Beauty on the Backroads

Stories of grace for life's unexpected turns

grocery shopping

When it's all holy ground

Some of my holiest moments happen at the grocery store.

But before you dub me some supermarket saint, let me tell you this: I rarely go grocery shopping alone. Usually I’m accompanied by at least one child, sometimes two, and anxiety hits before we even pull into the parking lot.

I love to cook. I like to plan meals. Even the list-making is fun.

The actual walking into the store and navigating the aisles? Well, let’s just say there are days when being trapped in a preschool would be more comfortable.

I can’t pinpoint when it started. Sometime after we had kids. Maybe when we had to get government assistance and every transaction brought imagined judgment. Or maybe it was the loss of those benefits and the food budget being less than $100 a month. Or maybe it was none of those things.

All I know is that grocery shopping brings me to my knees.

Not literally, although that might help.

On a recent trip to the store for just a few things, I had both kids in tow. Our daughter was out of school early, and we needed to pick up a few things. And with cold and snow keeping us indoors, the kids were a little rowdy before we’d even gotten out of the car.

I gripped both their hands as we walked through the parking lot and breathed a prayer. Out loud. Which if anyone had seen me would make me look crazy, I’m sure.

Jesus, get us through this.

See, I’m the mom mumbling to herself about how much she just wants to get in and get out of the store without everything being touched. I just want to work through the list without chasing a 4-year-old halfway down an aisle or waiting for him to catch up while he hops on only the blue squares. I want to keep to ourselves and not have to pull my kids out of the path of other people’s carts. Inevitably, we’re the ones clogging the aisle for shoppers who are in as much of a hurry, or more, as we are.

Sometimes we choose the longer line so we’re forced to practice patience. To slow down. To deny the urge to rush.

Sometimes we choose to let other people go ahead of us because we know we’re going to take longer.

An older gentleman at Costco once invited himself to go ahead of us in line because all he had was a roasted chicken for his dinner that night. We gladly let him, and he thanked us over and over again.

It was nothing. And it was everything.

—

I’m at my worst on Sundays, the supposed holy day of the week.

I’m annoyed when I have to wake up earlier than I wanted because the kids have an internal alarm set to 6 a.m. I’m frustrated when I have to serve them breakfast before I’ve made my coffee. I’m irritated by what is inevitably a last-minute rush to get dressed and get out the door.

Actually, this is most mornings, not just Sundays.

snow holy

But because Sundays are supposed to be “holy,” I think that means they’re supposed to be perfect.

Everyone wakes up cheerful and kind. Everyone obeys in a timely manner. We calmly leave the house in plenty of time to arrive at church unhurried. After church we enjoy family time and all take a nap or at least a rest, and we start the week rejuvenated.

As I write this on a Sunday afternoon, there is one person napping in the house, and it’s not me. The kids’ idea of napping is reading books loudly in bed next to me or dragging everything out of their room into my newly cleaned kitchen so they can imagine an elaborate schoolroom.

The dishes overflow the sink; the laundry overflows the hamper. We have no plan for dinner except to survive it and put the kids to bed so we can finally, finally relax.

Maybe I feel guiltier on Sundays because I think I’m supposed to react differently, be different than all the other days of the week.

Or am I?

—

I was a new Christian, discovering my faith, when my best friend and I trekked across our college campus to pray in the chapel’s prayer room. I don’t remember if there was a specific need or if we were just meeting regularly to pray about our lives. We ran into a friend who had been raised Catholic and was walking away from religion. He asked us where we were going and we told him.

“But you don’t need to be in a church to pray,” he said.

I think we knew that but we needed a sacred space. Someplace where we could talk privately and pray confidently without interruption.

But his words stick with me, profound when I consider them years later.

I remember driving to a place in Wisconsin called Holy Hill, a national shrine, when I was young and knew almost nothing about God. (I still don’t know much.) We were on a visit to my grandmother, I think, and it was sort of in the area. We drove up the hill and never left the car, but we agreed that we felt something, even sitting in the parking lot.

A presence. Something special.

It was more than 20 years ago, and I still remember how I felt.

—

Jesus could have spent all his time in the temple. But He didn’t.

He walked all over Israel. He met people. He taught on the banks of lakes, while journeying from place to place, in people’s homes, and in the temple.

We call it The Holy Land. (I always imagine it in all caps.) I once mentioned to my brother that I wanted to visit Israel someday.

“Why? What’s there?” he asked. (I think he was testing me.)

“The Holy Land,” I said, as if it should be obvious.

He reminded me that it wasn’t just a holy land for Christians but for Jews and Muslims, too.

Annie Dillard wrote in For the Time Being of her experience visiting the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. She describes the place and how you descend and descend again until you’re able to reach into the spot where tradition says Jesus was born. For some it is a deeply significant visit.

Her reaction is this:

Any patch of ground anywhere smacks more of God’s presence on earth, to me, than did this marble grotto.

Part of me wants to disagree, but I can’t shake the truth in her statement.

sunset holy

—

Do I need to visit Israel to experience the holy?

Do I need to wait for Sunday to encounter God’s presence?

Do I need to be in church to worship or pray or confess or be forgiven?

Or do I carry it with me?

Can anywhere I walk be holy? Not because I have mastered holiness but precisely because I haven’t.

The holy person can hasten redemption and help mend heaven and earth.

Another quote from Dillard. Words that are still sinking deep into my soul.

Most days I feel far from holy.

But if those days drive me closer to the Holy One, then it’s not all bad.

When God meets me in my most unholy of moments, I find myself on holy ground.

When He meets me in my most holy moments, I find myself on holy ground.

When I’m in church or the grocery store or limping through the day waiting for bedtime.

When I’m grumbling or praising.

When I’m getting it right. When I’m getting it wrong.

It can all be holy ground.

A place where heaven meets earth.

Where there is darkness and light

I was slow to get moving yesterday, drinking coffee, waiting for laundry to dry, reading blogs and Facebook posts after taking our daughter to the bus. There was upsetting news about the government shutdown. About people not getting paid for their work. And about programs like WIC running out of funding until the shutdown is over. I thought of all the days we’ve relied on WIC to provide healthy, nourishing food for our family. I thought of how those who are food insecure would get a little more insecure with the news. How going to the grocery store is drudgery for me, especially when I’m using WIC checks because they take more time and there’s almost always a delay or a problem.

I left for the grocery store bearing burdens too heavy for my shoulders.

—

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light day, and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.

Genesis 1:1-5

light from darkness

Photo source: Carlos Koblischek via Stock Exchange

—

I pulled my van into the Aldi parking lot and dug out my quarter for the cart. I was mercifully alone on my grocery errand, the boy at home with his dad so I could be quick about restocking our shelves. I opened the hatch to find our reusable bags when the man with the broken English approached.

“You are going into the Aldi?”

“Yes,” I replied.

“Come, follow me. I give you my cart free.”

I closed the back of the van and followed him to his car. I briefly wondered if this was wise but the parking lot was full and it was daylight. I watched him unpack a few things into his car. He gestured for me to take the cart. I held out my quarter and he shook his head.

“Thank you,” I said. “Have a great day.”

I walked into the store a little lighter for the kindness.

The days may be dark, but here was a glimmer of light.

—

I filled the cart, checking it against my list, grateful for the chance to take my time and make decisions slowly. I was halfway through the store when I noticed her. She was agitated and looking for her friend to borrow a phone. With her Access (food stamp) card in one hand, she furiously dialed and punched in numbers to check her balance. I’d made the same call a day earlier, checking to see if our monthly allotment had been distributed in the chaos of government bureaucracy. I’m forever fearful that I’ll get to the checkout with a cart full of groceries and not be able to pay because of a technological glitch.

I watched out of the corner of my eye as she was visibly upset with the result of her call. I don’t know the circumstances or lifestyle of the woman but I know what it is, at least in part, to stare at empty pantry shelves and wonder when and how you’re going to put a meal together.

My mind immediately leaps to the worst-case scenario, and as I looked at my cart, I wondered if maybe there was a problem after all and maybe I wouldn’t be able to pay for my groceries.

I walked on in faith, paid for my groceries and bagged them, grateful that another trip to the grocery store was done.

—

When I got to the car, I checked my phone. Even though it’s October and I’ve had less than a handful of calls from our daughter’s school, I’m still paranoid that she’ll need something during the day and I’ll miss the call.

I saw an e-mail instead. An urgent prayer request. A tragic loss.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

I said the words out loud.

In the beginning there was darkness. And there was light. And I wondered if God could have made a world without darkness.

—

I tire quickly of the darkness. I avoid the news. I keep to the safety of the neighborhoods I know. I shut my eyes to the horrors of the world because it is too much to bear. Too much darkness. Not enough light. Never enough light.

light candle

Photo source: Andrey Gorshkov via Stock Exchange

I tire quickly of my darkness, the black parts of my heart that seep out through my words and actions. I forget that the story doesn’t end with darkness.

You are the light of the world.

The people walking in darkness have seen a great light.

The city has no need of the sun or of the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God has illumined it, and its lamp is the Lamb.

—

In the beginning there was darkness. But the Spirit of God was moving. Light was being born.

There is darkness, yes, but there is light and it is us, and we are pushing back the darkness one kindness, one act of love at a time.