An Offering to God

Tonight at 7 p.m., our nearest Episcopal neighbors, at Christ Church in St. Marys will dedicate their new building. It is true that the church is the people and not the building in which they meet, but that doesn't make the building itself of no consequence.

W.H. Vanstone has written of the church building, "Here, at this level of concrete actuality is the work of art, the offering of love, which is the Church. The understanding of the Church as offering throws fresh light on...the attachment to the Church building itself...Attachment to a Church building is by no means to be dismissed as sentimentality; it may well contain a profound, though possibly inarticulate, understanding of what that building is."

Understood as Vanstone presents it, the church building is the congregation's offering to God and God's response is God's own presence in that place of worship in a powerful way. So tonight, we gather with Christ Church as they formally offer their building to God.