Warning: Long and rambling blog post ahead :)
For more than 5 years, I (and Steven too) had been failing our family. We put so much effort into making our lives comfortable with new houses and cars and things. We've made sure that Little Bit's childhood has been as wonderful and magical as we could make it. Living in the suburbs with friends everywhere you look, trips for no reason what so ever, and mythical creatures and people who come to our house to visit in the middle of the night, sometimes bearing gifts. I plan Halloween costumes months and months in advance. I attempt to create family time at our house. I have always believed that if everyone is home, dinner should be around the dinner table. Family outings sometimes need to be just that, family outings, without other friends along. I worried about her smarts. Little Bit has been read to every single night since we brought her home from the hospital. I'm even conscience of what she watches on TV. Granted, sometimes I find it odd that she's content still watching Max and Ruby and episodes of Little Bear. But other times, I'm glad that she has no clue what's happening on Icarly.
But it hit me that we were failing big time in her spiritual happiness and well being and in our own. This has crept into my mind on numerous occasions. I would even think about the future and think about when the day comes that Little Bit wants to get married. When you are currently nothing, where do you get married if you want a church wedding?! Every summer, Little Bit would go to VBS with friends. I loved it so much as a kid. It really hit me when Oscar the Boxer died and I had to explain for the first time about death. She had no grounding. My heart of hearts knew that we needed to find a church. Some Sunday mornings Little Bit would want to go outside and play and I would have to tell her that so and so isn't home, she's at church. That's when Soph would say to us, "why don't we go to church?" Good question my dear.
Over the years we had hit the church circuit. I remember going to one in Winfield and there were like zero other kids around, so we marked it off the list without even a second thought. There there was another giant one where there were PLENTY of kids, but as we sat listening, I realized I wasn't buying what that particular church was selling and I couldn't raise my daughter believing in certain things. And really, that was the problem. What I was raised, and the person that I had become today weren't meshing. So I felt stuck. I felt the familiarity in the type of churches that I went to as a kid but inevitably as I would sit in the pew a voice inside my head would say, "this is not you, this is oil and water trying to mix."
So I talked to friends. Because in your thirties this is the type of stuff you talk about. You don't talk about which bars are the coolest or what you are going to wear next week. You talk about your kids, your husbands, what you are going to cook for dinner, and bigger issues, like God.
I would go home and think and Steven and I would talk. And I kept coming back to Jackson's baptism two years prior at the Episcopal church. Jenny and Jared had asked me to be his godmother. I remembered the calmness I felt during the service. The beautiful rituals. And the overall feeling of happiness as he was baptized. So 2 years later, we walked back in there not knowing a soul or how things worked. And it felt right. It felt like that was where we were suppose to be. It didn't matter that we were raised differently. What mattered was that we were there. And I looked around at all of the different people and it felt good. Sunday at 10am in America is the most segregated hour of the week. Yet, I looked around me and there so many different people from all walks of life coming together. But that was it, they were just people. People there for the same reason.
It's been going on 8 months now. And we LOVE it. We are involved. I never thought I would be baking a cake to take to a church dinner. And I guarantee that Steven never thought he would be cutting grass for his church. I think I've missed 1 or 2 Sundays in all that time. Steven, on the other hand, had this little thing called "tax season" creep up, so he's missed more than 1 or 2.But we all went on Easter. The most important holiday in the christian world has now become even more special to us. For along with remembering that Jesus arose from the tomb we can also mark it as the day that Sophie and Steven were baptized. Sophia Carr was BEYOND excited about it. She would tell everyone coming and going what was going to go down on Easter. She would even run into our bedroom the week before an announce "guess what!? 3 more days until I get baptized!" I'm sure other kids were probably saying, "guess what?! 3 more days until the Easter Bunny comes!"
The service was beautiful and perfect. I was so nervous that she would say something totally off the wall to get a laugh. When she didn't I just combusted with pure joy and the tears came. She was beaming. Easter has now moved up the hierarchy in my memorable holiday list. So that's the story.
Here's a quick pic of the beautiful silver box from Jenny and Jared that Soph styled with her cross necklace from Aunt Paula and Uncle Humpar. Jenny also got her gorgeous cross earrings, but don't you know, girlfriend will be able to swap out earrings soon.
And as an aside (if you have made it reading this far), if you have this tugging feeling about your church situation, as we did, that little voice, that's the Holy Spirit pulling on your heart. He's trying to tell you to get up off your bum and do something about it. It just took me awhile to answer. It doesn't matter what you were, what you think you are, or what you want to be. Just go. Just walk on in somewhere.
Oh and finally, we got a certificate to prove it ;o)
