CHURCH #4. We may have found it.
It's not well-advertised. I saw its name on an office strip billboard as I drove by. They meet in the center of Athens, right next to campus. They have 90% 20-somethings in the service IN JULY (UGA's hasn't started yet). They are so similar in set-up and beliefs and the base denominational stuff as our old church - it's almost like it's our NH church but 10 years earlier. The people seemed so real and natural - not the "they are the greeters but they just seem too fake/sticky sweet". The kids area was really small, though, and the K and above kids sit in the big church during the summer. ??!! Have you SEEN my kids when they're supposed to act good/quiet??!!! That might eliminate US from the church, not the church from OUR search. :)) They provide crayons and coloring pages for the kids and make the sermon somewhat kid-relevant, so they're trying. The younger kid area W and Lauren went to (W was one week away from the "move-up" day) was in a large room with toys but not many kids. Later I asked a mom about the # of kids and it would be 7 kids K-2, 7 3-5. Small. How many families go to this church?? We didn't see many but heard that several were on vacation.
The music was AMAZING. The harmony was SO pretty and it had a slight country/bluegrass twang to it. We knew about half the songs (all songs we sang in NH). When the offering basket came by - it was silent. No music, no talking. It was reeeeeally awkward. But turns out they had some video glitch (they have screens up front for videos/song lyrics!) The sermon was a neat take on David and Goliath. My main takeaway is that you're not BRAVE/COURAGEOUS unless you are scared. You have to be scared first and then be brave enough to push through it. Wow.
When the pastor started his "pre-communion" talk, I looked at the communion table I'd been looking at off and on throughout the sermon and my eyes suddenly widened and it dawned on me that there were four big glasses up there with the bread pieces. Not the little plastic glasses I'm used to.... four big..... WHAT??!!! "AWW HELL NO" (with a southern accent so more like "HAY-ILL NO"), I thought. I quickly wrote a note to Bob saying "I will NOT go up there. I'm not sharing a cup. I'm sitting right here." And I mentally started to write this church off of my list. And then I tuned back in to the pastor who was saying "and when you dip your bread into the cup....." SHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Man! The RELIEF I felt. I'm no Megan Eshbaugh, but even I have a germ-sharing limit, and sharing a glass with 100 people is outside that limit!
Overall, this church may be the one. Its size is SCARY for us - we'd love the kids to have more kids in their classes, and more families to interact with (since we have to copy everything we did at our beloved NH church). This church would definitely challenge us. You can't "hide" in a smaller church. We WANT to take that next step in our spiritual lives - to be held more accountable, to be more visible, to be "pressured" to start a real, genuine, forever walk with God. Not a "salvation" walk - we're already there. But the "okay, you are fully in charge of us now, God. What is your plan for us? Why did you bring us down here?" We see this church as the type that will continue to grow, and it's kind of weird but it's so small yet so similar to our NH church that it's almost like we'd be "founders" of the church we just left. We still have one or two more to visit/re-visit but I kind of have that "recognition/knowing" feeling going on.
Church #5. The Southern Traditional.
We'd heard about this church from so many people - nearly every person we asked re: church recommendations mentioned this church. It is a "denomination" so we were a little leery of that but had heard that this didn't follow the hard/stereotypical line of that denomination. It was more contemporary/laid back. So we show up this morning and there's a police car directing traffic into the parking lot, which seemed small but you go around the corner and it curves left and right and left and right and goes on and on and on. Not big and open like a shopping center parking lot would be (I guess they are landlocked). But there were LOTS of cars. And these people were dressed to the NINES. Ok, some had maxidresses but they had cute little matching sandals and hair and makeup were perfect, etc. Even the teenage boys were dressed nice. Bob probably should have tucked his shirt in. :))
We plowed on and went straight up to the information table and a nice-enough lady walked us to the opposite side of campus to drop the kids off at their building. Two story. With two playgrounds. The lady at the information desk was the nicest person ever and the VP of the school the boys are going to had contacted her and told her to be on the lookout for us (I love this VP!) We entered the downstairs area and everything was so cutely decorated/painted, like you were going into different stores for each room. It wasn't overwhelming/in your face like Church #3 though. When we dropped William off the teacher in there was his favorite lifeguard from the pool so he walked in shyly smiling and surprisingly not complaining about anything. They keep the same teachers all year long. Quite a "burden" for those workers but what great consistency! I guess it's easier to serve in that way when there are two sermon times, thus you still get to be taught every week. The church has THREE meeting times and for the two earlier times there are two services going on at the same time, just with different music - traditional or contemporary. The pastor switches which room he preaches in every week. We went to the contemporary service and it was PACKED. The music was good - not as great as the other churches and I only knew one song but I'm starting to get used to that now :)) The sermon was ok - it's wasn't much about the Bible - was more focusing on the changes coming up in the area with all the students coming back and the importance of all of us serving each other and the church. I didn't leave motivated or filled. We can give it a "pass" since it's not fair to judge based on one sermon. Upon leaving, the traffic out of the childcare area, parking lot and street intersection was CRAZY. Thus the need for the cop, I guess.
Overall, Bob and I agree that this isn't the church for us. It's too big (it really felt like a cattle call at some points), we didn't get much out of the sermon, and it just didn't "feel" right. I did sense the judging eyes of the women sizing each other up, which I am typically immune to. But I told Bob maybe that's what God wants to do is put me in the middle of that and NOT be like that. But SHOOO it won't be in this church. I'd like to be filled, not drained on Sundays ;)) I WILL say that the people we talked to were really nice. They were the greeters and teachers so they had to be but it did seem genuine.
So looks like we have some questions to ask about #4 before we decide. I know we should trust our instinct since we prayed heavily (as did our friends) re: finding a church. But I want to know more about their goals/5-year plan/financial info and budget (where do they spend their money)/focus on children's ministry, etc. Will get back to you!
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