sunday.

A Sunday as it should be, full of worship, fellowship, and relaxing. I worked check-in at children’s ministry again this morning, I love getting to greet the parents when they walk in with their kiddos! Come February (when I’ll be able to actually serve in the classrooms, because I’ll have been a member for 6 months) I should know allll their names and faces. All the music at service today was Christmas, lots of festive hymns. The whole church looks beautiful and smells like the holiday, there are lots of real trees everywhere, and all the painting turned out so well!

The day that I walked to church to help paint because the snow and ice prevented any kind of driving!

Afterwards we all helped clean up the church from the services, then headed off to Husky Deli for lunch. Jenna, Dorina, Dustin, Tommy and I all went, and laughed a ton as usual, talking silly things about life. We walked down to Bakery Nouveau after that, and ended up at C&P, my favorite! We played several rounds of bananagrams as we listened to live music, perfect.

Laughing at our silly faces on Jenna's camera

After a few rounds I noticed that the man sitting near us wasn’t reading his book but watching our game, so I invited him to join in, and he took up the offer. That led into conversation about how we all knew each other (church), what we love to do (fellowship), and why (Jesus). He said he wasn’t religious at all, and we said that we weren’t either, and had the opportunity to explain the lie of religion in the face of a true relationship with the Lord. I’ve been praying for opportunities like that :)

I was thinking the other night about how we, as humans, deeply desire to be known. It’s evident in how we connect ourselves in every way possible: email, facebook, twitter, blog. But isn’t this merely a distorted response to a design intended to draw us more closely to the Lord? There’s purpose in design; we were made to be known. It only makes sense that this yearning was designed to draw us nearer to the God who created us and is reciprocally seeking such relationship eagerly. I love the Christmas season and all that it represents because it is a reminder of all that the Lord did to enable that. A reminder of the gospel, the truth that proclaims that we in no way can earn our salvation, and instead, must rely on the abundant and entirely sufficient grace that the Lord, in his goodness, freely gives.

The rest of the evening was spent swinging by the grocery store (finally, some fresh fruits and veggies, I’ve been craving them) and getting things organized at home. After this, I’ll probably read and go to bed early. This weekend was relaxing, but so full of out-of –the-norm fun things that I’m wiped out! Wiped-out, but thankful, and looking forward to the week to come.

Love.