It took me a while to learn to cook. I misread recipes, forgot to put in key ingredients, became distracted when cooking multiple things at once and messed up cooking times. But by continuing to cook and (eventually) learning from my mistakes. I have gotten better.
When recently reading 1 Corinthians 13, I noticed Paul advising the followers of Jesus in Corinth about church life. Paul instructs them to flavour everything that they do with love. Love is the key ingredient in being a faithful Christian community. There are lots of different variations and ways of loving others. Paul describes a way of loving each other, based on God’s love for us: being polite, having patience, focusing on the needs of others as well as our own needs. Not pulling others down but finding ways to lift them up. Not giving in to our anger, staying positive, and stepping in to help others. These things can flavour all that we do as a church community.
Yes, there are important activities that we should be doing as a church. But how we go about them matters as much as what we achieve.
The key ingredient in our church vision is love. Love for God, love for each other and love for all of God’s creation. Our church vision prayer is the recipe that we believe God is calling us to follow. The way in which we are to put together all the ingredients of church life. Cooking like church life can get messy; we won’t get everything right, things can take longer than we want, and we all have personal preferences. Our vision prayer is a recipe that reminds us to flavour all that we do with love, and helps us and others taste and see that the Lord is good.
Alec Gill
This article originally appeared in the St John’s Messenger. If you would like to discuss contributing a future article please contact news@valebenefice.org.uk.
