I'm going to open this post with an apology:
Sometimes, when I blog, I get scattered. I delve deep, and open so many threads that it will be pages and hours later before the thing is resolved. So I save a draft, which is the worst possible thing to do at that moment. I am a person of momentary perspective; if I leave it alone for a few hours I will come back to it with a plethora of new angles and thoughts-on-the-matter, and will have abandoned the former(s) with shallow disinterest. As a result, posts that are the product of multiple writing sessions are often hopelessly scattered, with thoughts running off to thousands of inaccessable corners, threads that will likely never be recovered or laid to rest respectably.

This, I admit, is one such post. And I'm far too lazy to attempt to right all the injustices I've done to it... I'm already turning it into a saga series, since I'm sure you didn't link here to read my first novel in one painful sitting. In this post, you're going to get a lot of background info, and very little of imminence. In Part 2, I plan on coming back to the current events that sparked this whole rant in the first place. If you see any glaring inconsistencies, let me know, and I'll muster up an edit, but otherwise, sit tight... and hang on for the exciting conclusion. Thanks for bearing with me!
~Kelly


The Lord works in mysterious ways... so I've always been told. Either that or He really enjoys plot twists.

My life of late has become great fodder for this debate, as several conversations and random events have led me to the brink of something I never thought I'd ever be considering - church membership.

The story behind my membership misgivings is a long one; is, in fact, a legacy passed down to me by my parents. My dear parents, whom I love, who have convictions of their own, have shaped my life and my opinions by the way that they've acted out of these convictions; it's a story I barely remember but that has been retold to me enough times that I now regurgitate it myself as proof.

When I was in grade 3, my family moved. No, no, none of that "say goodbye to your friends" crap... we moved about 4 miles up the road, and officially into the hamlet of Silverton, which is so small that it's usually not even worth mentioning, for those of you who have at some point recieved the short answer to the question, "where are you from?".... "Russell."

Silverton is, however, of note in this story, as it was the location of the small United Church that my parents and I attended, along with our grandparents, aunt, uncles, and cousins, and maybe 2 dozen (if we're being generous) others from the area who have known my dad and the Cochrane clan since the beginning of time. When we moved 4 miles up the road (or down the road, as it was 4 miles south and I'm sure one of my stickler sisters will correct me on that if I don't clarify - nerdy farm kids...), we suddenly found ourselves within walking distance of the Silverton United Church, as well as our entire extended family, the Silverton Hall, and several other things that sound cooler than they really are.

Then, I remember that, for some inexplicable reason, we stopped attending Silverton United Church, and soon found ourselves attending Russell Alliance Church, a change which I at first resisted for childish, grade-3-like reasons. I remember accusing, whining at my mom that "why are we switching churches now, when we can finally walk to the United Church?" I think I whole-heartedly believed that proximity was equivalent to God-ordained destiny, or something ridiculous like that. I was an idealistic child.

(The move to Russell Alliance Church, ironically, may very well have been God-ordained destiny, as it would become the church where my spiritual life and faith would flourish, where I would make some of the best and closest friends of my school years and, dare I say, my life.)

The reasons for our United Church exodus were always a blank in my mind, filled in by others, usually my older sister. She's told me the story many times of the strong, conviction-filled sermon that Sarah Bezan's father preached, and how the Kaminskis, the Bezans, and we Cochranes all left the United Church at the same time in search of a new home (I think this all happened in the Russell branch of the United Church...) The issues? The United Church had started to falter out in terms of conviction and sticking to their guns and were making all sorts of convenient and wishy-washy concessions, such as approving and ordaining women and eventually even homosexual pastors.

(Hey ladies: no burn on you intended. I am a woman who loves my fellow womankind and ministry both. It is difficult, however, to make a solid case theologically for ordaining women as pastors, as many of us have discovered as we've perused our Bibles in bewilderment. Many churches share this bewilderment, and have come to a variety of conclusions about the matter. However, the type of church that can convince itself that there is no controversy or objection to be found in making a case for women pastors often becomes the type of church that will find it easy to make the Bible say whatever it wishes to read, as the United Church so aptly demonstrates.)

When we came to the Alliance Church, we began to flourish, each in our own right, as followers of Christ. We were raised in Awana, which is where I first learned to absorb and regurgitate Scripture at an alarmingly adaptive rate (let's just say we weren't the type of family who learned our verses as a family, at home, over the week. We were the kids who showed up at Awana 10 minutes late, fresh from the Angusville Skating Rink and our figure-skating lessons, with toque-hair, no uniforms, no books, and no progress made in whatever "homework" our leaders may have, in vain, assigned us. Yeah, sorry, we were those kids. Explains a lot, doesn't it?)

In junior high, I joined a new program Russell Alliance was piloting, called Bible Quizzing, which turned out to be one of the best choices I've made so far in life. Besides the wealth of Scripture I now know by heart, word-for-word, and the rich biblical context my quizzing experience of 6 years gave me, quizzing truly allowed me to come alive in my faith. I think it's probably the first community where I ever was given permission to be a full participant in the body of Christ, and not "just a kid". For those of you who have never experienced the context of a CMD Quiz Meet, imagine driving hours to a city center in Saskatchewan to find yourself engulfed for a full, intensive weekend with a church body made up entirely of students, hundreds of them, who wield the Word as a weapon, who are full of that youthful passion and newness of faith that older Christians envy and long for, who come together, despite many differences, to compete and sharpen one another. "As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another." (Proverbs 27:17) This is the essence of Bible Quizzing.

In high school I was a faithful attendee of our youth group, and served on the youth executive. I sang with the youth worship team, I participated in the school's lunchtime prayer meeting, and our family was very much a part of the life of the Russell Alliance. Yet my parents were unwilling to give their names, their word, in membership. They told me that they did not want to give themselves in membership only revoke it again later, should necessity command it. They fully hoped and expected that Russell Alliance would acknowledge them for who they truly were and all that they gave, and for the most part, it was so. My dad camps out almost weekly in the sound booth, running the boards and such, and my mother's extensive cooking and catering knowledge has pulled off countless critical church functions, including, this very weekend, Russell's home quiz meet at which approximately 450 quizzers, coaches, and officials are attempting eat the good people of Russell out of house and home.

My parents are fantastic people. They love Jesus. They are on a journey. And they are growing. Their attitudes, however, towards church membership served to leave me with an inherited chip on my shoulder, and the sense that perhaps my church could not, should not, be pledged my allegiance, perhaps my church could not, would not, always and forever hold up the gospel, the unadulterated truth, and as such perhaps should not, could not be counted on.

It is a truth, which I have lately come to realize, that the church and I are inextricable. Attempts on my behalf to deny, to subvert that truth, become small rebellions within my soul, and wage war on my relationship with Christ, who loved the mess we call the Church, stood up for it the schoolyard, took a bullet (and a flogging, and a cross, and the excruciating weight of Eternity) for it, loved it so unreservedly, with all its warts, so much that He has married it, for all of eternity, in attempts to make an honest woman of it.

No. My church and the Church are not the same; one is part of the other. My arm and my body are not the same; one is part of the other. But, as Paul writes, if my quizzer's memory serves:

Now the body is not made up of one part but of many. If the foot should say, "Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body," it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body. And if the ear should say, "Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body," it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has arranged the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body. - 1 Corinthians 12:14-20

If I say, "I am doubtful and mistrustful of the church," I do not for that reason cease to be a member (I am speaking as a Christian here.) We are members. We are members of Christ! When we shun and hold at an arms length the congregations in which we find ourselves, we do the body a disservice. We tell our own mouth, our voice that we do not need it, and the hand we find extended that we'd rather not. And it is such vain resistance; we're kicking our own can in the end.

This is not a command to church membership; church membership is a convention. It is little more than an admission of the incredibly obvious; that we as Christians and church-goers, are members of the body of Christ. This is, however, a wake-up call to the painfully obvious, for those of us who have not thrown our ears away.

Alright. So I've been reading poetry lately, upon the prescription of my English prof. Of course, however unfortunately for someone like me, reading poetry inevitably turns into writing poetry and descending into a mushy pile of romantic, whimsical sappiness. It's a tragedy, really. But it's true.

So I've decided that if I must go, you all must go there with me! Don't worry guys, it's doubtful that I'll subject you to any of my own poetic endeavors; that might be just a bit too painful for all of us involved, and just when I've gotten my readership to an all-time high, hovering somewhere above 2...

Self-deprecation aside, I was struck again today by the profound loveliness of these lyrics to a song entitled Healed by Nichole Nordeman. If you've ever heard it, it's truly poetry set to song.

For those of you who aren't up to date on my current situation, I am currently living just outside the city of Seattle, Washington, where I am a volunteer youth intern at a church called Living Hope Free Methodist. The experience so far has been very beneficial and I've been overwhelmed by the goodness and grace of God and many of His people, who have blessed me in so many ways since I've arrived.

So when Pastor Jim and his wife, Kathy, with whom I live, free of charge, asked me to drive them to the airport Friday morning, I was glad to do it. The fact that I needed to get up early, difficult as THAT would be, was no real problem. And knowing that I would have to miss my guitar lessons on Tuesday evening in order to pick them up when they returned was mostly just water under the bridge. I was actually very thankful to be able to do something to serve them as they serve me by making me feel so welcome in their home.

Crashing their car on the freeway wasn't exactly what I had in mind.

Let me explain. I was driving home after dropping Jim and Kathy off, paying attention, staying awake, watching the road, not speeding, and all that good stuff, when the car in front of me put the brakes on. I tried to brake accordingly but somehow my efforts were lost in translation- their brakes are much less sensitive than the ones in my car. The few seconds it took me to adjust for that difference resulted in me rear-ending the aforementioned car.

The next few minutes involved pulling over and just sitting in my car in shock, trying to grasp the fact that I'd just been in an accident in Pastor's car, asking "WHY ON EARTH didn't I stop faster?", and searching frantically for Pastor Jim's insurance information.

Finally the driver of the other car came back, (probably annoyed that I hadn't had the courtesy to come up to her car instead), and we began to exchange information. We took stock of the damage, which appeared to be minimal, all things considered... I'm hoping that it extends no further than the bumper of both cars, but only time will tell.

Eventually a police officer arrived and wrote me up a ticket (gee, thanks!), basically said something to the effect of- you caused an accident, so you owe us money. Which is fair, but I'm sure I'll be owing enough people money in the near future as a consequence, without the aid of this ticket.

I drove home and got on with the fun part- calling Pastor Jim to break the news. They were in the air at the time, so I enjoyed several hours of suspenseful stomach-gnawing while waiting for them to respond to my voice-mail messages.

When they returned my call, they were gracious, as always, which always makes me feel much worse. Occurences like these make me fear and yet somehow long for someone to just angrily ream me out, tear me apart, like I know I deserve. Hearing Kathy tell me that she's glad I'm alright, and that's the important thing, and that cars can be fixed, does nothing to ease my feelings of guilt. It's times like these where my love-hate relationship with grace comes out- It's a wonderful concept, but it doesn't seem to be appropriate for people like me.

So it's times like these where my faith looks its grimmest. Somehow, I believe I am capable of accepting God's grace- it's been drilled into me from my earliest days of church-going, and I've come to expect no less from God, because I accept that He's perfect, and forgiving, and that He's going to stay that way. So I blame Him for letting me remain so imperfect, after all these years. I would much rather be flawless, perfect in all things, whether they involve actual sin, or just life and poor judgment.

And in the meantime, while I am shamelessly attacking God for my humanity, I'm making a hypocrite of myself by shunning the grace of others. I can accept it from God, I think because I've just given up on trying to convince Him of giving up on me. But no way will I accept it from His people. It doesn't matter that I can extend it to others and expect them to accept it. I am completely unwilling to accept forgiveness and grace when it is offered to me.

This is where God finds me frustrating, I think.

And I think he's trying to tell me that if I won't accept the grace of others, but chose to wallow in my own feelings of failure or disappointment, then I can't really have accepted or responded to His grace. Because it's supposed to transform us. And because it's supposed to override the judgement of others.

Think about it. If I believe that God forgives me, but I refuse to be forgiven by others, or even to forgive myself, I'm selling God's opinion of me a bit short- more than that, I'm disrespecting his Lordship in the worst way.

If His opinion comes in third on my list of people to believe, if His judgement of me is a "nice thought, but a bit impractical", then I am not truly His child.

So walk with me in this thought. I am trying to learn to forgive myself. God knows, and Jim and Kathy know, as well as I do that there was no ill-intent or offensive way in me on Friday morning when I was driving their car home. We also all know that God was there, and because of His blessing and favour in my life I was not harmed but instead I am fine, and so is the driver of the other car, and the damage appears to be minimal. And on top of all that I have spoken to God, Jim and Kathy, and the police, and no one is burdening me with any great blame other than myself.

If I don't forgive myself, I run the risk of blowing off God and rejecting His grace- and that's the last thing I want to do. 'Cause between He and I, so far he's the only one on my side. Without Him, I would have no hope for myself. And I sure know I don't want to live that way. This way is hard enough.

So I am endeavoring to change the way I look at my flaws and mistakes, and even my sins, because I am harder on myself than God is. Here is a nice bit of biblical poetry about God for us to dwell on...
" For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
so great is his love for those who fear him;
As far as the east is from the west,
so far has he removed our transgressions from us.
As a father has compassion on his children,
so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him;" Psalm 103:11-13

And though I am that way, as often as I can be, with others, I am not that way towards myself. And God is tired of it. So he says to me,

"I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more.
Review the past for me, let us argue the matter together;
state the case for your innocence." Isaiah 43:25-26

And I get the feeling that, for MY own sake, he wants this finished. He said it was finished, 2000 years ago, yet I am haggling over my sins. For His sake, He's put them behind Him, put them far from Him, at the bottom of the ocean floor, because He knows exactly how painful they are to us- He's felt each one of them. And because they are dealt with, we must leave them behind and journey onward.

He knows I'm hung up over it, it's only been a few days, and the dust hasn't even settled it. So even though it's painful to both of us, he is willing to rehash it with me, if I must. He says, "Go for it! State your case, let us argue the past. But it doesn't change the outcome, and there can be no more favourable verdict than the forgiveness you've already received. There are better things waiting for you once you move on from here. I'll stay here till you're ready, but know that everything better will come when you journey a little further, a little closer to Me."

And, Lord knows, I'm trying to do just that. And I hope to have your prayers supporting me.

So you can pray for me, that when I am guilty, that I would accept my guilt. That when I am innocent, I would stand on God's side and defend my innocence, instead of selling out on myself (I really am my own worst enemy. Or rather, the sin that lives within me). And that when I am forgiven, I would accept God's pronouncement on the matter as final, as I would a judge or jury, and would get the guts and strength to truly live as one forgiven.