Just the way it was always meant

Today is the first day of lent, the days 'lengthen' and Easter approaches, it is often the time when people decide to stop doing something.

As I write ‘Cornerstone Runners’ (the first group formed in Cranbrook) has just celebrated its second birthday; it was two years ago that a few of us set out in the darkness for a 4 mile run towards Exeter and back. We are now backed and insured by ‘Run England’ and have 8 trained leaders – in any given week on Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays between 20-40 runners go out for a bit of exercising and socialising. We have had couch – 5k, half marathon training, staggered starts, hill runs, crocodiling and the infamous ‘run to a pub’. Unsurprisingly the latter seems the most popular.

So why do we run? For some it is about fitness, others losing or maintaining weight, some might have personal goals to train for, many enjoy the social side and some just love running.

For me bits of all of the above are true, apart from the last part – I have said this before I don’t love running. Running is hard: my legs ache, it is tiring, I get hot and cold and wet and I can find many excuses NOT to go. So why do it? For me I guess it started as a challenge, I said I could never do it, I said it was impossible for me so I didn’t do it – a bit of self-fulfilling prophesy. This impasse was enough to make me try, to see if I had the mental stamina and discipline to go beyond my self-imposed limitations and although I will never win any races and am one of the slower members of the group, I can do it.

As church minister for Cranbrook people sometimes ask me what my job is, what my purpose is. Might I say simply this, I believe that inside each one of us are possibilities we negate because of self-imposed limitations, primarily - ‘I can’t. I believe that we often undervalue who we are and what is possible. I believe that we are made for much more and sometimes we just need to have a little bit of faith, often faith in ourselves.

So stop whatever you want this lent but alongside all that 'stopping' might I add, a cessation of the often wrong belief that you just can't. Might I also suggest that in all that stopping there should also be a starting - maybe start believing that you just might be able. In my experience a bit of practice, perseverance and self-belief goes a long way. For me lent, and the journey to the cross, is about a journey through the dark waters of the improbable and even the seemingly impossible to a place new place of belief, self worth and life in all its fullness, just the way it was always meant.

Cranbrook - an update - 'Let it go'

Greetings from Cornerstone church in Cranbrook, I want to start by telling you about Lillie…

  
Lillie is two years old, she came to Harvest Messy Church with her brother Harry (6) and mum Lisa, they were one family of over 100 people who came to celebrate harvest and share a meal that day, only a couple of weeks ago. Like many people in Cranbrook they have little church background but love belonging to what is happening, be it: coffee morning, toddler group, running group, family worship, family film morning or on this day Messy Church.

At the end of the Harvest service we sang the very traditional ‘We plough the fields and scatter’, Lillie (actually most people) didn’t know the words but she came to the front with many other children, caught up in the atmosphere of worship and celebration and span around singing her heart out, she sang her favourite song, the one she knew the words to – Lillie sang ‘Let it Go’ from Frozen – it was heart melting.

Lisa starting bringing Lillie to church because a few months ago I had taught some worship songs to the children at Cranbrook’s Primary School St Martin’s – Harry (Lisa’s son) had 2 favourites ’10,000 reasons’ and ‘Hide me now’ – he loved them so much that he persuaded his mum to find them and play them on YouTube at home – listening together the family were drawn into an understanding of God that was new and they wanted to know more.

This is a tiny snapshot, a single story, from the myriad of encounters that people are experiencing as doors are opened and the grace, love and inclusivity of the gospel is shared in Cranbrook.

Cornerstone church is at the heart of many of the activities that happen in a development that now has more than 800 homes occupied and is planned to have more than 8000. At the recent Great West run, nearly 20 runners (several of them new to running) ran the half marathon, the vast majority of them wearing ‘Cornerstone runners’ t-shirts. One of the runners said ‘I am not religious but the way the running group includes everyone epitomises the way that Mark and Cornerstone church includes everyone’. It is this ethos of inclusion and sharing God’s blessing that underpins all we do and the reason we have: car washes, litter picks, film night, choir, board game evenings, coffee mornings, quiz nights, toddler group, Messy Church, family fun days, family film mornings, home church, family worship, an ‘Exploring Christianity’ course, mothering day lunch, as well as harvest, Christmas, Easter and other celebrations.

There is another function that I undertake and that is liaising with authorities: East Devon Council, the consortium of builders, Eon (our heat provider) South West Water, the Police, Schools and many more. Part of the reason for this is that the Facebook page that I set up 18 months ago now has 1303 members! As a result of this I am regularly sent messages concerning a whole gamut of subjects, as a result I have been able to bring together groups so that, as a community, we can speak with a single voice – this has been a huge boon – I include a few quotes, not to big myself up, but to indicate the importance and significance of these relationships:

This is what the CEO of Eon Heat wrote:

“As one of the key figureheads of the community you have always strived to resolve issues in an amicable and constructive manner with the interests of the whole community in mind. This has been a huge support in getting necessary lines of communication open between ourselves and the local residents and I genuinely feel that without you facilitating this we would not be where we are today… I feel that your involvement has been instrumental in bringing this new town together and creating a positive and vibrant community.”

The projects director form East Devon’s Growth point wrote:

“You have played a pivotal role in helping to ensure that Cranbrook is not just a collection of houses in a field but has developed as a genuine community.”

The head from the Primary said:

“The school has worked closely with Mark and the impact of this work (and the school’s own strong Christian identity) is evidenced in the culture of the school, the opportunities the children have to engage in whole school and class-based collective worship and in the opportunities children are given to respond to experiences they have.  The school is inclusive of ‘all faiths and none’ and sees its role as ‘opening the door to worship’ for the children and their parents.  The school’s Christian identity is clearly identifiable and provides the bedrock for the school’s philosophy and practice to grow; a philosophy and practice of love, inclusivity, warmth and respect.”

Finally the Project manager for Cranbrook recently wrote:

“With a little reflection, I'd like to take a moment to note what a remarkable journey it has been … and how it is evident that the a burgeoning physical development of Cranbrook is truly being matched in equal if not greater measure by the ever growing vibrant and vital community within the new town. It must be said that we truly respect and value your remarkable skills and endeavours and not least for the link function that you provide between the Developers and the Community; it’s always good to talk and the two-way dialogue that we have certainly enables the Consortium to gain an understanding of views and opinions within the community and, where we can, to enable us to respond to that through partnership working.   So, it goes without saying that we hope and trust that for many, many years to come you will continue to play a key role in the development of Cranbrook as a new Community”

I am a little embarrassed by these comments and incredibly humbled but I wanted you, the people who have encouraged, supported, prayed and resourced me to see the fruit that has come from the vision of the church to get involved more than 12 years ago.

Harvest was the place I started and Harvest is where I will conclude with this letter. In Luke’s Gospel Chapter 10, verse 2 Jesus speaks to his disciples and says: "The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field”.

I have now been working in Cranbrook for two years, it is not always easy, but I love what I do and believe with all my heart that God is in it. There are so many opportunities here to be ‘church’ in a completely new way and to encounter ‘gospel – good news’ in ways that I had never dreamed of – yet at the core there are a very few of us, and many at the very start of their Christian journey. A number of Christian families have, understandably, continued to go to their existing churches in Exeter (while being wholeheartedly supportive of what we are doing), where their families and friends and familiar patterns of worship are. That has left us a little short of workers – might I ask you to continue to support the work that has been started here by praying for some more workers, called to serve in this amazing place.

So I will end with Lillie and pray that people will continue to be drawn into a deeper understanding of their worth in the eyes of God, that they will learn to dance and sing and delight in who they are, the way that they were created to be, and that their songs will be included and joined with the songs of others as we continue to learn what it means to be children of God, wherever we are.