How Did Those Presbyterians KNOW?!

I should start by saying that before I nervously arrived at this church, all I knew about Presbyterians came from the book Angela's Ashes. That is, that they come from North of Ireland and have Presbyterian hair that you have to let your grandmother spit on to make it behave. Ha ha! This isn't why I was nervous. I'm neither from North of Ireland nor a Presbyterian so I was in no danger of these grooming tactics. I was nervous because I had a feeling that if God had a retinal scanner at the door, it would surely alert security about my breech.

University Presbyterian doesn't have a retinal scanner. Instead, they have a beautiful courtyard surrounded by red bricks that opened to smiles and a kindly old fella at the door greeting everyone... even me. Luckily, I picked a church my super sweet friend attends regularly so I was in good hands. I'm not sure if it makes sense to be in good hands at a church, but I was all the same.

The scene inside was breathtaking. It was light and incredibly airy with large windows looking out onto trees. No stained glass, darkness, or a bloodied and anguished Jesus. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but that setting does put me in a very dark mood. Possibly due to several viewings of The Omen as a child. Anyway, the walls were light green and everything was just so fresh looking. I felt like we should have arrived in carriages. And then I saw that there was a LADY pastor! WOW!!! Times have changed. And she was amazing and articulate and very well prepared. I honestly felt like an intellectual sitting there. It was truly a survey of scripture. They even had a list of people to pray for for various sufferings or celebrate with. I'm still not at a point where I hold much weight in prayer, but I don't think that having an entire congregation funneling well wishes and love to any thing on the planet has ever had a bad outcome.

I got a little emotional at the beginning when we opened with a Prayer of Confession that seemed to have been written for me, even though we all said it out loud together. This part really got me:

"Deliver us, O God; we are overwhelmed by the carnage... created by us in our daily mindlessness, in our careless heartlessness, in our sloppy stewardship. We are embarrassed by messy attempts to cover up what we have done."

IF I believed in signs, this one was addressed to me and put in with a sock full of rocks then hurled at my head. OUCH! This is exactly why I've been begging people to attend to church with me. I am one living, breathing mess! I am presently upset with myself over no fewer than 15 major mistakes I've made and some of them can never be fixed or forgiven. I don't even try to cover up what I've done anymore because I seem to make it worse. That confession hurt and my eyes burned trying to fight back tears of guilt and relief that maybe other people feel this way. But they had something I don't have: JESUS. I left feeling satisfied with a well-spent hour, but I didn't leave with holy spirit. Instead, I left alone but maybe just a little less overwhelmed. I'll keep looking. Finding God is the only thing I haven't tried yet, so I am very excited that I'm FINALLY on the journey. I want to be just like those Presbyterians. I want to be on a team. I want to plead, "Oooh Ooooh!! Ooooh Pick me!!!! Pick me!!!" until God picks me. I don't even care if he picks me last.