Last Sunday I worked, so I went to church at the chapel there. I felt, as I've felt many times before, this connectedness with them as I have not felt since leaving the Small Group I was in at CSU. After the short service, my co-worker and I chatted with another member of this small 'congregation' as we headed back to work. About 10 employees are regular attenders. Most are custodial staff because they can be free of their duties for 15 - 20 minutes while the nurses and people higher up on the patient-care ladder can't.
I wondered why I felt so much closer to this small band of people than I did to the people in the large evangelical church I attend on my weekends off. Then it came to me: Fellowship. Fellowship daily on the job, fellowship when we talk about a patient together, fellowship when we talk about our own lives among each other. We are connected in all levels: as co-workers, as caregivers to our patients, and sharing our lives with each other.
This is exactly what the Small Groups at CSU strive for: unity in service, unity in being open to each other, and unity in living. That is how the apostles lived in the book of Acts and what Paul asks the churches to stive for in his epistles. I am thankful to God for our Medical Small Group in the hospital because we feel this strong unity. With the Great Physician overseeing the hospital, we can gain strength from Him and trust Him with our day to day tasks and the patients He entrusts to us with their care.
