The boundaries for me have fallen in pleasant places. I
praise God for the blessings he has showered on me all my life. Blessings I don’t
deserve.
Yesterday I thought about us all as refugees, staggering
along with our baggage towards our eternal home. Last night we joined with
other residents on the Leys Estate for an outdoor celebration of the Queen’s
Platinum Jubilee. There was a huge bonfire (beacon); there were fireworks and
prosecco and good dry weather – and midges… - but most notably, there were so
many faces of friends once so familiar, now grown older. Friends we stood with at
the football pitch side-lines (freezing usually), shouting the Crathes team to
victory (sometimes). Friends we stood with at the viewing gallery windows by
the pool every Friday night, watching other friends teach our kids to swim.
Friends we gathered with at PTA meetings, fundraising drives, school plays. A
community held together round the Crathes Primary School, a community which
dispersed as our children grew and moved up to the Academy and then on into
life.
What a joy to reconnect with these neighbours! Today I want
to give thanks to God for giving us the gift of community. We have such an in-built
desire to connect, to share our journeys. I am really grateful that we have been
embedded in this area for four decades, and that during those decades we have
met and walked with such a variety of individuals, all whom God loves.
Lockdowns interrupted our communities, but I pray that
society will recover its inbuilt urge to gather together, to share life, with
those around us. May we not become isolated on devices and entertainments, but
instead live into the life Jesus calls us to, one of community and kindness,
mercy and love.
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