Happy 2015, and welcome back to the routines of this school year. It's amazing how quickly we adjust and settle back in to classroom routines. We are back to 'normal' here at Covenant.
New Year's celebrations come with their share of stories. Stories of how the past year was with all of its high- and low-lights. As time passes, so do people, events, relationships, institutions, hopes, and dreams; realized or foregone. The perspective that an entire year gives can be encouraging or bleak. It's the same perspective, though, that can help us see God's faithfulness through it all. A friend of mine, wrote the following as an introduction to this school year in his OACS blog, and it was as fresh to me today as it was when he wrote it then:
"...my prayer for all of us is that following the story comes with potent moments of joy in addition to the moments of suffering that we also know so well. I pray that our experience of the story is powerful enough to make meaning even out of suffering, and by doing so also allow us to experience unspeakable joy. We use vocabulary like shalom, culture-making, image-bearing, covenant, kingdom; and Christ's coming is concretely realised in Kingdom metaphors of feasting, vineyards, gardens, glorious cities, still waters… We want tastes and sights (spiritual fruit!) of his presence here and now; we want it to be tangibly experienced as we gather together: camping with friends, eating with our families, singing in church and school, coming together in June graduation ceremonies and August staff retreats. How do we personally and communally "hear the story?"..."
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