I grew up going to church every single Sunday. I went to Sunday School, Wednesday confirmation classes, week long overnight summer camps, etc. I even went to an ELCA Lutheran four year college for goodness sake. When I moved to Colorado, I went from living a life surrounded by ELCA Lutherans who held very similar beliefs as myself who all went to church every Sunday, to living in an area where I didn’t know a single person my age who even believed in God, much less who went to church. It was a hard transition, to say the least.
Over the past 12 years, I have honestly gone in waves with my church attendance. Some years I go every week and am in the church choir, some seasons I have chosen to ski with friends instead. For a few years I was the part-time church secretary, and yet months will go by that I just cannot find the motivation to take my small children to church and attempt to keep them quiet and still get something out of the sermon.
This past summer has been one of those seasons wherein we have just not gone. We still pray before meals and at bedtime with our kids, and we talk about God and Faith in our house all the time, but Sunday morning church just hasn’t happened.
For the past few days (weeks? months?), my head and heart have been spinning. Between regular work/life stress, marriage stress, my Mom’s cancer diagnosis, and now the Trump presidency, I’ve just been pushed over the edge. I honestly think I’m depressed, and I knew when I woke up today that I needed to make the effort to get to church, whether or not I felt like it.
Today our Minister opened up with a speech about the election. She clearly was struggling with the results as well, though she was doing her best to be open-hearted about it all, probably because we live in an area that’s roughly a 60/40 split when it comes to political parties and beliefs. I greatly appreciated her effort to remind us all that God is above all of this, and though we can’t control how this election has gone, we can control how we treat those around us and what we fight for moving forward, and that’s what matters.
After the Silent Reflections & Prayer, the congregation sang their new “Centering Song,” which they learned last week. Here are the lyrics…
Come and find the quiet center in the crowded life we lead;
find the room for hope to enter, find the frame where we are freed.
Clear the chaos and the clutter; clear our eyes that we can see
all the things that really matter. Be at peace, and simply be.
Um, yeah. I was clearly sobbing by the end of the song. The melody was beautiful, and our congregation sang it slowly and thoughtfully, with so much meaning imbued in our voices and our hearts.
It was exactly what I needed today. 💗🙏🏻🎶
I hear you, we are a bit similar with faith bit up and down. We have also been having a crazy time of it fo so many reason. As I sit in a hotel room in Sydney on what is meant to be my husband and I on a few days of quiet time away together. Our little boy is back in NZ where they are having major earthquakes. All is fine but it all feels a long way at a stressful time. It will be all the sweeter to get back to him and how much we cheerish family.
Oh wow, I’m glad to know your son is okay! Scary times for sure.
We didn’t go at all this summer, but have been going almost every week again now that Sunday schools is back in session. (Lyla goes there.) We had McMister’s parents over for breakfast since they’ll be out of town for Thanksgiving, and I really didn’t want to listen to anyone talking positively about Trump at all. But after seeing this and a fb post from a Catholic friend in Utah, I regret not going and hearing what the priest had to say. No matter what he said, I wish I would’ve heard it. I hope getting back into the church swing of things helps a little for you.
Yeah, honestly, part of the reason I went was JUST to hear what she’d say about it. I am 100% not in the mood to hear positives about Trump, and if she’d have supported his -phobic stances in any way, shape or form, I’d have honestly gotten up and walked out. BUT, I was impressed with how she handled it, and between that opening and the song we sang, it did my heart good. Also, in place of the sermon this week was a discussion with a 91 year old woman from town who served in WAVES in WWII – it was VERY cool to hear about her experience!
We go to church pretty steadily every Sunday and on Holy Days and my kids attend a parochial school.
Our priest talked about the election as well, and talked about it in terms of God giving us 2 hands and needing the right AND the left…a balance, not having one stronger than the other which to me was a great way of rationalizing it.
Thanks for sharing!
Reading this post healed my heart ❤️ Thank you.
Just read this JJ and it moved me to tears. These are troubled times. But it always comes down to Jesus’ bottom line – love God with all your heart and love your neighbors as yourselves. Because love really does trump hate. And light really does overcome darkness. And we can’t make other people behave as we want, we can only choose our own path and words. Every little ‘ting is gonna be alright! Mucho love daughter of mine. xxMom
We went to church religiously (ha!) when I was growing up. We go about, um, quarterly now. We should do more but until E can go to Sunday school and stay put there without me, I’m less motivated to go. I love the church but not the kids’ programs :/
Yeah, Harv ended up sleeping in my lap most of the service this past Sunday. Ha! But not until after he told the congregation during the children’s sermon that “my dog poops in the garden.” You know, on the open mic. HAHAHA