The Church Bookcase

 

The Beginning

It started when someone suggested that our church should have a little bookcase. People could leave Christian books they had finished with, and others could take them if they wanted to read them. We could put it in the coffee area, where groups using the building could benefit. Lots of people liked the idea, as long as it didn’t interfere with having a nice coffee and chat after church.

Since no one objected, someone found a cheap bookcase and put it in the corner of the coffee area. Someone else made a little offering box for donations.

Lots of Someones brought books they suddenly realised they could live without.

The odd cardboard box turned up with dog-eared copies of all the 1970s classic mission biographies, so that today’s generation would have the opportunity to learn how God used to work around the world. In each box there was at least one Lion Handbook of Something, as well as various works of dubious or discredited theology which the former owner couldn’t find any other way to dispose of. (Admittedly, these are really only useful to the student of theology, now away most of the year, and should have been offered to them directly). Bookmarks from every decade since the 1940s told future readers how far they might expect to get in each volume.

The church bookcase wobbled a bit but stood bravely while folk sat nearby, sipped coffees and chatted. Nobody ever saw anyone putting books there, but they must have done. The shelves filled week by week and the books piled higher. The Green Group had been encouraging the congregation to reduce waste, so it now seems no one could bear the shame of recycling anything with an ISBN number. Anyone having a sort-out brought their offerings to the bookcase and left feeling cleansed and worthy. This was especially true when leaving books on sound Christian parenting and anything water-stained or nibbled.

Those drinking their coffee realised after a couple of months that the books were encroaching on their space. Someone took on the role of sorting and tidying the books at various moments in the church calendar. Excess books were removed to the Lost and Found area and there was much rejoicing.

The Middle 

Still the books came. If anyone had needed to know the correct Christian ways to pray, act, fast or understand 2 Chronicles, they would find it somewhere in the bookcase. If anyone felt the Spirit leading them to take home a half-completed Bible quiz book, they would not have been disappointed.

But just as we all wondered what beast we had collectively produced, something remarkable began to happen.

The books began to leave.

More importantly: people were taking them.

Someone noticed that donations box had filled up, and, when this was discovered, quickly got it screwed down.

Encouraged by the gaps that were now appearing on the bookcase, people raided their homes further for the benefit and general sanctification of all those using the coffee area. Non-book items appeared, including CDs from the 1990s and a ‘Teach Yourself Welsh’ complete set of cassette tapes (possibly related to a church mission to Wales seventeen years before).

A family of Gideon’s Bibles of all sizes multiplied across shelves and jostled for room with giveaway tracts from carol services. Someone local left a few copies of their autobiography. Parents dropped off cute Bible picture books and unread copies of classics like ‘My First Apocrypha’, all inscribed by devoted grandparents. Someone else local left a few copies of their autobiography. A charity recipe book the church had self-published appeared.

And so it was that I, occasionally glancing in the direction of the bookcase while trying to converse with friends and not spill coffee on fast humans underneath me, finally realised that I too have a role to play in the story of the church bookcase.

I know a bit about books. I know a bit about theology. I have read the 1970s classic mission biographies and know the 1990s music. Someone who knows books and who knows theology should occasionally sort through the bookcase and separate the sheep from the goats, and it might as well be me. I spoke with the minister, the administrator and the person who usually goes through the bookcase and no one objected. The other week therefore, I turned up during Warm Welcome Café, chatted with several people, consumed a whole coffee and turned my attention to the bookcase.

It wasn’t as hard as I thought it might be. Anything had to go if it met any of the following criteria:

(a) being a bad witness to visitors to the building (through age or irrelevance);

(b) any dodgy theology which might cause my brothers and sisters to stumble;

(c) well-intentioned but poor quality copies which were never going to be rehomed;

(d) not a book.

We were left with lots of interesting and useful books, which I was also able to categorise (children’s, theological, biographies, Purpose Driven Life, etc). I will no doubt have to look at the church bookcase again in the future, but for now the users of the coffee area can browse a tidy and attractive space again.

The End?

Now I've sorted the bookcase, maybe I should turn my attention to any other area in my life that meets the criteria above and consider what to do about it. 

Note – this post is an exaggeration of real events. But only a little.

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Picture created using Bing.com 

Lucy Marfleet loves reading, laughing, her husband’s cooking, walking her dog and marvelling at how tall the kids are getting. She teaches Biblical Studies for Spurgeon’s College on their Equipped to Minister course and has a Masters in Theology from the International Baptist Theological Seminary. See her blog at www.lucymarfleet.com