Column • His Light to My Path
Little Critters in Our Congregation
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Why mention this childhood experience? It reminds me of a dear little congregation who welcomed me as a young pastor’s kid into their community.
34 The Messenger • March 2020
ISTOCK
by Karla Hein
hen I was growing up, my Dad pastored a small congregation in a rural community. One winter Sunday, a little girl in my mother’s Sunday School class insisted that she must use the bathroom immediately. She proceeded to open the classroom door, then quickly slammed it shut. “There’s a rat going down the stairs!” she exclaimed. During the week a mama mouse had discovered that our warm, quiet building was a comfortable home for her offspring. The audacity of humans to now invade her space! My friends and I spent the service with our feet tucked up on our chairs for fear of the pesky critters scurrying across our dress shoes. Of all the legs available as makeshift ladders that morning, an adventurous mouse wisely chose the leg of a veterinarian who managed to stifle her surprise. Another family was amused by a little critter who positioned itself underneath a raised shoe in the next row— both man and mouse oblivious to their near fatal encounter. I did my best to listen to the sermon, but was distracted by the mouse who had discovered the piano. He stood front paws outstretched on a music book, head bobbing while his nose sniffed the air, as if joining the service with his own musical number. I remember the closing song, however, as mice came scampering out of the piano, startled by their sudden, loud eviction. Prior to the next church gathering, my Dad made an end to the distracting intruders! Why mention this childhood experience? It reminds me of a dear little congregation who welcomed me as a young pastor’s kid into their community. These church attendees did regular jobs, lived imperfect lives, and taught me what faith looks like as an everyday commitment. Renegotiating Faith (2018), a report published by several Canadian Christian organizations including Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, researched what factors are present when youth continue in a church community
upon reaching adulthood. It highlighted the value of Christian adults who invest in their congregation’s children and encourage them to be involved in church life beyond a specific children’s program. A family of believers who provide mentoring relationships for children to develop in their faith. The goal of our effort is that little Junior will have irrefutable evidence of Christ followers who are investing in each other’s lives, “[strengthening] the hands that are weak and the knees that are feeble” (Heb. 12:12). Despite the hurt that occurs in our congregations, Christ is sanctifying the Church from “the sins which so easily entangles us” in order “that He might present the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless” (Heb. 12:1; Eph. 5:25-27). Sometimes I wish I could have witnessed miracles like Noah’s Ark, the Red Sea crossing, or Jesus’ resurrection. Instead, I am inside one of the greatest, long-term miracles of all time: “the building up of the body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ” (Eph. 4:12- 13). Through our witness, may the next generation also believe this beautiful mystery.
