Photo: Meredith Farmer on Flickr
I remember planning my move to this beautiful place and my new future with Big Mack and I was so excited. I was excited to move back to the Okanagan; I was excited to be a part of a whole family again; I was excited to live in a house with a yard; I was excited to give my sons a new dad; I was excited to quit my job and become a stay-at-home wife and mom; I was excited to spend time writing music. There’s only one thing I wasn’t excited about.
I hated the idea of leaving my church.
My church was my home. It’s where I wanted to be. It was filled with people who cared about me, people who prayed for me and listened to me when I needed to talk. It was people who held me accountable and people who stretched me and taught me to reach out for God’s truth… to get to know Him better. It was where I belonged. It was my home.
I’d visited Big Mack’s church a few times during my visits with him before we were married – maybe 3 or 4 at most. I remember comparing it to Valley Church – my home church since I became a Christian in 2005 – and feeling completely underwhelmed. I remember thinking the music was lacking and the congregation was stifled and I remember disliking the preaching I did hear simply because it wasn’t Pastor Owen. There was some social awkwardness too… or maybe it was just me. I was, after all, attending where Big Mack used to go with his now ex-wife and, well… it just wasn’t MY church.
Ugh.
I remember mulling it over. I remember asking Big Mack if he would consider moving to something a little more vibrant. I remember wanting something different… I remember saying I couldn’t feel the Holy Spirit there. I remember praying about it and I remember God telling me to stop looking at church with an expectation to be served but, rather, to look at it as an opportunity to serve others and trust in Him.
This is right where he wanted me.
I am so grateful to the Oliver Alliance Church community for embracing me wholeheartedly, for welcoming me into their lives and into their hearts, for including me in their social engagements and for caring for me and my boys through the children’s ministry. I am thankful I have been given the opportunity to serve with the worship arts ministry and that I have been encouraged and prayed with and loved on and lifted up.
I am so completely ashamed at the terrible attitude I once held about this great group of people. As I have come to know many of them – even just a little bit – I can tell their hearts are genuine, their faith strong and true. I can tell they love my Jesus as I do.
I still have close relationships with Valley Church through songwriting; my co-writers are there and I have been meeting with them about once a month since I moved here. And I always take in a service there when I’m in the city on a Sunday… I am even still asked to sing with the worship ministry there on occasion. What’s beautiful, though, is I now have a new church family and all those things I thought about Oliver Alliance before were completely wrong.
So wrong.
It’s funny how our perceptions change. I think God changes them. Where once my poor outlook clouded my vision to where I couldn’t see the Spirit moving in that place I am now moved to tears in worship and humbled by the inspired preaching. So often Pastor Jeremy manages to preach on a topic or scripture passage I was just reading or contemplating the day before, confirming to me that God is very much still at work.
As Christians, our church becomes our family. They are an extension of us – the body of Jesus. We cannot function well without those vital relationships. We must allow ourselves to fall under the leadership and guidance of a pastor and a church body for our own well-being and growth.
I’m so grateful that God put me right where I am. My heart is here.
