Category Archives: The UK

Reaching Out

22 Tuesday May 2012

Posted by in Diocesan Growth Strategy, Flora and Fauna, Wester Ross

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This seashore grass has red roots which reach out beyond its green boundary.  It looks almost like this bit of nature is going through a church mapping process and it got me to thinking.

All too often when such processes are gone through the talk is about people coming to the centre from the outskirts to receive sustenance for when they travel back away from the hub, and that is true.  However this plant shows that it is a two-way thing for the roots also bring sustenance to the grass.  But I also think there is something far more fundamental that struck me as I pondered on those roots.  Yes there is a  community where the church building is actually placed, but the church is more than one building of stone, brick or wood it is the flesh building of each of its members.  As individual roots we are called to serve the locality of were we live – and for most of us that is not in the immediate community around the church – we are sent out to love and serve the Lord, not just until we leave the church grounds or its immediate community but right back to the end of our root, however near or far that might be.  What is more we are called to be the link, the root between the two being refreshed and fed by the centre, yes, but also bringing back to the center the concerns and joys and bounty from were we have been.  Which leaves me with something to ponder before we get too far into Growth Strategy, where is the community any given church serves?  Surely it can’t just be the one community were the bricks and mortar are situated, is it not more like a network of communities that the flesh and blood of the church lives and works in?