BY SAM DURGIN
In one of our recent gatherings here at Woodcrest, a young women asks,
“What is your vision?”
In our discussions on the values of commitment, the reasons for membership vows, and what keeps us together – even through the dry times and hard times, it’s a good question. Without a vision for why we want to live in community, we can lose the plot, we can start to drown in the small issues of daily living, and “abandon the first love” (Rev 2:4).
It’s a good idea if each member of a community is able to articulate their vision – why they want to live in community. There are so many ways to express this vision, but we do well to find our own way and voice.
I remember being at a bus stop in Phoenix, seeing a homeless man with half his jaw missing, pull up on a battered bicycle, collecting re-fundable cans from the trash. It was hot. He was sweating hard, and he moved on before I could collect my thoughts. Our poor world is full of people who are suffering, and need support. It can be overwhelming to be in any larger city with needs of all kinds surrounding you. It’s beyond what the heart can hold, beyond our capability to fully address even one situation that we come across. We need God’s intervention.
If we imagine the net of suffering, sin, confusion, and broken relationships as cloud that surrounds our world, what if we could poke even a small hole, right through the cloud cover to allow the sunshine of God to come in? If there could be a place, where the Kingdom of God is lived out fully and completely – where every one was loved and cared for, where children, old people, people with disabilities are happy and fulfilled, that could provide such an opening. Being human, we will always fall short of this, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be our vision and inspiration. Our prayer, “Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done,” needs to be for the here and now. It’s a prayer that requires word and deed.