Church - Bothered?

You'd better believe it!

Found myself in amongst the poo this morning and as the shovel was pulled out of the 'This Is Church' toolkit I find myself confronted with the reason for the owner of the poo being in such dire straits: 'They didn't want to bother anyone!'

God looked at the earth and the way people turned each other over, unfairly making money from others, lying, cheating, stealing, getting into wrong relationships and generally damaging one another and He said to Himself: 'Now that's a bothersome sight, I think I need to get involved - better get down and dirty!'

The result of this, as few appear to know, is that He decides that something has to be done and that someone needs to stand in the gap and get their hands dirty! Jesus never stood in a pulpit and, looking over his glasses, preached about the ways that were open to us to get us out of the poo - not at all; Jesus jumped into the poo and started swimming to the exit calling on those also inturd to 'follow Him'. 

If there's something wrong in the neighbourhood, who you gonna call?

The Church

The Holy Ghost Busters!

What causes me to feel most saddened by the number of people caught in their own, or worse still, the sin of others is that they don't realise just how near they are to finding love, support and relief from their situations.

What hurts me more is that we don't appear to be telling them - for we are great at stating positions, drawing lines and looking holy; excellent at flower shows with their clever, twee and pretty arrangements; seasonally valid with our Christmas trees and entertaining with our choral events, fetes (worse than death) and the like but we don't tell them the stark truth about Church, and that is:

WE ARE HERE TO BE BOTHERED

And of course that means we are out there doing something about it .

We are out there bringing the reality of God's love to those in need.

No mere words - only strong, firm and convicted actions.

We carry our cross - denying ourselves and being willing, like Simon of Cyrene, to help carry other's too!

Lent - more than giving up chocolate

Christian  - more than mere words alone

Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfil the law of Christ. Galatians 6:2