Performance or Heart...Order of importance?

My sweet little Amber will be turning 11 on Friday, December 3. Happy Birthday Amber!!

My little Braxton poo turned 4 on November 20. What's a birthday without a trip to the Olive Garden?

Unfortunately, I will be turning 41 on December 21. YUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Turning was 40 was so traumatic. I am a little frightened to see what 41 is going to look like. Maybe 41 will be the year of acceptance? Hmmmm...... Or, things can continue to break down and fall down. Good grief. The good news is that if I keep my shoulders straight and lift my arms up my boobs pop right back up like they used to be ha ha. Lord help me.

Spiritually, I find myself in a predicament. Since the whole mess with church and us leaving I find myself being unable to connect mentally to worship. Why is that I wonder? I know that God didn't do anything offensive to us, a Pastor did. I do not even relate the two together. Oddly enough I find myself excited to go every Sunday morning but completely resistant to going on Wednesday nights. My new church which was the church that I went to before I left the one I just did, does not have service on Sunday nights except for the first Sunday of the month. I have to admit that I do not understand that at all, We used to have service every Sunday night and then 2 years ago it changed to only one Sunday a month. Weird.

I do not even really want to read my Bible anymore. I still do, but maybe only like 3 or 4 days a week now. I did read the book The Case for Christ last week too but still, I just feel very distant mentally from worship and from the Lord. I know this is all me, I am just not sure why I am doing it. I was pondering if this may in fact be a good thing. I think perhaps I need some reprogramming of sorts. When I went to True Life before every time I was there it was consistently because I wanted to be there. When I switched to Hillside because my husband wanted to go there, at some point in time the church seemed to morph into church attendance being the absolute be all and end all in the validation of one's Christianity. It was always mentioned to me about my husband not being with me every single time he did not attend and if I missed for any reason there was always an email by Sunday night or Monday, a Facebook message and the next time I did walk through the doors it was most certainly mentioned that I was missed at the last service. I think it happened so slowly that I did not perhaps realize that I was no longer going at some point because I wanted to but because I felt like I had to. I also didn't want anyone to think I was a bad Christian! I mean my goodness, I was trying to grow the ladies bible class I was teaching, how could I do that if people thought I was not a faithful follower?

Now that I have left and I am back at True Life I realize that the other church was more about performance and not the true nature of the heart. True Life is so much about interactive worship, it is all about the heart. The other church was definitely about the heart and all but it was more performance driven as far as church attendance goes. I think perhaps I am pulling back a bit because I want to fall in love with worship and church again. I am not sure.

I was really super super super angry at our previous Pastor but I have to say that I am really pleased that I was able to control myself and I only shared with two people what happened and why I left. One was a close and trusted friend who invited us to go there to begin with and the other was the Associate Pastor's wife. The only other thing I did was blog about it which nobody around here even reads or knows about. So.....I felt like it was important that it remain private and then I felt led to study Samuel. I knew the Lord had a message for me when I was at the part where David refuses to do anything to the Lord's anointed. I was like....... you know that applies to me too. My Pastor did something really awful and it was not acceptable and I took my family out of his church. BUT, he is anointed and called by God to do the Lord's work and just because he made a mistake does not mean I am entitled to discredit him or malign his name. I will not harm the Lord's anointed.

I truly believe the two books of Samuel are just the most awesomely lesson packed books in the Bible. I love me some Samuel. Those books never get old. So, God put it in me pretty good to get over it and leave the man alone. Which I have enough tact to do anyway but I felt comforted by the fact that God acknowledged that He is well aware of what happened and that it is for Him to deal with and not me. Okie dokie.

I still find it disturbing that I do not want to venture out for the midweek services though. I also have to include that I find it very difficult to pray anymore either. That really bothers me. I find my thoughts drifting as I pray. I cannot stay focused as I pray. I really am not quite sure what I am going through over here. I think perhaps this whole mess with my Pastor being so cruel to my husband and us leaving has affected me more than I thought at first. Which is also odd for me because I am a survivor type personality. I just do what needs to be done, period. I would not consider myself to be weak at all. Actually, that's pretty funny, me and weak? Um, no. SO, what the heck is wrong with me?

We do not even want to discuss my husband's attitude about anything churchy now. Which is what really angers me. I really wish people would just shut up more and worry about the plank in their own eye. And, if you think you don't have any planks.... Lord help you because you are in serious trouble. Everyone has a plank or two. I may have 10 or 12 ha ha.

Well, that's where I am at these days. Confused and approaching another horrifying birthday.