This year has seen the opening of a new NPD self-serve in Mosgiel, soon to be followed by another in Kaikorai Valley.
What is the appeal of these petrol stations? Naturally we are drawn by the competitive pricing, especially given the recent large increases in fuel costs.
But the pricing is competitive because they are self-service, and that itself may be a feature of their appeal: we can refuel our cars and pay with minimal effort and avoid having to deal with people.
Elsewhere we see businesses allowing for employees to isolate and work from home, universities recording lectures so physical attendance is not required, and churches streaming their services fostering virtual congregations. Even at home, automatic garage doors and high fences mean that we might not know what our neighbours look like.
There are valid reasons for many of these conveniences, such as improving efficiency, or protecting health, or providing accessibility to those for whom things would otherwise be impossible.
Yet the different types of convenience may be eroding the formation and experience of community. Are we building habits that keep us away from others and creating a relational vacuum?
Might our desire to avoid people prove stronger than our fear of loneliness? Are we diminishing something basic to being human?
The Bible teaches that humanity was made for relationships, for community. We were made by a loving God, who calls us also to be loving. According to Jesus, there is no greater commandment than to love God and to love our neighbour.
In Genesis 2:18 God says, ‘‘It is not good for the man to be alone.’’ Within the Christian calling of living under God in God’s world, we are not made as insular beings but are placed in loving community together, helping one another, giving and receiving.
However, for many reasons, our relationships are often troubled or broken, and we look for opportunities to retreat from one another while still having a deep longing for belonging; a hunger to be in community. With that hunger, avoiding people could eventually prove to be an inconvenience, not a convenience, as the social costs we bear end up exceeding the costs we save through efficiency.
While it is becoming easier today to avoid people, we still see a strong longing for belonging expressed in our social media, university clubs, retirement villages, hobby groups, etc. Many of us want a sense of national or cultural identity that connects us to something bigger than ourselves.
Yet can these fully satisfy our relational hunger? Some groups are fraught with division, not unity. Some are too uniform, for only a specific type of person can belong to that community.
Others are too transient, for they only provide community for as long as a person can participate. Often our relational hunger will not be fully satisfied, for we long to belong to something truly uniting, truly welcoming, and truly lasting.
The good news of Christianity invites people to join something that satisfies this hunger, where our common unity is based on accepting and trusting in the love and work and call of Jesus Christ. It proclaims that Jesus Christ is Son of God and Lord of all people, regardless of their age or interest or background.
This is truly uniting. It proclaims that Jesus died for all and that ‘‘everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved’’ (Acts 2:21).
This is truly welcoming. It proclaims that Jesus is risen from the dead and gives life to all who would trust in him. This is truly lasting.
While churches may carry the same flaws as many other community groups, the central invitation of the church is the same uniting, welcoming, and lasting invitation of Jesus: not a place for one age group or one ethnic background or one set of interests, but a place where all kinds of people can come together under Jesus in repentance and faith.
In a self-service society of convenient loneliness, this invitation of the church increases in its importance.
• David Thompson is senior minister of Southern Cross Anglican Church, Mosgiel.
