The First Piece

 Thanks for your kind words yesterday, friends. Your emails and texts and comments were comforting, and I appreciated them.

When Ryan and I began our conversations about the next season of our lives, we knew we had to figure out where to go next. In some ways, we had a very blank slate before us. Just like when we came here, we weren't confined to any particular area by a school system for kids (since we don't have kids!) or really any other limitation. And the same remains true today. 

We looked at some job opportunities that would have taken us out of state, but ultimately, we decided we wanted to stay closer to "home base" to be able to be present for family things when needed. That has been a huge challenge for us in our current role. Sure, we're only a couple of hours away, but because of our schedule, we've missed a lot of holidays (most of them, actually) and the ability to help out with other things along the way for Ryan's grandparents and my parents. We knew we needed to stay close enough to be accessible and hopefully able to participate in more of the holiday gatherings.

In addition, we have a godson now, and we feel strongly that the commitment we made to him and his mother in taking on that role means we should be able to have an active presence in his life. We want to have an active presence in his life. We also have friends we've made while we've been here that we don't want to be ridiculously far from. So if we could find some sort of middle ground that would allow us to be part of all the lives in all the cities, we wanted to do that. 

It was also in those early conversations that we talked at length about church. Please hear me (loud and clear!) on this one. We love the people of the church we have attended while we've been here. The staff of the church has welcomed us, loved on us, cared for us, and not expected anything from us, because they were well in tune with the work we did and understood that it limited our ability to be involved at the church. Just last fall, Ryan and I were invited to join a small group, and they have been SO good to us. So good. Telling them we were leaving was so hard.

But even in all the goodness of the church, it was still a very strange way to attend church. We visited several churches when we first moved, but we finally decided that the one our tenants attended (or at least most of them did) was the best fit for us, because it best allowed us to help them in their faith journeys. We were there for their baptisms, their questions, their participation. But the flip side of that coin was that church was really an extension of work. We could never go and just be on our own, because even if we happened to have a Sunday off, we were still surrounded by tenants and questions.

Committing to participate in serving or being involved in groups was difficult, because even if we said yes to something, if we were on duty and a work emergency came up, we had to cancel our commitment to tend to work. (And we hate canceling commitments.)

We knew that one of the things we needed most of all in our next chapter was to be part of a church where we could really be part of the church. For a while, we know we need to just go and soak it all in. It won't be about deep involvement at the start (or at least we believe that will be the case) but it will be about simply being. Resting in the Lord. Learning from His Word. Meeting people that we hope will become more of our ever-growing framily. And then, when the time is right, diving in to serve in ways that we haven't been able to for the last many months.

Finding a church in a new community is one of the hardest things. But both of us had often expressed that if we just lived in the right area, there was a church we would love to be part of. And so in the most backwards of forward-planning ways, we decided to pray about that as a first step of a new season. We asked the Lord if it would be possible and pleasing to Him for us to live in the area of this church where our friend is the pastor. We have visited it before. We have met people there, and if it isn't too bold of me to say, we feel like we have a few friends there already in the people we've met on our visits. 

So we asked. We asked with great hope that the Lord would put His favor upon that. 

And we believe He has led that way. In ALL of the decisions that stood ahead of us in those early days - and even with all the decisions that STILL stand ahead of us - I must admit that knowing we have a church home is one of the greatest comforts. We know that no church is perfect. But we know that church is a big piece of heart growth and health, and we are both excited and so comforted to know that answer is already set in place. 

Acts 2 talks about believers in the early church meeting together and sharing fellowship. It says, "They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people." This is one of our biggest prayers for this next season with a new church family. We look forward to the opportunity to fellowship together, share daily life, and praise the Lord together!