A lot has happened since I wrote last. Okay, so honestly...not that much has happened. But one BIG thing certainly has. You all ready for this?
"Thing...Number One"-- Chelsea. is. going. to. church.
Did you just pass out? Gah, I had a feeling that was going to happen. I apologize if I startled you. It's a pretty scary turn of events for me as well. Whodathunkit, right?
It's kind of a long story, one I'm not too keen on inputting here, but we (my husband and I) are going to be getting involved with the church of a longtime family friend. We've been around this ministry for a while, and visited a solid half a dozen times. The pastor of this church did a lot of counseling with Jeremy and I before we got married, and we respect him. Pretty good foundation, just with that eh? Yeah, I thought so too.
I don't know, it's all kind of strange. For the last 2 years, I've been so completely against church. Not that I judged or begrudged anyone who attended, but I sure wasn't ready to take a similar plunge. Now here I am, just a few weeks later, and I met with said pastor today to ask how we go about getting involved.
Yeah, that's right. Not only am I going to church, I'm committing myself entirely. As I told the pastor today...I'm honestly terrified. In the last ten years alone, I've been through three different churches, each ending in their own horrific way. The idea of becoming involved in a group, and once again giving myself entirely to it's mission (which, is a pretty standard theological Christian practice, don't you think?) is pretty scary. But I know that if I don't just jump in, I'm going to stand on the edge forever, warily dipping my toes in. My feeling is that if I'm gonna do it, I might as well DO it. Besides...I'm pretty sure the Bible has a thing or two to say about living your life in a "lukewarm" fashion, none of which ends well for the "lukewarm-ee".
(lukewarm-ee = toe dipper)
"Thing...Number Two"-- Responsibility
Two times in the past 5 days, I've heard people talking about responsibility. I don't know about you, but I've tried to shy away from that particular word for a long...long...time. Not to say I'm not a responsible person! (we're all works in progress though, right?) I'm also not saying that I don't like taking responsibility for my actions. If I messed something up, I'll be the first to admit it! But when it comes to stuff that happens TO me, I'm much more likely to point the finger.
I was having coffee with a friend today, and she said something that really stuck with me all day. After she said it, I told her there was probably a sermon in there somewhere! Now I'm hoping that she won't mind that I'm kind of pulling it out right now. Here's what she said...
"There is freedom in taking responsibility."
I've heard this before, but today, in the context in which she shared it...it hit me in a new place. I'll explain from my personal experiences...
I have to take responsibility for my own actions and feelings during each of these "church" experiences.
Yeah, people got stupid. Yeah, I got hurt. I'm not belittling that in the least, but enough time has now passed that I can look at it more objectively. I can admit that I was naive, and actually pretty stupid myself. I set those people up on a pedestal where no mere man belongs. I didn't make them "gods" in my eyes, but I did set them up for failure.
I set them up to disappoint me. Does that make sense? By elevating their post/status/position in my head, I set them apart from myself, and subconsciously or not, expected more from them. When in reality, they...just like myself...have fallen short of the glory of God. No title, position, or status can save you from that.
So when it happened, I was crushed. Then it happened again. More crushing. Then again. At that point, I was obliterated. I swore off church. But in the end, that only hurt me! The churches of central Virginia weren't crying and gnashing their teeth because I wasn't in attendance! Heck, they didn't even know I was missing! Here I thought I was really sticking it to them...but my anger and bitterness didn't phase them a bit. Funny how that works.
All that being said, (and yes, this has gotten long...thanks for sticking with it) I'm hereby taking responsibility for my own actions regarding my church past. I'm not ignoring the fact that mean things were said, and horrible things done. Those things can't just be completely forgotten. But I'm hoping that this is just one more step towards my ultimate freedom from all this. Because I want that freedom.
I'm going to sign off here, but I want to give you some advice. Take it to heart or not, this is indeed only a blog.
Don't be afraid to take responsibility for the things that have happened in your life. Doing so isn't excusing the bad stuff. It's not letting the bad guys get away with anything. It's not even about accepting the "blame" for something. But I feel like, for me...it is about moving on. It's about letting go. It's about learning and growing. I can't hold myself responsible for how others treat me. But I do have to own up to my feelings, my words, my actions.
So yeah. Here we are. One more step down. Hmm, make that 2 steps actually. After all, I will be in church again this Sunday. :-)
