Dear friends
If you’ve got a spare minute or three, take a little walk into the Go Outdoors car park and find a path to the right into a grassy area with a children’s playground. You will see the Day Brook that our church is named after. Some of the brook is underground but here it rises to the surface. Take a moment to pause. What do you see?
The brook here has been ‘re-naturalised.’ You can still see the former, artificial, straight line but I hope you will agree with me that the new alignment looks much better. I wonder, why did we decide it was a good idea to put parts of the brook underground, and why did we decide that the brook shouldn’t meander?
What you see here is one of several projects that aimed, as far as it is now possible, to correct the mistakes of the past. Cross Mansfield Road to find the next section of the brook, a mini nature-sanctuary where nature is being allowed to do its thing. The Day Brook has been re-connected to its natural flood plain, so the risk of flooding is now minimised.
Take a seat and think about our church, here to be a channel for God’s living water. God’s water does not flow in straight lines. Sometimes we try to hide it away. Sometimes we try to make it run in straight lines that we can take control. But church works best when we allow God’s flow to meander and create the beauty along the way. When we are open to the promptings of the Holy Spirit and we see where he leads us. When we let God grow the beauty around us. When we create that mini-sanctuary, for all who are made by God.
It’s happening. If you’ve spotted it, offer a prayer of thanks. If you haven’t yet spotted it, take another look.
In his love
James
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