Spokane pastor uses food to bring Lenten sermons to life
News Story by Cody Wendt | FāVS News
German-born, licensed local pastor Rene’ Devantier of Spokane’s Fowler United Methodist Church takes a distinct approach to ministering to those in need.
“Our main push is trying to get people into church that have disabilities, or family members with disabilities, and so that’s what the whole building is kind of about,” he said, adding a reference to James 1: 27. “… Our whole idea is to take care of people that are not necessarily mainstream, but are left out a little bit. The widows and the orphans.”
The building is equipped with accommodations like a sensory room and spaces rented out for Alzheimer’s and dementia care. In keeping with his mission, Devantier often goes to lengths to incorporate experiences beyond the pure spoken word into his sermons.
“Whenever he does something, it’s very visual, because he likes to use a lot of PowerPoints,” noted Lynn Swedberg, a UMC disability worker who has helped Devantier with accommodations and past sermons. “They’re good for people who have intellectual disabilities and get lost with a lot of words.”
Giving spiritual meaning to food
The latest example of Devantier’s methodology comes in the form of his Lent Food Messages sermon series, which began March 9 and will continue through the end of the month.
“I was thinking, food or the absence of food (fasting) has always been a part of Lent,” he said. “But rather than just taking food away, I thought giving spiritual meaning to food would be a nice theme.”
He opened the series with a presentation on the spiritual significance of water in which he spoke in front of a table arrayed with bottled water.
The service included songs with lyrics such as “Jesus calls us o’er the tumult of our life’s wild, restless sea.” Devantier’s commentary and projector slides touched on Biblical episodes such as Jonah’s time in the belly of the whale or Jesus’ baptism in the River Jordan, calming of the storm and meeting with the Samaritan woman at the well.
“I kind of made everybody thirsty, and then I gave them water,” he said. “… The water came from everybody. It’s part of the family; part of the community; part of the body of Christ; a physical reminder of how we all belong together. We’re living in a closed system where water doesn’t move outside the system. It just keeps regenerating, turning into vapor, turning into ice, turning into water for all of time on this earth.”
Second came a bread-themed sermon this past weekend.
“Last Sunday I was there, and it was very multisensory,” Swedberg said of the March 16 service. “He decided it would be really nice to have the smell of bread — besides touching, smelling and tasting — and actually brought a toaster, and several times during the service, he put the toast down and had a fan that dissipated the smell amazingly.”
Devantier is planning to follow up this Sunday with a discourse on grapes, emphasizing “the idea that we’re a fruit and Jesus the vine, and we can’t live without that substance and that spiritual life.” Like previous entries in the series, it will be “hands-on,” pointedly giving parishioners the opportunity to experience its subject matter in more than words.
Finding the thin places
“Jesus used things like this around him and made them holy — made them a spiritual vehicle for us to connect with God in those thin places where I think we can connect to God in a deeper way,” Devantier said. “A thin space is where … we live our life, and God is kind of at a distance to us, but there are moments and times in our lives where we really get close and have a way of connecting. The space is very thin; it’s almost touchable.”
The series will culminate in a full Communion Sunday bringing together all the elements Devantier has preached on.
“We used all of those facets to get to those thin places again,” he said. “I guess that’s my emphasis: to get people a bit closer to God, in all different ways, in all different manners. You’ve got to find different kinds of ways to connect.”
Thanks, Cody, for reporting on Rev. Devantier’s efforts to create a this space through worship, and one that includes those with disabilities. Other churches could learn from his example.
This story warms my heart! Thanks for sharing to us all. This is relevant because many would be worshipers cannot be in a place/space with noise, lots of bodies, etc. because of their disabilities and medical/mental conditions. We need to be more inclusive! Great messge.