This summer I am walking away from the church that I have grown to love over the last 9 years not because I am breaking up with the church or because there are donuts across the street, or the music is too loud or not loud enough... but because our family is moving to Ottawa, Canada.
I wasn’t always so in love with church. I remember being 16 and lazy and not wanting to get out of bed for church and my father talking to me in his serious voice.
“Your mother wants you to go to church with her. Look, it’s up to you whether you go or not, but if you believe in your God, you need to BE with your PEOPLE. You can’t win a war without an army.”
My father, the military man, the one who listened to his Meatloaf albums on Sunday mornings. The agnostic. HE is the one who pierced my heart with the church speech. Not at that moment, but years later would those words hit me so deeply. My dad has been married to my mother for 45 years and looking back, I now know he was the perfect person to deliver that message because church like marriage is SO worth staying the course. It's worth pursuing, committing to and investing in.
My grandmother once told me Karen, if your new neighbors don’t show up with a pie, well then you just bake that pie and be the one to bring it to them! But OH did the women of ACF bake those pies..in the form of love, prayers, friendships, gifts, faith, mentorship and service. CHURCH! The people at Austin Christian Fellowship don’t wear special t-shirts that make their groups appear exclusive. They wear inclusive inspiring t-shirts that say: “You can sit with me”, and “Growing in Grace.” They yield swords that carve “truth lives here.” They speak words of “I was lost, but now I’m found and I was fearful, but now I’m FREE!” CHURCH.
I am proud to be leaving this church...because I will carry with me so many lessons learned from the people who poured into me, people who modeled what faith is, who spoke truth into my life, whole communities who prayed hand in hand for waters to rise and cancers to fall. People who invited me into their homes and hearts and stories. The ones who taught me how to set a table and pray over the women who would fill the chairs around it. The women who taught me how to die to my self and how to step up to lead even when it was scary and I felt completely unqualified. Each of them has taught me how to put on the armor of God, how to stay the course in friendship, in marriage...and in church.
I am FOREVER GRATEFUL for the things I have learned. For these people and THIS CHURCH.
I am four years old. My mother is helping me pray to ask Jesus into my heart. I tell him our address in case he needs help with that. We live at 39 Manarsky Cres. in Ottawa, Canada on the military base, where my father is learning about commitment and marriage and where he is being trained for so much more than he has signed up for.
How I ever ended up married with two kids and a dog living in TEXAS is beyond me!!! And all these years later we are called BACK. Full circle. HOME to Ottawa,Canada. Home to where I first invited Jesus IN as that little girl. How sweet and beautiful the gifts of the Lord are when we follow Him.
ps. Guess what? It’s all connected. Marriage. Church. God. Stay the course friends! In good times and in bad... and bake those pies! Raise your hands. Wear the t-shirt that says “you can sit with me.” Have the party you wish you were invited to. Pray non-stop! Chase God with your whole heart! Go to church! You will find a warm inviting light and PEOPLE who want to help you see it! And the best gift of all?... In HIM you will find HOME.
