Community Polishing

If you have been reading along this Lent with the Episcopal Relief and Development Lenten Meditations booklet that we handed out this year, you will know that one of this week's reflections was about a rock polisher, a coffee-can-sized cylinder that turns rocks around and polishes them. Michael Buerkel Hunn, a Canon in the Presiding Bishop's office, wrote about how he used to love rocks and loved to see what they would look like when they came out of the rock polisher. He used that metaphor to describe the church. "So I think of church as God's tumbling coffee can for our souls. We come together and as we interact we bump into one another, sharing our conflicting ideas and diverse perspectives. In the process, our souls are polished." Michael Buerkel Hunn, Lenten Meditations 2017, p. 44

In any community we interact with the other people involved in that community. Since no two people are alike, everyone is unique, we always have the opportunity to be learning from each other. As we are learners, we are teachers. In this process of learning and growing in a community, we become more fully the person that God is calling us to be. Sometimes this happens through agreements and finding other people who share our perspectives. Sometimes this happens through sharp edges, challenges, and growing in patience and perseverance. Yet, we are not on this journey alone. We are polished with care, bringing out the best in each of us.