It's a Team Sport
Sitting in a hard plastic booth at a local pizza place, I heard myself mutter to my dear friend pathetically, "I just don't feel like I belong. I am different than most at Hope-my background, my life, my beliefs. I just don't feel like I belong there." I thought I was being honest. I thought I knew what belonging meant regarding a faith community. But now, I think I was wrong.
I had been having trouble with "church," and I have plenty of excuses to go with it. The fact is that I have trouble with belonging. Well, maybe the exact truth is that I just have trouble dealing with imperfect, broken people. And maybe that isn't yet the truest truth...I think I really have trouble knowing myself as struggling and broken lately and knowing that I probably am going to make a mess, try to control, throw something or someone out of whack...and that is embarrassing.
But I live in this tension of wanting to connect and be known while wanting to protect myself and guard the unattractive and sometimes dangerous bits.
I have been detaching. My world is shrinking in many aspects and I justify this as my need to take care of myself during these frustrating days with irregular sleep and flash flooding emotions. While I see it as necessary on one hand, I have also given my closest friends permission to speak up if they think I am moving too far away. Which landed me in a pizzeria attempting to reconnect with my friend.
I had received a loving reminder to not wander too far-from my friends or even from the church community. Hope has been my church for years. But things and people and circumstances have changed. I wanted to belong...but it just didn't feel right.
I did what I usually do when I am trying to justify my opinion; I began to research. I decided to look up the definition of "belonging" to make sure I was right. Instead I found that it really isn't just about the feeling but also about with whom is one's affiliation-with whom I stand. In my self-centered, twisted understanding, I had perceived belonging simply as a cozy connectedness, not unlike Goldilocks finding the bed that was "just right." Instead God was asking me, do you stand with me?
Of course I think I do. I just sort of stand with Him alone. But, a friend who points me, time and again, to Hebrews 10 might not agree. Though we haven't talked about it, the more I read those verses, the more I don't think that standing with God alone, belonging to Him on my own outside of community, is correct or healthy.
“let US draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having OUR hearts sprinkled to cleanse US from a guilty conscience and having OUR bodies washed with pure water. Let US hold unswervingly to the hope WE profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let US consider how WE may spur ONE ANOTHER on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting TOGETHER, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging ONE ANOTHER"
Hebrews 10:22-25 NIV
Apparently, belonging to God [the Church, the Body of Christ] is a team sport.
Sure, I can draw near to God, but I have been taught and guided by others in how to recognize the Spirit's activity and how to listen to that still, small Voice that roars. I could hold on, white knuckling through the dark nights, but witnessing others, who also belong, holding on despite deaths, diagnosis, and disappointments encourages me that I can do the same.
I don't know how to belong really. How to choose to be a part of something when I feel so different and awkward. When I don't have the energy reserves to do something that gives me purpose and justifies my presence. When I don't have the emotional reserves to make sure I feel safe and push aside the lies that cause me to shut down.
There is an intimacy in belonging: a deliberate choosing to be a part of, not just feel a part of and a conscious choosing to be vulnerable to others and God, most of all to God, as He uses others to grow me.
I am still scared to choose to belong, but I can at least choose to show up this Sunday. Even if the service is boringly passive. But that's a post for another day.
I had been having trouble with "church," and I have plenty of excuses to go with it. The fact is that I have trouble with belonging. Well, maybe the exact truth is that I just have trouble dealing with imperfect, broken people. And maybe that isn't yet the truest truth...I think I really have trouble knowing myself as struggling and broken lately and knowing that I probably am going to make a mess, try to control, throw something or someone out of whack...and that is embarrassing.
But I live in this tension of wanting to connect and be known while wanting to protect myself and guard the unattractive and sometimes dangerous bits.
I have been detaching. My world is shrinking in many aspects and I justify this as my need to take care of myself during these frustrating days with irregular sleep and flash flooding emotions. While I see it as necessary on one hand, I have also given my closest friends permission to speak up if they think I am moving too far away. Which landed me in a pizzeria attempting to reconnect with my friend.
I had received a loving reminder to not wander too far-from my friends or even from the church community. Hope has been my church for years. But things and people and circumstances have changed. I wanted to belong...but it just didn't feel right.
I did what I usually do when I am trying to justify my opinion; I began to research. I decided to look up the definition of "belonging" to make sure I was right. Instead I found that it really isn't just about the feeling but also about with whom is one's affiliation-with whom I stand. In my self-centered, twisted understanding, I had perceived belonging simply as a cozy connectedness, not unlike Goldilocks finding the bed that was "just right." Instead God was asking me, do you stand with me?
Of course I think I do. I just sort of stand with Him alone. But, a friend who points me, time and again, to Hebrews 10 might not agree. Though we haven't talked about it, the more I read those verses, the more I don't think that standing with God alone, belonging to Him on my own outside of community, is correct or healthy.
“let US draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having OUR hearts sprinkled to cleanse US from a guilty conscience and having OUR bodies washed with pure water. Let US hold unswervingly to the hope WE profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let US consider how WE may spur ONE ANOTHER on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting TOGETHER, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging ONE ANOTHER"
Hebrews 10:22-25 NIV
Apparently, belonging to God [the Church, the Body of Christ] is a team sport.
Sure, I can draw near to God, but I have been taught and guided by others in how to recognize the Spirit's activity and how to listen to that still, small Voice that roars. I could hold on, white knuckling through the dark nights, but witnessing others, who also belong, holding on despite deaths, diagnosis, and disappointments encourages me that I can do the same.
I don't know how to belong really. How to choose to be a part of something when I feel so different and awkward. When I don't have the energy reserves to do something that gives me purpose and justifies my presence. When I don't have the emotional reserves to make sure I feel safe and push aside the lies that cause me to shut down.
There is an intimacy in belonging: a deliberate choosing to be a part of, not just feel a part of and a conscious choosing to be vulnerable to others and God, most of all to God, as He uses others to grow me.
I am still scared to choose to belong, but I can at least choose to show up this Sunday. Even if the service is boringly passive. But that's a post for another day.
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