. We are just glad they are here with us to talk about God and witness to us.

I had a nice gentleman in our barn a couple of years ago that told me after I said this to him that I needed to get me and my family to church. And, that we needed to specifically go to his church.

I asked him to tell me why. Not to be combative…but to help me understand where he’s coming from.

I was quiet for a bit without saying a word to allow him to talk and share with me what his church meant to him. Because like I said to him when he entered. Our Barn is a safe haven for this.

Listening to him I sure enjoyed the story he told me of where he was coming from. Then, how he found God again among others in that church after a family tragedy. They really helped lift him up through that tough time.

When he was done I smiled at him. I told him that I was in the Barn currently working for the Lord 6 days a week and sometimes on Sundays too.  Once again I wasn’t being combative. But, I asked him if it was better for me to worship and work for the Lord 6 days a week in here or just on Sunday and work for others the rest of the week?

He paused.

I then told him that my wife was a NICU nurse and that those babies won’t make it if no one is working there on Sundays. Someone has to be there and she has always stepped up to do her calling.

After we conversed back and forth for a bit we found a great understanding about where we both were coming from.

I ended that conversation with this verse written in Jesus’s own words.

“For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.”Matt.18:20

I looked at him with a smile and said that I sure enjoyed having church with you today.

He shook my hand and said he did too. :)

What I’m getting at is that

Church was never solely in those now abandoned  buildings. It’s just a place or a location where we are together with others in God’s name.

I made these windows for an important reminder. Whether that place you gather is at your home every night or in your work office every day.

It’s just a reminder that Church can be wherever you are with others, every day of the week.

Not just on Sunday’s.