Church Actually - God's Brilliant Idea

I spent 6 days last week at Butlins in Skegness. You may be thinking that April is not the best time of the year (if there is a best time) to spend at Butlins in Skegness. To be honest, in the normal course of things a holiday at Butlins would probably not be my first choice (nor my second or third!) However, I was there because it was the venue for the annual Spring Harvest event.

Spring Harvest takes place each Easter at the Butlins sites in both Skegness and Minehead. The event has taken place annually ever since 1979. It is a gathering of thousands of Christian of all ages, denominations and backgrounds, with a programme of activities, including Bible teaching, worship celebrations, seminars, workshops, sports, recreation, and late-night entertainment. It was several years since Sue and I last attended Spring Harvest, and we were very much looking forward to it.

This year’s theme was “Church Actually - God's brilliant idea”, and we were reminded that God invites the Church to be involved in his mission: to take the message of his love, in word and deed, to the world (as someone at Spring Harvest said, ‘God didn’t create the Church then give it a mission, he has a mission so created the Church’). William Temple once said, “A church is the only organization that exists primarily for the benefit of non-members”. If a church is to be effective, it must be outward-looking. The problem is, we can sometimes forget that, and become inward-looking, mirroring the consumer-oriented culture around us.

I thoroughly enjoyed the week, not least because we were part of a group of around 20 from our churches on Doncaster. It was good to be able to spend several days with other members of our church family. I think that each member of the party benefitted from the experience in different ways. One downside was that it reminded us of how much we are going to miss our friends here in Doncaster when we move to Leicester in the summer.

It was good to see so many young people as part of Spring Harvest. Separate worship celebrations and activities had been arranged for various age groups. One evening I went along to the 18s-30s worship celebration, along with 3 other members of our group (and I was allowed in!) For me, that evening was probably the most memorable event of the week. There was a real sense of God’s presence, and it was clear that those leading the celebration were in tune with God’s Spirit. Amongst other things, I felt that God reaffirmed that although Sue and I are soon to take the big step of moving from Doncaster to Leicester, with many elements of our future unclear, he is in control, and he has a plan and a purpose worked out for us.

When Jesus called the first disciples, he simply said, ‘follow me’. He gives the same invitation to people today. In some respects it’s a journey into the unknown. If we decide to follow Jesus, we don’t know where he will take us. Sometimes the journey will be scary, sometimes it will take us to places we might not naturally choose to go. But there’s no better place to be than with Jesus. That’s what real life is all about!