The game of choice this year has been Pandemic, a cooperative board game where all players join together to defeat viruses outbreaks across the world. I don’t know what made us think of this, but there we are. Pandemic is a notoriously difficult cooperative game…
I am not fully decided whether it is the pandemic or the predicted economic and employment turmoil that I am most concerned about.
In Acts 9 we read of Saul’s encounter with Jesus on the Damascus Road, and his sudden and unexpected experience of being rendered blind. Done to him, it plunged him into darkness and removed from him every confidence, certainty, and comfort that he was previously used to, and made him dependent upon others.
I remember press coverage of a “private” conversation between world leaders at a G8 summit a few years back where our (then) prime minister complained about the lack of thinking time and the relentless unceasing mill of meetings and decisions. There was no opportunity to pause or reflect or to gather evidence before setting events in motion, and as the leaders talked they each revealed a longing for space to reflect and consider.
If you’re starting to struggle, you’re not alone. I’ve been grappling this week with feeling sad at the ministries and gatherings that have dropped away because they can’t meet, and trying to summon up the energy to make some calls to colleagues. I suspect I’m not alone in wanting things to hurry up in a return to “normal”.
Last week, I was working with our gardening club whose volunteers look after our grounds. I became most concerned at the state of a fuchsia which was looking far from its usual buoyant self. Its leaves had turned yellow, its floral bells looked tired and were withering, and it projected an air of being altogether sick and struggling.
At the front of the building, another fuchsia was proud and strong, its branches laden with radiant scarlet bells and enjoying the hot weather that had recently arrived.
As churches need to get to grips with different ways to administer their Sunday offering, one of the leading providers GIVT offer this editorial with some thoughts on the subject.
Please note this article represents external content provided by GIVT (givtapp.net)
I wonder how much money, or the lack of it, has been talked about in your churches in the last few months? A great deal? Not much? Never? Of course, there have been many other pressing priorities and issues to occupy us, quite apart from the fact that money is not a subject we always find easy to discuss, even in ‘ordinary’ times. Perhaps, then, it might be best to begin by publicly acknowledging that, for quite a few of our churches, there is a financial problem that we need to discuss?
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