I wanted to let you in on a funny thing happened on Saturday that I thought I would pass along to everybody. Our Community Group serves at the Lighthouse in Orillia on the first Saturday of every month. It's a highlight of the month for me. I look forward to going with my kids to help Tim and his team out. The Lighthouse does such a great job serving the people of Orillia. It's a great community builder as our group grows closer together through shared experience. Plus in a small way we are living out Jesus' direction to not just "proclaim the message" but also to "demonstrate the message". It's just great all around.
Picture this . . . Saturday morning we were all serving. Some folks were cutting potatoes, others were upstairs cleaning bathrooms, a couple people were in the kitchen doing dishes. In just a few moments Tim would open the doors and let our guest for the morning come in. Then shortly before 10 am Tim calls me into his office. He let me know that there had been a mix up and that he had double booked another group to come and help. There was a group coming from Connexus to help make lunch today at 10 am. He had thought that we were that group and that we arrived 1.5 hours early. (Our reputation for liking to get things started early precedes us!) He felt awful that he had double booked our group – when they called to book he thought that we were the same people! I was proud that there were so many groups of people serving at the Lighthouse that it confused him! I'm so glad that people are making real efforts to serve the poor in our communities. Oddly enough . . . it was one of the proudest moments in my Connexus life yet. I like making Sunday stuff work well but seeing people live out the message of Jesus really fires me up!
So we had to leave and make room for the other group. We went back to our place and hung out. You know . . . built community and stuff. It was a fantastic morning all around. The kind of thing that makes me proud to be a part of this community.
Rich Birch
[email protected]
Executive Director of Operations
Connexus Community Church
p.s. If your Community Group isn't serving at a place like Lighthouse you are missing out. If you want ideas of the sort of things that you could do drop me a line!
p.p.s. There is a group that is looking to add some new faces to their group. Particularly if you have kids under the age the age of 10. Drop me an email and we'll get you connected.