Leah Kostamo is an earthkeeper and storyteller who is passionate about helping others live lightly on the earth from a place of joy and hope. For the past twelve years Leah and her husband Markku have spearheaded the work of A Rocha in Canada. She is the author of Planted: a Story of Creation, Calling and Community.
My mother-in law wears a bikini. She is seventy years old and decades of gravity have done their work. But she wears a bikini nonetheless, with a devil-may-care nonchalance to what others her age are more inclined to cover in sarongs, ruffles and cruise-wear. She’s my hero.
I have a small, determined grandson. He can insert an astonishing number of vowels into the word NO. Whether in two-year olds or adults, strong differences of opinion may need to pass through several stages before a degree of cooperation is reached − mutual listening, clear communication, appropriate compromise, and peace-making − which in his case means a cuddle.
Community is a complicated word. Like one of those huge lorries that thunders past on the motorway, it isn’t always obvious what’s in it. It’s an emotive term which may awaken longing, panic, or just mild curiosity. Why is it so important? And why was John Stott so good at it on so many different levels?
John was more English than almost anyone I know − except perhaps my father-in-law! Yet beneath the reserved, even conservative demeanour of this gracious gentleman lurked a profound and often subversive cultural agility. His humility and genuine interest in people, along with a considerable sense of humour, enabled him to make friends across all religious and cultural boundaries.
I have a favourite photo of John Stott. He is crouching over a clump of wild crocuses on a stony Turkish hillside, the heavy lens of his camera perfectly steady in his outstretched hands despite the awkward angle of his body. Photographing photographers is always fun.
John Stott wasn’t interested in being liked or admired, or in winning arguments for the sake of it. He was interested in knowing Christ and making him known, in his lordship over all creation, and in the truth of the biblical record.
In late July 2011, the church lost a great statesman, and A Rocha lost a great friend. News of John Stott’s death reached us just as we were setting off for Strumble Head in Pembrokeshire to watch seabirds, walk the cliffs and scan the skies for Peregrines. John’s beloved cottage, The Hookses, lay just a few miles to the south. Fitting, somehow.
I still remember how it all started seven years ago… We heard the trucks going down to the eastern marsh and saw the smoke rising. Somehow, we knew this was going to be a long battle, but we didn’t know how it was going to end.
We just got back from a family reunion, quite a big one – huge in fact. One branch of the family couldn’t make it, and one much-loved sister stayed behind to care for a very sick brother, but about 80 others travelled from all over the globe, eager to reconnect with each other. We rented a conference centre in the Netherlands, and slept in dormitories or small cabins in the woods.
The theme at church this past while has been “the Good Seed” and the good seeds of the Kingdom – seeds of love and justice and grace that are sown in seeming obscurity and randomness, but grow like invasive weeds, big and strong and vibrant. This has been the A Rocha story around the world, and it’s been our story in our particular corner of the world in Canada.
