Finding a ‘new sacrament’ of self-care at mountain gathering
The Rev. Dr. Winterbourne Harrison-Jones challenges ministers to adopt rest as sacred practice at closing worship of 1001 New Worshiping Communities event
![Worshipers at 1001 New Worshiping Communities national gathering wrote down answers to the question, "What are you seeking?"](/sites/default/files/styles/responsive_16_9_350w/public/2025-10/IMG_2582.jpeg?h=fee99c1a&itok=n9QCW4Qd "Worshipers at 1001 New Worshiping Communities national gathering wrote down answers to the question, "What are you seeking?"")
ESTES PARK, Colorado — As soft jazz filtered through Hyde Chapel at the YMCA of the Rockies on Oct. 15, worshipers settled into a space transformed by fall gourds, woven blankets and wooden lanterns — a sanctuary carefully curated to embody the very rest it proclaimed.
A brown paper runner stretched the length of a narrow table, sprinkled with the faded yellows of dried aspen leaves and the scrawled prayers of those who gathered. Each handwritten plea answered a question asked a few days prior at the worship service that opened the week: “What is it you are seeking?”
The service featured music led by Dr. Jillian Harrison-Jones and a sermon by her husband, the Rev. Dr. Winterbourne Harrison-Jones, pastor of Witherspoon Presbyterian Church in Indianapolis. Two days before the conference opened, the couple had visited local thrift stores to transform the worship space with throw pillows, leaves and autumn décor, creating what participants described as a comforting, contemplative atmosphere imbued with the spirit of local hospitality and natural harmony.
“What would happen if we honored the Divine within ourselves, the various dimensions of who God has called us to be, just as we honor the breaking of the bread and the drinking of the wine?” the Rev. Dr. Harrison-Jones asked as he began his sermon for the closing worship of the 1001 New Worshiping Communities national gathering. He challenged the 150 gathered leaders to embrace self-care as a sacred practice equal to communion and baptism.
“What would happen to our lives if we would adopt this new sacrament?” he asked.
His message capped a three-day gathering focused on “rest as resistance,” where new worshiping community leaders experienced extended free time, contemplative worship and the serene beauty of Colorado’s Rocky Mountains.
Drawing from Matthew 11:28–30 and the Magi's alternative route home in Matthew 2:9–12, Harrison-Jones framed the gathering as both warning and welcome. He referenced Christian contemplative and theologian Dr. Howard Thurman’s meditation on life’s fluidity, asking participants, “What do you want? ... Really?”
In Thurman’s recorded voice, played during the service, he reflected that “there is a dynamism in which all life, individual life is grounded and that purposes, therefore, goals, genes, ideals, can fulfill themselves because of the fluid, flowing character of all of life.” Life, he said, is not fixed, but fluid, meaning encounters with God’s love and call are both welcome and warning.
“Might this be the warning you have been waiting for,” Harrison-Jones preached, “that the ways that we live, our inabilities to set boundaries, our inability to reach out for help, the supermen and superwomen complexes that we carry? Could it be that God has allowed us to have this encounter, and has warned us that the way that we are going will only lead to destruction?”
Following the sermon, Harrison-Jones invited worshipers to gather in small groups to discuss concrete commitments they would take home from the mountain experience.
The Rev. Jemimah Ngatia, originally from Kenya and serving as the first African woman to be ordained in the PC(USA), said she was taking home this self-care sacrament.
“I needed to hear when I break the bread that this is self,” she said. “Who am I going to be? Am I going to remain the same?” Ngatia serves Neema Fellowship, a new worshiping community in Denver.
Courtnye Lloyd of The Gathering, a worshiping community in Indianapolis, said, “Something that stood out for me was to think about what the rhythm looks like, but also to be intentional in developing a rhythm connecting with the land and nature.”
The message resonated with leaders navigating burnout and boundary challenges. Harrison-Jones defined self-care as “developing rhythms, rituals and routines that nurture the divine within.” He drew connections between rhythms of a faith marked by epiphanies and mountaintop experiences but lived out in ordinary time and circumstances.
“After the song of the angels is still, when the star in the sky is gone,” Harrison-Jones said, echoing Thurman's poem “The Work of Christmas.” “Then the work begins.”
the Rev. Jeff Eddings, associate for formation and coaching with 1001 New Worshiping Communities, announced that the office will offer a Sabbath Innovation Lab beginning in January — a monthly cohort for leaders to practice and discuss Sabbath rhythms. The 1001 NWC program also offers Sabbath grants ranging from $1,500 for two weeks to $3,500 for four to six weeks of intentional rest for new worshiping leaders.
“I believe Sabbath is magical,” Eddings told the gathering, sharing his own transformation through sabbatical practice when he earned the nickname “Sabbatical Jeff” from his kid’s soccer team. “If you truly practice Sabbath, if you take that, maybe it’s one of the things you want to do when you go back. It’ll transform your life.”
The service concluded with a poetic reflection by the Rev. Laura Beth Buchleiter, spoken against an improvised piano postlude echoing the closing song, “I Need You to Survive," by Hezekiah Walker:
“I was caught up in the novelty of my own existence and never sure if the next turn would create calm or chaos, constantly searching for meaning, for purpose, for roots watered with love. I was wandering,” Buchleiter said, describing the feeling of following a story arc so distant, “always a step ahead, always a step forward, always a step along, never, never stepping into the peace that had been promised.”
The deadline to apply for 1001 New Worshiping Communities' Sabbath and Sabbatical Grants is Nov. 7.
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