Keep Reaching - by James Crews

The trick is to keep reaching
for the light you will never touch,
and to be nourished by the stretch
toward impossible things.
The trick is to bloom where you are,
not calling it a failure because
you wanted a different outcome.
Live each day devoted to awe,
so that when a monarch lands
on the tip of a coneflower, seeming
to swell with that sudden infusion
of sweetness, you don’t miss it.
So that, while you watch, a pair
of hard-won wings seems to open
and close, and open again in you.

These words have stayed with me as I have been preparing for Harvest festival on Sunday; reaching as we do, as a church, for the seemingly impossible goal of fair distribution of the world’s rich resources. 

As someone who has spent a chunk of their life working in the charity sector, the sense of ‘hard-won wings’ opening resonates deeply with the days donations would land on the doormat or in the inbox, despite the cost of living crisis in our own nation, and even as tumultuous international political landscapes threatened the survival of small and big organisations alike.

Working for a charity (voluntary or paid) can be incredibly rewarding because you share a common goal with global and local neighbours who you otherwise might never have interacted with. You all reach and strive towards the same impossible end, and you learn to appreciate the little miracles along the way: the widow’s might, the sponsored swim, a legacy gift in memory of a loved one, and the kindness of volunteers who stand armed with tins (of food or change) when they could be doing almost anything else, but instead choose to minister presence, remind us of our neighbour’s need, and help us open hearts and wallets for the good of humanity.