This morning I attended Bible study at our church. This group grows more precious to my heart each week, which is btw, week five for knowing ANY of the ladies involved in the study. The majority of women are older, have grown children and grandchildren my children’s ages…one other is home with children as I am, working from home. We have been studying how to allow the Holy Spirit to lead us in our studies of the Bible….amazing study in how God is a God of each of us and the Bible is alive….its apparent as the age span and expectations and maturity in Christs levels are so varied in this group of 9-12 women each week….at first everyone had on their “Church lady” game….polite attendance, sweet voices, and “correct” but impersonal comments….and alot of pleasant smiles and knowing looks.
Enter the new to the church, not even officially a member yet swirling into her place, married for 20 years, though it took three marriages to get there, stepmother and mother of four teenagers/young adults….who doesn’t in any way, shape or form meet their qualifications for “church lady” elite membership, but who loves God dearly and wants to learn and share what God is doing in our life…I in no way fit the “church lady” definition qualifications, in fact, after the first week I almost wondered if I would be allowed back to this reverent group….after all, my life was messy…despite the joyful restoration I have been blessed with in the last seven years….God has had to work the wheel a bit longer and harder than most, and I suspect there were many times my choices required a “do over”…
You see, I wasn’t a never churched girl or youth, or even young adult…but I wasn’t an obedient child of God either. I grew up in a church that expected you to behave just so, dress just so, and lead others to be just so….or so the feeling tone was …and the unspoken threat…or else God couldn’t love you. Imagine my surprise when after a lot of ugly had happened in my life (much to the horror & embarrassment of my parents, grandparents and others in a small town), the same God I had feared, loved, but avoided most of my life knowing I was never going to be enough on my own, was the very same one I learned not only loved me, but could and did forgive me. God forgives me daily no matter how I dress, act, fail him, or have to repeat the basics of accepting God’s grace and forgiveness….and truth is, the more transparent I truly try to be about that…the more God openly allows me to share the deep transformations He has brought to my life through my failings and repentance and accepting of His love. ….and I still fail regularly girls…I am most definitely still on the path to obedience, sometimes wondering on off the trail of sweet, lovely, kind, patient, and regularly going the wrong way some days on the one way street of tender hearted, patient motherhood mode….
We as a church, I mean the whole church structure, not just ours…get so tied up in the appearance of propriety and the appearance of holiness that we forget that Jesus was about loving the unlovable, the outcasts….saving the forgotten, healing the unhealable, and inviting himself to dinner with those less than socially acceptable, and I didn’t see a verse about him washing his hands when things got messy not once among them either. As our church prepares for a new minister, one who is said to be “old school” I am personally hoping that we are preparing our hearts to stop looking at the outside of other’s lives, but learning to have a heart vision for loving those who need Jesus…of teaching by example of the command to love others….of witnessing peace and affirmation that God indeed loves them and wants them to know his peace and joy in their hearts.
This being a obedient Christian is a messy, hard business,…our task is to stop judging and being about the business of power or artificial influence of the world and start serving. Stop worrying about elevated positions and position ourselves to care more about other’s needs than our feelings or desires….and it’s not just about reaching out to the messy, but allowing the “together” to be needy too…to allow all of us to be what God made us…imperfect….and to affirm and praise God that He indeed loves us all anyway and allow Him to continue the work He began in us until we all go home with Him!
God is good…
Such great thoughts! It's very true that we all want to appear sweet and holy and like good church ladies. It's hard to let down our guard and let people see the real "us" and the junk that's in there. But I'm convinced, like you are, that we have to be real and imperfect with one another. That we are to grow in grace with each other. You gave a lot to think about in this post!
And just a comment on the painting! Your projects turned out so great! Your man is a jewel to paint and repaint…I don't know that mine would go for pink or raspberry, but your colors are lovely and even my guy would admit it 🙂
I love what you have to say. Our pastor has been on a mission for a while now, and that has been to teach us that we are "the church" we do not "go to church". He said something Sunday that really intrigued me and kind of stung too, but it was very true. Here is an excerpt of the notes: "Are we discipling or disinfecting Christians? Disinfecting isolates Christians in a spiritual safety deposit box called the church building and teaches them to be good. This results in …. Decent church members with little world impact. Disobedience to God's command to reach this entire world. Wasted lives." Wow! For a girl who grew up in the largest "social club" of a church in my home town, that bites. To hear it in it's entirety go to http://www.brookhills.org and look for links for Sunday's message. Great stuff.