Strangely this morning has seen a flurry of activity in our Church grounds. A big push to get it looking 'appropriate' for Christmas day. It is also happens to be a beautiful day for gardening. Our church grounds have got a bit away on us this year. Without care and attention weeds have a habit of springing up, and slowly taking over. Clearly this was becoming a problem as our neighbor across the road, who was dealing with weeds in his own garden, sprayed the last of his weed killer on our grass verge. It seems the congregation have taken the hint and set to today, to put things right.

There is some kind of lesson here about our life as a church community too. Without being attentive to our wellbeing and spiritual health, weeds will take root and grow. Sometimes it takes the actions of an 'outsider'; to wake us up to the weeds, the things in our life together that are just plain unhealthy. The problem is that while we might be ok with being prompted to dealing with surface things like gardens and lawns, we are invariably much more reluctant to acknowledge, let alone begin to set right, the deeper issues of the condition of our souls, or in community, the condition of our relationships together. And more than likely the 'outsider', the one who reveals the 'weeds' will be persecuted for it.

My prayer as we come to the end of 2011, and as we celebrate the gift of Immanuel, the gift of 'God with us', this Christmas, is that we may courageously be willing to do the hard work required to clean up the garden of our communal life together, which for each of us means setting to in the garden of our own being.

But we do have a keen helper in this task.

In fact, the hard work we are to do, is simply this: that we give God permission, through his Son, and his Spirit to be the one who works in us.

Blessings

John