For me, moving to a new city is always a weird adjustment. Each place has its own culture, its own feel. People drive differently in small town Iowa than they do in eastern Washington or in Chicago. People eat different foods, talk with different accents, and have different interests. More changes than just the skyline and your zip code. Moving to a new city involves a readjustment to what is normal and what is strange, to the way the seasons change, to the way you live in general. I always find that one of the biggest adjustments is finding a new church.
Whenever I move to a new city, I spend the first couple months of Sundays visiting different churches. I’ll spend hours on the internet visiting different church websites, reading doctrinal statements, maybe even listening to snippets of sermons. I ask co-workers where they go to church and what they like about it. What is the congregation like? What is the preaching like? What keeps you coming week after week?
But during these months of searching, I always find myself getting restless and lonely. I’m used to having a church body to connect to. It’s part of what helps me develop friendships in each new place I move to, what helps me feel like I belong in a city that is otherwise strange and different. During those months of visiting one church after another, I don’t feel as invested in my spiritual walk and don’t feel like I’m investing in anything. And if the search continues for more than two months, I find myself feeling more and more disconnected. God created us to be in community and to be part of a body. I feel that absence every time I move somewhere new.
It’s been about two months since I moved to my most recent “new city,” and for the past three weeks I attended the same church. I loved the preaching and the commitment to Christ. I agreed with their doctrinal statement and confessions, and I found myself challenged to grow in my faith each time I attended. The only thing that caused me to be hesitant about calling the church my home was that I didn’t yet feel connected to the people. Each time I went I sat by myself. But I sent in a request to be part of the small group ministry and started attending some events for the young adults group. I hoped that the sense of community I longed for would come as I made an effort to be a part of it.
It came in a way I never expected. Last Sunday was my third visit to the church. I arrived, made sure my cell phone was on vibrate, and slammed the car door shut just as I remembered my keys were still in my bag beneath the front seat. I tried the door handle, knowing that it was useless because the doors were locked. I called my mom. She didn’t answer. I tried to ignore the little voice of panic in my head. I wasn’t too far from home. I could always walk back and leave my car in the church parking lot if I needed to. But my first shift at a new job was that afternoon, and I knew that without my car, there was no way I was getting there. I had to get the door unlocked.
Unsure of what to do, I went into the church, took the bulletin the usher handed me, and sat down in a seat in the back. Just then, I felt my phone vibrating. My mom was calling. I answered and ducked back out into the foyer, but she didn’t have any good advice for me except, “Ask the people at church to help you.” I hung up, dismayed. I wasn’t part of this community yet. I didn’t even know who to ask.
I walked over to a reception desk and explained my problem to the woman there. I could tell she didn’t know what to do either. She suggested I try and see if the police could come unlock it and helped me find a non-emergency number to call in the phone book. I called, but the man who answered said there was no way they would do that for me. He gave me the number of a towing company that could. I hung up, trying to do the math in my head. This could be expensive if I had to call someone. Where was that money going to come from? I already live on a pretty tight budget. An expense like this could leave me hurting.
I went back to the receptionist. She got the attention of an older gentleman who was in the foyer and who she seemed to know. “Could you help this girl? She locked her keys in her car.” He smiled at me and said he’d take a look. We walked out to the parking lot together. He looked in all the windows, asked me how the locks worked, checked the handles and the seals on the doors. But in the end he concluded that I was probably going to have to call a professional. He just didn’t know how I was going to get the door unlocked otherwise. I went back inside, thanked both him and the receptionist for their help, and called the number for the towing company I had gotten from the police. They said they could do it for $50. The price wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but I was still upset with myself for making such a stupid, expensive mistake.
I walked back to the foyer. The towing company was going to call me when they arrived, so I decided to go back into the service. On my way in, the receptionist stopped me. “Is the towing company coming?” she asked me. I nodded and told her I was just going to sit in the service until they called. “How much is it going to cost?” she asked. When I told her the price, she pulled out her checkbook. “I’m going to pay for it for you,” she said. “I know how it is when money is tight. And you shouldn’t have to come to church and worry about stuff like this.” I was blown away. I hadn’t told her I was worried about the cost. I insisted that she didn’t have to pay for it, but she wrote out the check and handed it to me. I walked away stunned and overwhelmed with thankfulness.
I missed most of the service that week. I don’t know what the sermon was about, and I don’t know what songs they sang. The towing company came and unlocked my car door. I paid the man, knowing that it was my mistake, but someone else had picked up the bill. A friend I had met in the young adults group texted me as I was climbing back into my car and invited me over to her house for lunch after church. I realized then that I had found a church community. I had people who cared for me. And I left feeling a tug on my heart, wondering how I could bless someone else who was a part of that community.
After two months, thanks to the wonderful people I have met at church, I can finally start feeling like this new city is really home.
Learning to Speak 