A cooperative venture should (i) cooperate and (ii) venture.

Sometimes when I go to regional gatherings of churches, I hear the story of a parish that has discovered something that works. I treasure one such story. A minister from a large church in the lower North Island reported their parish had 19 midweek Bible study groups and that some of them had been meeting together for years. Telling the story, he said that using funds donated for his discretionary use, he had quite deliberately without invitation given $200 to each of those 19 groups and asked them to spend it to creatively benefit people from outside the church. The minister reported that although he had started with a small seeding investment, over time a great majority of the group were transformed from folk who came to the group for nourishment to groups who were there for others.

The minister further observed that the more creative and the more involving the social service taken on, the sooner and the deeper the group changed. He said that where they had had 19 Bible study groups, they now had 19 social service groups - all still doing Bible study.

Almost every church that I know provides opportunities for members to talk, to face one another. A great thing. It’s my observation however that the churches that provide opportunities for people to look together in the same direction will make more of a difference to the lives of their people and to their community, long term. The work of the church is done when its members look together in the same direction(s). Co-Operating.

Time spent together with another on a shared task, a shared journey, that will matter most. Such time will benefit the individuals and the corporate life of the body. I have briefly wondered whether the sharing of tasks would matter even more greatly if the individuals involved are somewhat disparate/dissimilar – different from each other in say education, wealth, physical ability, household make up. Venturing.

Some years on, what will matter more? The gift that your friend brought you or the effort they took to get it. The things that your friend said to you or the things that you did together with your friends. When you remember good times with your parents – will it be the chats about the other folks you grew up with or undertaking tasks and journeys together? Walking to a particular destination or traversing a particular track; building or demolishing a structure; cleaning, painting or emptying out a room; hosting a sale, or the time you put on entertainment. I have come to think that sharing a task with another will matter more in the longer term than any conversation. I remember successful tasks shared with my dad - milling strainer posts, making concrete – far more than the many discussions about the course of my life or of his.

As John Brook wrote “Fantasy is the difference between what we have and what we want. We all dream constantly, and we try only a little less constantly to make our dreams a part of what we call reality. We usually succeed; reality is merely the sum of dreams that have been made to come true. (That many of the dreams were bad ones means that the world needs not fewer dreamers but better ones). Few of us settle for less than what we want, although we sometimes confuse what we want with what others have. Why does anyone want less than a world of love?”