Sunday Thoughts

I have been attending a small Baptist church here for the last two weeks. The first Sunday that I was here I attended there intending to try it out and then try the Pentecostal church, but the sermon was theologically sound and I felt so welcome and accepted at the Baptist church that I decided to attend there again today. The church is small; today only nine people besides the pastor's family and I attended, but they have a close community within the church. Today the pastor's wife sat one of her nine children (a seven year old named Julia) beside me and I was amazed at how welcome that I felt just by her sitting there and curiously reading my notes as I wrote them. There is something about being accepted by a child that made me feel like I belonged there. The thoughtfulness of the gesture was great- I didn't even consider that I would want someone to sit next to me, but I felt totally included in the community when someone did. In the past I have typically been the one who has attended a church for years and feels fully comfortable there. These past weeks I have been a newcomer, and it took a small child sitting beside me (prompted by her mother, but content) and an open invitation to help with Christmas gifts for prisoners to make me feel 'at home' in this church.

So to any Christian who reads this (including future me), I encourage you to reach out to the visitors and the new members at church next time. Sit beside them. Ask their name. Invite them to join a ministry. Ask them if they want to help with packing shoeboxes. This is how we grow the family of God: by supporting and welcoming those who enter our churches so that together we can shine God's light into the world.

- Aliya