Blog
After a break of three years we are once again going to witness something incredible on Sunday as thousands of runners make their way from Maritzburg to Durban in the 2022 Comrades Marathon. And inspired by what we see, maybe some of us will be lacing up our running shoes before the sun comes up on Monday morning with visions of what will be in 2023 :) After all, when we see people of all ages and shapes and sizes crossing the finish line, it seems very do-able doesn’t it?
Kym and I have been in a course this week – the penultimate module in a two year Spiritual Direction training programme offered by the Jesuit Institute of South Africa. This week the course has focused on leading retreats. My experience of retreats over the years has been a quiet morning here and there, occasional ministers’ retreats where much of the time was taken up with talk and admin, and a couple of multi-day private retreats. But not much of any of these in the last couple of years.
I spent some time this week reflecting on the open meeting we had a couple of weeks ago to dream and plan together for our church. We began that meeting with a group exercise which asked how we would like others to describe our church community. Three broad themes emerged from that process – they reveal some of our core values as a church
Nearly a century ago Archbishop William Temple famously said that "The Church is the only society that exists for the benefit of those who are not its members". I suspect that some other NGO’s might challenge that statement today, but it’s still a powerful idea – as the Church we don’t exist simply for our own benefit. On the other hand, a church that is entirely outwardly-focused and pays no attention to the needs of its own members may find that its members soon grow weary and discouraged.
A few years back we invited the WMC community to come to a meeting and share ideas for our future. Feedback from that meeting showed every single group identifying reviving our youth and children’s ministry as absolutely vital for our church. This clearly was front of mind for everyone, but how were we to see progress, especially post-Covid?
On Wednesday evening about 50 of us gathered at the church to dream and talk about WMC and our future direction. What a great evening it was! We worshipped together and enjoyed robust discussion, lots of laughter, some inspired ideas, *Cordon Bleu* wors rolls and above all, a real sense of hope and excitement about the way forward for our church community.
It’s good to be back home after a lovely, restful couple of weeks away with our family. And encouraging to see how the WMC team has got on with things just fine without me :) (in truth, the real challenge these last few weeks has been managing without Samson, who is due to return from some well-deserved leave this weekend)!
St Paul probably had something else in mind when he spoke in 2 Corinthians 3:18 about our unveiled faces reflecting the glory of God :) but doesn’t it feel like a significant threshold that we have crossed, now that the last of the Covid regulations have been repealed?
Our young adults home group restarted this last week after a long break. Honestly, it's been difficult to get going again - we got out of the habit of meeting in person during the various levels of lockdown and starting again feels like exercising a muscle that hasn't been used in years! Many of our groups have experienced a similar lethargy and found it hard to get going again.
For many months during the pandemic the Westville Churches Foodbank has operated from our property, and what a remarkable ministry it has been! Thousands of rands worth of food were distributed each week using a very well organised system for tracking individuals and their specific needs. It was especially encouraging during this time to hear from people who were able to report that they had managed to get back on their feet and no longer needed our help.