Blog:FOREST LAKE TALKS

Dear Friends,

When I look at all that happens both at FLPC and through FLPC, I sometimes feel overwhelmed. The building is used by multiple groups most every day, and our list of ways to serve in the community could fill every weekend and several nights a week. In this newsletter there is a challenge to “Do a Good Thing for our Community!” that lists five different ways to serve just in November, and it is not an exhaustive list. Last Sunday, our youth went, with some wonderful adults, to play with children who live in the subsidized Spring Garden Apartments on Percival Road. I wish you could have seen those youth, leading a dance party, or blowing bubbles with children that they did not know and – in some cases – with whom they could not talk because of language barriers. But there were lots of smiles and laughter.

When I am tired, it is easy to say, “I have too much to do. I’ll just stay home and let someone else do more.” If no one asks me, what am I obligated to do?

Certainly, God calls us to rest. The Sabbath is a command, not a suggestion. And also, being present and showing up for others is also a command. Community is not magic. Community does not just “happen.” We must choose community. If we choose to show up for others, it may or may not have a lasting change on them, but we may be the ones who need to be changed. Sometimes building community is fun – full of laughter, food, and affirmation. But sometimes building community is really hard – trying things that do not work or inviting people who do not have the bandwidth or even the desire to know others who may be unlike them.

This election season, if you are tired of the division and meanness, DO SOMETHING different. Lean INTO community. Make it a point to listen to someone who disagrees with you. Show up – even if you feel tired or may not be excited to go. Most of the time, we leave those events buoyed and grateful for the community. Be more present to someone in need than you are to your favorite online show. Don’t post that snarky response, instead pick up the phone and call someone you haven’t talked to in a while.

Community can be difficult. Sometimes it feels impossible. But what really is the alternative? Isolation. Loneliness. Despair. Disconnection. Fracture. The word “religion” actually means to re-connect. Ligare is the Latin root of the word religio which became in English, “religion.” The same root is found in ligament – those things that keep our bodies together. So, to be re-ligious is to re-connect ourselves – to God, to others, to creation, to our own hearts. So – lean in!