By Nita Wilkinson

Faith Editor

Sometimes faith is hard to put into words. We may know what we believe. We may feel something deeply. We may even want to share it with someone else, but somehow the words just don’t come.

That’s where Common Thread comes in. First Christian Church, 215 E. Sandusky Ave., Bellefontaine, offers a unique ministry that gives people another way to explore and express their faith, not necessarily through words, but through the arts.

Senior Pastor Kevin Greenwald describes Common Thread as a place where people can express their thoughts and faith without words.

“I want to give people tools that will help them express their faith,” Pastor Greenwald explained. “How do we give them these tools? That’s where we get into the arts. Because artistically there are so many ways for people to express their faith.”

And Common Thread explores a lot of those ways; painting, weaving, writing, music, gardening. And so much more.

The ministry is open to everyone, regardless of church affiliation or artistic ability, and there is no cost to participate. Common Thread typically meets once a month, often on the first Sunday of the month.

What began as the Mustard Seed eventually grew into the once-a-month Common Thread ministry that First Christian Church offers today. The idea is simple: create a welcoming space where people can explore creativity, faith and community together.

Sometimes something happens in that space that no one expected. Take retired Bellefontaine Police Department Sgt. Allen Shields, for example. Allen attended one of the poetry-writing sessions. As the class began, he made it clear that poetry wasn’t exactly his thing.

“I write reports, not poetry,” Allen said.

But somewhere along the way, the retired police officer discovered that he had something to say, and a poem was the way to say it. By the end of the class, Allen wrote a beautiful poem.

The writing didn’t end there for Allen.

The poetry-writing clinic actually prompted Allen to pick up his pen again and write about something meaningful to him.

Two years earlier, Allen and his wife, Bobbi, had taken a two-month summer trip to Alaska with two of their grandsons. The adventure included roughly 1,000 miles round-trip on the Dempster Highway, a gravel road that carried them through mountains and tundra into the wilderness and eventually to the Arctic Ocean.

After the class, he put his thoughts and feelings about the journey down on paper.

“I guess that the poem is really representative of my feelings about the entire Alaska trip,” Allen said. And then came the part that made me smile.

“Who knew after 33 years of writing police reports something would inspire me to write a poem about a trip that I shared with my wife and two of my grandsons?”

That is the beauty of Common Thread. The goal isn’t to turn everyone into an artist. It’s to give people the tools and the opportunity to discover another way to communicate what is already inside them.

The music component of Common Thread offers another example. What began as a Common Thread class eventually grew into a community chorale group. The group has now moved beyond the ministry and continues its work as its own ministry. That’s a win for everyone involved.

Common Thread gave people a place to begin, and from that beginning, something larger grew.

Pastor Greenwald believes that is part of what makes the ministry so valuable. It isn’t simply about learning to paint, write, weave or sing. It’s about making connections. and learning to recognize and appreciate the differences between us.

The arts can do that. They give us a way to see something through someone else’s eyes. They allow us to communicate when words fail us. And sometimes, they help us discover things about ourselves that we didn’t know were there.

Faith can be expressed in a sermon or a Bible study. It can be sung in a hymn or spoken in a prayer. But it can also be painted onto a canvas, woven into a piece of cloth, written into a poem or planted in a garden.

That is why the name Common Thread fits so well. We may all have different stories, different gifts and different ways of expressing our faith. But somewhere in all those differences, there are threads that connect us. Common Thread simply gives people a place to find them.

Here is a list of the classes for the rest of the year:

Sept. 13 - Grandparents Day Studio, 2 p.m.

Oct. 4 - Creative Writing Revisited, 2 p.m.

Nov. 1 - Wrapped with Love, Create Holiday Gift Tags, 2 p.m.

Dec. 6 - Christmas Carol Sing Along, 2 p.m. ■