God doesn’t need you to be perfect.

For a while in my 20’s while I was figuring out who I was, I thought of myself as a ‘spiritual’ person who believed in a Higher Power: on the surface I didn’t call God by name, but He was still God.

“Religion” made me feel inferior when I was young. As a creative person, I enjoyed expressing myself. I felt like I would have to conform in order to live up to someone else’s religious standards.

In my teens and 20’s I liked wearing makeup, edgy clothes (it was the 80’s after all!), and the occasional swear word would slip. While I went to church in high school fairly regularly with a friend, I always felt awkward. Certainly not because of anyone at church, they were wonderful. I just felt like I didn’t belong.

I was extremely shy and introverted, and social situations with people I didn’t know well were awkward. To this day I would rather have a root canal than attend a large gathering filled with people I don’t know.

It became a circle of guilt: I felt guilty because I didn’t go to church, but then I was so uncomfortable when I did go that I felt guilt because I hated it. I finally just gave up.

I don’t respond very well to being TOLD what to do, and if someone told me I “needed to go to church”, I dug in my heels, more determined than ever not to go. (I’ve always said there’s a reason the Missouri State animal is a mule!)

It was a pamphlet dropped off at our house brought everything into perspective. Suddenly 30-year old memories that I’d blocked out came crashing back. They were so clear and profound that I had to sit down and just breathe. I felt the emotions all over again that I’d felt as a kid: terror and fear.

My grandmother, bless her, was a Primitive Baptist. They had a big picnic in the summer, and I went with my grandmother a couple of times. I don’t know how it is today, but back then the pastor was a traditional hell-and-damnation-bang-the-pulpit guy who quite frankly scared me to death.

I thumbed through the pamphlet in front of me to kill time during the sermon. I saw drawings of a man who was in the ground, practically the same drawing I’d seen in the pamphlet dropped off at my house. The book talked about the importance of being saved before you die so your soul could get to heaven.

My 6- or 7-year old self didn’t understand the meaning of the picture.

I thought he’d been buried alive. 

I was afraid to go to sleep for days afterward, afraid I’d be buried alive while I slept. It’s kind of funny now, but back then it was sure scary!

Eventually I forgot about this until the next year when I went to the picnic and the cycle repeated itself. I think that may have been the last church picnic I’ve ever attended. 😀

The moral of this story is that you don’t HAVE to go to church to know that God’s in your life. I think it’s WONDERFUL that folks worship together and find joy in church services and other activities. I wouldn’t rule that out for me at some point.

But for now, I’m still an introvert. I require a certain amount of time to myself to recharge my batteries in order to be my best self for others. I worship Him my way, and God is just fine with that. I can tell because I feel him in my life daily.

God doesn’t need you to be perfect. He just needs you to give it your best effort and to move forward.

Don’t be afraid to reach out to Him. There’s no right or wrong way to do it. At the end of the day, it’s what God thinks that matters, not anyone else.

Cheers, friends.