This is where it all started.
That first church, that welcomed me as a newborn in the nursery here. Then into kids’ classes.
Baptized here, youth group here, a pianist here.
My mom the secretary, my dad head deacon, and oh so many days spent here.
Fervent prayers. Deep friendships. Beautiful music.
And the first several years of my life that was all I knew here. Or at least all I remember. The best of playing with friends, the joy of going to worship as a family, the lightness here.
But when the walls start to crumble they seem to fall fast.
There was the long list of pastors we went through. Pastors who didn’t treat the congregation well and left, and pastors whom the congregation didn’t treat well and left.
There were countless deacons’ meetings my dad came home from angry, stressed out, and discouraged.
The church began to be characterized by fighting to me. Distinguished by division.
And I learned quickly that when you crossed the threshold you entered the world of better-than.
Better than you behaved elsewhere.
Better than the people who didn’t come there.
Better than the people who did but didn’t come as much as you.
The show, the fakeness, the hypocrisy, it all cumulated for me with her.
I remember them walking her to the front of the church, all scarlet letter style. My best friend’s sister standing between her mom and dad, integral leaders in the church, as they stood jaw-set and deep-shamed as she eeked out the words.
I’ve fallen into sin. I’m pregnant. I’m sorry.
And would we forgive her?
They walked to the back of the church and out as we all sat there left in heaviness and air thick with disappointment and tsk-tsk.
I remember being confused. Why did she need our forgiveness?
And I remember the months after that, being friendly with her, realizing most weren’t, wondering, didn’t we all sin? Why did one have to stand up before the judgment of so many fellow sinners who got to stay in their pews?
This caused a crack in the foundation of church for me. But it didn’t cause the crumbling.
That came years later when she got pregnant again and we found out the babies were her father’s too.
How does a father do that to his daughter? How does a mother know and shut the bedroom door?
And how does a church participate in a judgment room against this girl without even knowing her enough to catch her victimization?
Years later I was married in this church and walked away for the last time.
I heard of more crumbling since. Missionaries they back-stabbed. Power-hungry men seeking control. More people leaving.
Until one day the doors shut for good.
And you can hardly tell now it was ever a church. This empty shell that’s been repurposed and now sits purposeless.
But back when the exterior said church, wasn’t it still hard to tell?
If a church is marked by division and pride, feuding and judgment, shaming and arrogance, then one has to wonder. Was it ever a church?
The church should be the most loving, humble, unified place in the world.
And when it’s instead steeped in the exact opposite, its doors deserve to be shut for good.
I stand out here now, taking pictures, looking around, seeing the emptiness that was always felt here all along. Feeling the irony of a church that consistently put up fences now being fenced in.
And I’m anything but sad that it’s shut down. I only wish it happened sooner. Before that girl had to stand there and be shamed. Before I had to sit there and be confused. Before Jesus was misrepresented to so many by the people whose sole job was to show Him to others.
And I stand here now with a longer list of confusion in my heart and hypocrisy in my memory within the walls of churches. It’s been a long journey that’s gotten me here, gotten me back home to where it all began and to where it seems to all be ending for me.
Or is it just beginning?
I walked away from my first church 16 years ago.
And as a pastor’s wife, I walked away from my last one half a year ago.
And I stand here now with a long list of church experience in between and one nagging question.
Have I ever really been to church?