CHRISTIAN VIEWPOINT: Everyone carries ‘baggage’ from their past – some may be from church
A new church was birthed back in January – Tornagrain Community Church. It serves both the new town and the surrounding area, and currently meets in Petty Parish Church.
The minister Innes Macsween who, along with some of the church’s other members, lives in Tornagrain described how well-planned the development is. Already, there’s a café, a shop, allotments, tennis courts, play park, community room – but until recently, no church. When Smithton Church was considering where to plant a new congregation, ‘Godly wisdom made it clear it should be Tornagrain,’ Innes says.
I’m so impressed with him. There’s his concern for others. Even in his teens, in the early 2000s, shortly after saying ‘Yes!’ to Jesus, he was online daily nurturing and encouraging the many Christians among fellow pupils at the Nicolson Institute in Stornoway. ‘My heart went out to them,’ he tells me ‘and I wanted to walk with them as a brother in Christ.’
There’s the experience of darkness which matured Innes early. While still a teenager, newly accepted to train as a Free Church minister, a neurological condition confined him to bed for nine months, unable to freely move arms or legs. Through this time of anxiety and despair, he learned to hold on to a seemingly-distant God. Jesus had died for him, therefore whether he recovered or not, all would ultimately be well. As a result, he has deep empathy with those who walk in dark places.
There’s his understanding that everyone carries ‘baggage’ from the past, and that some of this burden may have resulted from experiences in church: wounds caused by attitudes, traditional practices, misunderstandings, words unwisely spoken. His ministry is gentle, sensitive to the baggage people have.
There’s his awareness of the social, philosophical and cultural issues folk wrestle with. This is in contrast to the Christians on Lewis he mentions, who too often discussed abstract theology while the young people, the first generation of ‘digital natives’ worried over issues like ‘how do I deal with the temptation to watch porn?’
There’s his recognition of the need for clear, effective communication as modelled by his inspirational school janitor who ‘would talk about Jesus in a way which was so fresh’.
Above all else, I’m impressed by Innes’s love for Jesus, who died to draw us back into community with God. He tells me: ‘We were made for relationship with the One who knows us and loves us and wants to walk with us.’
Christians believe there is something missing from the most perfectly designed community – or individual life – if God is not central to it. And so the new Community Church aims to ‘share the hope of Jesus’ among the people of Tornagrain.
