PaperYarnGirl

I rarely write much about my spiritual walk anymore; that part of me sort of hangs in the background, sometimes bubbling up with something important, but not very often. This week, though, two things crossed my path that got me thinking. There’s no knitting in this blurb, so if this isn’t your thing, feel free to skip ahead ;-)

First, I read A Former Leader‘s blog entry, Family First. She shares about how we preached “God first, Family second, Church third,” but we lived “Church first, God second, Family third.” How true. It was rare that I spent time in our church building with my kids. They were well cared for, but not by me (unless I happened to be teaching a group of kids, and my girls were in that class). I was off running here and there, serving and doing for everyone else. If the girls were tired and ready to go, but I had things to get done, they had to wait. Barb writes, “If there was a crisis with one of the kids, it would have to wait till after the church stuff we were involved in. Family first? Hardly.” Geesh. Not only was our schedule (and therefore, the activities our kids had time to engage in) totally dictated by our church calendar, but I can remember bringing puking kids to the service – stashing them away in a back room so they wouldn’t infect anyone else – and making sure my part got done. How twisted is that? What did I think that would teach them? (Well, I know the answer – I thought it would teach them about spiritual families, serving the Body, fulfilling a calling, shaking kingdoms, and giving of ourselves… but I think what it really taught them was that they were pretty far down the list of who was most important to us when it was Sunday morning, Sunday evening, and Wednesday night. And Thursday night, and Saturday morning, and…)

The other side of the coin this week was the latest Free Believers podcast, “Nothing Wasted.” What do we do with those years that were invested with great emotion and dedication? Was it all for nothing? Was it all for show? No, I think not. Was any of it real? Yes, I think it was; we served Father the best we knew how at the time. It’s a shame that our lives were so out of proportion, so principle- and duty-centered that we missed relaxing into the joy of real Life. Yes, we often had “great worship.” But much of it was just the bells and whistles to move the emotions. It opened our hearts, yes… but not anymore than what our hearts can be opened today. And while we prayed to receive the song list that would be what the Holy Spirit wanted us to do at a particular service, to be honest, I think it mostly came down to what we thought would make us feel good. I love Darin’s point of saying that it’s okay that this is what it often boiled down to. Emotions are wonderful, inspiring, and encouraging. But to think that what we had was “real” worship, that we need to recapture that, that I’m missing a calling if I’m not still working the piano and mic… well, we’re missing the point.

A church service is what it is… a fun and encouraging place to gather and hear teaching, enjoy the music and how it makes us feel, visit with friends and family, and leave feeling inspired and not alone. But doing that service is not what being and living church is all about.

Was it worth it? Yes. Nothing wasted? No, I don’t think so… except the time with our children. I wonder how things might have been different had we not been as invested as we were in everyone else, and had we invested more time in them as we spent time with our spiritual family. But we are where we are, and I trust that Father has brought us – and our lovely girls – to where we are because He knows that’s where we should be. And that does bring out a heart of worship.