I’ve probably been going to New Covenant Church (NCC) for nearly two months now, with a few Sunday services missed for several reasons- reasons which have had little to do with apathy.

I started attending there for several reasons after a prolonged layoff from church attendance.

For one, I wanted to go back to a church not really for the people, or for the music, or for the amazing facilities, or for the clever funny pastor guy, but just to hear the Bible taught, in some expositorial approach. Despite my burnout and some semblance of gradual disillusionment with what I experienced at Sagebrush, I know that how A church is is not defining for THE church really is. Stan Nelson, theology professor at Golden Gate, propounded to us to remember that there is the visible church, and that there is the invisible church, and there is a world of difference between the two. The invisible church is made up of the faithful, the persuaded, the truly dependent ones on the Word and on the power of the Holy Spirit. The visible church is made up of both the persuaded and the pretenders, and you have to really tune in to find community with the former group.

I was missing hearing the public declaration of the gospel message and wisdom from Scripture.

My second reason for deciding to go to NCC speaks to my slacker tendencies. I have driven by that church thousands of times, as it sits off of Paseo del Norte, across that street, a quick hop away from my house. I could walk there in 10-15 minutes from my house if I wanted. I can drive to it in 5.

My third reason for going was the encouragement I got to visit from my friend Jenise. Acquainted through dance club activities eight or nine years ago (I think), Jenise and I discovered we shared a desire to live lives of faith, and in time, Jenise, who worked downtown as a lawyer at the courts, became a friend and a mentor of sorts to me. Fast forward a few years later, and Jenise retired from that job and after that, from dancing, but we’ve remained friends, and knowing about my struggles with wanting to engage with church life after Sagebrush, encouraged me to give her church a try. I could go and do nothing and be anonymous and just listen and heal. It was a welcoming place of kind people. I finally took her recommendation and attended it, and after several visits, find it is at least letting me bare my heart to the preached Word. I’ve remained anonymous a little, but in reality, I knew others who went there, and seem to stumble across old acquaintances every other Sunday.

Still, I am finding I enjoy going over there on Sunday mornings in the quiet of my anonymity and just sitting alone and listening, and letting my heart sift suggestions and observations for the things my heart longs to hear from the Spirit- about being a child of the Good Father, who meets and restores His children who ask Him.

I feel no need to do anything more than this at that church. I will not join anytime soon. I will not try to teach anything, or to volunteer for any long term assignment for a while yet. I will probably sit by myself more often than not for a while also, just so I can listen, and focus, and find some inner healing through the Word.

And trust.

And peace.