"Searching for authenticity" seems like such an odd phrase to me. It seems to me that a person is either authentic or not. It should happen naturally. Life happens, though, and I think before we know it life can begin to be defined by our reaction to the sum of our experiences instead of our natural inclinations. At least, that's how it has felt for me.
I was born in 1972 to parents who are believers. I was told that I began going to church "in utero". We were a family that were at the church every time the doors were open...Sunday school, kids church, "Wednesday night supper", kids choir, Vacation Bible School, and any and every other activity that a person could be at church for. Church was life. My brothers and I also attended Christian school. It's very safe to say that we were immersed in the Christian lifestyle. To further assure our protection from "worldly things" we had no television, and weren't allowed to see newspapers. I was only allowed to listen to Christian music as well. I grew up on The Imperials, Dallas Holm and Praise, David Meece, Leon Patillo, The Goads and whoever else made the cut in my Father's eyes. The truth is that I don't feel like I really missed anything. I was a bit socially awkward, though, because I had little to nothing in common to talk about with my friends. I was also bookish... ok a nerd... too and that didn't help.
My world opened up a bit in 4th grade. That year there was a new girl at school. For whatever reason, she decided we were going to be friends. She pursued me until I gave in and we became really tight friends. We went everywhere together. We were a package deal. Pretty quickly after beginning to hang out with her I started noticing that there were some pretty extreme differences in our households. I spent A LOT of time at her house. She didn't like being at my house. I thought her family was really weird. They enjoyed each other's company. I'd never seen anything like it. They hung out with each other because they wanted to, not just because they were related. I thought they were really unusual. To top it off, her parents were big Me fans. They were always so kind. They were always spoiling me. It was an experience like none I'd ever had.
My parents were also Amway distributers. When we weren't at church or school, chances were that we were doing something "business" related. Through Amway I met several more friends. Every summer we would go to a big convention at a cool resort. As we got older we had more freedom during the day when our parents were "at meetings". I usually spent most of my time with 3 other girls my age. One of the girls was a member of the family of musicians that were always at those conventions too to provide the entertainment. We spent a lot of time with them because they were "cool". The times I spent hanging out with that amazing family ultimately changed my life. They were, in many ways, like my friend's family that I thought was so odd. They were crazy in love with each other. They took all that love stuff to a whole new level. They were also crazy in love with God. In all of my time at church I had never seen anyone like those people. I wanted what they had. I wanted to know God like they knew Him. The summer before I turned 14, I invited Jesus into my heart.
No comments:
Post a Comment