pat loughery

Yesterday I picked up the mail from our PO Box and had a very pleasant surprise awaiting me.

It was a card from Mary, whose son is a friend of mine and a prophetic/intercessor type guy involved in a nearby church. He and Mary attended our first home group as we were gathering and training and getting to know our core team. She’d been involved in a horrendous church split (is there any other kind?) a decade back, and our little group was her return to the church. We enjoyed getting to know her, even though we knew that she lived too far away for her to feel comfortable plugging in to us as a regular church home. I’m not sure that she’s made it to a Sunday gathering at all. It’s been a year – or maybe a year and a half – since I’ve seen her.

But the card I got yesterday was wonderful – she tells me that she’s been praying for us, and a change in her job may allow her to come visit us more often. It’s clear that she feels that she still belongs to us (or us to her?). It confirms one of the things I learned from Joseph Myers’ excellent “The Search to Belong” – that I, or the church, don’t define a person’s level of commitment or belonginging – they do. They define that level to the extent that they’re comfortable, able and willing.

I used to be a small groups hardliner, and I have said and written things like, “you don’t really belong to this church unless you’re in a small group and finding a way to serve somebody”. Now, I realize that my language (and my attitude) must be more invitational – “here’s something that I think can be very valuable; come join in the fun”. That fits much better with my overall thought process anyway – that people vote with their feet, that everybody’s a free agent, and that attracting them into something that they don’t really desire, or need, isn’t particularly healthy. But the Gospel – the true Gospel is attractional in and of itself. Community is attractional. Meeting the needs of others is addictive, if hard to begin doing.

I’m looking forward to seeing Mary again soon.