This is a blog that I have had on my heart to write for at least a week now if not longer, but I have been putting it off knowing what it was going to take. I have had a hard time with opening up and making myself vulnerable. This is one of the many ways that I feel the Lord is calling me to stretch myself and it is one of the hardest. This blog is nothing special, but it is a huge step for me in opening up in my struggles and ways that God is making changes in my life.
Ever since the second I got my acceptance call for the World Race I felt God calling me to more. At first, I was super excited. I would love more. But His more was a little different than I had imagined. I quickly saw He was calling for me to take more from when I was at church. This was weird because my church has been a second home to me for most of my life. What more could I get? These people were here for me when I had issues with my family, when me and my girlfriend broke up, and many many other things. He couldn’t possibly be asking me to leave this place that I have loved for so long right before leaving for the World Race. That was a joke, right? Well I tried to squeeze this “more” I knew I needed into what I had. I tried a few different things so that I wouldn’t have to leave what was comfortable for me, but I still felt something lacking in my spiritual life.
Well like the Lord has had to do often throughout my life, He got my attention in a way I never would have thought. A good friend of mine who is a youth pastor at a different church asked me to help out with an event he was putting on. I have helped with Collide (this event) before and it was always a blast and spiritual refill, so I said yes in a heartbeat. I knew I was going to have fun and see the Lord in this weekend. Inside though part of me was hoping that I didn’t have too much fun because I didn’t want to feel called away from my church. I didn’t want to have that tough decision. I wanted to be comfortable. I wanted easy, but He wanted more for me. At Collide I got to meet a bunch of the church’s 18-25 group. These people were absolutely amazing. They brought me in and treated me like one of their own. At my old church this was something that was lacking, a young adult ministry. I never realized how much I was missing out on until I finally had it in my life. Well when Sunday morning rolled around I was hoping once again that I would be disappointed with the service since I loved everything else about this place the rest of the weekend. Well for the first time ever in my life during this service I felt myself just completely let go of everything and worship the Lord. I had tears come to my eyes when I was worshiping Him and thinking about how blessed I was to have been able to come to Collide and get some amazing new friends.
Well this is where the real fun began for me. I left Collide tired from spending my weekend with some high energy middle school boys but filled spiritually. I also knew that I had this tough decision ahead of me I was dreading. The 18-25 group had invited me to come to their Tuesday night small group, so I was just going to let the previous weekend marinate for a couple days. I wasn’t going to rush into a decision of where I would call my church home. I was going to just pray and be still. After small group on this Tuesday night I called my best friend and mentor to tell him what was on my heart about leaving West Town and what I felt while I was at Quest with the amazing 18-25 group. My best friend is a special man in how he is able to ask the right questions to make me think and make hard choices easy. He never tells me what to do but rather asks me things about what is going on in my life. Well after this talk with him it was obvious that for me to get the “more” I had waiting for me I would need to leave West Town. This was extremely painful to realize. This was a place I thought I would never leave. This place was a big reason why I decided to stay in Augusta after I got out of high school. And to be called to leave right before leaving for the World Race was hard.
Well it has been about a month since the Collide weekend. It has been a true blessing to now have a solid group of people close in age to me that I am able to open up and talk to without judgement. It is awesome to be able to feel truly at home at church and to be able to just let go of life and worship Him. It has been hard to tell some of my closest friends at West Town that I was going to be leaving. I am extremely grateful for everything that West Town has meant for me throughout my life. I love the people there more than words can describe. But every season must come to end at some point and that season has come to an end and another has begun. I am excited to see what the Lord has in store for me in my next chapter in life in beyond. Thanks for taking the time to read this and I love yall.
April is going to be blog month and we are being encouraged to write 4 blogs this month. Its going to be a busy month so I can’t guarantee that but I am going to give it a shot. #BlogItLikeItsHot
