I posted earlier this summer that our pastors had resigned and this had caused quite a bit of turmoil in the church. Our own lives were personally affected by this as we are friends with both sets of pastors. All of a sudden we were watching our friends leave and not sure why. Over the summer we made numerous attempts to get to the answers, but really, only God knows the whole truth. I feel like we have enough of it to know what we needed to, but the last 4 months have been very difficult.
I had to take on a larger role than I wanted to at church, my husband took on more responsibility as we began trying to decide whether to stay or go. It came down to if we believed the church would be able to continue on mission as we knew it, or if that mission would begin to change. We also watched our friends endure a ridiculous amount of slander from people that didn't even know them. Horrible things were said about them, assumptions were made, and they are trying to recover from the personal damage they endured during all of this too.
We decided that for our family's sake, we would move on to another church. So began the process of looking. That turned out to be harder on one of our children than we imagined. I won't say we've found a new church home, because that's actually a painful thing to say, but we have found a place we are visiting on a regular basis. It's still not "ours" though. We walk through the door relative strangers. I don't know the folks names as I come in the building and we don't have a small group. There are remnants of our former church still meeting as a small group, but I'm not sure how much longer that will continue.
So why the grief? I had memory flashbacks of small group at our pastor's home. The honesty, the care, the laughter. I miss hearing him preach. I miss walking into that building and seeing all of the faces that I grew to love. I almost miss pushing around those big black moving cases from Portable Church. More than anything, I miss the feeling of community. The can-do, we're on mission attitude. I miss having a church in our county that cared about our county and the world around us.
I struggle with why God allowed this to happen. What the bigger plan is. How come we finally found a good place - close to home - that allowed us to serve - and now it's gone for us.What's next? Why were our friends put through this? What possible good is going to come from it? What will happen to those of us that have left that church - will we be able to maintain our community apart from the binding influence of Sunday worship? What about those that have chosen to stay? What will that church look like 6 months from now? 1 year from now?
Good did come from some of what happened this summer. My husband took on more of a leadership role in our home and in the church during the process of the aftermath. I learned that I had grown past my dependence on a person to be my representative for a relationship with Christ. I was strong enough to have one on my own even when the people around me let me down. We did strengthen our relationships with a few other folks from the church - some of which still attend. I know I've grown personally through this process, but it hasn't been easy.
There have been days where I wanted to yell and scream at God and certain people. To release my frustration and disappointment at how they have behaved. When I heard some of the more ridiculous things being said about my friends, I wanted to lash out. If I were younger - I probably would have, but thankfully, I have learned some temperance over time. I am still angry about some things. A good friend told me that it was ok to be angry when she saw me trying to bury it under the pious pretense of not becoming resentful and bitter. She told me to embrace that anger and take it to the Lord because only then could He transform it. She was right - she usually is.
I guess the glimpse I caught tonight means I still have unfinished business to deal with in myself about everything. Just because I left it doesn't mean I've dealt with how I feel. I've just had to stop seeing it week to week. I think it's time to settle into this feeling for a while and learn to make peace with this too.
No comments:
Post a Comment