Out of place at church.

For a number of months, Kyle and I have felt that the act of getting ready for church, rushing out the door to get to church, spending an hour of singing and teaching while apart from our kids all to head back home with the same drugged sense of a Sunday afternoon as I believe so many people feel, was disobedient. I was becoming apathetic and lazy in my approach to the teaching of scripture on Sunday mornings. I left church maybe contemplating what was taught. I'd go home to feed the kids, put everyone down for naps and savor my last few hours with my husband at home before the week 'kicked off'... and I did it again the next week.

Something about this wasn't right.

I walked into the kitchen this morning after waking to find Katie's plastic pig stuck into the straw of yesterday's sippie cup. For a moment I contemplated whether or not I had actually woken up yet. Although odd, it occurred to me right then, like a reel tape in my mind rolling a tape of me in church with subliminal messages of a pig with its leg stuck in a sippie cup straw. I saw that there was likely no better way to portray how uncomfortable and out of place I felt when attending church.

This is not me placing fault on the church. It has been a discovery of my obedience to Christ. No matter how good the good thing is that we're doing, if its not in obedience to Christ than there's nothing but emptiness to reap. Kyle and I have known that God was asking us to begin seeking for our immediate family something different than what the North American church was offering. We've known it for awhile but had yet to step forward in faith.

So four Sundays ago we had our first church at home. It is NOT a "home church" as some have called it. We don't feel the release from God to 'go public' for lack of better words and invite others. But instead we believe that for now this is a time of prayer and seeking scripture in a way foreign to what we've been raised with. If we were to begin inviting other families and growing this Sunday morning gathering soon we would be too big for the home... the kids would be too great in number to focus on the way we want to... soon enough we'd be formulating the exact same structure that we believe God has just called our family away from.

So we walked away from everything we knew and were comfortable with into a place much more suited for us.

Our family is desiring to walk in obedience to the Lord. Our kids are being called to be leaders of their generation and Kyle and I are responsible for training them up in that way. We prepare a feast and while the food is cooking we sit in the living room and read the story from the children's bible. We teach them hoping to stretch their thinking and their understanding of God's character. They are expected to sit quietly and listen; ask questions and give input. We then serve lunch and sit together at the table while the adults begin reading out of their bibles the story read earlier. The children sit and listen and we devour scripture together and seek God's Truth. They are dismissed into the living room where they quietly play until the adults are done reading and praying. Afterwards, there is no transition. We're already here and the Spirit is present. Its almost as though we're moving in slow motion with the wonderment and awe of who God is surrounding us as we tidy up and crawl into bed for naps.

Though we only know enough of what God is asking of us to prepare for this coming Sunday we aren't shaken. The lack of planning and understanding as to what He's doing is only increasing our faith and our anticipation of Him.

Its out of obedience and nothing has felt more right.