23 April 2009 No Comment

I’m sure I once commented on something I’d read recently in a Bible. It went something like ‘freely you have received; freely give’ (note how post-modern I am- I don’t even say what part....). If I didn’t, I should have as it really hit me.

Yesterday at a huge and very tragic funeral I came close to blows with someone. I can’t go into detail as I don’t want to be too specific. But the conversation went something like- ‘these people’ who are ‘using’ this church should be giving more to it (by which that person meant a large proportion of the donations at the end should go to that church). I thought about the fee already going to that church (plus my fee, donated back) and got unreasonably angry……in our pressure to maintain aging buildings where did the idea that we have been given much and therefore can bless much go to?

So my ‘what if’-, my dreaming dreams for the future -would be that we live the idea all the time that we have been blessed so much…so go and bless….freely. And when we (and I mean I as well) get the ‘warm fuzzies’ from that idea….. but then look at ‘practical’ issues and start to make the shift of ‘well, we do live in the real world as well’, that we look again at that text and say ‘isn’t that referring to the ‘real world’?

Grrrr Grrrrr. But hang on, the way I read most of the New Testament letters is that the early Christians couldn’t get the hang of this either. Which probably means that even I can’t on a day to day basis (my ordination therefore must have failed as I still remain human...)

Still……what if?