It's been a month since we arrived in California. It truly is difficult to believe how quickly that time has passed, but it's also still a bit hard to believe we're back.
I feel a bit like Alice...through the rabbit hole...wondering at how things keep getting curiouser and curiouser.
I'm not sure the reality has truly set in...that the kids are actually going to school in Dos Palos...that I'm able to pick up my nephews at least once a week...that Tom doesn't currently have a job...that we don't live in Florida anymore.
And that we can choose where we want to go to church.
That one's sort of a biggie. For as long as we've been married, we've attended the church Tom has worked for. Of course, he's never worked for a church that who's beliefs we totally disagree with...but he's also never really worked at church that was a perfect match for the way we prefer to worship. We've taken a bit of a break since we've been here, needing time to heal and rest...and not wanting to rush it. But for the past week, we've both been strongly feeling the need to get back in worship.
Last night, while in Fresno, Tom got online searched for a church to attend this morning. On a total whim, he picked one...one that ended up being not too far from the church he worked at for eight years...with a pastor that he realized he knew through high school friends...a small church that meets at a high school...where service consisted of a small worship band and passionate, transparent, Truth-filled teaching...we couldn't stop smiling when we left. And several hours later, I'm still p0ndering and praying about the expository teaching we heard this morning and how it applies so directly to where I am right now (more on that later this week, I think).
In the nearly 15 years we've been married, we've never been simply consumers at a church - to put it anohter way, we've never attended a church service that our income wasn't actively tied to.
You can't imagine how freeing it is to just go to church.
It was amazing. And we're hoping we can go back soon. With no job, it's too much to ask of our budget to drive an hour each way to go to church every Sunday, but we're thinking we can maybe make it work every other week and visit more local church for the in-betweens.
I know it will be only for a season, until Tom's master's is done and that next step comes along, but it's truly an awesome thing to come home from church refreshed and inspired.
Curiouser and curiouser.
This made me smile...and also frown. I find it so difficult to process that you were in churches where you didn't always feel so fed and refreshed because you worked there. I find that a sad state of affairs for the American church system.
Posted by: chksngr | February 21, 2011 at 06:46 AM