“Sanctuary” is the title of my newest Advent art exhibit. The work will be on display at Monroe Community Church, Grand Rapids, MI from December 8, 2024 – February 20, 2025. These paintings explore the idea of “sanctuary” as God’s physical dwelling place in Mary, Mother of Jesus and in the church.
Just as our bodies are “Temples of the Holy Spirit” (1 Corinthians 6:19), so was Mary’s. Mary’s body became a Temple in a literal way when she became pregnant with Jesus. The Lord came and dwelt there in the Temple, as He had in the Israelite’s Tabernacle in the desert. She opened her heart to receive God’s love so completely that she became one with the Holy Spirit in the moment of The Incarnation. In fact, the early church referred to Mary also as the Tabernacle. A medieval hymn refers to her as “Mary the Temple, Christ the Temple’s Lord.” In the Bible the word “Sanctuary” referred to the holiest place in the Temple, where the presence of God dwelled. We use it to refer to the place where we worship, the space where we encounter the church, which is both the body of believers and a physical space.
Medieval architects built towering cathedrals to be visible, tangible expressions of divinity, signifiers of God’s presence on earth. They are places intended to foster an encounter between heaven and earth, convergence of earth and sky, physical and spiritual.
In the midst of the desert and darkness of this world, we look for sanctuary, we wait for Presence.
