How Great is Our God - Baring My Heart For the World to See...

So I've been on a Christian music kick lately and have discovered Chris Tomlin's "How Great is Our God," which I am probably late in discovering, but I thoroughly enjoy it anyway. (I found out while listening to a string of music from Mr. Tomlin, my favorite of which is "Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone).") So anyway, as I am typing this, if you've never heard the song, look it up on YouTube and listen to it while reading this blog entry. When I was 18, my parents were invited to attend my mother's best friend's church and we started going to church as a family for the first time. It had been a long time since I'd attended church--5th grade to be exact. I had forgotten little things like tithing and had recently went to the House of Mercy's service as my high school marching band was getting an award for marching in a parade in their honor and I, as band captain, along with the drum major were asked to go. Imagine my embarrassment when I had to let the drum major drop in money for me to tithe with because I had forgotten all about it! (I never admitted to forgetting about tithing until now.) Anyway, so we started going as a family. I had been to church before with friends and neighbors, but never with my family. It was an awesome feeling. Finally, something good we could all do as a family, even though none of us are morning people and were usually cranky until we got there. It always turned out that we were happier once we got there, simply because we were in God's house, being with people who were warm and welcoming and we LOVED our preacher. Over a couple of years, the rest of my family stopped going, but I stayed true. I rededicated my life, got baptized, and kept going to church by myself, much to my preacher's delight, who frequently told me how proud of me he was. I joined the Baptist Student Union at CSU, made great friends there, and served our Lord with all I could do, pushing my comfort zone until I felt greatly rewarded. I loved going to the BSU and praising and worshiping and serving God and the fellowship that such a group brings to your life. The BSU remains one the best times of my life and one of the greatest times of my premarital era. I even met my To-wee there, whom I still feel is one of my great rewards for serving Him at the BSU. When Corey and I started dating, he had just moved to Columbus and did not have a home church, so I invited him to mine. The first time we held hands was during Wednesday night service, singing hymns, in the sanctuary. I loved sharing my church family, fellowship, and God time with him. Over the years, we continued to enjoy our church, helping with Fall Festivals and VBS; I sang in the choir and occasionally played my flute for them (especially since the preacher loves the sound of a flute so), and the church accepted us as a couple long before we got married. Soon, they did not expect to see one of us without the other and when Corey's new job made him start missing Wednesday services and I had to go by myself, I frequently got asked where he was. Right after we got married, we even did a stint of teaching Children's Church on Sunday mornings. However, somewhere along the way, we lost our way. We got off of the God track and started on the selfish world track. We got a new Sunday school teacher shortly before I got pregnant with Bree and the new teacher started out with teaching Revelations--with great relish. Now, I admit I'm no fan of Revelations. Not only is it a hard read, but I've always worried about the people I love whom I won't be able to successfully witness to before it's too late. I'm not worried about myself, just others. So, because I didn't want to hear her glorious interpretation of Revelations, we quit going to Sunday school. Until this past Sunday, I hadn't been since. I taught VBS that year. I had volunteered before, but only as an assistant. I had never taught it, taught it. I had kids that were in fourth grade--I think--and I didn't mind it. I enjoyed participating in the classroom decoration contest--which I did not win, but it was fun--and once it was all over and I had to go clean it up, I got to be in the Sanctuary alone for the first time. I was upset because I wanted to get pregnant and was getting impatient--so much so that I was picking fights with everyone, including poor Corey (not exactly conducive to getting pregnant, I know.) So that morning, I prayed at the alter, all by myself. Then I looked over at my favorite window--a stained glass window, depicting a white cross with flowers behind it--and saw how the morning sun was shining just right so that the cross was shining on the adjacent wall. It was gorgeous! I knew then that God would answer my prayer, I just had to learn patience. (A month and a half later, I found out that I was pregnant with Bree.) So to make a long story short, eventually, even going to church for regular Sunday morning worship got to be too much. Corey and I got a little too fond of sleeping late over the weekends and decided it was easier just to stay in bed. So then we just went on Wednesday nights, but then we got too tired to go after work. So eventually, our attendance petered off to almost nothing. One day my preacher said to me--without any prompts from me--that he knew what was wrong: that we'd gotten lazy. Truer words were never said. So I tried harder after that. Around that time, I found out that our church was not going to be able to do VBS that year. This was disappointing to me because Bree was finally old enough to go to VBS and I wanted her to have that opportunity. My sister, Chrissy, had started a new church by then with a friend of hers and invited Bree to go there. So that's where she went. She had a blast! Plus, she got a t-shirt. Our church had never done this. At the end of VBS, of course you know they have their Sunday show-off day at the end of the week, so we attended Chrissy's church for services for the first time. (This was not the first time I'd met the preacher there, he had recently preached my grandmother's funeral, and I knew I liked him.) We liked the service and that day, I told Corey that if we ever needed a new church, I thought we should go there. Eventually, though not as often as we should, we wound up going to Chrissy's church more than our own church. My family started going there too. I told my preacher that it's just too tempting not to go to church with my family and that's why they rarely saw us--I didn't mention that I didn't go to that church all that often either. Each visit made us seem more and more welcoming, no matter how long or short it had been, and ours seemed less and less so. Maybe it's because our church has an older congregation; maybe it's just because I knew in my heart it was time to leave; but I will never forget the day we went to our church on a Wednesday night before Valentine's Day and when I walked Bree in the door, the teacher of the class kinda groaned to another lady standing there and complained that they had an unexpected one and told me that they would have to find something to give her since they were having a party for their class that night but they didn't know Bree was coming. I had never felt so unwelcome in my life. That truly bugged me--it still does, especially considering who she was. I don't think I've been back there since. Maybe once, but not again on a Wednesday night. So going to church began to feel like a chore--an obligation I did not find enjoyable at all. So anyway, here I was, stuck in this rut, feeling as though I'm torn between two churches. I love my church and the few people there who still talk to us and the memories I've made there. I love the sentimentality there. I love to sit and look at the place where I was baptized and married, the spot where we dedicated both of our children, my favorite window and I love to try to catch the sunlight on the wall again--I never was able to see it like that again; I love to look at the place on the pew in front of where we usually sit and look at Austin's teeth marks where he was teething and we were so busy paying attention to the sermon, we didn't notice he was chewing up the pew in front of us. I love the preacher, his wife, and the couple who always sit nearby and talk to us. Most of my friends that are our age from that church have moved on to other churches so no one really talks to us anymore. Then, there was my sister's church, where we always felt welcomed; people asked about us when we weren't there; and Bree had more adult friends and fans than I do. (The best way to a mother's heart is to love her children.) They sing contemporary Christian music, which Corey and I both enjoy (hymns are great, don't get me wrong, but the contemporary stuff reminds us of the BSU, which we both count as a special time in our lives.) The (now former) preacher at my sister's church is funny, younger than our own, infinitely more accessible through email and Facebook, and we all love him too. Bree leaves this church and can tell me what she learned that day, and even sometimes brings it out when she's playing with her dolls and thinks no one is listening. Despite all the signs to switch, I just couldn't do it. Maybe I'm afraid of change. Who knows? So, on September 11, I get up and go to church with the kids without Corey, who wasn't feeling himself that day and stayed home. This is my sister's preacher's last day at her church and I want to listen to him preach again before he moves on to his new church. During his sermon that day, I remember him talking about holding on to things that didn't really mean much to anyone but him, and talking about how great it is to see people he brought to Christ doing work for Him and bringing more people to Him (to which he started crying, which made me cry--men can't cry in front of me and expect my face to remain dry), and then he started talking about relationships and how you can watch TV sermons all day long, but you'll never get that fellowship that we as Christians need so badly; and I realized that relationships was exactly what I was missing in my church. No one really talks to me there anymore except the preacher. The last time we went, we talked to him, but no one else really even looked at us. Then I think about how much I loved serving God at the BSU and how I never really had the opportunity to do that at my church and how I desperately want to find a way to do that now. I realize that this church could provide me with the opportunities to do just that. I started crying. I don't know why. I decided right then that I was finally ready. It was the relationships that did it. So when they did the alter call, I waited--rather impatiently because I felt like this was my last chance, like I was about to miss the train and I did not want to miss it--for the guy in front of me to quit talking to the preacher, and I walked up there and told him--and how he understood me with all the sobbing I was doing, I don't know--that I was ready to switch memberships. So I was welcomed into my new church family. The preacher of course, made a joke about me waiting until he was leaving to do so, and I told him I just waited too long, but I have my theory on that too. I always said that if my preacher left, I would leave too. Maybe this was God's way of telling me that there are important people in your church family that are not preachers. Do I wish we still had him preaching there? Absolutely. Do I feel that this is a major deciding factor on whether I will continue to go there? No, not one bit. As he told me that day, "It's a good church." Yesterday, we went to our first Sunday school service at the new church--or since before Bree was born, I'm ashamed to admit. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I'm in a class with people I've met before and who are friendly and welcoming and I feel like I've always belonged there. I look forward to serving God at this church. In fact, I've already inquired about joining the choir and plan to attend practice Wednesday evening. How Great is Our God, that He would allow me to stray for this many years and still accept me when I wander back His way? Thank you, God. I am back again. Please forgive me for neglecting You this long.