Church lady 2.0…
Almost thirty years ago, I was first introduced to Jesus through the kindness and love of my neighbors. From the very beginning, the church became the center around which I wound my life. I threw myself into church, the good, the bad, and the ugly for all of my adult life. My kids and I grew up between the pews, rambling around that sacred space as though it were our second home.
It has not been an easy relationship. As a woman with a particular personality and set of gifts, I presented a certain challenge. The blessing and the pain are woven together in my heart. Within the walls of my local church I was given immense grace to serve, to offer up my talents and abilities’ in service to others, and if I’m honest, I’ve also been deeply wounded. I have been loved with tenderness and blessed grace, and I have been gravely judged. My wounds have been tenderly cared for, and I have been left for dead. I have been filled up with words of encouragement, prayer, and worship, and I have been poured out and tossed to the side when I was no longer useful.
There have been so many times when those around me have encouraged me to go, to protect myself and flee. And yet, I know that while it is not easy, church life is good. I have experienced in my own life and others the beauty of a church doing the work of God on earth. It is a paradox I can barely conceive, to recognize too the great damage the church inflicted on people who show up faithfully week by week.
Over the past decade, I have had to reconsider my relationship to the local church. For the most part, this has been a slow unfolding, and a gentle reconstruction. I did not set out to unravel this, I simply set out to find a way to stay connected and involved now.
As I write this, I am aware that this process isn’t done. There will be future challenges and hurts, I am sure. There will also be new ways to engage and to live as part of this community. In the end, the door is open. I can stay or I can go.
Over the course of this unravelling, I’ve learned some things I wish I’d known earlier in the process.
The church can’t love you-People can love you. God can love you. The individuals in the church can love you. Developing and maintaining those relationships takes time and attention. The church as a whole can serve you, provide a meal, fill your gas tank, and encourage your spirit. But love requires knowing and being known… and that is the work of people.
Ministry is always a sacrificial gift- I once served with hope that it would make people love me. I thought if I loved people, they might love me back. Instead, I learned that love at its best must be act of sacrifice. It must be freely offered with no expectation of return or it is not ministry.
The church isn’t the center-My view of the church has shifted over time. Now, instead of placing it at the center of my life, I recognize its place as being one important part of many in my life. My home, my workplace, my church all take up space in my life, each offering something that supports the other. At the center though, there is room only for the intimacy of my beating heart in relationship with the One who made it all.
I am not innocent– Although my desire has been to love and serve, I am also keenly aware of the myriad of ways I have failed. I have shared confidences that should have stayed secret, I have served with favoritism, and a too great a sense of my own worth. As I write this, I can see the faces of precious people I have hurt, and I know there are more whose pain I never even saw.
In order to stay, I know I will have to manage my heart and my expectations. I will need to let the church off the hook. She can never fulfill my need, nor live up to my hope. She will continue to stumble and fall, just as I stumble and fall. I hope that there are others who will step in and love me enough to help me grow past my own experience and preferences, and I hope to love my friends enough to do the same.
As I enter a new decade of life and church, I am letting the church be what it is. I recognize its great potential for both love and loss. I am committing to show up and offer my small gift, to lean into our
So, I’m all in for bringing casseroles, holding babies, and standing up for the dignity of the people around me. This relationship has been worn thin, battered by time and circumstance, and yet it remains part of the bedrock of my life. I think it will look different moving forward, and I’m not entirely sure what that will mean, but I am ready to step back into the fray and find my place as church lady 2.0.
