The barista’s face dropped when I said the word.
‘I’m from the church down the road.’ I said, with a beaming smile while offering her a flyer for our community carol service next month. You’d be forgiven for thinking I had just sworn at her. But then I guess I had. I said the C-word. Church.
There is so much baggage in that word, oftentimes people will associate it with judgment, exclusivity, humourlessness or even trauma. And in some church spaces, that has certainly been my experience too. In my early twenties as a newly baptised Christian, hungry to learn more about God and church and eager to follow Jesus, I asked a lot of questions. As a result, I nearly left the church completely. Not because I didn’t believe in the way, truth, and life of Christ, but because the church felt so distant from the God I had come to know and love. How can this possibly be good news at all, if it’s not good news for all?, I wondered.
It was only through the lives of everyday people getting on with preaching a gospel of liberation – not with words necessarily, but with action, with generosity, compassion, warmth and love – that I encountered what the church as the body of Christ had the potential to be. I’ve seen it both in and outside of churches across the country, and I’ve definitely experienced it during my time at St Martin-in-the-Fields.
The barista’s ice-cold, unimpressed stare thawed as I explained what we were organising, how this was a gift to the community, to those who live and work in the area, how all are welcome exactly as they are, and that there was no pressure. She took the flyer and smiled, then offered me a free coffee. This is the gospel in action, I thought. Each of us, encountering the other across difference or division, and giving what we can. Just as God encounters us in the gift of Jesus, healing us from the myth of distance and separation.
Jolley Gosnold
