I have felt rather lost lately. I feel the urge to write but not the confidence to do so. I feel the need to create, but not the drive to start. I feel the push to share my thoughts, but then feel a more overwhelming need to hide. It makes for a difficult place to begin.
Last week in church we were given a sheet of paper that included questions that were designed to help us tell our faith story. Having shared it here before (I think?) and been given the opportunity once years ago to share with the youth at our church, prompting questions are not really necessary. My story is ingrained in my soul.
As part of the service several people who work at the church shared their stories. Most stories I have heard over the years start with vacation Bible school, or a grandparent taking the person to Sunday school as a child. They usually include going to church as a child in some kind of way.
I rarely hear a story where the child was not only never taken to church but discouraged from going. I rarely hear a story that when the kid finally went to a church in 8th grade, after a childhood of being told negative things about church in general, she finds herself in a church where many in the congregation go down to the front of the sanctuary with no explanation at one point to lay on the ground, speaking in tongues, not only scaring the poor girl, but reinforcing all of the things that she had been told.
I rarely hear about a high school student being taken to a youth event where they are pushed to accept Christ after being promised an automatically better life if they do, only to take that step and then feel even worse because they don’t know what they have just done.
I rarely hear a story where the person can’t wait to go to college so they can “sneak” and visit some churches, only to feel like they don’t belong anywhere they go. I rarely hear about someone longing to believe, to belong, to understand and having no clue where to start.
The stories I usually hear in church are of people rooted in a faith that is so much a part of them they can’t imagine a life without it. I sometimes hear how people of faith have their moments of doubt, but rarely do I hear the internal struggle of the person who spent the first 25 years of their life being told the whole “Jesus” thing was merely a myth and a dangerous one at that.
When I was finally taken by the hand to church, guided and welcomed, taught and embraced, it was a constant struggle between where I felt led and the voices of my past swirling in my head. While I took all of the Bible study classes offered (some multiple times) and joined the small groups that fit my life at the time, I didn’t join the church for over 13 years of attendance because I felt I had to be more, I had to be sure.
When I was finally baptized and joined the church at the age of 40, it was because I wanted to be a member before I asked my son to go through confirmation and become a member. I felt that I couldn’t ask him to do that if I wasn’t willing to do that myself. I had baptized him as an infant without being baptized myself, but to ask him to go through classes and make that decision of confirmation for himself seemed hypocritical when I had not done the same. However, I still didn’t feel worthy.
As long as I live, I will be grateful to my husband for bringing me to our church soon after we started seriously dating. He told me that first Sunday that during the service they did weird things with the lights and that we would stand up and sit back down a lot, which was all true. He told me that he believed that you never had the collection plate pass by you without putting something in it and that there was really no excuse for staying home on Sunday morning.
We have had our times when life kept us home, although I don’t think a collection plate has ever passed us by even if we only had a dollar to put in. The service has gone through slight transformations as different minsters have come and gone, although we still stand up and sit back down a lot and the lights still randomly (or so it seems) change during the service.
I am also grateful to a group of women who embraced me and have been with me as I have gone through raising my child and losing my parents, changing jobs and going back to school. One in particular sat by me in several church settings and quietly explained things to me in a loving and affirming way that helped me to feel included and loved. We lost this sweet soul several years ago, but I will never forget her love, her patience, her faith.
The rest of my circle of friends are there for me, even when I am too embarrassed to fully share my insecurities and my shortcomings. I might doubt myself, but I never doubt them and their support and love. Even when I have told them I am fine and don’t need help, they know better and are there enfolding me in their love and support.
My journey has been one that has taken me a long way. It has not been the usual story of growing up in church and then having a big moment one day when it is all comes together for me. I have days when I am so unsure, when the voices of the past try to drown out my own present day voice.
I was told growing up that I was not good enough and to be as small as possible, but in God I have had to fight that voice and try to be all that He wants for me. I have had to fight to feel worthy of grace, worthy of His love.
The cross in the picture is made of scraps that Tim put together. He saves most of the pieces that are cut away when he makes a project. They could certainly get thrown away, but he keeps them to make other projects. Some of the most meaningful pieces are made of the scraps that he saves.
Back in church today (because even my insecurity and doubt aren’t reasons to stay home on Sunday!) I heard them say that it is often harder to forgive ourselves than others. That when we fail, we can try again. That we can take our heaviness and pain and restore it to joy. We can take the scraps of our lives and turn them into something wonderful.
I so often get bogged down by the voices of the past that it is hard to move forward. Too often I believe the old voices telling me that I am not good enough, that I will never be good enough. Today I was told that my story, however twisted the road has been, is not over.
I have to lean into what I have learned from the past, while moving ahead to what the rest of my story will be. What that story can be.
And even if my story doesn’t seem much like anyone else’s, I guess that is ok. Maybe it is preparing me for something I can’t even imagine.
