Ministering with Peaches

I now have 1/8 bushel of peaches in a big bowl on my kitchen counter.  I began with 1/4 bushel yesterday, and after church, I invited anyone who wanted peaches to take some.  My spouse and I do love fresh peaches, but I knew there was no way we'd be eating that many peaches.  And yes, we could make peach preserves, but again, we don't really use much in the way of preserves throughout the year, and we don't have storage for jars and jars of preserved peaches.

How did I end up with so many peaches?  Back in the spring, I found out that one of the church's youth was selling peaches to support the high school band, so I casually mentioned that I would be happy to buy some peaches.  This was the week that they came in, so I arrived at church to discover exactly what I had bought.  They were waiting for me in the sacristy refrigerator.

Some days, I feel like I have fallen into a Norman Rockwell landscape.  But then I am reminded of all the ways that my church congregation faces 21st century issues, not the least of which is how to carry on with dwindling numbers.

Maybe ministering with peaches is the membership campaign of the future!  I am kidding, although there may be more to this idea than initially meets the eye.  Many of us are yearning for a different kind of life, the kind of life that Norman Rockwell captured in his paintings, where there are peaches for all who need them and safe spaces, like family and churches, to help us navigate the issues of the day (those issues were captured by Rockwell in different paintings).