Why I love church

By Pastor Jaime Rogers-Fairchild

What a joy this first month has been! On behalf of Liz, my dad (Jim) and myself, we thank you for all the warm wishes, greetings, and gift cards! We have felt very embraced in the warmth of your hospitality. I look forward to getting to know each of you better over these next few months.

I love church. Truly love it. I always have. It has always been a place of deep joy, with both laughter and tears. I have always loved to talk about my faith, about God, and the importance of church. Even in the days of being the rebellious teenager, my friends all knew that on Sunday morning, I was going to be at church.

Church has been the place where I have created relationships and the best of friendships. Worship has and continues to deepen my faith. It has gifted me lifelong friendships of true honesty; introduced me to people who became a part of the village in raising my son; and created extended family as the people of the church mourned with my family at the loss of my brothers, cared for us through my mother’s cancer and death, and fully supported me throughout my journey into ministry. I cannot, and won’t even try, to imagine life without church.

In classes, the teachers would sometimes talk about the loss of connection when you are the one serving the church as opposed to being the one receiving. I am quite happy to say I have not had this feeling of loss, and I did worry about it. Church is still church for me. It fills me up. I love hearing the voices, whether in tune or not, singing the hymns. I love hearing the voices together during prayers and it makes me think of Pentecost when all the people spoke at once in different languages. I love the coffee and conversations over snacks. I love sharing my thoughts and receiving your thoughts. The entire experience is fulfilling, even when I rewrite the message four times, stumble through prayers, and feel extra anxious. I just simply love worship.

Worship is something we do together. God wants us to be together and what a great place to create togetherness. I value your input into worship because I want to ensure you enjoy it as much as I do. If there are scriptures or topics you want to know more about, let me know! I bet we can work that into how we can all learn together on Sunday morning. If you want to talk about something said on a Sunday morning in the message, scripture, or prayer, let’s talk! If you want to know the history of the hymns we sing or anything about the worship process, let’s learn! Why do we sing? Why do we have Holy Communion? Why do we light the candles? Why is each liturgical season given a color? What is a liturgical season? What does liturgical mean? Why do we need ‘corporate worship’? That one is easy – it creates a space of intention to be with God, and to be with others, as we experience life together.

Let’s worship!

Shalom,

Pastor Jaime