Pastor's Life - Big Enough

God is big enough to hold all of our curiousity, doubts, joys, fears by Rev. Adriene Thorne “In pursuing a writing life, we often become alienated from the very things we wish to celebrate with our words.” - Aaliyah Bilal Don’t tell anyone, but I think I’ve lost my faith. What I mean to say is that the rules and training and dogma of my Christian belief are cracking and falling away. If I’m honest, the fit has always been uncomfortable, and I’ve mostly worn the clothes loosely. As I strip down, what I’m left with is mystery — too big for containment in only a handful of prayers and holy hymns. Now the boundaries must stretch to hold the God of my understanding. Don’t get me wrong, I still walk with Jesus, and imagine I always will, but that pesky Holy Spirit has taken me to unexpected places and continues to fill my journey with surprises. My earliest depiction of God was something like the sun: bright lights, multiple colors, an energy I could not capture except with abstract art. That eight-year-old kid, who talked to The Holy and heard The Holy talk back, was close to God and onto something. Trailing clouds of glory do we come / From God, who is our home, Wadsworth wrote, and I’ve been trying ever since to get back to what that kid knew about God.

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Rev. Adriene Thorne serves as senior minister at Riverside Church in the City of New York. Before leading Riverside, Rev. Thorne served The First Presbyterian Church of Brooklyn where she co-founded the award-winning Brooklyn Heights Community Fridge and where the community named her one of the Top Ten Most Impactful People. She earned her Master of Divinity from The Pacific School of Religion.

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