So today I realized that I am in a curious state and have been for these past two months….one in which my head and heart are in different places. It seems that one is always ahead of the other or behind, and they are continuously changing places with each other as well.

In the beginning, on St. Valentine’s Day when everything “clicked” and I was feeling the Lord’s presence so much, that WHOLE day, I didn’t feel any doubts that day…just LOVE, LOVE, LOVE! Also great JOY at the thought that He did have a plan, and a CHURCH for me, for us believers, that there didn’t have to be so much contradiction within the Body of Christ, etc. It was a glorious day. That day my head and heart seemed “aligned” together.

But that is a rare occurrence. Depending on the day and circumstance it is a topsy-turvy sort of world for me right now. Still great joy and love and excitement, etc. But I’m having to work through years and years and layers and layers of Protestant theology. Some days, my brain gets it all! It makes a lot of sense, and on those days it seems my heart feels the loss that will be coming to me, loss of friends that may not understand, loss of my old life before I knew this Glorious Truth. Those days my heart is holding back, holding on to the past.

Then there are days where my brain says “STOP! Things are moving TOO FAST….SLOW DOWN!” That happened on Sunday night after listening to a sermon on EWTN regarding Mary. I’m having a hard time with Mary right now. While my heart wants to simply just believe in all of it, my brain says STOP! I haven’t worked through all of these doctrines yet. I’ve read a lot of them, and they make sense to me in a very real way….I imagine because I’m reading TRUTH…..but my brain still has to work through the nuts and bolts of it all, own it for myself. Those days my heart is ahead of my brain. (Side-note: I decided to put off Mary doctrine for another day, I’ll just stick to Peter and the keys for now!!)

This is definitely one of THE most challenging experiences of my life. I am being challenged to my very core about who I am…who God is…who Jesus is…how He wants to be worshiped….which is different than my 40 years have understood it to be this far. What will it all mean for the future? For my family….as my choices not only affect me but them. And my closest and dearest friends.

Last night as I nursed my baby to sleep and mulled it all over, I started crying, anticipating how different things are going to be….mourning my old life again. It’s like another convert wrote….she’s set up her tent outside of the Promised Land, the land that God has brought her too. But Egypt looks pretty good sometimes. Maybe if I just sit out here on the other side of the Promised Land close enough to the Light, that is good enough.

But it is not….it is not obedience. I know that if I don’t move forward it would be disobedience. And I am mourning my old life of ignorance today. My heart is holding back today.

Today I brought my three children with me for the first time to a Catholic Mass. I asked dh if it would be okay since it was Palm Sunday. He has agreed to go with Mass with me in the future, so we can be unified as a family. But he hasn’t been available to do so yet. I am also wanting to tread lightly, this is his relationship with Jesus also. Not mine. He would be quite happy if I decided I could just go to our Grace Brethren still. But I can’t. I could do both, if he wishes to. But my heart wants us to be received into the Church together unified as a family. Anyway, he gave me his blessing to take the children today. So I did.

When I woke up this morning, I knelt beside my bed and prayed, “Please Lord draw the kids close to you today. ” They didn’t want to go. Well, they didn’t mind going but they both said they loved their old church and did not want to change. Anyway, I was nervous about them not liking it at all and reporting to dh that it was terrible, etc. So I prayed, “Please Lord, draw them close to YOU today.”

So we get to the parish, and I inquire if the best thing to do is take the kids with me to the crying room in the back of the sanctuary. And a kind soul told me that there was a Children’s Liturgy at the 10:00 Mass (which we were at) and before the Homily the Priest would invite the children up and then all of the children together would exit to Children’s Liturgy. My son liked this because he is used to being dismissed before the sermon at our present church. Good so far! So anyway, right before the Homily the Priest called for the children to come up, and my children ran up….I walked them to the aisle and got to smell the incense for the first time ( I saw it burning but couldn’t smell anything in the crying room). I almost cried because I smelled it as I saw my children running to join in with the other children in God’s church. It was such a special moment.

So the rest of the service I spent trying to keep my wiggly toddler happy. But I was still able to join in, following along in the book they gave me at the door. I don’t know what they call this book yet. The homily was longer today because it was Palm Sunday and it was from Luke’s Gospel today. I don’t have it in front of me to record here. But it was all very moving and I heard nothing but SCRIPTURE the entire time. I was very teary throughout the Homily.

Then the kids joined back with me in the crying room before the Eucharist was served. The first thing my son showed me was a special little stone with a cross on it that he was given during the Children’s Liturgy…he told me it was “blessed”. If he had told me something of that kind 6 months ago I would have made sure he knew that that was NOT what we did! LOL That would be creating an idol. I’ve come far…because it actually warmed my heart when he shared that with me. My son likes special treasures and so I was thankful to the Lord because I felt He was answering my request from this morning. DD also met a little friend, and both of them had their Sunday School sheets with crosses and a lesson on them to do at home. And so I think they will do just fine.

When we got home from Mass today, my kids were waving their palm branches that were handed out at the door, and wishing the neighbors “Happy Palm Sunday”. DD wanted to give one to her little girlfriend down the street. I thought to myself how judgmental I’ve been in the past….so hung up on avoiding any sort of “traditions of men” thinking it pagan or idol worship or not meaningful. Look how much fun my dd was having, and she was sharing it with her friends already! I suddenly felt so ashamed…I remember visiting that very same parish for a funeral a few years ago….and thinking smugly to myself that all of that service was just pagan ritual. But now I see these traditions are so beautiful and also so helpful in drawing me close to Him, here in this physical world I still reside in for now. As I remembered all of my sinful judgements in the past, I cried and asked the Lord to please forgive me for judging HIS Church like that. I am so ashamed. And not only have I been guilty of judging the One Church He has given to us, but also I have judged other Protestant churches in the past as well. Each of us is doing the best we can to try and serve Him the best we know how. I know I was and look how far I was from the Truth, and I certainly don’t have it all together now. Far from it, I feel like a babe in Christ…brand new Christian all over again. I hope that from now on I can look at people differently….not wondering about whether they’re truly saved or not, or if they are a mature Christian or not, but rather how can I love them. Show Christ to them. Or Like Mother Theresa said, find Jesus in them.

Well, dh got home from work and asked the kids how they liked church. Of course they both said they only liked it a little. That they had to sit still too much, etc. LOL But dd then went on to tell him how there was a little girl who was stealing crayons in the Children’s liturgy. She was breaking them in half and putting them in her pocket. DH looks at me, and says “what kind of a place are you taking the kids?” I told him, the church is made up of sinners, not perfect people. He started laughing, because he was just joking, but I thought he was serious! I thought he was just looking for something to complain about so we wouldn’t go there anymore. At-least he’s got a sense of humor about my journey.

I have been contemplating starting a blog for sometime, but didn’t see the importance of it until recently when I realized I was forgetting the “sweet details” of my conversion. So I will try to record here what has happened to me since my journey began. It all came to a “head” 2 months ago on St. Valentine’s Day. But it really began 2 years ago….

2 years ago I was concerned about a loved one who was caught up in the prosperity gospel preached in some of our Protestant churches and on television. I spent many hours searching the Internet on various Apologetic websites, seeking whether this practice of hers put her at risk of losing her salvation. Some of the websites actually went as far as to say that she was worshiping a “false Jesus”. That it was a false gospel. This scared me!!! I was very burdened in my heart for her. It also got me thinking, well, what is “saved”? Am I saved? How do I know that she is wrong in her doctrine, and it’s not me? She thinks she is worshiping Jesus with all of her heart. I think I am worshiping Jesus with all of my heart. How do we know we are? Does our doctrine determine this? It really shook my faith at the time.

My dh put me into contact with a friend who was studying to be a Pastor. And I phoned him and talked with him about this loved one, and asked him what it meant to be a Christian….how important was our doctrine? He said as long as she agreed to the essentials of the faith, that her error only affected her Christian walk. Well, I still didn’t get it…but I accepted it. His answer gave me a measure of “peace” for this loved one. But the “essentials” weighed heavy on my heart. Who decides what’s essential?

I remember reaching a low point one night where I cried out to God, “How do I know I’m worshiping YOU? I want to know what it means to worship the One True Living God of the Universe, Jesus Christ. What does it mean to serve YOU? ” How did I know I was worshiping God and it was not just some emotional experience or someone I’ve made up?”

Fast-forward to a year ago (one year after I cried out to God with my prayer) and my little Christian bubble popped. My home church, a Calvary Chapel, in which all of my friends and home-school group was centered, split….because of something the pastor had done and in which we felt wasn’t handled in a Biblical manner. This shattered me at the time. I spent many days depressed and nights crying. I did not know where to begin again. I had my children at this church, started attending there when I was pregnant with my first born almost ten years earlier. My very best friend attended here too (and has since ended up at a different church than me which at the time we both desperately tried to avoid). And also, I had looked up to my pastor and his wife…and while what they had been alleged to do wasn’t “grievous” it really affected me. I thought our church had “the truth”. How could they be preaching something and doing something completely different. If they could, knowing the truth, do such a thing….are they saved? Am I saved? Again, what does it all mean?

I also for the first time started thinking about authority issues within the church. What happens when leadership screws up, does the flock just get scattered? That’s what had happened to us. We would have stayed except the error had affected the children’s program in our church. Being homeschoolers we needed a strong children’s program for our kiddos. Atleast that was our thinking at the time. But as we began to look at other churches to consider visiting, for the first time I wanted a “denomination” not just one that did it their own way. So I wanted to know what the different denominations believed. I wanted to make sure our hearts wouldn’t get hurt again. I wanted to feel “safe”. Looking back, I realize this was a crucial first step into me appreciating the authority of the Catholic Church.

Well, while investigating different denominations, we stopped going to church and had church in our home for a few weeks…. then we started looking for a church, and that was fun…..not. And I began to wonder, what is the CHURCH? Is itjust a place to meet other Christians and fellowship? A place to bring unsaved souls? A place to serve?

So we visited different churches, to see which was a good fit for our family. I was beginning to broaden my horizons, and consider other churches besides a Calvary Chapel (I know this sounds so prejudiced looking back), but I wanted to make sure we chose a church that preached “The Word” and wasn’t watered down. I know now that this was all part of God’s plan and timing.

After visiting all of these churches, I got to experience different worship styles, different pastors, but one of the differences that stood out to me was in the offering of communion, “The Lord’s Supper” which I now know as “The Eucharist”. At the church we decided to plant ourselves, a Grace Brethren denomination, communion was only offered quarterly. Our former Calvary Chapel offered communion monthly, and some of the churches we visited when we were “church shopping” offered it weekly. I got to thinking about this….pondering it deeply in my heart….communion was something that I really enjoyed at church, looked forward to and doing it monthly really didn’t seem enough to me at the time. I always looked forward to confessing my sins to Jesus from my heart, meditating on what He did for me on the cross, feeling clean and forgiven for a moment, and it seemed to bring me closer to Him, albeit for just a moment. Anyway, I got to thinking why do we get to decide when we do communion? What did the Lord want? Surely He had a plan and didn’t leave it all up to us.

It was around this time that I started getting down thinking about it all. All the different beliefs among the Protestants. I wasn’t even considering Catholicism at this point. I remember particularly one day listening to KWVE (Calvary Chapel’s radio) while driving in my car, the program “To Every Man An Answer” and a caller phoned in to discuss how he doubted that he was a Christian, even though he had given his heart to Jesus some 20 years earlier. The answer he was given was that he needed to accept he was saved by “faith”. Pray more, go to church more, stay connected to other believers, have them pray for you. And the list went on and on. The problem was with his “faith”. He just needed to push through and accept he was saved even though he struggled. They gave him scripture to stand on. I had heard all of those defenses before. I started crying as I listened to this caller. I so related with his dilemma, as I had been asking myself that very question. What does it mean to be a Christian? Am I really one myself?

What does it mean to be a Christian? Is it a set of rules we follow? If I home-school my kids and dress them modestly and tithe to my church and avoid alcohol and listen to Christian music only and Christian sermons only and witness to my unsaved neighbors…and love Jesus with all of my heart , does that make one a Christian? Well, I thought there had to be more to it than that. But I couldn’t put my finger on what was missing.

I was praying earnestly throughout this time, reading my Bible daily, attending church faithfully…..feeling guilt for not witnessing more to my neighbors….but not sure how to share something that I didn’t understand or if I even knew it to be true anymore. In short I was beginning to have sort of a “crisis of faith” for the first time in my life. I had been a Christian since a young girl, and while I went through a rebellious period in my teenage/young adult years, I never stopped loving Jesus, or doubted that He was there.

But I was starting to feel lost, and to wonder about God and His plan for me. And Jesus and how did I know I was actually following Him. I also began thinking about the Pharisees and wondering if I had become one in my efforts to keep myself pure in my doctrine, the Calvary Chapel way. And I didn’t want to be a Pharisee. So I went on a search….a search for TRUTH….and HOPE….and KNOWING without a shadow of a doubt that I was truly a Christian and was actually serving the Living God of the Universe, not who I made Him up to be.

My search led me to lurk on a home-school forum that year, a forum in which there were lively Theological debates. One day, I posted a question on this particular forum for a book recommendation to help me figure it out….the answer to my question….”What does it mean to be a Christian?” Well, some very kind Catholic gals recommended two books for me. The first book recommended was “Thirsting for God in a Land of Shallow Wells”, by Matthew Gallatin. This one I trusted the source because it was authored by a former Calvary Chapel pastor. At the time I felt “safe” with Calvary Chapel because they had the clearest interpretation of Scripture, according to little ol’ me. So anyway, I wanted to read what he had to say because he would be coming from my perspective.

The second book recommended was “On Being Catholic” by Thomas Howard. This one scared me a little at the time because I had been taught that Catholics weren’t really Christians. That in fact they were following after a false gospel, one that kept them bound in rituals and legalism. And if I knew any Catholics that seemed like Christians, well it was in spite of being Catholic, not because they were Catholic. My sister had converted to Catholicism 15 years prior when she wanted to marry a Catholic. I had been sending her anti-Catholic literature from time to time over those past 15 years trying to “save” her…..much to my shame now. But for some reason that I cannot explain, I started having a hunger to learn more about what Catholics actually taught. I had read alot about what I thought they taught from anti-Catholic sources, but never studied it out for myself.

I ordered my books from Amazon but then I also remembered that once upon a time, I had been invited to join a yahoo group in which you could ask questions about the Catholic faith. So I joined it. I read some of those ladies conversion stories right away. I still didn’t have my books to read, just those wonderful ladies’ blogs and I will be forever grateful that they poured out their hearts and stories on those blogs, because I could relate to them in many ways.

I should note that the first Catholic teaching that spoke to my heart was on the Eucharist. Remember, I was puzzled by the variants in practice of the Eucharist in the Protestant churches. When I learned that Catholics actually taught that Jesus was present in the bread and the wine….a REAL PRESENCE I immediately understood. Again, I believe the Holy Spirit just opened my eyes. But it made so much more sense than eating bread and drinking wine to just remember Him. Yes, I can remember Him when partaking, but something sacramental was happening to the believer as well. And I wanted that!

On St. Valentine’s Day was the day that I joined that group. That day was a special day in so many ways. The Lord opened my eyes that day completely! I had many obstacles to overcome still (and even still today) but on that day, I remember thinking “Can this be?” I felt giddy with delight! I felt like I had secret lover, Jesus was wooing me to Him, to his Church. Words couldn’t express it. That was in the morning time. Later that day I went to Wal-Mart to get Valentine’s Cards for my kiddo’s park day and when I turned on the radio a song was playing that jumped right into my soul, “Mountain of God” by Third Day:

“Even though the Journey’s long and I know the road is hard, you’re the One whose gone before me, you will help me carry on. And after all that I’ve been through. Now I realize the TRUTH. That I must go through the valley to stand upon the Mountain of God.”

I fought back tears of joy in the car, I didn’t want my kids to think I was sad or something. But I was so HAPPY! I didn’t know what this meant, but I knew that He was taking me on a Journey.

I came home and opened my One Year Bible and the reading for that day in the Old Testament was all about the temple. And I just remember reading the part about the incense and the anointing oil and just realizing all at once that incense was Good and the Oil was Good! And the beauty of the temple was Good and God had commanded it all. And how the RCC wasn’t ritualistic to its detriment but actually made more sense! I saw the connection with the temple and the Mass. I remembered that Jesus really did come to fulfill the Law not abolish it. It all just “clicked” in a glorious way all in that one moment.

And then I went to read the New Testament reading for the day, and it was from Matthew 28:1-20 in which Jesus had risen and the tomb was empty. And the women had found the empty tomb, and when the angel told them Jesus had risen from Matthew 28:8:

“….the women had hurried away from the tomb, AFRAID YET FILLED WITH JOY….”

those words just jumped out at me because that’s exactly how I felt at the time! Afraid but filled with joy!!!!! That’s the only way I know how to describe it.

And then I read the first verse of the Psalm reading for that day and it was from Psalm 34:11:

“Come, my children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord”

and those words jumped to my heart as well…. and then my Proverb for the day was Proverbs 9:9-10:

“Instruct a wise man and he will be wiser still; teach a righteous man and he will add to his learning. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.”

And I just knew that the Lord was leading me, that it wasn’t my own thoughts at that moment, but that he was going to teach me more……Mostly I knew right then at that moment that he was answering my question from 2 years before on that lonely night when I cried out to Him with all my heart, “What does it mean to serve You, the Living God of the Universe”.

 

These past 2 months have been very exciting….filled with days of JOY and days of DESPAIR. Sometimes at night I would cry and remember my little church before it split, and I would wish that I could just go back to those days of peace. But I knew I couldn’tt go back. And I didn’t really want to go back. But I was scared. I still get scared.

I have only shared with a few people what has happened to me, besides my dh. He is supportive, but would be quite content if this all turned out to be just a passing fancy! Although most recently he has agreed to attend Mass with me. His heart was not planted yet at our new church. So I’m excited about this! My very best friend also knows, but I think she doesn’t really understand. And I can see how hard it would be for her, because if the shoes were reversed I would probably have a hard time understanding as well.

I can’t explain it to anyone, except that God did something inward….he rewired me in some way! He “unblinded” my eyes….as my dd says. And while this Journey may be hard at times, I will be forever grateful that He answered my question from 2 years ago. I believe He is showing me what it means to serve the Living God of the Universe and follow HIM!!! Praise Be To God!