A Year Ago.....

We have been at FBC for a year.  This past Sunday marked one year since we first visited.  That first Sunday everything was so different.  I was a nervous wreak.  I didn't really want to be there.  My only experience of FBC was attending Vacation Bible School there as a child.  To say I didn't like it would have been an understatement.  I thought it was boring and everybody was really old.  Yet Randy insisted.  He had heard of the preacher.  He had researched the church.  He really thought it may be a good fit for our family.  So we visited just over a year ago.  It seems like it hasn't been that long at all....it still seems so new!  We never left.  We never visited another church after First Baptist and we had some others on our list.  We just couldn't bear to miss a week.  The teaching ministered to our souls.  It challenged us.  It encouraged us to grow!

The hardest part of changing churches, without a doubt, has been building relationships.  They take time.  Home Fellowships have definitely helped with developing friendships.  It is starting to feel like home.  We are making friends.  Relationships are developing.  We are sharing life experiences.  We are being sanctified.  We are maturing.  We are being encouraged and prayed for and loved.  Feeling at home did not happen over night.  It has been slow and lonely.  Changing churches is very hard and very serious and should not be done lightly.  It should only be done for good reasons and with lots of prayer.  I think if in doubt....you should always stay.  Leaving is too hard and too painful.  Yet if it is right and if it is time to leave....then leave.  I would say our experience is that it takes about six months to feel somewhat connected and known and it has taken a full year to start to have real relationships begin to develop. 

As a new person at church I am now much more sensitive to new people at church.  People like my new friend Dana, who is super hospitable and opens her home weekly to our Home Fellowship and monthly for a ladies gathering, has made me feel so included and welcomed.  I am learning that I too can be vulnerable and allow people into my life....for real...like into the doors of my home.  People who called and prayed and visited with us after losing my grandparents....made an impression.  Friends who called after I got bitten by a dog to see if they needed to take care of the dog made me feel protected.  People who noticed I wasn't at Home Fellowship, or Bible for Life, or Church and cared enough to ask made me feel noticed.  These people hardly knew me, yet they cared enough to wonder about me.  A sweet lady who invited me to her home to a ladies Bible Study blessed me.  I have never seen a body who opens their homes and lives so regularly to one another.  Life does not take place primarily at the church or through programs it takes place in each others homes and in the community.  There are real relationships not social relationships.  It is beautiful.  A pastors wife who invited me to tea and called me to chat makes me feel like I have a friend.  Another ministers wife who invited me to run with her and some other ladies made me feel included.  Another ministers wife who regularly encourages me on fb and shared her favorite tea with me makes me feel special. 

FBC has been a blessing to our family.  It is not what I would have chosen.  I am so glad that HE knows what is best and that HIS plan is not based on what I want and desire.  HIS plans really are for our good.  Even if it is different then what I would have chosen HE truly does know best.

Really grateful for FBC Durham.