A friend of mine visited Plimoth Plantation, a re-creation of the village built by English Puritan settlers. Costumed role players take on the names, viewpoints, and life histories of real people from that first colony. In character, these players know nothing beyond the world of 1627.
My friend approached one of the players and asked, “Where is your church?” The woman looked surprised. She said, “We are the church. We need no building.”
I’m Howard Butt Jr. of Laity Lodge. We’ve come a long way since the Pilgrims. But I wonder if we could learn something from our Puritan heritage. Where is our church? We are the Church—and the Church goes where we go—in the high calling of our daily work.
“Now I rejoice in what was suffered for you, and I fill up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ’s afflictions, for the sake of his body, which is the church. I have become its servant by the commission God gave me to present to you the word of God in its fullness—the mystery that has been kept hidden for ages and generations but is now disclosed to the saints. To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.”— Colossians 1:24-26
