kiss me goodbye I'm defying gravity

- Wicked

After reflecting on my last post I realized that I did not quite hit what it was that has been bothering me the last couple weeks.

It is true that I find the habits I formed at Calvin to be more difficult to maintain in Jamestown. But to be more specific I just spent a year immersed in being an RA. I was focused so much on how to be a servant to my dorm community and how to model a good Christian faith that it really rubbed off on the way I lived my life. Coming back home, where I no longer had the responsibility of being a model or servant for anyone in particular I didn't. I automatically became more focused on doing what made me happy or fulfilled for the time being.

And that is what the problem is. Partially due to past baggage, and my previous experiences living at home and without the concrete understanding of what God wants me to do to serve him where I am at, I have become more selfish. I realized this more clearly when I was talking to a friend of mine at church. We were talking about why we find it difficult to go to our home church. We both had found other churches we enjoyed going to much more and felt partially guilty for not wanting to go to the church our parents attend even though both of us are members.

This made me think, what is it about this church that I don't like compared to Mars Hill, the church I attend when I am at Calvin. Well one obvious thing that sticks out is the fact that Rob Bell is the pastor at Mars Hill, but I realized that its not just Rob Bell. The problem was, my church in Jamestown, Zion Covenant Church, has gone through four pastors since I have graduated from high school. The pastor we have now seems great, but I leave not particularly empowered to change the world. Whereas, at Mars Hill, usually when I go I feel recharged to do something and change the world I live in.

Here's the difference, Mars Hill because of its size and resources is capable of making big dents in fixing the worlds problems, one of the great blessings of a large church body. But what about Zion? My parents talk about ministry Zion could do, but because of it's location in half commercial half middle class homes, nothing exceptional stands out to me. There isn't much Zion can do to reach out to its neighbors that it isn't already doing.

Yet, Pastor Rick pointed out this Sunday that one of the ways the kingdom of God is realized on earth is by its church taking care of one another. I realize now that that is the biggest ministry that our church needs to focus on right now is how to take care of one another. After a huge fiasco over opinions about our pastoral staff a huge rift was created in our church and we have been working for about five years to mend that. Most of that time I have spent in college away from the problem, which is why I forgot how important it was. Moreover, after realizing how awful Christians can treat one another within the same church I kind of wanted to remove myself from the situation. I was very angry and upset to realize that Christians would treat each other in such an un-Christian and hurtful way.

Therefore, I cannot expect Zion to re-charge and empower me the way Mars Hill does because it is a completely different place with different people and problems. Instead of focusing on how Zion can serve me I need to think about how I can serve the people of Zion, where I am now. It has been an interesting shift to go from having tons of responsibility and having a feeling of purpose in day to day life to complete vacation. I still have not figured out what God wants me to do this summer. I feel pretty hopeless in Jamestown because there are much less opportunities to serve my community, as well as less drive to do so because it is harder to see the potential for change in Jamestown. We shall see how this summer turns out.