God Created Death?
Stories
Shining Moments
Visions Of The Holy In Ordinary Lives
John Sumwalt
It happened at a fifth and sixth grade church camp that I directed with my wife, Jo, at Pine Lake United Methodist Camp in central Wisconsin, several years ago. The theme was "Partners in Creation." There were about thirty children and eight adult counselors. Each night we gathered around the campfire for worship and storytelling. I invited everyone to make up their own creation stories to tell as we studied the creation stories in Genesis throughout the week. Each night we closed with a litany based on Genesis 1. I would say, "In the beginning God created ..." and then I would point to one of the children, who would fill in the blank by saying something like "trees," for example. And we would all say, "In the beginning God created trees, and they were good. Very good!"
The blank was filled in by lots of obvious things, like rainbows, water, air, people, puppies, grandpas and grandmas, and so on. Near the end of the week, I told the campers the sky is the limit, and that they could include silly things. We had great fun saying "In the beginning God created 'mosquitoes,' 'oatmeal,' 'armpits,' 'broccoli,' 'prune juice,' and 'homework.' And it was good. Very good!"
We went along like that, doing a mixture of silly and serious things, laughing and praising God with much joyous banter, when I pointed to a little girl who had not said much all week, and she said, "Death" (we discovered later that her grandmother had died just before she came to camp). There was a poignant pause, a holy hush as we looked around at each other, wondering if we could go on with the litany. It seemed like a long time, but it was only an instant, one of those moments that cannot be measured in time, when the Spirit moved in and through us, and we all knew that what the little girl said was true. We joined our voices together as one in a holy affirmation I will remember till my dying day. "In the beginning God created death, and it was good. Very good."
It happened at a fifth and sixth grade church camp that I directed with my wife, Jo, at Pine Lake United Methodist Camp in central Wisconsin, several years ago. The theme was "Partners in Creation." There were about thirty children and eight adult counselors. Each night we gathered around the campfire for worship and storytelling. I invited everyone to make up their own creation stories to tell as we studied the creation stories in Genesis throughout the week. Each night we closed with a litany based on Genesis 1. I would say, "In the beginning God created ..." and then I would point to one of the children, who would fill in the blank by saying something like "trees," for example. And we would all say, "In the beginning God created trees, and they were good. Very good!"
The blank was filled in by lots of obvious things, like rainbows, water, air, people, puppies, grandpas and grandmas, and so on. Near the end of the week, I told the campers the sky is the limit, and that they could include silly things. We had great fun saying "In the beginning God created 'mosquitoes,' 'oatmeal,' 'armpits,' 'broccoli,' 'prune juice,' and 'homework.' And it was good. Very good!"
We went along like that, doing a mixture of silly and serious things, laughing and praising God with much joyous banter, when I pointed to a little girl who had not said much all week, and she said, "Death" (we discovered later that her grandmother had died just before she came to camp). There was a poignant pause, a holy hush as we looked around at each other, wondering if we could go on with the litany. It seemed like a long time, but it was only an instant, one of those moments that cannot be measured in time, when the Spirit moved in and through us, and we all knew that what the little girl said was true. We joined our voices together as one in a holy affirmation I will remember till my dying day. "In the beginning God created death, and it was good. Very good."
