Once there was a Baptist Minister whose children owned a hamster which escaped. It waited (it was suspected that there was a conspiracy involved) until he was really tired and his wife was away, so he was looking after his children alone, to make its great escape. One morning the minister was woken at 6am by his son who said the hamster wasn’t in the cage and the hunt began. Eventually the hamster was tracked to the kitchen where scrabbling (scratchy noises, not the game silly) could be heard from underneath a cupboard. In a moment of brilliance, the minister decided to google ‘what will lure a hamster out of hiding’. Results ranged from hamster food to carrot and even chocolate. All these were tried but the hamster was nowhere to be seen and the scrabbling had stopped.
The minister was pretty sure that Houdini (what he had decided to rename the hamster in that moment) had squeezed through a gap near one of the pipes to get outside and so he prepared to go back to bed.
In a moment of actual brilliance, the minister’s son said ‘when you are in church you tell us to pray so will you pray now’. A very religious prayer was prayer that went something like:”God, I’m really tired and need to sleep. Please can you make the hamster come out’?”
Within seconds Houdini appeared was scooped up and put back in his cage. The minister resisted the urge to glue the cage shut!
In previous months we have considered the Places that we are, the Opportunities that we have and the Inspiration that we need. This time we want to provoke some thought about our Need for God.
When it comes to Mission, there is so much we can learn from one another. Please do let us know any thoughts that you have had or any ways that you are engaging creatively with your community. Part of our Mission strategy involves us being a conduit to share your stories rather than us centrally suggesting ideas for what could be done. Next time we will consider the Training that we need.
