Finding a New Home

Anyone who knows me knows that I had a very diffcult time transitioning from my life in Dallas to my life in Illinois. For a solid year I found myself breaking down in tears on a regular basis, missing the life I had known and loved so much. Being a (relatively) well-adjusted person, I felt like I was able to move through the whole "stages of grief" thing, so the tears have not come for quite some time. However, if the last step is "acceptance", I felt like I have been at the point of accepting my situation, but not exactly rejoicing in it. Resignation is a better word than acceptance I suppose you could say.

I would say the biggest reason for this sadness is the loss of immediate friends. While I have enjoyed the developing friendship with our neighbors, it's sad when after 2 years in a place you only have 2 friends. I spent 5 years in Dallas cultivating meaningful and deep relationships with quite a few lovely ladies, and I still miss their presence. I have most often found fellowship with other like-minded women through the church I have attended. I think the biggest vacuum in my life over the last two years has been the lack of a church where I could worship God and be fed by other believers. I think I have cried as many tears over that as anything else.

The city that Ryan and I have moved to is home of Scott Air Force Base, which means people are coming and going all the time. Frankly, Ryan and I figured it would be nice to live in a place where we figured people had to be friendly, since there were so many newcomers all the time! This morning, he and I tried visiting a neighboring church. We started getting excited about the ministries available to serve in through that church. Then this afternoon I listened to a sermon from another nearby church, and when I went online, I discovered they had a 6 p.m. evening service, so I decided to visit that church, too, while Ryan stayed at home. Both churches today had ministry fairs going on since it's the start of the school year. I started getting incredibly excited about being plugged into a church again.

I guess this is where all my hopes and fears start getting co-mingled.

What if we start attending a church like the one we went to in Mt. Vernon, where it seemed alright at first, but then our impressions of the church deterioriate the more we attend, but by then we're invested? What if I really like a church but Ryan doesn't, or vice versa? I'm generally the "jump first and ask questions later" kind of person when it comes to churches, and Ryan's more the "wait and see" type. My fear is that we'll be stuck in this perpetual luke-warm state about any church we attend, never taking the plunge to get fully involved, and then we'll never really "bond" with any church.

I think another fear I have is that I'm placing too much weight on this decision. I grew up going to just one church, and my mom is still going there, some 40 years later. I have this feeling that, "Oh my goodness, we better pick a good church because this is the church not only we'll be going to, but the church our kids will be raised in." That's a tall order, when you don't even have any kids yet!

Finally, my third fear is that I'll try to use a church ministry as a reason or justification for being in St. Louis. To elaborate, I still question why we're in St. Louis, of all the places in the country. St. Louis is very similar to cities like Detroit, Cleveland, Baltimore, etc. It's a far cry from the likes of Grapevine, Texas. I often feel like God uprooted me from the Land of Milk and Honey and placed me in the desert, and I keep thinking to myself, "Wasn't it supposed to be the other way around?" It would be easy to say, "Well, God brought me here because he wants me to minister to x,y, and z" people. But that's a very arrogant thing to say. I have no doubt that God has many things to teach me by bringing me here, but it would be presumptious of me to put all my eggs in some ministry basket, thinking that would somehow explain away the circumstances in which I find myself. It would be even more arrogant to presume I was placed here to impart something rather than because I'm in need of the imparting.

Heavenly Father, you know how much I long to be in a church where we are challenged to live like You are a reality, a church where we can find friendship with other believers, and a church where we can serve with the gifts you've given us. Please show us which church we are to call home. Amen.