I got a little lost yesterday, but fortunately I had left early enough so that I was still “on time”.

Even though Waycross is only an hour down the road, I had never been to their church before.  Seems a shame to have a Nazarene church that close and not do more things together.  Back in the “the day”, we had Zone Rally’s on a quarterly basis and that’s when the “local” churches would get together and share a service and some food together.  I guess that’s when people weren’t so busy. 

The Waycross people seem almost familiar.  They were warm and friendly and just reminded me of the “typical” loving people you will find in a small to medium size church.  I haven’t visited a lot of different denominations, but overall, I bet you’d find the same kind of christians in any church as I found yesterday.

There’s the older gentleman who will be one of the first ones to greet you when you walk in the door, “hey, young lady!”  He’s probably been in that church for forty years and is steady as a rock.  He’s the one who will do anything for the church and probably doesn’t care that it isn’t busting at the seams; he gets real joy out of just loving the people that do come.

There’s the little old lady who has her favorite pew to sit on and her favorite hymn to sing.  She can’t do as much as she once could, so she prays fervently for those who can.

There’s the young mom who always ends up keeping the nursery…..probably because her kids are the only ones in there.  And when church is over and she does get to come out, she’ll be the first one to come up and say, “I really enjoyed your singing today.  I got to hear it on the nursery speakers and it was great!”

There’s the “church kitchen lady” who knows where every untensil, pot or pan is in the kitchen.  She might leave the service a few minutes early just to make sure things are set up.  She’ll fix her plate last to make sure that there is enough chicken and banana pudding for the visitors.  She’ll be the first one to get up and start putting everything away so she can rush home, take a quick nap, and get back to lead choir practice at 5:00 P.M.

There’s the 40-something head usher and sound man.  He’s the one who does things at the church during the week and never gets any credit….and he doesn’t care if he ever does.  He just sees what needs doing and does it.  He also stops by to take the Pastor out for lunch sometimes, just because.  And if he knows the Pastor likes to fish, he’ll make sure they find a good pond on a Saturday.

There’s the 50-something lady who’s full of life!  She has the biggest smile and hug!  She’s lived long enough to learn that you shouldn’t sweat the small stuff.  She’s in charge of the ladies ministry and makes sure they have FUN once a month, whether it’s making crafts together or going to the local ice cream parlor for an ice cream cone.  Her motto is LIVE, LAUGHTER AND LOVE.

The body of Christ…..everyone doing their part.  Being uniquely created to serve in the way that God planned.  The body functions as it should when we all fill the place we were designed to fill.

And when you’re not there, something is missing.