Last year at the beginning of the pandemic, I brought home my potted succulents from my study at the church. I set them where they would get more light, but still they were all stretched out. I turned, as one does, to Google to learn all about my succulents — which were alive, but looking more like an untamed jungle than houseplants. It turns out that succulents will stretch to find the light. And stretch they had. I read up on how to trim them and replant them. It turns out they really are durable little plants. After trimming them I had a pile of fresh cuttings, which I read would reroot themselves if I gave them the right environment. Instead of throwing them out, I made a shallow tray of soil, and waited. Today many of them are still growing! It has been slow going. Not all of them worked out, but I have a bunch.
In many ways, this reminds me of the new things God has been doing all around me. I see so many places where the pandemic left the remnants of ministries scattered about. Then loving, creative, faithful people come in and give them the nourishment, new ideas and adaptations. Suddenly, ministries are reborn into new life-giving opportunities! I believe God is in this creative thinking every step of the way. God created us to be creative so that we could problem-solve and adapt over time to new ways of being. As the world was falling apart and leaving us with remnants of what we used to know, our creativity shined in new ways. I have seen this in pastors, ruling elders, deacons, worshippers and volunteers. I have also seen tons of collaboration between different groups.
Creativity and collaboration are not necessarily a new thing for God to have God’s hand in, but God has breathed new life into them during this season of struggle. I suspect if we open our hearts and minds, we will find we are being called into new ways of being the church in this moment as well. At the end of the day, this is the amazing thing about God: all those broken pieces of what was are somehow mended into a creative new that serves God’s beloved people. In that process, we have answered God’s call, relied on one another and tapped into our creativity to further God’s dream for God’s people “on earth as it is in heaven.”
The challenge for us moving forward is to continue to embrace this creativity, collaboration and change as we are able to move back toward how church was before. If we cling to going back to exactly how we did things prior to the pandemic, we risk losing all of this great ministry-building work. God will continue to call us to be creative in the ways we serve. God will continue to call us to change the way we do things. God will continue to call us into being the connectional church, allowing us to pool our resources to serve the people well. Will we be ready to embrace that new thing God is doing and let go so that we can live fully into our call to be the church?
I pray that we are, and look forward to watching this lived out all around me.
