Restless Faith: Lessons from the In-Between
Part 3 of a Four-Part Journey through my Denominational Shifts and Faith Formation
Throughout this month, I’m reflecting on the different church traditions that have shaped my life: Catholic, Baptist, Non-Denominational, and United Methodist. Each brought both joy and struggle, but each left a lasting imprint on my faith and formation.
If you missed the early parts of the series, you can read them all here:
Campus Ministry: Discovering the Heart of Worship
Last week I wrapped up with a story of friendship and support at the Baptist Church of my youth, but for my first few years in college, my journey was a bit more of a mixed bag. I continued attending that church when I was back home, but things were different at the University of Florida.
My Baptist and Catholic roots had grounded me in the Christian tradition, but the trail suddenly ended, leaving me wandering through a wide-open field of disorienting yet beautiful growth.
I tried a couple of Baptist churches in Gainesville, but I never quite fit in. One particularly bad experience came when a church told me I could not be actively involved in Bible study or outreach ministries unless I transferred my membership, even though I was only in town during the school year. This seemed an odd requirement in a college town filled with transient students, many of whom already had home churches. I also visited an Evangelical Free Church, but in all honesty, none of the churches I visited seemed particularly welcoming to single students with no family in town.
I did, however, discover campus ministry. Despite their insistence that they were not a church, they were the closest thing to church I could find. My first week on campus, a friend and I were walking across the street from our dorm, talking about someone we had known in high school who we heard was on the football team. A senior walking behind us overheard the name and told us the person we were talking about was going to be at a prayer meeting, and she was on her way there.
When I walked into the room, not only did this high school acquaintance (two years ahead of me) recognize me, but he and everyone else in the room welcomed me like I was a long-lost brother. I soon discovered that this group was entirely student-led, mostly juniors and seniors, who had spent the entire summer fasting and praying for the incoming freshmen class. The person who would later become my Bible study leader sat on the floor in the middle of the room with a guitar, and they sang and prayed for several hours.
A few months later at a fall retreat, we did the same thing one night, only to be interrupted when the adult leaders came in the next morning to say it was breakfast time. We had no idea we’d been there all night. I’ve never experienced such a genuine spirit of worship or been so lost in a sense of God’s presence that time itself disappeared.
For two years while in college, this became my “church” family. Though my home church had great music, this felt like encountering the heart of worship for the first time, inspiring me to learn guitar and begin writing and leading music myself. I was used to large bands, orchestras and staged worship, but there was beauty in the simplicity of this worshiping community that felt more authentic than anything I’d experienced before.
For as much as contemporary worship music has changed over the decades, this simple, quiet, “campfire worship,” as I like to call it, still speaks to my soul in a way that no other music has, and I’m forever grateful to have been shaped by such a spirit-filled community of students.
Everyone said I would lose my faith at a large state school like Florida, but the truth is, this is where I began to discover my own faith for the first time, and where I moved from believing in Jesus to being in relationship with God. My hunger for that kind of authentic worship and community propelled me forward, not realizing how hard it would be to find it again.
Non-Denominational (Baptist in Disguise?)
McKenzie and I married in June 2000, a year after my father’s death. She also had a Baptist background, but like in Gainesville, we never really connected with any local Baptist church. We got involved in a church plant meeting at a local school and found a home in their young couple’s group. McKenzie played keyboard in the praise band, and I ran sound and helped our friend with the youth ministry. Technically, it was non-denominational, but except for being new and not having our own building, it didn’t feel much different from our Baptist churches.
Things were going well for a few years until the youth pastor left for seminary, and they hired someone who virtually dismantled everything, including the strong student leadership team we’d developed. Even worse, the pastor grew angry that the parents of many of our students did not attend Sunday worship. These were mostly unchurched students, which I thought was great, but apparently not so great for a leader who expected the youth group to serve as an on-ramp for new “tithing” members.
It didn’t take long to realize that though most of the church was made up of young, low-income couples and families, we did not align with the demographic our pastor was looking for and were apparently a deterrent to his wealthier target audience. When our worship leader was finally let go and replaced by a more “professional white collar church musician,” we knew there was no place for people like us.
Despite the painful ending, the leadership experience I gained in almost every area of that church was invaluable. No amount of seminary training has equipped me as much for the kind of behind-the-scenes work needed to run a church. In a small church startup like this, everybody helps with everything. McKenzie and I learned just about all we needed to run a church of our own. Full-time vocational ministry was not on our radar, but those years quietly prepared us for it in ways we could not yet see.
Becoming Christian… Again?
After we left, we all but gave up on the church. Eventually some friends invited us to their “Christian Church.” The congregation included people from many denominations, and the pastor would regularly have everyone shout out what denomination they used to be: “Baptist, Presbyterian, Catholic, Lutheran, etc.” Then he’d ask what we were now, and everyone responded in unison: “Christian.”
The not-so-subtle implication was that they were the true Christians who had moved beyond denominational labels, but the irony was never lost on me that they were just another denomination like the rest. We tried getting involved like we had at the church plant, but there wasn’t much room to use our gifts. This church was more organized, with full ministry teams already in place. The only opportunity I had to help with music was to lead children’s songs at Vacation Bible School, which I quickly learned is not my gift.
We soon realized that we were no longer the kind of people who could just sit in the pew and be comfortable. Our church-plant experience gave us a taste for active ministry, and we knew if we were going to attend a church, we needed a place to serve.
The Road to Nowhere
We bounced around to a few other Christian churches, and I even took a part time worship leader position at one small church that wanted to introduce contemporary worship, but neither the congregation, nor their current pianist, were on board with the shift. We even attended a Church of God for a very short time, until we realized that we wouldn’t be allowed to do anything unless we spoke in tongues.
Looking back on all our church hopping, we never once considered a mainline church. We didn’t even know what a “mainline” church was. But we were slowly realizing there was no longer room for us in the fundamentalist, evangelical world we had known.
By God’s grace, this is not the end of our story. Those years were rough, both in church, and in the early years of our marriage, but they prepared us for more than we ever imagined.
Through all my denominational shifts, I concluded that none of them, not even the “Christian Church,” had it all right. I was done with churches who established themselves as the only way to heaven, despite their outward claim that Jesus was the only way.
Each denomination we attended acted like Jesus’ personal bodyguards. No one could come to the Father except through Jesus, but no one could come to Jesus except through them.
The Catholic church of my childhood was great at keeping every other denomination out of sight, as was the Baptist church of my youth. I think I know why.
The more I realized that there were other “Christians” out there who didn’t think exactly like us, the more I questioned who was right.
And considering how little welcome we received, both as singles and then as a young married couple with no children, I determined that none of them could be right. Each had good intentions and glimpses of truth, but in the end, their demographic preferences, theological agendas, and loyalty tests won the day.
Grace in the Rearview Mirror
I know this feels like a miserable place to end, especially for a series meant to highlight the gifts in each stage of my denominational journey. Things will definitely get better in next week’s conclusion, but I share this in-between stage of the journey because, despite not staying anywhere long over those three or four years, the range of experiences and the commonalities between these churches that each thought they had a corner on the Christian market, made me realize that God had to be bigger than what the church had told me.
Maybe I was still chasing the nostalgia of my campus ministry experience, and after that, I don’t know that any church would have suited me for long.
Nonetheless, this season of my journey helped me gain greater clarity about who I was and who I was not. I discovered gifts and graces for ministry I would never have seen in myself. I was stretched beyond my comfort zone many times and learned to discern more clearly the line between the Spirit’s leading and human ego.
My theology may not have shifted much from my Baptist days, but my experiences, both good and bad, made me who I am as a person and as a pastor. They gave me a more generous spirit toward the wide range of spiritual experiences and traditions in people’s lives and taught me to recognize the God who is present in and beyond our differences.
Perhaps the greatest irony is that my encounters with so many exclusivist evangelical denominations actually planted the seed for the open heart and open mind that I would later discover as a cornerstone of my future United Methodist home. I guess God does work in mysterious ways.
I’d love to hear your story. Have you ever had a season where you couldn’t quite find a spiritual home, yet still felt God at work in it?
These reflections are always offered freely. If they’ve been meaningful to you, you can support my work by buying me a coffee as a small gesture of encouragement. Thank you for reading and journeying alongside me.
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