Wishing for a connection but afraid to commit.

For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine.

Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them

a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears

want to hear. They will turn their ears away from

the truth and turn aside to myths.

2 Timothy 4:3-4

Dear Me,

You’re a young, a new mother. You want your young family in church. Your husband doesn’t care where you all go. “Just choose one,” he says. “They’re all the same.”

No, they’re not all the same. If you choose the church nearest you (because it’s the most convenient) and settle in, you’ll get attached to the people. Over time you’ll start studying the teachings, the public policies of the church, and the church budget. Because you’re like that; you’re always asking “why?”

Why is the pastor teaching without referencing the Bible? Why is the church literature trying to promote a feminist ideology and not God’s Word? Why is the church officially funding and populating protests in Washington, D.C. for abortion rights?

You, Priscilla, believe abortion is wrong.

So, you pretend for a while that all is well with the church. Until you can no longer pretend.

You’ll try to speak up, to explore with fellow church members truths in Scripture, to have a say in where the tithes go. Can’t they go to more tangible needs... pastors’ salaries in poor areas or church repairs or the homeless right there in your own community? Other members are aghast at the expenditures of the denomination. They didn’t know.

You’ll be politely shut down for stirring up trouble. You and your family will have to leave the church. Remember all the people you got attached to? It’ll hurt to leave.

Instead, from the very beginning, look for a church that teaches sound doctrine. You have a study Bible. Study it. Bring it to worship and follow the pastor’s reasoning in his sermon. Read the church literature. Find out how church funds are spent.

You know that little, white clapboard church at the end of the road? The one with the pastor who don’t talk good grammar? He may speak colloquial English, but he’s also pretty darn sharp when it comes to Hebrew and Greek. Why don’t you give that church a serious try? Or the cowboy church on the highway, or the church on Fort Avenue in the mod-1960s building?

Then, when you’re my age, maybe you won’t be floating around as a perma-guest between two churches, wishing for a connection but afraid to commit.

Talk soon,

Priscilla