About a month ago, I decided that we could all use a little more God in our lives. My kids have never been regular Sunday School attendees, even though my husband and myself both grew up attending Sunday school and/or church every week. My husband and I have both come to a place in our minds, lives and hearts where we feel disconnected or somewhat disillusioned to the idea of religion and the stresses that being a true believer, follower, and practitioner can put upon you.
Our brother in law, Andrew, works for the church that we have attended sporadically since moving to our new house. Yes, we are the Easter/Christmas type of church attenders...offensive I know. Since his employment there, the idea of attending more often had started creeping into my mind. I began feeling compelled to go. My sister in law asked me a few times if I would go with her and unfortunately I was playing softball on Sunday evenings and was unable to go. As the month of September crept on, the idea of going with her when my Softball league was over was no longer an idea but a date on the calendar.
Since the second week in October, we have gone to church every Sunday except for one where we had a prior obligation. We go to a church service called "Elements." It is at 5pm on Sunday evening(perfect for those of us who don't want to get a family of 5 ready and out the door by 8:45am), a live band rocks out and we sing the best Christian songs out there, we can wear jeans and be comfy instead of dressing to the nines just to feel like you fit in, and our pastor is one of the best speakers and teachers that I have ever had the privilege of listening to. If any of you are busy "Keeping up with the Kardashians" then you have seen him before as he was the pastor who married Kim and Kris. The kids go to Sunday school and Avery was a list minute addition to their "Jelly's" program where 1st-3rd graders get to learn songs and sing and dance to preform at the Christmas Concert...to say that she adores it is an understatement. Since Andy works the service, we get to sit with Bethany(Chadd's sister) and then we all go to either their house or our house and we do a great Sunday dinner together as a family. I.Love.It.
The focus this fall at church has been the book of Romans. It is one of the best books in the bible and certainly one of the most beautiful. I find it mildly ironic that as a Christian struggling with my beliefs I would start attending church when the message is centered around what it means to be Christian and how wonderful life can be when you are truly walking with God. My mindset and my life is being transformed by the words and the teachings of this book and I feel so uplifted.
Last Sunday's message was specifically about what the differences between believers and unbelievers are. We learned that the primary characteristic of a genuine Christian is the idea of the holy spirit living within you. I feel like it has always been there for me. No matter how lost I am, I can go to church and feel an overwhelming urge to sing which brings tears to my eyes and lets me know that yes, He is always with me. There are 5 ways to know that you really are a child of God. At the end of his message, Pastor Joel asked us to close our eyes and affirm for ourselves whether or not we are true believers living our lives in a way that we are meant to be. Of the 5 characteristics, I was able to say "yes" to 2 of them. Yowza! I have some work to do. Little did I know, I was about to be tested on my ability to stay true to 1 of the statements I answered "yes" to.
On Monday mornings, I usually take a spin class at my gym. The class gets unbelievably full so my friend Allison(who also attends my church) saves me a bike. That morning I was actually running ahead of schedule, so I almost missed Allison when she came to drop her son off at preschool. She yelled out the window of her car as we were passing each other that I was in row three, the fourth bike over. She said she spoke to the girl on the bike next to mine and told her I was coming and to save that bike as I may be 3-4 minutes late. Anyways, I make it up to the cycle studio before 9:30 and go to the bike that was row three, fourth one over and someone was on it. I stared dumbfounded for a second or two and inside I started to panic. My bike was gone. Someone took the bike that Allison had saved for me. I walked up to the girl who was on the bike next to mine and said were you the girl my friend Allison spoke to about this bike. She said no. So I started to walk away. The girl who was on my bike is a girl that I recognize from all of the other classes that I take and she looked up to me and asked, "Don't you have a bike?" I said, well I was supposed to but she was on it. She got this look on her face and she exclaimed, "Well, we pull towels at 9:30." I said, okay, but I was here before 9:30. Blank stares. I turned around and a gal at the end of the row said that there was one bike left in the back row. I thanked her and quickly started to set it up. In the meantime, Allison walks in and I see the confusion on her face as she realizes that I was not on the bike she saved for me. I called out to her and she rushed over to me. She apologized and said that she cannot believe it. She then realized that the girl who took my bike, was the very girl who she had spoken to earlier about saving it for me. We were both shocked.
The hour of cycling begins and I unfortunately have a direct view of the bike that was supposed to be mine and the girl on it. The first 15 minutes were awful. I was spinning and shooting daggers with my eyes at this girls back. I felt terrible. I kept thinking about the message at church yesterday and how right at this moment, my thoughts are betraying my desire to do what is right. I started to pray that God would help me forgive this girl so that I could enjoy the rest of my workout and stop obsessing about all of the things I could say to her. Yes, I am human I know and most people would be thinking the things I was....such as: When she comes up to me to apologize(in my gut I knew she would) I would shrug and say, "No biggie, I believe in Karma! *insert evil smile*" Or simply, "You know that was a pretty crappy thing to do." I will admit I thought about this for at least the first half hour of the class and it made me pretty upset. I prayed and prayed for help to let it go. I kept wondering about what she was thinking and also what my friend Allison may be thinking. By the last 15 minutes of class I was at peace with the situation. I was over being ticked off at her for taking my bike. I got a bike, I got my workout in, and I knew that she is the one who was going to have to live with what she did.
We ended the class with some stretching and just as I knew she would, she started making her way toward me. All I was thinking was, "Here it comes!" She looked at me with these puppy dog eyes(kind of like Puss in Boots on Shrek) and said, "I am so sorry that I took your bike. I feel really awful especially because I know you. I was watching you to be sure that you got a bike and if you hadn't found one I would have given mine up for you." I gently put my hand on her shoulder and smiled at her. I said, "It is really okay. It's no big deal. It's okay." To which she said, "No, really I am so so sorry." Again, I repeated that it was okay and I thanked her for apologizing. Allison came up to me after that and was apologizing for everything as well and she felt terrible the whole hour thinking about how disappointed in that girl she was. This is what one bad choice can lead to. There were three people in that class who had an overall crappy workout because we were dwelling on one person's poor decision.
The next morning, as I walked out of the child care center at the gym that girl was walking in. I held the door for her and said, "Good morning!" She did the whole puss in boots thing again and said, "How are you?" See....she will forever think about her bad choice every time she sees me now which is almost every day. That sucks to be her.
Even though I struggled for a half an hour in that class, I ended up doing the right thing. How can I know that I really am a child of God? In Romans 8:11-17 I am told that I will know because I have a new power, I have the desire to do what is right, I am led by God's spirit, I relate to God out of love and not out of fear and I have confidence that I am His child. I am working on all five of these things every day.
This week we are going to be learning about "Freedom from discouragement-No Frustration." I cannot wait to see how Pastor Joel relates this to our lives and inspires me to be better. Not to mention, this week Bethany is making chicken and dumplings for dinner...YUM!
Wow, Amber, what a touching post. Good message, many of us forget.
ReplyDelete