Swinging

Joy....if only we could expierence this like we did as a young child swinging on a swing for the very first times to do so. I'm not sure what it is she is doing with her tongue lately but it makes for a really cute picture! I took this monday night at our church picnic. It was a lot of fun. We got to play volleyball, throw the football around, eat burgers and visit with our friends from church like we never really get to on busy sunday mornings. It was neat and I look forward to doing more of that in the future.

It has been an amazing journey thus far being a part of Creekwood Church. Growing up we never went to church. I can remember as a little girl having a little fellowship time around our coffee table with our neighbors....but we never became involved/members of a church. I even had a bad outlook on chruches. I constantly got pressured from friends to "come to this event" or "visit my church". I even had several friends stop hanging out with me because I wasn't babtist and wasn't involved in a church. Then one of my very close friends was repeatedly raped by her youth minister. Not so inviting after you hear about that one. My over all opinion of churches, whether right or wrong at the time, was a negative one. I could never understand why people would get up on one of the only days you get to sleep in just to hear someone preach to them. I could never understand what the big deal was about going to church.

Then on December 3, 2005 my heart, body, mind, and soul did a complete 180 swing. It took 26 years to do but the Lord showed me what the appeal was. We started going to our church that day and haven't missed a service since (except for when all three of us got a wonderful intestinal virus and couldn't be more than 2 feet away from the toilet). We walked into the service with an open heart and a willing spirit. And boy did God show us!! That very first sermon was like we were the only ones in the room and God himself had put these words into our pastor's mouth just for us to hear. We both cried....and I seem to cry at every sermon I hear to date. The worship time is AWESOME! I love music and it is so wonderful when you can enjoy something you totally love AND get to worship our ever loving God at the same time. How beautiful. It is an awesome expierence to feel at "home" with all these people. Every single person has opened their hearts and homes to us from day one. Chris and I both feel that we have so much to offer this church and can't wait til God reveals where He wants us involved. For the first time in my life I wake up on sunday mornings excited. There are no more lazy sunday mornings. GOOD! I love the hurried whirlwind of our little family getting ready on sundays. I long for the songs to start pouring into my ears. I thrive on the words He speaks through Pastor Stephen. I feed off of the spirits of others and warm embraces they bring. I never knew how much I would or even could need other believers and how much they just might need me. God is quite the awesome God.

I now know what those other kids were tring to get me to see. I now know what the appeal of getting up early on sunday morning is. I now am one of those friends who is so enamored with her church that she wants to tell everyone she meets about the wonderful God we have and about the awesome power He has to change a girl's hardened heart towards church. I now know what it feels like to have a home away from home in a church. This home has a wonderfully new meaning to me and I never knew I would adore it so intensely.