It's a bit weird, being so infrequent with my .. for lack of a word... visitations. Every so often at Sunday church, I feel like everyone's growing up without me. Friendships are formed through weekly and daily experiences, and as one of the 'older' ones, bumping into people between classes, or randomly in our food mall is a rare occurrence. It makes me feel a little detached at times, but gratefully so - I feel that I've served my time in many ways and it's good to know that things are functioning fine without me and will carry on like that when I leave.
Back to last night.
We started with some shared experiences about when situation where you'd felt like an outsider. A bit ironic in light of my confession before. The experience I shared, however, was one that never left me: I went to an Afrikaans church when I was younger. I clearly didn't fit in - struggled with the language, came in shorts and T-shirts (my mom heartily tried her best with me) when all the other girls were in pretty lady-like dresses.
No-one befriended me.
I'm sure they tried, but after so many times struggling with linguistic differences, there's only so much you can do. I probably wasn't the happiest of campers then, anyway.
But last night, while we were sitting there sharing our stories, and then studying the Word together, I was reminded that this is what church is about: belonging and acceptance.
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I had that too, but in my case it was the Afrikaans-speaking girl going to the English church. At least there wasn't as much of a language barrier (as long as I didn't have to pray out loud in English), but I was decidedly the odd person out. And being a fairly shy person didn't help either.
My clearest memory of being warmly greeted was Adrian Bertrand in that tuck shop that used to be next to Vlambojant (before they closed Brollocks in the Neelsie). He knew me because my brothers were doing Youth. That made all the difference - having someone to go talk to at church. And then Maria spotted me and my "feeling like a stranger"-ness was gone.
I think I joined the music team shortly after. And that REALLY catapults you into the thick of things because everyone sees you and knows your name.
You're right, one way of belonging as soon as possible is to make an active commitment. After all, you only become part of a community once you assume responsibility for that community's wellbeing.
Hence, me needing to go to Bible Study more regularly.
And join the band again :-P
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