The big shake up
About five years ago, I posted this musing on God, Jesus, Christianity, Heaven, and hell. I am able to look at the stats for each of my posts to see how many people looked at them. That post was one of the most clicked-on I've ever written. Some time after I wrote that post, God started nudging me. In that blog, I admitted that I had a Bible next to me but that I didn't open it, instead I just spoke from my own human emotion. God nudged me to start reading the Bible, start talking to those who'd had more years to read it than I have, and to question what had started to feel so nice and right to me. I've never publicly discussed the huge, frightening change God nudged me to make for my family in 2014. But I'm going to now.
Let me back up a little. So, part of my personality is the incredible need to please people. As a child, I loathed when anyone was upset with me - parents especially. As a teenager, I started to push the boundaries and was kind of a nasty daughter and friend at times, to prove to myself that I didn't have to always please everyone (I lost some friends in the process). As an adult, I've learned more constructive ways to respect myself and not be so disheartened if I upset someone (no one goes through life never upsetting others, right?). But four years ago, "peace at all costs" was still a pretty deeply held belief for me. I believe our relationship with Christ is a continuous journey and looking back four years ago, I realize now I was at a point in my journey where my lil human-brain imagined God as a super-human (rather than as GOD which is who He truly is) because His Godly unknowableness was just too much for my lil human-brain to wrap around.
Also, I was at a point where attending a church that felt super easy and welcoming and loving and giving and fun and friendly seemed like the right place to be. It was easy because Stu had grown up there so he was known and knew people in the congregation; it was welcoming because the parishioners there are all kind and loving people; it was giving because that was the main focus of that church - being generous to others near and far; it was fun because there was a focus on planning entertaining church activities on a regular basis; it was friendly because the church was small and many of us (especially parents of similar-aged kids) got to know each other well and saw each other at church and in the community and even hung out together outside of church sometimes. Because I love to please people and help where I can, I taught Sunday School and accepted the invitation to serve on the board of that church.
Let me back up a little. So, part of my personality is the incredible need to please people. As a child, I loathed when anyone was upset with me - parents especially. As a teenager, I started to push the boundaries and was kind of a nasty daughter and friend at times, to prove to myself that I didn't have to always please everyone (I lost some friends in the process). As an adult, I've learned more constructive ways to respect myself and not be so disheartened if I upset someone (no one goes through life never upsetting others, right?). But four years ago, "peace at all costs" was still a pretty deeply held belief for me. I believe our relationship with Christ is a continuous journey and looking back four years ago, I realize now I was at a point in my journey where my lil human-brain imagined God as a super-human (rather than as GOD which is who He truly is) because His Godly unknowableness was just too much for my lil human-brain to wrap around.
Also, I was at a point where attending a church that felt super easy and welcoming and loving and giving and fun and friendly seemed like the right place to be. It was easy because Stu had grown up there so he was known and knew people in the congregation; it was welcoming because the parishioners there are all kind and loving people; it was giving because that was the main focus of that church - being generous to others near and far; it was fun because there was a focus on planning entertaining church activities on a regular basis; it was friendly because the church was small and many of us (especially parents of similar-aged kids) got to know each other well and saw each other at church and in the community and even hung out together outside of church sometimes. Because I love to please people and help where I can, I taught Sunday School and accepted the invitation to serve on the board of that church.
As I said, God was nudging me. I still wasn't reading the Bible as much as I should have but God was whispering to me to question things that didn't seem to jive and to listen to the little discomfort I felt after attending church some Sundays. There were sermons given at that church that intimated the Bible was not always true for us in this time, so many years after it was authored, and that some parts should be taken with a grain of salt. That just didn't feel right to me. But, I thought, "Maybe I'm misinterpreting this? I am terrified to question a man of God but I think I need to talk to our pastor to understand what is truly intended here." Somehow I gathered enough courage to request a meeting with our pastor. Actually, I gathered the courage by praying to God and asking for strength. I never could have done it on my own. And before the scheduled meeting, I prayed for discernment (from gotquestions.org: Discernment is defined as “the quality of being able to grasp and comprehend what is obscure; an act of perceiving something; a power to see what is not evident to the average mind.” The definition also stresses accuracy, as in “the ability to see the truth.” Spiritual discernment is the ability to tell the difference between truth and error. It is basic to having wisdom.) The pastor invited a newly ordained assistant-pastor to attend the meeting as well. Unfortunately, the more questions I asked and the more answers I was given, I realized my misgivings were valid. I was not then, am not now, and never probably will be a Biblical scholar but I knew enough to realize that something was deeply amiss. Plus, if you are willing to believe that God will lead you the right way and listen to the internal nudging, you will know what is right from wrong. These pastors were telling me they wholeheartedly believed that what Jesus said in John 14:6..."I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" was invalid. Instead, they essentially believed that God equaled BIG LOVE and that God's BIG LOVE meant that there is no hell and that all of humankind is welcome in Heaven, no matter what. I literally asked them, "Are you telling me that if someone worships the sun, moon, and stars their whole life and rejects the Christian God of the world, that they will go to Heaven?!" and their answer was unequivocally "Yes". I burst into tears because I knew this was going to change my family's entire spiritual life. The pastor offered to send me books that gave credence to their belief and I said no thank you. I left the meeting and drove home, shaking in my car.
As terrifying as it was, a day or so later I e-mailed the pastor and head of the church board, resigned my position, and explained my family was leaving the church. The books I didn't want arrived in the mail soon after and I kept the unopened envelope for a while but eventually threw them in the trash. I started researching and attending different churches each weekend, searching for a new place that felt like home. I prayed that God would lead me in the right direction and we would find the church that was right for our family. During this time, I was idly browsing Facebook and ran across a post a friend had shared where a church I'd never heard of had created a cute music video of some of the kids at church singing a fun song. I'd never seen anything like it. It was clear this church had a large budget. I noticed the church was called Eagle Brook and thought to myself, "Isn't that the church Brittany (my cousin) just told me her husband's family goes to? What a coincidence!" I decided to go check out a sermon that Sunday and as I got close to the church location another interesting realization hit me - "Oh!! This is the enormous church I used to drive past while taking Ryann to horseback riding lessons a few years ago! I always wondered what church that was." I walked in and thought, "Holy cow, this is nothing like any church I've ever been in before!" I walked into the enormous auditorium and found a seat. There was a countdown on the bigger-than-life screens and suddenly the music blared out. "Welp, I thought, THIS is not going to be Stu's cup of tea..."
But the message...the message just seemed so spot on. I prayed about my morning there and asked my mom to go check out Eagle Brook too. She said what I thought she would - she didn't love the music, but the message was really good. The messages have continued to teach that the Bible is the unerring Word of God and it guides us in the Truth God intends for us. The most important of all is that Jesus died for our sins, He is the way, the truth, and the life and the only way to Heaven (the road is narrow) is through Him.
To make a long story short (and maybe I'll write about this again in more depth someday), I convinced Stu to come check Eagle Brook out with me. The music was not his favorite (at first) but that week's message was right on, too. We had found our new church home. It was a scary and life-changing time but, blessedly, it's continued to be life-changing. About six months after we began attending, Ryann made the decision to be publicly baptized.
More and more of our family started to attend. And just a week or so ago, Stu, Adam, and I were publicly baptized.
The big shake up of 2014 was worth it.
As terrifying as it was, a day or so later I e-mailed the pastor and head of the church board, resigned my position, and explained my family was leaving the church. The books I didn't want arrived in the mail soon after and I kept the unopened envelope for a while but eventually threw them in the trash. I started researching and attending different churches each weekend, searching for a new place that felt like home. I prayed that God would lead me in the right direction and we would find the church that was right for our family. During this time, I was idly browsing Facebook and ran across a post a friend had shared where a church I'd never heard of had created a cute music video of some of the kids at church singing a fun song. I'd never seen anything like it. It was clear this church had a large budget. I noticed the church was called Eagle Brook and thought to myself, "Isn't that the church Brittany (my cousin) just told me her husband's family goes to? What a coincidence!" I decided to go check out a sermon that Sunday and as I got close to the church location another interesting realization hit me - "Oh!! This is the enormous church I used to drive past while taking Ryann to horseback riding lessons a few years ago! I always wondered what church that was." I walked in and thought, "Holy cow, this is nothing like any church I've ever been in before!" I walked into the enormous auditorium and found a seat. There was a countdown on the bigger-than-life screens and suddenly the music blared out. "Welp, I thought, THIS is not going to be Stu's cup of tea..."
But the message...the message just seemed so spot on. I prayed about my morning there and asked my mom to go check out Eagle Brook too. She said what I thought she would - she didn't love the music, but the message was really good. The messages have continued to teach that the Bible is the unerring Word of God and it guides us in the Truth God intends for us. The most important of all is that Jesus died for our sins, He is the way, the truth, and the life and the only way to Heaven (the road is narrow) is through Him.
To make a long story short (and maybe I'll write about this again in more depth someday), I convinced Stu to come check Eagle Brook out with me. The music was not his favorite (at first) but that week's message was right on, too. We had found our new church home. It was a scary and life-changing time but, blessedly, it's continued to be life-changing. About six months after we began attending, Ryann made the decision to be publicly baptized.
More and more of our family started to attend. And just a week or so ago, Stu, Adam, and I were publicly baptized.
The big shake up of 2014 was worth it.
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