Where do you go to meet your friends? The answer to that may depend on to which generation you belong: 50 years ago, it was to the dancing that people would go to meet their friends; now it is Starbucks that for many people is the place where friends meet.
Or is it a virtual meeting place? Do you meet your friends on Facebook? The meeting may not be physical, but an enormous amount of information is shared every day across cyberspace.
Will I see you tomorrow at the Juniper Green Farmers' Market? That has become a bit of a social focus for the community because people meet there and chat. Some Saturdays it has taken us ages to get home because we keep meeting people to talk to; it's great.
In the communities of Juniper Green and Baberton Mains, the snow did us a bit of a favour. Ok, it brought a lot of disruption, caused some to fall and hurt themselves, but there was another side. People were out clearing snow from their paths, or from the roads themselves. Guess what, they began to talk to one another in a way that during 'normal times' just doesn't happen. There is no meeting place in Baberton Mains, other than for parents at the school gate, or if you go to visit a friend.
Church as a meeting place? Here are two thoughts from Dietrich Bonhoeffer's little book Life Together which is all about community, one a positive comment and the other a little bit of a challenge. Positively he says about us as Christians: "Our community with one another consists solely in what Christ has done to both of us." We share so much in common by virtue of the work God has done for and in both of us.
Secondly:"If we do not give thanks daily for the Christian fellowship in which we have been placed, even where there is no great experience, no discoverable riches, but much weakness, small faith, and difficulty; if, on the contrary, we only keep complaining to God that everything is so paltry and petty, so far from what we expected, then we hinder God from letting our fellowship grow according to the measure and riches which are there for us all in Jesus Christ."
See you tomorrow?
