Being Faithful Matters
I was in the grocery store parking lot, checking my phone quickly before I drove home, and this text popped up.
Is Bible study still the same time and place?
This from a woman who faithfully attended our Bible study, but then life got hard and circumstances changed, and if she was being totally honest, I think she'd admit she needed a little time away to process it all. We have times in our lives when we shake our head in wonder and think, how did I get here exactly? That's where she was. We didn't see her in Bible study for a couple of years. Then this text.
Excitedly, I wrote back.
Yes!
For eight years now, we've been meeting every week in a conference room at a local library, because our church doesn't have a building yet. Later this spring, that's going to change. After 11 years, we're going to open church doors of our own. The Middle School that's housed us will resume its Sabbath day of rest, closed for business until Monday morning when the tweens arrive.
In the last few months, I have had a handful of inquiries about our weekly church service. Do you still meet at 10:30 every Sunday in the same location? Yes. Recently, we spent some time in St. Louis and I saw a friend who's rarely on Facebook and I don't have all that much contact with otherwise. He told me he reads my blog posts and I'm doing a good thing. At a restaurant the other night, we knew our server, and she said she really likes reading my articles. As I look all around me, I realize too, I'm not the only faithful one, which is encouraging.
I've written about this before, nine months ago to be exact. I went back and looked, I Want You To Find Me Faithful. In a world that lacks commitment. Where we hesitate to add one more thing to our overwhelmingly busy schedules. When Sunday morning looks like a good opportunity to get things done because there's so much to do, or even better, it's the one day where we sleep in and rest. Among friends and family who we want desperately to have a relationship with, but it takes so much effort. Maybe you're just tired, you know?
Being faithful matters. Look, it's not sexy. There are no fireworks that go off, and no confetti thrown for the faithful. Our faithfulness isn't likely to be a major news headline. Sometimes it's exhausting, frustrating and you ask yourself if you're making a difference. But it's the way of faith. And when hard times come to those in your circle, and they find themselves spinning out of control, in need of a spiritual anchor, you know who they'll think of? You. The faithful. Then, you know what you'll have the privilege of saying?
Yes, Jesus and I, we're still here. Let's sit with him for a while and rest.