Grace, something I have know all my life but maybe now only just understand a bit more.

I was raised up in the Lord, I can't remember ever not going to Church though there were some years or some places that we lived that there wasn't a Church where we could go.  I remember traveling miles to go to Church and sometimes having Church in our home.  I was raised up in the Church.  When my parents left to move on with their lives, I no longer had an option to go to the Church I was raised up in.  I could have traveled to Zootown to go but as I have aged it has come to me that my community needs me to participate in a local Church.  I was truly at a crossroad in my life.  A dilemma that I didn't take lightly. I decided that God would lead me to the new Church he would want me to be at and much more importantly the Church my girls would be raised up in.  I, about the same time in my life meant Belle, she and I clicked right from the beginning.  We both have a life time of faith as a meeting point for our friendship.  I got to know her and the more I got to know her the more I learned about her faith, how she worshiped the Lord and that it was a possibility for my search.  She however does not go to Church locally, she goes to the Zoo.  I actually went to an event with her and still felt that I could go there but if I was going to go out of the community I could just go to the Church I was brought up in.  I therefore didn't seek to go with her.  My girls asked to go to Awana's and for a short while we thought maybe we could go there, but the Lord in no uncertain terms told us NO, don't go there.  I am so glad that the Lord guided our search. I thought for a short time about going to another Church in town, the interim preacher was the same preacher that married my brother to his lovely wife, but they were not going to be the long term preaching here.  I  love my brother but they believe in a way that is different from what I do and probably could.  I thought again of Belle, and that I and she believed, very similarly.  I know I felt the way, because the similarity far out way the differences in my mind, I am sure that they would think that I didn't believe in the true light.  I decided to see if we could go to the local church here that is her faith.  I contacted Violinist, as she went to that church.  We as a family decided to go.

We found that we were welcomed. and the Church was a good fit for Poppie and the girls.  The Lord called to Poppie and he was baptised after about 6 months.  Bug saw the Lord in his father, more so than ever before, and he decided of his own accord to go.  Mokie and family come and go, Son, being forced, forcibly, to go to Church his whole life doesn't like to go at all. We had tried to go with Grandpa but it too was out of the community and a lot different than what we could believe, but I digress.  The kids and Poppie love the Church.  I too love the Church but have been having a hard time assimilating to the differences.  I have learned about Grace in a whole different light, which sings to my heart. 

I have always known that salvation was through Grace, and Grace alone, but knowing something and knowing it down in your soul is different.  The Preacher has taught me Grace in a whole different light, or maybe it was that the Lord really wanted me to know Grace in a better way and he spoke to me,  maybe it was the Preaching I know not which but Grace is now at the core of who I am.  I know that Grace is a gift, never earned, you have no eternal life with out it, you can not judge who has it, or doesn't, and Grace is not and never is works.  Works are a whole different part of faith, Grace is the love of God to and for you. 

I am still struggling with the difference is my old Church and beliefs of 50 years and the new Church I am going to, the Church that is the Church of my daughters, my husband and hopefully my other kids and grandkids in time.  I have talked to the Preachers, I was apprehensive to do so because I believed he would find all my beliefs wrong and try to amend mine to his.  He assured me he wouldn't and was very good with me in studying but at his heart he wants me to believe what he believes, that is what Preachers do.  I offended him and he offended me, that is what people do as well.  He always says if I haven't offended you or you haven't offended me stick around and we will.  I did alteast get his views on the scriptures that are the bases for  his beliefs in the differences.  I didn't have a change in my beliefs and different opinion of how or what I read in the bible.  I was still at an impasse with my soul.  I prayed and prayed, I asked the Lord to guide me, I opened my bible as I often do when I have prayed this and know that God will send me an answer.  I opened up to Romans 14, there was God's answer for me.  His answer is that if I praise the Lord and worship him with love and faith in one way and if the Preacher teaches to praise the Lord and worship him with love and faith, they are both loving, worshipping and praising the Lord with all our hearts.  In Romans 14 the Jews and the Gentiles were not admonished but allowed to love and worship the Lord with all their hearts to the best of their ability.  The Lord accepted both of their worship.  I now have my answer.  God isn't as worried about what I don't do or what the Church doesn't do but that we love God and worship him to the best of our ability, with all our hearts and souls.  God's Grace is big enough for both..... tomorrow.