Tag Archives: prayer

I Didn’t Go To Church For 3 Months. This Is What I Learned.

09 Thursday Jul 2015

Posted by in For the Love of People, Love, Personal Growth, Uncategorized

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Its Sunday morning.  I am sitting in the place where Americans gather to laugh and love and converse about life, the place where lives are encouraged and transformed for the better, the place that has come to be one of my favorite symbols of comfort and rejuvenation.  Yes, it is a beautiful bustling day at my local Starbucks.  You walk in, you pick your version of hope in a cup, you walk out feeling a little bit wiser and just a little bit more prepared to handle the troubles of the day.  Isn’t that what Sunday mornings are for- grabbing a little hope in a cup to take with you for the rest of the week?

I didn’t go to church for nearly 3 months.  That might not be shocking to some, but for me that is a huge statement.  I have spent most of my post-college, adult life highly involved in everything church related.  However, this past winter due to some uncontrollable circumstances combined with transitional timing and life in general, church was not a place in which I could be found.  After a few weeks I became aware of my absence and I began to take note of some changes that were going on in my spiritual life.  I started questioning why, as Christians, we go to church.  I started questioning why I go to church.  What is church anyways?  I know the answers I have been given from a life time of sermons, catechism classes, and Sunday School teachings but I needed to discover the answers for myself.  So I decided to talk to God about it as I trekked through an unusual winter sans church.  These were my findings.

  1. Church can exist outside of the a building.

Now I know that wherever 2 or more are gathered in His name then Jesus is present but during my dry spell from  church I actually experienced a completely different idea of what church could be.  It was so simple and reminded of how Jesus would often meet with people throughout the bible.  It was all about the food.   Friends, family members, and people we had just met would gather around our dining room table during the winter of no church and we would commence in some pretty spectacular discussions on faith, the bible, and pretty much everything you could think of that we experience on a daily basis.  You know…. Life.

I remember one particular evening sitting at the table after a big enchilada and Spanish rice dinner with some guests and thinking to myself that the dinner conversation was one of the most spiritually stimulating discussions that I had participated in for a long time. The conversation was honest.  I wished that I could have this all the time.  Wouldn’t it be great if this was how church happened always?  But of course, that is exactly how church began.  Jesus didn’t always sit in a building and wait for people to come to him.  He went to people’s houses and shared meals with them.  Even after Jesus had left this earth, His disciples would gather together in their homes and just talk.  They would share about what Jesus had done in their lives and how they experienced Jesus in their personal lives.

2.  You can still have a fruitful growth/ healthy walk with Christ without going to the physical building of a church.

No church did not equal no relationship with God.  In fact, I was clinging to my faith even more during those quiet months.  It was uncomfortable.  It felt wrong to not be going to church as if I was going to have my Christian card revoked.  I was constantly thinking about it.  So, I was constantly praying about it and journaling and reading.  I spent a lot of time alone, with nothing more than my bible, my journal, a cup of coffee and my conversations with God through prayer.  I wish I had the time to share with you right now all of the things I discovered about Jesus,  myself, my faith, and the world around me during those months of alone time with God.  We’ll just save those stories for another time.  I had such a fear that I would withdraw from my faith if I did not go to church consistently.  It was a refreshing relief to realize that church is not at the center of my relationship with God.  Nope, GOD is actually at the center of my relationship with God.  I think in a lot of ways attending church and serving in church ministries and participating in church activities had become a point system for me.  I had always been warned about that but never thought it could happen to me.  Those months with no church were a reset button on my spiritual life.  It was a time for God to clear away some of the gunk that was crowding our relationship and get my eyes focused on what was actually more important.  Him.  Which leads me to my next observation:

3.  Without the distractions of church your eyes are opened to be able to see the world around you and the people that God loves who aren’t going to church.

What am I going to wear?  What am I going to make for the church potluck?  What is going to be my lesson for  Sunday school class?  These were just a few of the questions that would fill my brain in previous seasons of churchgoing.  Notice that God is not actually a part of any of those questions.  But I was serving.  Right?  Serving has always been one of my arguments as to the necessity of church.  We need to be serving others and church always needs volunteers.  This is true.  But you know who else needs volunteers?  THE WORLD.

The winter church- solitude brought with it acquaintances with non-church goers.  Real people with very little to non-existent faith in a God who can bring peace to your life.  People with real problems, addictions, and pain.  People that churches had turned away in one way or another.  People who did not feel comfortable going to church because the church goers would ask you to take off your hat or to cover up your tattoos or to pretty much change your entire self before you come to the altar.  People who Jesus said to love and to win over with said love.  I guess, you could count all those months without a steeple  as research as to why people do not go to church.  Plain and simple: the church can be a very judgmental and daunting place sometimes especially to someone who is not accustomed to the culture of church.

When I wasn’t busy with churchy activities I really began to observe how there is this group-think mentality that is plaguing our churches.  It is this nebulous bubble that, if you are not careful, you can find yourself trapped in.  I really never noticed it before and I really didn’t even know that I was a part of it, but during those 3 months I could really see it clearly because I was on the outside with the outsiders and looking in did not look so good.  This is what it looked like.  As followers of Christ, we adopt all of these other beliefs that really have nothing to do with Jesus dying on the cross for our salvation.  These beliefs might have more to do with politics or cultural preferences.  After a while, each church begins to appear homogenous  in that its congregants tend to agree on  ideas not in the bible.  The average outsider cannot tell that there is a line between biblical truths and personal preferences because everyone seems to agree on just about everything from dress code to radio stations to political party to social graces.  The outsider sees this and thinks that being a Christian means knowing better than to wear a hat in church or knowing which way to vote.  To the outsider it is overwhelming and it is clear when you don’t fit in.   We wear these beliefs as badges and present them on social media.  These “belief badges”  have nothing to do with the love of Christ but we excuse it as love or pride even though it looks and feels unwelcoming and exclusive.  We relish in the us versus them mentality and when we go to church we join the congregation in cheering each other on and shaming the behaviors of the very souls that we claim to be praying for all the while failing to see our own shortcomings and forgetting to first take all of our concerns to God through prayer.

Yeah, I’m guilty of joining in on the group-think.  The idea is that we can all band together and encourage each other’s soapboxes that distract us from the sermon on the mount which says, “but I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,”  Mathew 5:44.  We claim that we pray for our enemies and we are happy to post on our social media of choice that we are praying for our enemies.  But what about Mathew 6:1 “Beware of practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven.” and Mathew 6:5-6 “When you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by men.  Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.  But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door and pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.”

There is a real world out there that needs to know what love truly is.  In my research, the world thinks we look angry.  Maybe I now sound angry and judgmental too.  Like I said,  I am guilty of all of this as well.  I have been convicted that this cycle is not helping the world it is actually driving people further and further away from Jesus.  I’m ready to try something new.  You too?

4.  You fall in love with Jesus all over again.

Ok,  I might have gotten really passionate about that last one and I hope I didn’t lose you because this one right here is my favorite.  When I didn’t go to church for 3 months the best thing happened to me: I fell in love with Jesus all over again.  I don’t know, maybe the time away from the rows of pews was like a vacation for me and  my savior to relax and enjoy each other’s company.  Since I was often alone with nothing more than my prayers it became easier to pray throughout the day.  And while I was praying/ meditating throughout the day I began to see more and more how I need Jesus in every second of my life.  Left to my own devices, I am nothing but selfishness and mischief.  I already knew that I need Jesus every single day of my life but because I was in a state of heightened awareness my self-reflection was highlighted.  In evaluating myself all I could think was thank God I have my Jesus.  Thank God I have a savior who saves me from myself!

5.  I miss church as a community.

I’m still not exactly sure what is at the root of #5.  Maybe it’s the Catholic school girl in me that just adores systems and organization and the routine of going to church on Sundays.  Maybe it is because the new testament speaks of gathering together to pray for one another and to worship together.  Maybe it is because I really missed hearing about God from someone else’s perspective.  Whatever it is, I really missed going to church as a family.  Please understand that this list is not an encouragement to not go to church.  I did not purposely skip out on church.  I think it was a gift; a short season of my life for me to reflect on why I do what I do and a season to listen to what church needs to become for me.  It was a time of preparation.  I’m pretty sure I already knew some of this but I needed to be reminded and my thoughts refreshed.  It’s one thing to be told these things, it is another to experience it firsthand.

All across the country churches are changing, adapting to the next generation.  I have been to churches  held inside of coffee shops.  I have been to coffee shops housed inside of churches.  Sometimes I wish that church could be as simple as the experience of going to the coffee shop.  You walk in at your own pace wearing whatever you just so happen to be wearing because you are going to a place where you know you will feel comfortable.  Someone pours something wonderful into your cup or places something delicious on your plate.  You sit down with a small group of people and listen and speak and pray and savor.  Perhaps you take a moment to enjoy the music that plays in the background.  You pour out your heart as Jesus is poured into you.  Pass the sugar and cream please- I could get used to that!

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Help Part III: The Heart of the Matter

04 Wednesday Feb 2015

Posted by in Faith, For the Love of People, Living Unbound, Love

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This is not my image. But it was so beautiful and I love Les Mis quotes- I just had to share

This is not my image. But it was so beautiful and I love Les Mis quotes- I just had to share

A loaded gun sits on the table.  The argument escalates.  A second later, a man is dead.  And it was all over a waterbed frame and $96.

On April 29, 20 year old Richard was sentenced to life in prison for the murder of his friend, Mark*.   Mark worked with Richard out on the oil rigs of Texas.  In the months that preceded  the murder, Mark had stolen money from Richard, had assaulted Richard’s girlfriend, and had written some hot checks.  Tension was building by the time April 15, 1984 came around when Richard was to buy a waterbed frame from Mark.  Mark took the money but did not provide the bed frame.  For the hot-tempered Richard who described himself as a hooligan at that time, it was the last straw.  Mark came over to Richard’s house that night to discuss the situation.  Unfortunately, Richard’s hot temper boiled over and exploded into an untimely death for Mark.

Richard knew he was playing with fire that night.  He had purposely left a loaded gun on the kitchen table as a warning to Mark that he was ” about to get tail- kicked” in Richard’s words.  When I asked Richard if the shot was an accident he was clear to mention that he grew up in the Ozark mountains of Arkansas shooting squirrel straight in the eye. Richard was a good shot, he knew what he was aiming at.

Richard spent his first 8 years or so in and out of solitary confinement due to his rebellious spirit.  He went 6 years without seeing the natural sunlight of day.  Other inmates steered clear of Richard; his hot-tempered nature branded him with a reputation of a man that was not to be reckoned with.  When he was not in solitary confinement Richard was the go to man for your every need.  Weed, cigarettes, money, you name it  Richard could find a way to get it to you.  If he was a hard man before the murder then prison had only made him worse.

In 1992, a prison ministry began 4 day bible retreats for inmates.  Richard participated in these bible studies as a way to break up the norm; it was a way to have a little more freedom.  I imagine Richard sitting in a circle with other hardened inmates, perhaps feeling vulnerable.  He was a man that never turned his back to anyone but in those bible studies he was asked to share the most intimate of ideas- faith.  It must have been difficult for him to break down some of those walls but Richard was tired of his “hard living.”  He was ready for a new start.

When Richard and I sat down together recently to discuss this time in his life, he continuously referred to an illustration in which you feel like you are at a hole at the bottom of a ladder that you just can’t quite reach.  You want to get out but you just can’t get to that ladder.  Richard felt like he was beneath that hole and really needed someone to reach down and pull him up.

During this prison ministry Richard experienced well versed Christians teaching these classes but, in his opinion, it seemed like they were totally missing the point.  It was clear that they knew the bible backwards and forwards but they still came off a bit stand offish and it was hard for some men to relate to the lofty concepts that were being presented.  While these Christians were well meaning, it was the Christians in the group who, in Richard’s words, “fell down a lot” that he could really identify with.  It was the people who were honest and admitted that they were not perfect- these were the people that caught Richard’s attention.  It didn’t matter if they were well versed in theology.  These Christians, you know, “kept it real”.  They made a relationship with Jesus Christ seem attainable even for someone like Richard.

According to Richard, Jesus got a hold of his life and hit him like a bolt of lightning. Inmates would comment that nothing made Richard mad anymore.  Try as they might, other inmates could not ruffle Richard’s feathers.  Richard’s hot- tempered nature had melted into a patient peace, a noticeable difference from his tumultuous prison beginnings.

It was this peace that finally allowed Richard to forgive himself for his crime.  Part of Richard’s sentencing stated that Richard was not to make any contact with the victim’s family.  By the time Richard had repented of his crime, Mark’s family members were all deceased.  Through prayer, Richard apologized to Mark and his family anyways and asked for their forgiveness.  At this point Richard decided to dedicate his life to Mark and his family.

From that moment forward Richard sought an education for himself, learned several trades, and set his mind towards being a light in a dark place- dedicating every action to the life that Mark never got to live.  The way Richard saw it was that both he and Mark were on a path of destruction and now that Richard had changed the course of his own life, he owed it to Mark to live in such a way that it would honor Mark’s life as well.  Richard felt like it was his duty to give Mark a second chance at life in this way.  It would be his life-long burden and pleasure to live a good life for Mark.

That might seem like an undeserved privilege- to live a good life after you have taken someone’s life but it is indeed a cross to be carried.  If it were me, I could see myself crippled with guilt at the thought that I had taken someone’s life.  The guilt would probably weigh me down to the point of no relief.  Burying yourself with guilt is the easy way to deal with a situation like this.  It is much more difficult to receive the free and easy grace of God and forgive yourself.  Richard says, “You have to forgive yourself or you can never deal with the consequences.”  That made a lot of sense to me.  If you don’t forgive yourself then every time you face a consequence for your crime, such as not having a place to sleep at night once you are out of prison,  that debilitating guilt would creep back in and drag you back into darkness.  Then all the work that God had done in your life would be in vain and that little light would be snuffed out completely.  Perhaps the guilt would be so heavy that it would lead you back to another tragedy, another death.  I’ll take forgiveness over darkness any day.

After 29 years and 6 months in prison, Richard was released on parole probably in large part due to health issues.  Richard’s heart was beginning to fail him and it was costing the state too much money to keep him in prison.

Richard thought that he might die in prison because of his heart condition, but his heart condition ended up being his ticket out.  I find that as a kind of poetic justice; Richard’s heart could no longer be confined to a prison cell.  It is especially satisfying to see him on the outside, healthy, receiving proper medication, and always wearing bright colors.  Richard loves to wear shockingly bright colors of the highlighter palette.  Yes, Richard is a neon sign shining through the darkness flashing “mercy,” “grace,” “forgiveness.

“Do I deserve freedom?  NO!”  was Richard’s response to my husband’s questioning about how he felt now that he was out.    “All I can do is live right and follow the letter of the law and be thankful.”  With every blessing, with every lovely thing in life Richard thinks of Mark and strives towards goodness all the while flashing the neon light of his story.

*Denotes that name has been changed.

Again, not my image but Les Mis quotes just go so perfectly with Richard's story.

Again, not my image but Les Mis quotes just go so perfectly with Richard’s story.

Help: Part I- Meeting Mr. Richard

21 Wednesday Jan 2015

Posted by in A Leap of Faith, For the Love of People, Love

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Found on Etsy

“He did 30 years in prison for murder and he has nowhere to go.  I think he should come stay with us,”  the compassion in my husband, Emmanuel’s voice was dripping through my cell phone and into my ears where his words hung suspended in the air.  “Murder?”  I couldn’t get passed that word.

Emmanuel was filling me in on the details of Richard’s case meanwhile my mind was buzzing and fuzzy with images from one of my favorite stories of all time, Les Miserables.  It is a story of redemption for an ex-convict named Jean Valjean who devoted his life to serving God after repenting from a lifetime of crime.  I love that story.  It gets me every time.  But here I was in reality with Jean Valjean knocking at my doorstep and I was too afraid of the what ifs ringing in my ears to shine a ray of hope on a man who so desperately needed it.

“OK.  Yes,”  My own words echoing with finality like a gavel announcing the fate of a defendant.

That’s all it took to get me down on my knees in fervent and frenzied prayer.  It’s amazing how easy it is to pray when you are faced with such an illogical risk like bringing an ex-convict into the same home in which you potty train your children.  If only I prayed with such vigor on an hourly basis.

The people pleaser in me began fretting over what all our friends and family would think.   How could you have a complete stranger sleep under the same roof as your children?  Aren’t you concerned about what could happen?  What if he robs you blind in the middle of the night?

What if…?

What if ….?

What if….?

If you are reading this, then I am willing to bet that similar questions are running through your mind as you read on.   For some, it might put your mind at ease to know that Mr. Richard, as I have come to call him, was in fact very much like my beloved fictional character, Jean Valjean.  When my husband interviewed Mr. Richard we discovered that while in prison, he used his time to repent of his troubled past and found God in the bleakest of places.  Whenever Richard speaks of his repentance and the regret of his actions his eyes glean a sincerity and determination that could strike you to the core.  You get the feeling that if his bones could talk they would sing a prayerful hymn of humility and forgiveness.  “Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me…”

Since his release from prison, Mr. Richard had been crashing on the couch of an acquaintance and persistently looking for a job but to no avail.  After about 6 months or so he found himself in a rut.  It was time for him to move on from his temporary place of residence but he had  nowhere to go, no job, no friends or family in the area of his parole and no possessions to his name.  His search for a job had proven near impossible over the past 6 months as he carried the burden of his crime with every application that he filled out. He had tried every church and shelter in the area.  They helped  in the ways that they could but no one was able to put him up for an undetermined amount of time so that Richard could get his feet on the ground.  He was at the end of his resources.  His family and fiancé were waiting for him in Arkansas but his parole nailed him down in Texas until he could be released to transfer his parole to Arkansas.

This is where his entrance into our lives began:  homeless, wanting to do what’s right but  feeling down on his luck and dragging his feet through the town with no place to go.  Richard sat with his head in his hands on a park bench that lined a nearby walking path with nothing more than his bicycle, $35 in his pocket and feelings of defeat.  Richard had nothing else to do but pray. At this time an acquaintance of ours spotted Mr. Richard and out of the goodness of her heart offered to help Mr. Richard.  How many people do that these days?  How many people see a stranger on the side of the road and pull over to offer a helping hand?  Not many.  But this compassionate woman set aside her own fears and what ifs and did just that.   She and her husband referred Mr. Richard to my husband Emmanuel who, after meeting Mr. Richard and hearing his story was ready to say yes.  He just needed for me to approve.  Thus the phone call while I was supervising the children play at the park.

We had opened the doors of our house to people before.  Some had a stained past and some did not but we had never had anyone come live with us who had committed murder.  Not gonna lie- I was scared.  Even after Mr.  Richard shared his testimony with me and I believed him,  I was still nervous. Who wouldn’t be? After all I am a woman, a mother of two small children, a wife.  This character is usually the one most vulnerable to horror and despair in suspenseful movies and books.  But, as I prayed, there was this gentle flame burning within me- guiding me towards the unknown.  As the flame flickered, the smoke whispered to have faith and trust that God is good and that God is in control.  The usual scriptures came to mind, “God has plans to give me hope and a future….” “If my God is for me whom then shall I fear…”  “Fear not….”  “For such a time like this…” etc. etc.

And, I trusted my husband of course.  The man had always led me to greener pastures.  Emmanuel was always right when it came to things like this.  Recently, Richard admitted to me that what stood out to him the most in this whole situation was that I trusted my husband to take the lead in this pivotal decision.  He saw it as a testimony of the strength of our marriage.  While I accepted the compliment, I did not view the situation that way.   I saw it more as a conversation between myself and my God.  I had been praying for months for God to show me how to be a servant and here was the perfect opportunity.  I saw this as a lesson in faith and dependence on the grace of God.

Mr. Richard walked through the door and Emmanuel introduced us, the kids nipping at my heels.

I smiled and shook his hand.  Richard promised me that he would do whatever was asked of him and thanked me profusely.  Meanwhile, I was praying like crazy.  Praying.  Praying.  And then more praying.    I got Mr. Richard towels.  Prayer.  I showed him around the house.  Prayer.  I introduced him to the kids.  Prayer.

I ushered the kids off to bed and braced myself for a sleepless night.  I had no idea what was coming around the corner.  Sleeping in my downstairs family room amidst legos and yoga mats and the laundry was an older, Arkansas parolee who had shot a man.  This would either be the beginning of a heart- warming and triumphant story a la Les Miserables or it would turn out to be something else.  Spoiler alert- it’s the former.

But the story is not in the destination; it is in the journey. I hope that you will come back and accompany Mr. Richard on his journey.  Having been one of his companions on this crazy ride, I can tell you that you won’t want to miss it.  Stay tuned.

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