Looking for a Home Church

         I didn't feel like writing today but I have a lot of entries that I need to finish some day so I thought I should to one of the oldest ones today and this subject has been on my mind a lot lately. More then it has lately. It started to be on my mind in Dec. but I really started seeing and thinking more about it this month. Don't take it the wrong way I have now found a home church here in AR that I love too death but as I am saying that now it is the first time that I have really meant it since I have started going to the same exact church for 4 years.
         It took me 4 years to where I can get to saying that and feel truthful when I do say it but I think that has a lot to do with me and what I was looking for in a "home" church. That is why the title is what it is. A lot of people say they are looking for a "home" church and who am I to judge what they think that means. This entry is going to talk about what it means for me and this is what I found out and how I feel this church is to me now and the service I go to. First off, I was scared of going to a big church because I grew up in those small country churches out in the country on the gravel road. I didn't know what a big church was like but I knew it had more things to do for people my age then any small church would and they would need a lot of help serving different places. I love to serve too.
        I started out going to this church during the late Sunday morning services because that is what I was use to growing up. Going to church every Sunday morning. As I kept going, it just kept getting bigger and bigger and more people. I couldn't stand it. While going to that service, though, I was looking to get involved with a community group with other singles and I did that is how I moved the the 6:45 Saturday night service. The community group went to that one so then so did all my friends. The more I spread out into different community groups and Bible studies like Women's Bible studies and just some classes they had I got to know more and more people that went to Saturday nights.
         I also started to serve with that church with a friend on Sunday mornings in a Kindergarten classroom and that was so fun! That is a memory I will never forget. I miss that time but it was time to move on I felt like. Things could only get better or at least I was hoping. I found my community group and mission groups I could go on and hang out with and that is how I got to know more people next. Again, some of the best days of my life but it still wasn't for me. I couldn't live everyday life with them even though they were the right people for that time. I liked going out and eating afterwards every Saturday but then it got boring for me and taking up some of my time when I could be doing something else. I just had to reschedule my life in a way after that. Things just didn't feel good there. I feel like I wasn't accepted after they got to know the true me plus I couldn't get close to anyone because it would always be a big group of us. If you know me, you know I don't like that.
           While I was going through that transition, I was also serving and I think served for about a year with the infants on Saturday nights during the 5:00 service the service I didn't go to then. In a way I feel like I was doing all of this, just so certain people would like me. Just so I would fit in with the big company people but the more and more I hung with me, the more I realized it was not me at all. I needed to step back and return to being myself. That is when I started going to the 5:00 service by myself and sitting by myself. I mean I knew people that went but we weren't very close at that time. There was a stage in my life during that time that I felt so strange sitting by myself. I felt like everyone was staring at me because I was by myself.
           Then I realized it is not about the people around me. It is about how I worship God the best and that is being alone anywhere. I can't have any interruptions around me like people whispering around me. I like to think about what is being said and write it down. I'm a deep thinker. God took some time to show me that. There was a time in my life that I had to be by myself for a reason. Then I felt God calling me to the Discovery Class, where if you want to be a "member" you can take that class and find out more about the church and meet the pastors and leaders. I think that class helped me a lot to understand what the church is for and the people in it. You think that would be enough to prove and put things together in my mind for me that this was the prefect home church in AR. It didn't.
            I needed that one special step and God knew what it was. It was talking to a friend that is not there often but yet seeing how that friend really misses it when the friend is gone on trips. The friend told me that listening to podcast is okay but being around family and at a church that feels like family is better and what I like. I miss it when I'm not here. That moment I could of and did agree with my friend. There is something in the church that just makes it feel like home even when you are by yourself most of the time. That something is God's presence. Again, I am starting slowly this year to help serve in the toddler building and seeing how that goes for me with everything else going on. We'll see how 6 days per week with toddler will do with my health. They need me in the children's ministry so as long as they need me anywhere in that ministry, I will stay for sure. :)
           The main things for me when I look for a home church is: comfortable, where I can feel God's presence, where I can hear the truth in new and creative ways yet it is still from the Bible, and where I can serve and am needed in the children's ministry.