Deep Breathing through a Bad Air Day

The San Francisco Bay Area, where I live, has been in the national news of late, due to the lightning-sparked wildfires consuming our state. Our region is surrounded by record-setting fires, and as a result our air has become smoky. The Air Quality Index (AQI) has for days been in the “hazardous for all people” range, with a few respites in the evening as winds change.

As a lung cancer survivor, minus one lung lobe and afflicted with asthma, I am hunkerin’ down at home with the A/C and fan running night and day, sealed against the hazy soup that mocks me.

We take breathing for granted until we can see and smell the air around us. Ordinarily, breathing draws little attention to itself, but these days in the 1 a.m. quiet, I can hear my bronchi whistle—yes! a clear signal that dirty air drawn in to my windpipe is causing mischief. But I am surrounded by this air and it is, in a sense, defiling me.

This scenario offers some insight for the Christian life. The apostle Paul urges us to take care to surround ourselves with the atmosphere of heaven by “seek[ing] the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.” Paul goes on in Colossians 3: “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory.”

Assuming it is not possible to relocate oneself to a place where there is no dirty air, no corruption, no sin lurking in shadowy corners to tempt us, Paul is saying that we have the power to lift our thoughts and hopes into a space where the spiritual air is clean and refreshing to the soul. One might think the admonition requires a person to hang out at church to be shielded from earthly influence. Well, even that is not possible with our shelter-in-place rules in effect. No, what gives us new air and a fresh perspective is the Spirit of God, who breathed life into Adam at creation and who instills God’s ruach—breath—in each one of us. When we sing, “You are the air I breathe,” we are acknowledging the presence of the Lord’s Spirit within us regardless of the AQI of the world’s air around us.

So how does this work in the everyday, ordinary Christian life? It means we start breathing with intention: exhaling dirty thoughts, anger or sarcasm, ingratitude or hopelessness, and breathing in the Lord’s beauty, goodness, forgiveness, and salvation for our souls. It means thinking differently, training our minds to dwell on “things above, where Christ is” and to let die those thoughts that are destructive to our spirits, damaging to our neighbor, and discouraging to others. It means relaxing in a place where the spiritual air is clean, the breezes refreshing, and the Spirit’s work unhindered. And then it doesn’t matter where we are (physically) or what climate conditions prevail. We are “hidden with Christ” and have a reliable source of oxygen that will sustain us for the journey.

As I think about it, that’s a pretty good model for daily prayer:
EXHALE (confess, relinquish, cast anxieties off, surrender to God),
INHALE (receive God’s forgiveness, peace, and sustaining power), and
RELAX (rest in the Lord, trust the Savior’s work on your behalf, and know the love of God that nothing can thwart).

Breathe deeply in Christ and it won’t matter whether it is a Bad Air Day or a Good Air Day!