The motto of our church is “In Christ, Believe, Belong and Behave”.
It’s a great motto/mission statement & I could go on about the theological unpacking of this in a long blog, but instead I think I’ll tell you all a couple of little stories.
Believe:
I’m sure there are any number of people who have heard kids make professions of faith that appear to have no bearing on their lives. I’m so lucky that I get to see kids faithfully express their belief. Having a sleepover for the “40 hour famine” was going to be tough, cause I am in the middle of a busy period at college, but to see the kids express their belief in God through their concern for others was awesome. Some of the kids collected amazing amounts of sponsorship & basically all of them embraced the weekend with an awesome enthusiasm which reflected thoughts and actions in harmony.
It’s great to see people know and understand what they believe & then see how that affects their priorities in life!
Belong:
I was putting some cups in the sink as a group of people were getting ready for our communion dinner, when Gai swings around & talks to me. She’s the mum of 5 girls, 4 of which I have youth group involvement with (the 5th of which keeps me entertained whenever we chat after church).
“So, I understand you have news to tell me” she says.
“Oh yeah, confirmation classes are going well..” I tell her coyly “anything else you wanted to know?”
“you know what I’m talking about” Gai counters, then goes on to tell me how she feels like she has failed because it was her husband that who told her interesting news & she had never asked me.
“OK, so I have a girlfriend” I tell her “and it’s going really well”.
So I copped questions for another minute or two & then Gai decides that I need her mobile number so that I can call her & let her know how things are progressing. I tell her that if I get engaged or something any time in the future, that I’ll see if the phone list can run “Parents, Siblings, then Gai”.
I thought that this would be suffice, but she tells me that she doesn’t want to wait for info down the road. Instead, I have to fire off a text if I go out on a date & it goes well. She wants the inside track!
The youngest daughter & I then spend the next couple of minutes discussing how once an adult gets married the romance is gone out of their life, so they have to live vicariously through those still in the pool!
Some people might have felt a little uncomfortable about the whole exchange. I love it because people at the church invest in each other, in relationships. I feel like I belong there & that people care. I know there are people who ask about my life in general, but I also know that there are people who are praying for me too! It’s good to belong.
Behave:
Alison is such a great encouragement. She gives with no expectation of reciprocation & is always quick with a smile, or a kind word. She shows her commitment to ministry at St Jude’s, firstly, through the amount of times she drives to church a week so she can drop her two kids off for different stuff. She also expresses her love for her Christian family through the work she puts into things like organising supper rosters & stuff like that.
What a model of Christian behaviour.
Tonight we had the communion meal & Alison did an awesome job of bringing it all together. There must have been about 50 people who enjoyed a great meal! Of course, the people who didn’t enjoy the meal were the individuals outside who were busy smashing windows in a couple of cars & rifling through the contents.
Alison had every reason to be distraught over the whole experience. While she is slogging her guts out to serve others, there are others who are breaking windows to rob her. Through all of this, she was so amazingly gracious to say how happy she was that they hadn’t robbed my car (next to hers) that happened to have basically ALL of my camera gear sitting on the front seat!
It’s such an encouragement to see beautiful behaviour.
In other, completely unconnected news: Even though I have never personally met her, I have it on good authority that Claire has “Mad Skills” and that Nic is also pretty kickin (and now they’ve BOTH made their first mention on my blog! Does this mean I get a comment?)