sitting here at the front desk at the university computer with a dead laptop at my elbow and only a little bit of sleep, i am thinking about church buildings. i've been in a lot of churches. no lie. and more specifically, the ones that i can remember precisely. vine street baptist church in louisville, kentucky. first baptist church walnut valley, california. elk creek baptist church in orange, virginia. coaling baptist church, first united methodist church both back home. elkdale baptist in selma. the carver baptist center in new orleans. it's weird how i can remember the exact layouts of each of these buildings...the ups and downs and secret rooms and hidden stairways and which rooms make a big circle. i could probably draw you a map of these places.
so i was sitting here thinking that that's what most people consider a "church". we don't think about the people in those buildings that actually make up the church, the body of Christ. funny how it is that we can remember the building clearly, but we can't remember the names of the people that we worked alongside while we were in that building. funny how we can't remember the kids whose lives we worked to touch. funny how the "fun" and "random" things like singing and dancing down the street stick out more than the activities we planned for vacation bible school. interesting how when the lists come out for summer missionaries the fun activities are always mentioned front and center in the description of the mission field.
i don't know. it's just something that came to mind and i figured i would type it up and sent it out to internet world. it never hurts to have a reminder that the church is not the building that you meet in but instead the people that love you, help you, teach you, and touch your life...and again, those people that you love, you help, you teach, and touch their life.
