Life is Sacramental – God Speaks Through Tangibles

If my family were to sum up my grandfather in one word, it might have been, affectionately, that he was very frugal. Aside from his love of musicals, movies, and a good laugh, he loved saving money and providing for his family.

Born in the Great Depression to the son of an Eastern European immigrant, he understood the value of money and made it his hobby – almost a game - to nickel-and-dime his budget by counting coins and cutting coupons. 

So, when he was dying of cancer, back in 2010, one of his deathbed concerns ended up being his car insurance. My dad thought it was funny, and the least of his concerns as he was dying. He promised to take care of it and told him not to worry.

And so, after my grandfather died, my dad called his car insurance. And he found out, true to my grandfather's frugal legacy, that the insurance ran out the day he died. 

A little wink from eternity. A little stamp of the eternal nature of life and a God outside of time. A little sign of God that seems to say: I am concerned with and know every part of you. That the tangible characteristics of a person, no matter whether they are seemingly material or trivial, have a meaning outside of time for God.

Tangibles are signs of the mysterious and invisible. Because for God, when he made man body and soul, it became by order that He would speak to him through the sacramental physical: people, places, and things.

For Catholics, sacraments and sacramentals are visible signs of God: Jesus in the Eucharist, healing through anointing oil, a holy relic of a saint, scapulars, and holy water. God works through matter as well as spirit for humans because we are both body and soul, unlike the angels. 

And so, in discerning God’s answers to our questions in prayer I think it makes sense that God would speak to us through the physical reality around us. 

I sometimes find myself trying to conjure the voice of God out of thin air when I want to hear an answer.. But He is sometimes already speaking through the physical in front of me. Say the coffee table book in front of me. Because God works through tangibles.

We can’t disregard any method by which God might speak as being too “un-spiritual.” 

Recently, I was really straining myself to hear God. When I do this, I usually think to myself that I should put down “all distractions” (as spiritual self-help articles suggest) and try to hear God. Turns out, in that particular instance, picking up a book I was ignoring, right next to me on the shelf, helped provide the answers I was looking for.

Sometimes doing a small, physical task is also a good way to hear God. The moments I can think of when I have had a new thought pop into my head (a thought that I can believe or attribute to God) came when I was washing my hands or in the shower.

One particular God-thought came to me as I washed my hands on a slow Sunday evening about two months ago. I was thinking about possibilities and new work ventures going forward and the thought “work smarter, not harder” came to me. 

It seemed a good thought, but I didn’t really attribute it to God. Then maybe an hour or two later that day as I did some sewing and listened to a Christian YouTube video, the speaker in it, out-of-the-blue mentioned that he felt God was saying “Work smarter, not harder”.

Confirmation in the physical. The tangible voice of God that requires no conjuring to see or hear. For God lives and breathes through all being.

​Look in front of you and see what interests you. What might God be speaking through it today?

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“I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, God’s dwelling is with the human race. He will dwell with them and they will be his people and God himself will always be with them [as their God].” - Revelation 21:3
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Scripture texts in this work are taken from the New American Bible, revised edition © 2010, 1991, 1986, 1970 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Washington, D.C. and are used by permission of the copyright owner. All Rights Reserved. No part of the New American Bible may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the copyright owner.