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I need all the help I can get

Country Roads

Sixty years ago I would have given up ice cream if I could have stayed home from church. My parents took their six ornery kids to church most any time the lights were on and their six ornery kids were not always excited about that.

Six decades later my thoughts about church have been rehabilitated. A recent poll by the Pew Research Center indicates that only 36 percent of Americans attend church weekly. My wife and I are in that minority.

Though I came to faith as a youngster, my teen years were messy. While I went through the motions my heart wasn’t always in it.

Fortunately (and providentially) I fell in love with a beautiful brown-eyed Baptist girl who helped get me back on track. As a result, we made God and church a part of our family life.

When I lost that brown-eyed lady to cancer, our faith ­– hers and mine — helped me through some very dark days. God blessed me again when I married Julie, a woman of strong faith, and today our church and our church family are an important part of our lives.

Faith is a personal matter and we each have to come to faith – or not – on our own.

While worshiping God is a key reason for attending church, of course, I need regular worship to keep me connected to my faith. In the Protestant tradition the sermon is a primary element of the service and our young pastor’s sermons are powerfully good and relevant, always leaving me with something to think about the rest of the week.

Again, this is a very personal thing. One of my good friends and coffee partners is a Roman Catholic who also finds regular worship important in his life. He tells me his participation in the Eucharist each Sunday keeps him connected to Christ.

In the moments before the service began on a recent Sunday I was reminded of another reason why regular church attendance is important to us: the people. We usually arrive at church early on Sunday mornings so we have time to visit with our church family.

In the five years we have lived in our community and have been involved in our congregation we have witnessed babies grow to kindergarteners and middle schoolers to high schoolers. My wife teaches at children’s worship and helps with Vacation Bible School and is affectionately known by many of the children as Miss Julie.

Praying for each other is an important part of church membership and knowing that others are praying for us — especially during times of illness and grief — is a real comfort.

Our church family is becoming more diverse and we love that, too. We have seen an increase in the number of immigrants from Africa at worship recently as well as a young woman from the Middle East. Our worship band drummer is from India.

During the early months of the pandemic when online worship was our only option we realized how much we missed seeing and visiting with our church family regularly.

Julie and I had a hand in creating a program for folks our age this past summer. We call ourselves “Seasoned Citizens” and we have a good time when we get together. It should be noted that in all three activities held to-date ice cream has been involved.

During my years with The Salvation Army I came to understand that sharing the Gospel includes helping meet physical needs. Salvation Army founder William Booth wrote, “You cannot warm the hearts of people with God’s love if they have an empty stomach and cold feet.”

Our church offers opportunities to share our faith in spiritual and in physical ways.

I write all this to share why church membership and attendance, though declining in our nation, is still important to us. Rest assured, we do not believe going to church makes us better than anyone else. The Bible is clear that we all fall short of what God desires for us.

Day-to-day, month-to-month, year-to-year, however, my faith and, yes, my everyday life, is enhanced by our participation in a church family. Sunday mornings help me live a more faithful life the rest of the week. And I need all the help I can get.

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