Thoughts about The Gathering Place, an organic faith community.

A walk down the produce isle in the grocery store always gets me excited!  I love looking at the beautiful fresh fruits and veggies .  When I have extra money, I will snatch up lovely bunches of veggies, herbs and exotic fruit.  My children's faces will light up when the gentle mist of water showers the food.  I feel so healthy in that isle, I find my self with hopes of this dish, or that, containing the fresh  items, so I grab up my selection; just to toss them out rotten 3 weeks later.

Increasingly there seems to be a small section in most stores for organic produce, produce that hasn't been exposed to the pesticides and waxing and whatever.  That area is never as impressive as the many rows of sparkling, shining, produces that engulfs it.  The fruit, much of the time, is smaller.  Many times it is bruised and doesn't shine like the others;  and on top of that,  it is most often much more expensive.   Why would anyone pick up a piece of fruit from this small, unimpressive area of the produce isle?  

I would say that most people would not choose from that section. The organic section isn't in the obvious area and there is nothing there that catches your eye.  For that reason,  it is largely overlooked. The people that "buy into" the organic stuff are the curious or the informed.  

I see our little group in this light.  We are not the biggest or fanciest, some of us are bruised and we pay a great price to be able to gather together on His Sabbath.  The fact is, any Tom, Dick or Harry that is looking for a "church" is not going to choose us as the obviouse choice.  The people attracted to us are the curious or informed, the ones that know the harm caused by the toxins of bad Biblical interpretations and theologies that have been pumped into the majority of churches that line the streets of our communities.

Often, even the informed will not choose us.  We are too expensive, we don't fit their lifestyle budget.  It cost too much to turn down the invites of social and family get togethers.  It seems ok to choose the world for a couple Sabbaths.   But a couple Sabbaths turn into many and pretty soon,  they take the easy way of the mainstream church, a church that will fill their bellies and give the illusion of being healthy but really, it will cause a cancer to grow in them that is very hard to cure.

So my challenge is this,  to seek out the small, "unimpressive," organic fellowship in your area.  You may have to search in the less obvious places to find it; maybe a house or an office building.  You may have to take a long drive past many of those fancy, sparkling churches.  You may have to rearrange your work schedule or disappoint family and friends by turning down social invites with others that are not like minded.

This is the way toward not just staying alive but living abundantly.