Something I've Learned in Life

Life is Complicated

I spent the first 17 years of my life in an intentional, Christian community/church. While there, I learned many good, no, great things, about how to serve, lay down my life for my friends, how to have clean, good fun, and how to love.

I left this community when I was 21 years old. I didn't know what to expect in the "real world" as I had always called it while in the community.

Personally, after visiting many, many churches and trying to build relationships with people, I've found myself become increasingly disappointed by what I felt/feel as callousness, cold heartedness, distance and non-self-sacrificing, but more of a preservation of oneself. It's been a culture shock. I am not used to people not bringing meals to others while sick, or after having a baby, or not really being deeply interested in another's life's struggles or victories. Everything has seemed rather superficial, more interested in image, self and personal life.

But something else I've discovered is any community/church that has any sort of community like lifestyle also has control issues. Honestly, I'm not sure why. I haven't done research, I haven't tried to have a church where there is a community feel without control issues. It's complicated!

The Ideal Life

My ideal life is probably more of a fairy tale that can't, or won't happen. I dream of friends that are more like family. Friends that care for each other; celebrate babies, marriages, anniversaries, support during hard times: loss of jobs, life, or even everyday life struggles like post partum depression, or marriage struggles.

Where I grew up, life was free, simple, fun. Yeah, we had the stress of the spiritual side of things, but I'm not discussing that right now. I'm talking about the simple things of life.

For instance, something I've run into with churches is that they charge for everything. Conferences, retreats, even marriage counseling sessions.

Where I grew up, every homeschool meeting, every woman's meeting, men's meeting, etc, was free. Marriage counseling and meetings for young couples: free. We gave women wedding showers full of fun, needed gifts. For their wedding we made quilts by hand, the guys made beds and we worked night and day to get their house ready. When babies were born, we celebrated with baby showers, hand made quilts, and store bought things too. When a baby was born, there was round the clock care, meals delivered, etc. If someone got sick (like with cancer, or some other health issue) their children were cared for, meals made, and a lot of times a prayer chain started for them.

We had a sense of community. We played together, we laughed, we cried, we worked together. We served.

But out here in the "real world" it seems it's more of a world of serving self. It's not the norm to do the things I listed above. I've found a more "shocked" "wow" response from people when I share my past. A lot of times, people seem to close down and not even listen, as if the stuff listed above is too much to take in, or digest. But to me, it was a way of life. It was normal. It was great!

So coming out here in this world has been a bit of a culture shock. Part of me wants to ask people why this way of life seems so hard? What is so difficult about it? Are we more worried about holding onto our assets than helping someone else out? Are we more worried about ourselves than laying down our lives for our friends, our loved ones, our family? What is really holding churches back from living this type of lifestyle freely, voluntarily and excitedly? It was exciting for us to do things for others.

But Something I've Learned

I can't expect everyone to know what it's like to serve freely, with excitement and freedom if they've never experienced it. It's something they have to experience to appreciate. They have to experience the giving and the receiving of this type of love to understand and appreciate it. I've learned that for people to be able to experience this, someone has to step up to the plate and begin the "love service movement" as I like to call it. If you wanna see something happen, you have to do something about it.