Stray Planks

From Gold Teeth and Parking Spaces, a 2012 collection of my earlier blog posts

I heard a joke.

Some shipwrecked people are stranded on an island, praying for rescue.

One morning a spacious, empty, wooden boat drifts onto the shore. The people are delighted. They waste no time. Tearing the planks apart they set about constructing the raft of their dreams...

Building a raft could be a bit like building church.

— We might start by sketching in the sand what a raft ought to look like.

— We know from experience what floats and sinks.

— We have ideas about the right size and shape.

Aesthetics won't save us from drowning, so we need to talk practicality and science.

And it's just part and parcel of the process that the marine engineers among us will feel thoroughly engaged and energised by the whole experience, whereas if calligraphy is more your thing, you might struggle to feel useful or relevant.

(Those calligraphers! There's always one when you're trying to get on and build a raft...)

But of course building church isn't like building a raft.

If we try to fathom rationally what church should look like, we'll lose the plot.

I mean, we'd probably vote in favour of preserving the health and wellbeing of the visible body of Christ on earth for a start! And yet when Peter suggested this, Jesus cast him aside for blasphemy (Matthew 16).

In our sensible strategising, we might overlook weird and wild possibilities too - for example, a dad prepared to sacrifice his little boy, or a prostitute lying to the authorities. And yet there's Abraham and Rahab, doing just that and exemplifying faith (James 2).

Fortunately, as we know, Jesus is the church builder - good news for marine engineers and calligraphers alike.

I don't think He's that interested in the details of our blueprints, but He welcomes open access to the blue touch-paper He's already built into our hearts and minds, because the New Covenant isn't a matter of small print and hand-holding (Hebrews 8).

We're called to live by faith.

And faith comes when the word is heard, the penny drops, the revelation dawns.

When I step up to the plate and dare to live from where I'm really at, I open my whole being to transformation.

At the same time, I'm free to do the first job of unity with God and others, which is to find my multi-layered self naturally being pulled together in integrity, rather than feeling torn apart and exhausted in the name of raft building.

Righteousness (things being in the right place), peace and joy are hallmarks of the Kingdom of God.

If that's not our current experience of church and community, it might be worth checking our eyes, for stray planks (Matthew 7).