My wife and I are coming to what looks like the end of a very difficult, what could be considered “pruning,” season. Our goal in this journey has always been to mature in our faith. We’ve been in search of 2 major things: Biblical truth, and deep, healthy fellowship with other believers. We’ve found what looks like both, but to say it’s been a messy and difficult process would be an understatement.
We met at a very large local church, that by many standards, would be considered a “megachurch“. We made many friends, served in a few different capacities, and attended faithfully (almost) every Sunday. However, we saw what we perceived as an inability to make genuine connections with people. We had many friends but lives did not intersect. People had all sorts of differing priorities, and we just felt lost in a large crowd. I’m not putting the blame on anyone, it’s just where we were in life.
We sought to remedy that by trying to find a smaller church. We found one through some old connections I had, and made our way from a church of thousands to a church of about 20 regular attendees. We liked that we got to see familiar faces more regularly, and people noticed if we missed a Sunday. We also liked the depth in the Biblical teaching– not that it was missing from the megachurch, it truly was good too.
Eventually we got together with some friends from this smaller church and formed a small group, which then evolved into a “house church .” Gathering together with these people was by far the most amazing feeling of true fellowship, with people regularly praying for one another, intimate worship and going through some serious ups and downs, together. Theologically, this group had the most noticeably broad range of doctrinal beliefs. Many of them conflicting.
This group, along with the smaller church we previously attended, had a sense of dislike for the format of the large megachurch. It wasn’t always stated, but it was very noticeable– understandably so. Intimate fellowship and genuine accountability seems to be more of a challenge in larger settings. I think most likely these things just aren’t possible in a huge congregation of 1000+ members; it needs to take place in a subgroup like a bible study or small group.
This house church season of our lives wouldn’t last much longer, as the ones hosting it would end up moving across the country. One by one, those in our little fellowship would part ways and left my wife and I feeling alone and wrestling with a need to wrestle with all the differing theologies we encountered along our journey. We got a taste of genuine fellowship, and thorough Biblical study but couldn’t seem to shake the feeling that there was something amiss.
My wife stumbled across a sermon on YouTube that perked her ears. We ended up finding what we realized was a network of home fellowships, and a website with some seriously thorough Biblical teachings. They seemed to address context, culture, history, original language. These teachings checked off all the right boxes for sound teaching. The problem was, they seemed to go against many of the things we’ve been learning!
Regardless, we pressed on and absorbed a TON of information, measuring it up to scripture as best we could and seeing if it fit. Sure enough it seemed to fit. In fact, it fit so well it seemed like a lot of the mainstream Christian teachings were either taking things out of context or just plain inaccurate! I think we’ve been deep in learning from this group for about a year now. I’ve kinda lost track.
However, at this point we’ve gotten to a point where we feel disconnected from other Christians– which I’m sure is a red flag. We never wanted to isolate ourselves, we just wanted to dive so deeply into addressing false doctrine that we felt like we couldn’t relate. It seemed like no one else was teaching this stuff and the Christians in our lives either closed off to wanting to dig with us, or assumed we joined a cult or something.
Determined to not be separated, I’ve recently had a renewed motivation to reach out to pastors and people I think may be willing to take a look at what we’ve been learning with us. Even if it means going back to a megachurch. I want to continue our digging, but also retain connections with other Christians no matter how shallow those connections may be at first.
As I reflect on our journey I have been wrestling with thoughts about us coming back full circle and wondering if we’ve done nothing but waste time “outside the sheepfold.” I think I can truthfully say we have not wasted time.
What we learned was we want genuine, smaller, intimate fellowship group interactions even if we become part of a megachurch again. We know that setting cannot be replaced. The other thing is, we’ve learned to navigate the Bible, gained perspective and learned to think more critically. That will be crucial in helping keep us in the sheepfold so we arent lead astray by false doctrine. Most importantly, we have seen how God’s faithfulness never wavers, regardless of where we are in life. God in all His righteousness, power, justice and goodness has been the constant anchor for us.
If you find yourself relating to our journey, please just know this: don’t give up searching for God. He’s always there, and if your heart is to glorify Him and to grow in your relationship with Him, I believe He will honor your journey and lead you to Himself. It most likely won’t be easy, but it is worth it. We would like to be part of your journey. Know it comes from a place of understanding and a desire to keep one another accountable and more importantly safe.
As for us, the implications of our journey are that we will likely have some unique perspectives on scripture. Believe me, if it’s not true, I don’t want to believe it either. That’s part of the inspiration for this website. I hope you will join us, and that we can approach one another with grace. There is false teaching out there, and we also live in an individualistic society (USA) that makes genuine fellowship difficult to find sometimes. Both our goals for our journey will come with difficulty.