The Eco Church Story
Read the full text HERE
I'm talking about Eco Church as being part of the flow of God
...
And you know it is God because when you’re moving into it the feeling is positive, there’s a lightness, even if the topic is difficult.
That’s what we are in, just at the moment, with the most unpleasant subject of rubbish. Who wants to bother about the bins? Who cares about church waste? yuck. But, hey, it has got to be done. In fact, God is demanding that it be done. And God is resourcing his people to get on with doing it. Because it is not OK to pile more and more and more stuff into holes in the ground, or burn it and pollute the air. That is not how God made the world to work. We in NZ think of ourselves as clean and green but that is not the truth. The fact is, we create more rubbish per person than most other countries. And if churches are not part of God’s solution then we’re just adding to the mess.
So, this is, kind of bizarrely I think, where God has taken us, and how we are launching Eco Church in NZ. Not with pretty pictures of native forests and beautiful church gardens, but with the bins out the back.
So, at the moment, I am having lots of conversations with churches about what they do with their rubbish. And churches are saying, ‘yeah, we know we have to look at this. Let’s get on with it.’ And churches are realising that it is about faith and it is about mission.
God reminds us that he’s at work in little moments like when I met with a church yesterday and one of the staff had just that afternoon received an email from NZ Rail about the unused railway land beside the church, and after months of getting nowhere suddenly there was an openness for the church to help look after that strip of abandoned land filled with weeds and rubbish. It was wonderful to be with that group of people coming to the decision of, ‘yes, actually, let’s be an eco church. Let’s do it.’
So, there you are. That is a potted summary of the birth of Eco Church in Christchurch. It’s a story of people getting together to talk about really important issues for Christian spirituality and our world. It’s having a fun time and making friends, and feeling called and motivated and inspired. It is people using their gifts, sharing their talents, and making connections between church and community and planet. And it is a story of how God works, how God forms his people according to his character for his purposes in the power of his presence.
I'm talking about Eco Church as being part of the flow of God
...
And you know it is God because when you’re moving into it the feeling is positive, there’s a lightness, even if the topic is difficult.
That’s what we are in, just at the moment, with the most unpleasant subject of rubbish. Who wants to bother about the bins? Who cares about church waste? yuck. But, hey, it has got to be done. In fact, God is demanding that it be done. And God is resourcing his people to get on with doing it. Because it is not OK to pile more and more and more stuff into holes in the ground, or burn it and pollute the air. That is not how God made the world to work. We in NZ think of ourselves as clean and green but that is not the truth. The fact is, we create more rubbish per person than most other countries. And if churches are not part of God’s solution then we’re just adding to the mess.
So, this is, kind of bizarrely I think, where God has taken us, and how we are launching Eco Church in NZ. Not with pretty pictures of native forests and beautiful church gardens, but with the bins out the back.
So, at the moment, I am having lots of conversations with churches about what they do with their rubbish. And churches are saying, ‘yeah, we know we have to look at this. Let’s get on with it.’ And churches are realising that it is about faith and it is about mission.
God reminds us that he’s at work in little moments like when I met with a church yesterday and one of the staff had just that afternoon received an email from NZ Rail about the unused railway land beside the church, and after months of getting nowhere suddenly there was an openness for the church to help look after that strip of abandoned land filled with weeds and rubbish. It was wonderful to be with that group of people coming to the decision of, ‘yes, actually, let’s be an eco church. Let’s do it.’
So, there you are. That is a potted summary of the birth of Eco Church in Christchurch. It’s a story of people getting together to talk about really important issues for Christian spirituality and our world. It’s having a fun time and making friends, and feeling called and motivated and inspired. It is people using their gifts, sharing their talents, and making connections between church and community and planet. And it is a story of how God works, how God forms his people according to his character for his purposes in the power of his presence.