go back to church

I’m so happy I decided to go back to church. This past week has been great.

Friday I went to LifeGroup, which I decided to sign up for kind of spur of the moment (for me, that is- I’m sure it was average timing for most people, but I normally spend weeks THINKING about doing something haha). I used to have horrific social anxiety, and I think I can still fall in to that sometimes- so going into a house full of strangers for 3 hours would have been out of the question 5 years ago. Now? Sure, it was a little awkward at first, but man…I’m so happy I went! I met some amazing people and am looking forward to future meetings.

I didn’t go to bed until 4:30 this morning, so I was nervous about being able to wake up on time- or worse, waking up when my alarm goes off, but being so grumpy from lack of sleep that I decide to stay home & sleep in.

God supplied me with plenty of rest though, and when my alarm went off, I woke up with ease.

Church itself was great. Relevant as ever, and I’m continuing to meet new people and start to build upon relationships. It’s exciting. There’s so much potential for change here, it’s incredible.

God is good :) He’s continuing to show me that all I have to do is show up with a willing heart…all I have to do is be there, and HE will orchestrate everything. He will cause me to meet people I need to meet, hear what I need to hear, and tug my heart when it needs to be tugged.

So I got a random urging to go to church this last Sunday, and I’m so happy I did. I think I’ll be able to stay connected this time.

I’m going to give my self 4 months to mark this goal as complete. Obviously, not saying I have to be there EVERY sunday for 4 months- because things often come up…but I want to be there for the better part of 4 months before I mark it as complete, so as to be able to ‘trust’ myself that I’ve truly made that commitment.

Exciting :)

I’ve started watching sermons online from the church I plan on going back to, and it’s completely reenergized me. The only reason I stopped going was because I was having a problem being consistent in the past and I felt bad about that. It created some strange fear in me- kind of a cross between a fear of letting people down, and a fear of looking stupid- I suppose it was also a fear of looking insincere. I just felt so bad about myself when I would miss a week or two.

Anyways. I’ve let that fear keep me out of church long enough. I’m so inspired by the messages, I’m so encouraged- so challenged…I desperately need to get back to church.

My sleep schedule is horrendous, but I plan on changing it slowly over the remainder of the week. My plan is to go back Sunday. It’s going to take a lot of prayer to ignore the lies that the devil is telling me- the lies that say I’m not good enough to go back- that I’ll just keep screwing it up, that people will think badly of me…because they are just that…LIES.

This church is full of amazing people, people whom I’ve NEVER had a bad experience with. There is no shame there. I also firmly believe that they will help hold me accountable so I WON’T continue to screw up.

The only thing going against me here is fear put in me by the Enemy. I love the messages, love the people, love the worship…the ONLY challenge is fear that is founded on LIES. If I can remember that, I’ll be just fine :)

I found the perfect church in 2007. I started going, but then became inconsistent. I felt really bad about that and I just suddenly stopped going. Started again in early 2008, but same story.

I really need to get over the mental-block I’ve put in the way and just get on with it! The church is amazing and the people were absolutely wonderful- I’m not sure what my problem is!