Addicted

This Sunday was WAY better than last week. I can't begin to describe how good it was to worship with a church family again. I was welcomed into the sanctuary this morning, baby and all, with a "the-more-the-merrier" attitude. My daughter had a great time in the nursery. All in all, it was a wonderful experience.

As I was sitting in the service today it came to the time for communion and I just felt this deep sense of relief. Its like that feeling you get when you've gone without caffeine for a day and finally get that jolt running through your body that makes you go, "Ahh, that's better."

I kinda laughed at myself, in my head of course (can you imagine how weird it would look if I had laughed out loud), and thought, "I'm addicted to communion". What a lovely thing to be addicted to!

Communion has long been my favorite part of the worship service. And the more we move around the more powerful it becomes. It gives me a few minutes out of my crazy week to remember just how BIG our God is and how widespread his body is. Every Sunday I think to myself, "My family in Castlemilk ate at this table today. My LCC tribe ate at this table today. My friends in Colorado, Honduras, Bolivia, Africa, and numerous other places in the world will come to eat at this table today."

For those few minutes, I remember that I'm part of something much bigger than myself, something awesome, something eternal. And no matter what the week held or what the future week will hold, those few minutes are set aside to remember the sacrifice Christ made for me. For those few minutes, I'm reminded that I'm not alone.

Ahh, what a sweet addiction...

One big, happy family?

Today I was escorted out of the main sanctuary in church because I had a baby with me. When I gave the attendant a quizzical look his response was, "You know, to cut down on distractions in the service."

He then proceeded to lead me to the "family room", which doubled as a cafe. He said I could watch the service from the plasma screens posted in the cafe. People all around were munching on food, drinking coffee, talking amongst themselves and a hula class was happening in the courtyard located directly behind the screens. Talk about distracting...

Anyway, as the attendant left me there on my own, I started crying. I was crying because I had been looking forward to going to church all week. I desperately wanted to worship with a church family. I wanted to sing loudly, pray together and sit next to someone who didn't need their diaper changed. For one hour out of the week, I didn't want to worry about unpacking our house, or cleaning laundry or finding ways to sneak veggies into my daughter's diet.

But I was told I could not take part in that.

I was heartbroken. After crying for a bit all by myself, I tried to justify what had happened to me. I tried to understand it. I tried to tell myself that I shouldn't let it get to me.

But that's not true. It's okay, and even right that I'm angry about the way I was treated. I don't think that Jesus would be happy with anyone being asked to leave his sanctuary because someone thought they were a distraction. Wasn't that one of those "learn the hard way" lessons taught to the disciples? How are we still making that same mistake today?

I hope I never make someone feel the way I felt today. I hope that I am never so self-focused that I think that something I do will decide if someone does or does not come to a relationship with Christ. From what I've understood about the scriptures, they way to bring someone into a relationship with Christ is to love them like Christ. And I don't know about you, but I serve a BIG God, an AWESOME God. And if he wants a relationship with someone in that sanctuary, a crying baby isn't going to stop his Spirit from moving in their hearts.

Thankfully, neither will a pharisaical church, which is my one hope for the person who was seeking God at that church today.

Maybe it was the single mother I met in the nursing room. She stayed in there because it was quieter and she could listen to the sermon and take notes. I hope she connected with Christ today, despite being exiled from worshipping with a church family. I pray even harder that she finds a family that will accept her and her daughter rather than shoving them into a nursing room so they don't distract others.

Never Forget

Tomorrow marks the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. Ten years later, it still seems so unreal to me. Like everyone else, I remember every detail of the day. I was a senior in high school, sitting in Speech and Film class when my sophomore English teacher walked in and without saying anything, walked across the room and turned on the television. After 30 seconds, when we had finally processed that one of the towers of the World Trade Center had been hit, we watched in horror as another plane crashed through the second tower. Our world was never the same.

Of the people I went to high school with, about 1/3 of the students who were within a few years of me went into the military. That's kind of what you get in small town America. But the one beautiful thing that came out of 9/11 was that a day that was meant to tear our country apart, brought us closer together than ever before, and in a way that I've not seen since.

We were all hurt. We were all sad. We were all determined to never let it happened again. We all came together in confusion, in anger, in prayer. We were united.

Since that day 10 years ago, 9/11 has been declared a National Day of Service and Remembrance. I think that's a beautiful response. It is so easy to just get mad about the events of that day and the way they have changed our world. But we don't need to do that. Instead we can choose to remember that day by serving others.

I've been watching footage about 9/11 today and they don't tell stories about how people were seeking revenge on the attackers. They don't tell stories of hate. They tell stories of service. They talk about people who died that day because they chose to serve others rather than serve themselves.

Many people are serving in very official ways this weekend to remember 9/11. But even if you don't serve at a local charity, I encourage you to find a way tomorrow to serve someone else.

Make dinner for that single mom at your church, do yard work for your elderly neighbors, say a prayer for your nation's leaders. (Even if you don't like your leaders. That actually means you should pray for them even harder and more frequently.)

So ask yourself, how will you remember 9/11? Who will you serve? How can you make your world better? How could our world change if we made the decision to serve others for the next 10 years?

"Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms." 1 Peter 4:10