Little homecoming

This morning, my huddle at St. A's was cancelled because we have our women's retreat this weekend. I usually have a pretty packed Wednesday, but today had some rather huge chunks of freedom due to my first inspection not being until 1.  So I did something different.  Let me back track.  Yesterday I spent and hour in Dicks Sporting Goods.  Looking for cool coaching stuff.  Did i mention that I am coaching a middle school girls soccer team?  I know what you are thinking. Just don't worry about it.  It will be just like when I was in middle school...  Dear Lord I hope not..  Any ways, I ran into an old friend from the church that I used to go to.  Eastbridge. 

Here is a little back story for you people- I went to Eastbridge four like 3-4 years while I was in college.  It was my first real church home.  I was basically the only college person, unless Sam Joyner and a few others were home for Xmas break.  Basically I was surrounded by extremely nice people.  It was the first time I had a real church family etc.  It was a small church, so if you had a beating heart then basically you were doing something.  I learned what it was like to be an actual active church member.  You didn't serve out of obligation.  You served out of love and willingness to help.  It's where I learned about intergenerational relationships.  I met some of the kindest people there.  Some of my dearest friendships were made there.  I learned to pray out loud (it was a very large accomplishment for me), I played guitar in front of other people for the first time, and I learned how to basically be seeking after the Lord.  After a few years, I guess you could say I was ready to fly the nest and really felt called to St. Andrews.  It was really hard leaving there for many reasons.  It was my home.  Not just the church, but the people.

So in the middle of Dicks, I got way overly sentimental (Internally of course) and did not want this friendly meeting to end.  Have you ever had encounters like that?  I had so many people to ask about.  I probably could have talked to this sweet woman for the next 2 weeks.  All of these nostalgic feelings kept flooding in.  The best feeling was that they had not forgotten about me (Extremely self focused I know, but I was all the more relieved).  I left there thinking that it would do this heart good to stop in one day. 

One day being today:)  My Wednesday huddle was cancelled and I happen to now that every single Wednesday at 9am, Mrs. Esther has her prayer time at Eastbridge followed by bible study.  So I went.  I was kind of nervous at first.  In fact, I almost didn't go in.  When I left, I never really got to say goodbye.  I just kind of stopped going.  So when I opened the big double doors, all of the familiarities came flooding in.  I popped in the office to say hey.  I made my little mini coffee at the kitchen and headed down the hall.  (If you have read any of the Mitford books- I was totally having some kind of literary flashbacks).  I felt like the prodigal daughter coming home for a quick visit (A little dramatic I know, but it's who I am..)  Then I went in.  There they were.  The familiar faces that I used to see all of the time.  Sweet Mrs. Esther with her Bible and her prayer sheet that she makes for everyone.  Just to get to see her was so delightful.  Talk about a prayer warrior.  I had a strong urge to run and tackle her, but since she is a hair older, I went with the long hug.  She pulled up a chair in my old spot and it was just like old times.  Catching up.  I love when you can pick up where you left off.  Just sitting there in the midst of these ladies brought back so many sweet times.  Its so cool for me, because my time at Eastbridge totally equipped me for St. Andrews.  St. Andrews is big. If I hadn't learned how to plug in at Eastbridge then I could totally have fallen through the cracks.  It's funny how things work together to get you other places.  When you don't even realize it at the time.   All in all, today was a very sweet little homecoming experience.  And I hope I don't wait four years more to do it again.