Church Challenge: Complete!

Ladies and gentlemen, we have finally done it! We have found our new church home!

*balloons and confetti woo!*

This church was recommended to us by the gal I was in contact with here and when we looked at the website it reminded me a lot of our church back home. They've only been around for a year now but they've got some good stuff going on.

Went there on Sunday and WOW! You know how normally when people greet you and you're new it's just "Hi, what's your name? Hope you like it here!"? Yeah, that didn't happen. Instead, the people that greeted us actually took 10, 15, 20 minutes to talk to us, get to know us, and talk about the church and the community. One gave me her phone number and said if I needed anything at all to call her. The worship leader gave us his card so I could email my resume directly to him instead of going through their FB page (more on that soon!). It was such a nice change!

Worship is waaaaaaay different than what I'm used to. Like, the worship leader sings like David Bowie (epic win!) and I'm preeeeeeeeetty sure all the songs were written by the worship team. It's loud, it's rock band-esque, and yet it gets straight to the heart of faith and makes you reflect on your relationship with Him.

The message was awesome. He's very similar to our old pastor. Not afraid to be humorous, not afraid to to challenge and convict, not afraid to talk about the hard stuff, not afraid to be relevant and applicable. Really excited to see how our faith grows here. The new sermon series starts the week after next about the truths of God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit which I think will be interesting. Probably enlightening too.

Now for the best parts!

JT is actually able to get involved with life groups here since he gets off work earlier out here. We were always sad we couldn't participate in Ekklesia because the times of all the groups was just never good for us.  They'd start a half hour before JT even got off work and it always bothered us that we couldn't make deeper connections due to missing out. Here, we're already personally invited to get involved in a specific group meant for couples without children.

The church is currently expanding their building and in need of volunteers. JT jumped on that real quick! You see, we've been praying for months that God will use us to expand His kingdom and to help us see how we're meant to use our gifts for Him. We didn't feel called to be missionaries and there wasn't any opportunity presenting itself to us at home so we really didn't know what we were supposed to do. Moving here and finding our plans completely turned upside down made us wonder if something bigger was going on. Now we find ourselves at a church that is doing everything it can to reach out to the community. First step, finishing this building. They have plans for two more plants, including one in the heart of downtown hopefully, within the next year or two. They're well on their way to doing that and we get to be a part of it! JT is stoked!

On top of the church expansion they're also adding a coffee shop to the building. A coffee shop that is looking for employees. Ahem, I JUMPED at the chance of that! Here's hoping! The coffee shop wouldn't just be a place for coffee and studying though (although those are needed here, there's almost NO coffee shops here...sooooo different from the NW), the way the building will be laid out it'll allow people to check out the church and get to know some of it's members at a pace and in a way more comfortable for them. It's a lot less scary to go to church for the first time if you get to see what the building is like and meet some of the people who go there beforehand. So it would be a job but it would also be a chance to minister to others. I really hope I get this job! I'm so stinking excited to see what's going on here and how this will impact our stay here. We still want to go back home ASAP but knowing that we'll have a family here is comforting, especially if we add a little one to our clan before going back home.

Needless to say, we're more than a little excited. And relieved. We really needed this.