Monday, September 18, 2006

seeds

The last couple of days I have been thinking about how I got to this place I’m at right now. Which leads to how Melissa and I got here. The story that I was told was one day Linda (Dandy Don ‘s wife) stopped by to talk to Bobbie and she started to attend Church of Christ and soon Jim and Loretta Criss moved out this way and then they started to come. Some years later Tim married Adele and then they moved out this way and Tim and Adele started to attend. At this time I had been married to Melissa for about five to six months and we were building a home here in the Brooklyn area. Melissa asked me if I believed or would go with her sometime and just try going once or twice. Still I didn’t go. In October of 2002 Melissa was pregnant with Keturah, I was trying to finish our home, working some crazy hours, There would be days when I left and she would be sleeping and when I returned she would be sleeping again. Not my greatest days.

Then I fell and was hurt quite badly and went from seeing Melissa a couple of days a week to 24/7, quite a change. After we moved out here, Adele had asked us if we thought about coming to church? I was thinking more about it at this time. Melissa told me that she was going and I could come if I wanted to, or not. So I did. The first time we walked through the doors of the Church of Christ I felt loved, meeting Bernie, and Bobbie was wearing some purple colored suit jacket, Jim sitting back in the corner wearing a Brown’s jacket. Barb standing and smiling with Mabel. It seemed that every sermon was written for Melissa and I, it would just fit into what was going in our lives and it felt as though we belonged. It was people like Jim Criss, Bernie, Mike G, Mike B, Paulie, Jim, Russ, Bobbie, and Tom who made us feel like someone, it did not matter how poor we were we belonged with that group of people. Someone somewhere had touched or planted the seed

The split did sadden my heart, leaving friends and family to go off but it was for my family and we have bloomed in this place getting to know friends who I now call family, and we have grown as Christians. Which leads me back to how did I get here. Someone planted a seed and the seed grew in a family and that family grew into another which grew into mine and for all I know I could have planted some seeds somewhere along the line, and someone just might join the family. Just because we all don’t live under the same roof does not make us family, we all share the same Father. If someone planted a seed in my life am I doing the same? And what about the rest of us?
Be blessed



Zechariah 8:12
The seed will grow well, the vine will yield its fruit, the ground will produce its crops, and the heavens will drop their dew. I will give all these things as an inheritance to the remnant of this people.

4 Comments:

At 7:33 AM, Blogger Doug E. Pudge said...

My brother you have said it so well. We must always remember that we have a huge family. A part of that family still worships at the corner of Chicago and Union! Thanks for sharing part of yourself. B4T

 
At 12:24 AM, Blogger Swinging Sammy said...

Amen Ryan, and DEP, I can add no more.

 
At 8:41 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

It's often a struggle for me to relate to stories like this. I've always grown up in the church and surrounded by people like this. But it's stories like this, and the one Jay tells, that help me get into the mind of those we are trying to reach. Like why would you decide to go to church after never going? And why would you choose one church over the other? I have no answers because they were never questions for me. They were hardwired answers from the beginning.

I sure am glad you chose what you did though! :)

 
At 12:44 PM, Blogger Jay said...

Amen my bald brother, Amen!

 

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