the church through the years

Today I was thinking about the church. I am myself a member of the church, and continue to think about this often. Many times this includes thoughts of frustration, thoughts of judgment and thoughts of wondering if I do want to claim to be a member of an organization which often times, to be frank, I wonder if I agree with the decisions which are being made, morally and biblically. Especially being in seminary, I am CONSTANTly aware of the church and the things which are harmful to humanity's perspective of God through the physical display of churches. I think that part of the constant struggle which I have with the church , when I boil it down, comes down to my OWN pride, my own internal battles and my own insecurities in facing things that God is desiring to teach me. There are so many sources of hearing God's voice on a daily basis, which from what I have experienced is a combination of listening to friends and hearing their thoughts, filtering those out, pondering over them, and then dicing it out with God through prayer throughout the process.

As I have been thinking about the church, this is a thought which has been occurring to me repeatedly. In my frustration with the OTHER people who I go to church with, it is actually MY problem. I think it has been easier for me to categorize my thoughts as frustration with THE church in general, but when I do this, I start picturing the faces of individuals who are part of the church of which I am a member. These are individuals who have called me when I have been ill, who have given me rides when my car broke down, who have invited me over to their home countless Sundays for lunch, (this for a broke graduate student is the TRUEST form of grace to be displayed). I realized tonight that there are always going to be issues which arise within anytime a group of humans (who have faults and sin) gather together in any type of organization and try to come to somewhat of a mutual understanding of how to form a community. I will continue to have issues within whatever church I am a part of, but the thing that became ubber clear to me tonight is that THE Church, the one that I actually care about the most, is that I am a follower of Jesus Christ, who is the ultimate church and ultimate community of which the community of followers stretches throughout the world and spans across all languages and races.
This church is one which does not discriminate based upon age, denomination, ethnicity, number of years that an individual has experienced grace, etc.

This realization of how much broader the church was a good reminder tonight. The story which actually made this central to my thoughts today was that I was blessed with the chance to meet with my friend Katie tonight and have some bomb Mexican food in the quaint town of Chino Hills. Katie and I met in 5th grade in Woodinville. This faithful woman was one of the pivotal sources of why I am now attending seminary at the age of 23 years old. Her perseverance to invite me to youth group, to show me a different kind of friendship than one I had EVER known before, as she was the person who LIVED out the grace of Jesus Christ to me early on. Her pursuit of friendship with me IS one of the ways that God spoke to me and called me to a place where I realized I would not ever be able to do anything on my own. My nice actions and thoughts were dandy, but let's be honest, I found out I couldn't run on those devices for very long. It makes me feel like a hamster on a spinning wheel. Katie and my life took different paths, as she moved away to California, and I continued to live in Woodinville. There were periods within this shift where I questioned and fought with God about why a friend this amazing would be taken away. God's answers seem to come way later than I always like. ;)
Tonight, 12 years later, we are now living like an hour away from one another. I have been really lucky to be able to hang out with her every once in a while. We spent the night talking, and much of our conversation is something that I felt was cool to share. Through a lot of our conversation we talked about our own struggles with being a part of the church, with churches we have been a part of in the past, and shared honestly with our own assumptions and how preferences interact with what places we end up staying at, where we end up leaving.
Somewhat near the end of the conversation we both agreed on one point. Sitting at a Mexican restaurant in sunny Ca, we had first been a part of church in 5th grade for a little while. Yet, tonight we were the physical display of THE church, the followers of Christ, who regardless of what denomination we affiliate with, without needing to sit in any building, WE were two girls, sitting and chatting, being the church. All this to be said, I think that often times believers will first ask what church another believer goes to, yet my question tonight is: does it truly matter? Why spend the time talking about what church you go to, why not talk about what you have seen God do today, what things you are struggling with today, and what people (including yourself) that you can ask that person to pray for, and what community across the world you can spend time praying for?