Jenny’s letter 13th July
Dear Friends,
There’s something magical about watching a Test match at the Home of Cricket.
Lords, with its deep history, white picket fences, and subtle murmurs of appreciative applause, is more than a ground—it’s a place where the soul of cricket breathes, or so I am told. I would love to visit the museum – one day.
Though I have yet to go there, I had the pleasure of taking in a few hours of the Lord’s Test match on TV recently. And, while some might have called it ‘a bit slow’, for me it was like slipping into a well-worn jumper—comforting, familiar, rich with meaning. The slow ebb and flow of the game, the tactical battles, the quiet patience—this is cricket as it once was, and still can be.
Then, almost in direct contrast, on Friday evening, I found myself caught up in the razzmatazz of a Lancashire v Yorkshire T20 match. It was fast-paced, loud, colourful, thrilling from start to finish. It’s a game made for the age in which most are living: quick, digestible, dramatic. It was brilliant in its own right.
Old-style and new-style. Slow-burn and instant-hit. Test and T20. You might think there’s no way they can co-exist, but in cricket, there’s room for both. They meet different needs, speak to different rhythms of life, and yet are part of the same glorious game.
That idea—of different expressions belonging to the same story—reminded me of Messy Church. We’ve had some incredible times recently and I continue to be amazed by the way it opens doors.
It’s chaotic at times (as the name suggests!), but in the best way possible. Paint, glue, laughter, sausage casserole, worship, and storytelling all jostle together. And in the middle of all that glorious mess, something holy happens.
I’ve really loved getting to know a small group of parents—people I probably wouldn’t have chatted to on a Sunday morning over coffee because they wouldn’t have come. But here, at the craft tables or gathered on the carpet for a story, or in the midst of eating a meal together, we connect. Not through sermons or structure, but through shared experience, real conversation, and the shared challenge of keeping jelly on the plate and sausage off the floor – to say nothing of the paint and glue! There’s a richness in tradition, yes but there’s life in experimentation and new ways of doing things too.
Both the old and the new have their place. And perhaps that’s what Jesus meant when he said: “Therefore every teacher of the law who has become a disciple in the kingdom of heaven is like the owner of a house who brings out of his storeroom new treasures as well as old.”— Matthew 13:52.
There’s wisdom in what has gone before, but there’s value in the new as well. The church, like cricket, doesn’t need to choose between the past and the present. We are stewards of both. The slow and the fast. The orderly and the messy. The ancient and the now.
It’s a reminder that God works through it all. Whether in the silence of Lord’s or the cheer of a floodlit stadium. In the hushed beauty of traditional worship or the buzz of a hall filled with sticky fingers and french sticks. It’s all part of the same story—His story. And there’s room in it for everyone, including you.
Wishing you every blessing for the week ahead,
