Wandering Around the Desert Some More

There is a group of churches that have been meeting together once a month for last couple of years. Christian Ministerial Fellowship - CMF for short. The purpose is pretty much to learn together about community programs and resources and to share a meal together. In the past few months the discussion has arisen of exactly what our purpose is and how we can be more effective as a group - to meet the needs of the community. Every church has been dealing with increased requests for assistance and what better purpose of the Kingdom of God than to help those in need? So we have been discussing how to work together towards that end.

In the meantime - I received an email from a Community Organizing group that they are having a meeting of all the churches in the area "to see how we might work together in the community."

And today we received a letter from the Samaritan Center saying they were finding it difficult to make ends meet. The letter told us to do what we could to serve the community and in the meantime if we could send them some money or sponsor a food drive that would be great too.

SO there is a theme here-many different groups are trying to tie many other groups together to work together to make a difference in the world they serve. I have this image of the Israelites wandering in the desert trying to find the mountain that was right in front of them. We all continue to deal with more and more people in need of help of one kind or another - utilities, gas, rent, groceries, bus tickets, motel rooms...not to mention feeding hungry kids and mentoring kids that need a role model.

We have our own part in this wandering. As we continue to discern the call of the Community Center and what exactly we can do and should do...the Isrealites were their own worst enemy - they perpetuated their time without a home. But the promise is that the Isrealites DID make it to the promised land...God did lead them out of confusion and into the light...so community of faith - let us listen and guide each other so that we don't wander long. The world needs us to get it together...

Time and Routines

Well folks, here we are...in the second week of school, about the time that a routine begins to emerge and at my house when we ask "so what is your schedule today" a few less times. I have shared in the past, that I never feel the passage of time more than when the school year begins. It takes me back to my own first days of school, but now I also have to turn the page in my own head that I am now the parent of two high school students! It just wasn't that long ago that I sent my last child off on her first school bus ride and I cried because she didn't look back at me. She was ready!

The start of the school year also changes the routine at church. We go back to classrooms for Sunday School, attendance at worship goes up, and studies and small groups begin. There is a change that settles over us...picture this, God's finger begins stirring the pot, and there is chaos at first, things bumping into each other, but soon there is an order to the new stirrings. And in that order, there is time and space to hear God say "It is good."

So where in your emerging Fall routines can you hear that voice, where in the order of new routines can you settle and find peace? Give thanks, give thanks, and remember God is calling you...