Life Outside the Bubble

In my daily Bible reading I participate in with two friends from church, we're just now getting into some really good stuff.

Specifically, Song of Solomon.

Song of Solomon holds the distinction of being the only book of the Bible you can feel a little guilty about reading.  It's a love story, and it does not hold back on the torrid romance.

We were talking about what verses stuck out to us, what deeper meanings they might possess when I recounted a funny story from my fundamentalist high school.

For our senior year, we got to choose a Bible verse to go in the yearbook next to our senior portrait.  Since, even then, I really enjoyed messing with fundies, I picked a verse from Song of Solomon.  (Honestly, it was one of the tamer verses from Song of Solomon.)  I chose Solomon 1:2, "Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth, for thy love is sweeter than honeywine."

Pretty, right?  Eh, my school didn't think so.  Whereas every other senior had a Bible verse printed next to their name, I did not.  They just printed a small reference, "Sol. 1:2".

I was recounting this to my friend and, instead of laughing, she looked incredulous.  "Your Christian high school censored the Bible?"

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Personal Ads: Goldilocks seeking church.

If you're a churchgoer, unless you've gone to the same church your whole life, you've been in this boat.  Maybe you've moved, or just had a falling-out with your old church, but for whatever reason, you're looking for a new church home.  So you visit different places every Sunday, trying on churches like you would a prom dress, looking for that "perfect fit".  A lucky few find that right place right away, maybe in the first month of searching.

A few less lucky (or just pickier) people do like me, and half a decade passes before you join anywhere for good.

For the most part, I'm very glad for how things worked out.  I love my church and feel lucky to have found it.  But I don't think I should have spent 5 years barely going anywhere because nowhere was "juuust right".

Here's some of the reasons, good, and not so good, why myself and others cross prospective churches off our lists:

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