New church "home"

The Tarletons have found a new church home. Although it doesn't feel like "home" yet, I'm sure it will with time. Once again the Lord placed me in a new church that I was very resistant to at first (Go back and read blogs "Transition Team" part 1 & 2 for THAT explanation!). Florence Baptist was the first church that Rodney visited while he was living alone in the Kroger-provided apartment. Even he admitted maybe the services were a bit too "polished" for his liking and it was definitely too crowded; but he was intrigued with the fact that they had a fully functioning videography ministry (He had always had to start one in our last three churches!) and something just kept drawing him back there. When the girls and I visited with him, we agreed about the "too polished" comment and you could almost not find a place to sit and you DEFINITELY couldn't find a place to park if you were not a visitor AND got there early! I didn't want to go back but Rodney reminded me that it was never the music program or even the preaching that brought us to a church....it was always the Sunday School. We have always joined a church despite their music and sometimes despite their preaching; we would fall in love with the church family that we met when we would visit their Sunday School. I told Rodney, however, that I didn't even want to visit Sunday Schools till we were certain where we would be living permanently. After all, I didn't want to attach to a people, then move 20-30 minutes away. We've always believed in serving in a church in our immediate area when possible, then you will be serving YOUR local community and building up Christian fellowship in YOUR area. So I persuaded him to start visiting other worship services within 15 minutes of Florence. Some of my previous blogs documented a few of these visits; we visited about six other churches. These visits did help us to focus in on what we really did want in a church....and what we did NOT want!

Once we knew we were going to live in the nearby Walton community we started visiting Sunday Schools. I didn't even allow the first Sunday School to be Florence Baptist! But once we DID visit Florence Baptist's Sunday School, we were blown away. This is a huge church body...about 1200 attend Sunday morning worship....yet we were not allowed to be a nameless face in the crowd. Pastor Pete (pastor of young adults and media) met us at the door to the education building and had other youth take our teens to class and sit with them. He directed us to a warm, fun class where we were immediately made to feel welcome. Our small group teacher, David, went out of his way every time we showed up to make us feel special. Pastor Rodney (Senior associate pastor) took a special interest in us and still stops us weekly to see if we are getting plugged in. We've been visiting all the small groups of our age and each group has been very friendly and accepting. Dang it! The Lord was doing it again! He was drawing me into a church I hadn't even liked! Sometimes I think God is up there, ribbing one of his angels, saying "Watch this hard-headed one, Gabriel...watch her put up a fight again...every time!"

One by one, my objections were being knocked down. Sure, they were a large church...but they went out of their way MORE than the smaller churches to make us feel welcome. The services were a little more formal, polished, maybe even rehearsed-feeling than we liked....but the music WAS good and we always enjoyed Pastor Tim's (senior pastor) messages. The parking was atrocious and the building was crowded but they were about to move into a new huge, spacious building with plenty of parking in a couple of months just....now get this...9 minutes from our new home....ok, ok, that IS my community now *sigh*. I still felt resistant...it wasn't what I had in mind. But there was that incredibly tall steeple of the new building just mocking me every time I drove that way....which was every other day! One day, as I was driving by again, I felt the Lord say to me "This IS the one, Joy." As my eyes followed the steeple, I finally said "Ok, Lord, wherever you want me." I don't know why I always make it so hard. My husband never agonizes like I do...it is always an easy decison for him.

We just joined 3 weeks ago and attended this past week the new member's informational luncheon. Obviously, the staff of this church has read the book "Simple Church" by Thom S. Rainer and Eric Geiger because this church patterns exactly their model church! Their process and strategy are the same: Know (worship), Grow (small groups), Live (Service), and Share (sharing/evangelizing) the Truth. As a member you are expected to do all four...which is how it should be...don't join a church if you aren't ready to work shoulder to shoulder with fellow Christians to build the Kingdom! Rebecca is already making friends in the 6th grade class; Rodney will be approaching the media pastor about his area of expertise, videography, in the next few days; I have already been practicing with the choir and will be singing with them for the first time this Sunday (backing up Clay Crosse, a well-known Christian music artist of the 90's!); Rodney and I already have talked to Pastor Phillip (worship pastor) about helping with their passion plays and other major dramas; Michelle, Rebecca and I will be helping with their VBS in June. We are trying to begin to integrate into the life of this church.

It is still difficult though. Michelle doesn't really feel welcomed by any of the older youth; even though she is an eleventh grader, the only ones making her feel welcome are the ninth graders. It is hard to go from being the lead singer, lead actress, congo player, and one of the leaders of the youth to a new youth who is really nobody in the youth group. I feel her pain. Nobody really knows us here. It is like our slate is wiped clean and we have to start all over again. Like we have to "prove" ourselves again. When people see our faces, they don't think: videography, crisis pregnancy center, youth band, drama, singing, home school guru, Sunday School teacher, etc. They just think "new people". We really don't have any friends here in Cincinnati area at all yet...so it is still very lonely. But hopefully, that will change soon.... now that we have made the big step of choosing a new church home...or did WE really choose it?