What If New Zealand

I sometimes think of my life as a prayer room.

By that I mean that I experience things through the lens of devotional prompts. When something wonderful, or challenging, or boring happens, a script is being written in my thoughts, instructions as to how someone might encounter God in the same event.

During our stay in the South Island I was so overcome by the beauty of New Zealand that I began imagining this country as one enormous prayer room that would inspire worship for thousands of pilgrims yet to visit. A spot for the spiritually hungry, devout, weary, or wanderlust individuals to flock to and draw near to God. Instead of a prayer room in the back of a church, I imagined the hills, lookouts, and bush walks existing as prayer stations.

What if the huts in the national forests were temporary shelters for pilgrims and the placards at the base of the falls included reflections as stunning as the pools they were designed to identify?

What if people traveled from far and wide not just do to the great hikes, but to meet the King on the Kepler Track and experience the song of heavenly hosts in Hooker Valley? What if each region were identified by the nature and character of God and Jesus-follower's planned their itineraries based on the treks that facilitated spiritual direction?

I got to dreaming about more than prayer rooms in New Zealand churches. I'm dreaming now about a living prayer room, carved into the cleft of every mountain and cut into the path of every national park. The breath of God already sweeps through every valley and bubbles up from the cracked earth here. His voice rings out in the fjordlands through the music of native birds and bounds through the forest in the form of tumbling waterfalls. He is in all and through all. He has given New Zealand her beauty and He is ready to be known and experienced. By all.

May the pilgrims come.

May the potters and surfers flock to Raglan

and the marine enthusiasts to Kaikoura

May the shores of Napier be flooded with worship

And the scenic routes be sprinkled with psalms

May the peaks of Aoraki provide strength to the weary

and the Tongariro wilderness commission priests and parents

pilgrims as well as pastors

Restoring vision to those blinded by their burdens

and kindling desire in the heart of every way-finder

who's come seeking

Mercy and justice.

Healing. Forgiveness.

Repentance and rest.

Lift your voice to the hills

and wait for the echo

Let Him resound upon your chest

And awaken your soul

Awake and arise

That the King of Glory may come in

To the heart of Aotearoa

The heart of New Zealand.

The heart of every pilgrim willing to be remade.

What if these islands were home to the hermits and an oasis to the overwhelmed?

Cathedrals of mossy tree canopies inviting single mothers as well as monks, a place for the pious as well as pitiful...What if all who sought God knew they could come to Aotearoa to hear His voice and gaze upon His beauty?