Saturday, January 10, 2009

A New Adventure

We’ve been members of Wilshire Baptist Church for 14 years.  Wilshire Baptist is a remarkable church.  We love the people, we love the staff, we love the fact that we agree so very completely with most everything the church stands for, but it’s okay if we don’t, and most of all we love George Mason, the pastor.  

We love Wilshire Baptist Church. 

However, the only issue we’ve ever had was the fact that all of my daughter’s friends from school were members at Park Cities Baptist Church, and that’s nothing we, or Wilshire Baptist Church, could control.  

About a year ago, my daughter spent the night with one of those friends and went to church at Park Cities with her family.  

She couldn’t stop talking about it.  

All her friends were there, and she felt connected and plugged in right from the start.  

For a little over a year we’ve been in somewhat of a “Church Membership Limbo.” 

Do we leave the church and a pastor we love?  This is the church that Macy was born in.  It’s the church were she was baptized.  This is the church that stood by us when my dad was fighting cancer. 

This is our church. 

Or do we put the spiritual needs of our daughter before our own?  This is a hard time of life.  It’s a time where we want her to want to be at church.  We want her surrounded with friends who are not only Christians, but they are friends with similar values.  This is our daughter and she’ll only be a teenager once. 

This is our daughter. 

We spent about a year thinking, praying and trying to figure out other possible solutions to our problem.   Do we drive back and forth between the churches every Sunday?  Do we stay at Wilshire and Macy joins Park Cities?  Do stay members at Wilshire, but just attend Park Cities for the next five years until Macy heads off to college?  Or do we take the plunge and simply join Park Cities? 

In the end, we made the decision to change churches.  It was a tough decision and one that didn’t come easy.  I mean, our lives were invested there, but this was a decision the family made for Macy. 

Melissa and I decided that we didn’t want to only half join the church.  Oh no, if we were going to make this move, we where jumping in head first…no "baby pool" membership for us!   

So, before we were even officially members we volunteered to teach eighth grade Sunday school.  We haven’t taught Jr. High Sunday school in over 10 years, but somehow it just felt right.  

The crazy thing is I teach with my chauffer from my volleyball stories, a guy named Keet Beastly.  He’s fun guy, a good teacher and a great new friend.  However, for some reason he reminds me of the strange mumbling guy from the volleyball games…I guess you never know.  

So there’s our new adventure.  

Funny how something that starts off as a problem can turn out so well.

 

Hmm??? It makes you wonder. 




1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Isn't it wonderful how the Lord orchestrates situations and people within our lives so... perfectly? His love for us and unquenching desire to show us, day in and day out, is tough to even try and comprehend.

Equally ironic; what started out as an issue and challenge for your family, ended up as a blessing to ours - beyond what we even could have seen coming. Personally, I am a better teacher, husband and dad for having Hugh Atkinson in my life and being able to count him as a great friend.

Keet da Mumbling Chauffer