Sometimes things happen that cause you to lose faith. Not my faith in God but my faith in people and in particular, the church. Something happened to me that shook me to the core and really challenged my faith.
This post has been on my heart and my mind for months now. Lately my blogging hasn't really been from the heart, just surface stuff. I keep feel this tugging that I need to share this story.....I'm not really sure why.. I blog to share my story and share what's on my heart and keeping this story to myself doesn't feel right.
When we moved 9 months ago we left behind an amazing church family. My heart aches for what we used to have. Once we moved we set out on a mission to find a new church family, settle in right away and plant roots. Turns out that's much harder than I thought.
We had been trying a particular church out for a couple months and one Sunday morning I decided I would be brave and take Sadie to church alone, since my husband was working a day shift.
Sadie has always been a very happy and vocal baby. We were in the balcony just enjoying the worship that Sunday morning. Sadie was really enjoying it and singing along in her own loud way. Someone hands me a note. I tuck it away thinking it's a positive encouragement. I hold Sadie tight and and just enjoy the time with her.
Someone taps me on the shoulder and says that I have been asked to leave the service since my baby is being a "distraction" to the congregation.
I quickly leave and try and hold myself together. I think to myself "did that just happen???"
I rush to the nursery and the tears start falling. I feel betrayed and extremely offended. Luckily there were some lovely ladies in there that I could talk to.
The note wasn't what I thought it would be at all.
I won't go into too much more detail of what happened that day. My heart still hurts and is still healing from what happened at that church months ago. We did meet with the church to discuss what happened but unfortunately we haven't been back.
" Then Jesus called for the children and said to the disciples, "Let the children come to me, Don't stop them! For the Kinddom of God belongs to those who are like these children."
This scripture is truth. I don't share this story to gossip or slander the church. I share this story in hopes that anyone else that has been hurt by the church has the courage to go back and try it again. Church is run by people. People make mistakes. We've forgiven the church and are now ready to move on.
The world is a broken place and that's why we need Christ so much. I hold tight to His truth and promises.
If you've been hurt by the church please, please, give it another shot. Having a church community has made our lives so much richer. We've loved having a little village along side us to help us not only through life's valleys, but joyful things too!
Now that September is finally here (my FAVE month of the whole year!) we are ready to make a fresh start.
It's taken a lot of time but I think we are finally ready to start trying other new churches.
Maybe this was Gods way of leading us to where we are supposed to be. We won't really ever know why this happened. I hope that because of this some changes were made in that church. This definitely shook my faith but I know "that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them." Romans 8:28
Sometimes God gives you a double rainbow when you need some hope and a reminder that He is faithful. |
PS- Happy fall!