How We Found St. John's Greek Orthodox Church

At St. John's, like most other churches, it not uncommon for people to inquire as to how you ended up attending services there.

My answer?

Google.

This may seem a little unorthodox (sorry, I couldn't help myself), but it's the truth.

We quit attending Cross Point around the end of October in 2010, and while we were (and are) still going to our Community Group gatherings on Sunday nights, we had no desire to return to the Sunday morning services.  We were tired.  We were sick of contemporary church; sick of loud music, spectacular videos, and flashing lights (or if it would help set the mood, lights that slowly changed colors from a warm, energizing red and yellow theme, to a more relaxing, cool, blue/green motif).  It was all meaningless.

The music and the lights and the trendy videos could evoke an emotional response - sometimes.  When they did, we felt close to God, connected to something bigger.  When they didn't, church felt empty, dead, lifeless.

We were longing for substance.  Something that wasn't about emotions or 'feeling' close to God.  Modern church seemed like nothing more than emotional manipulation under the guise of spiritual enlightenment.  I truly believe that it was all done with the best of intentions, but that didn't really change anything.

In February, we finally decided that we had to go to church, but we had to find a new kind of church.  Not just a new church, with new people, a new band, and new songs...we needed a fundamental change in our spiritual journey.  The way we saw it, we had three options - Protestant, Roman Catholic, or Orthodox.  Protestantism wasn't what we needed, Roman Catholicism certainly wasn't what we needed, so Orthodoxy it was.

A quick Google search for 'Orthodox churches in Nashville' and I had the address for Saint John Chrysostom Greek Orthodox Church.

We went.

How We Left Protestantism

There was no grand "I'm not going to church anymore!" moment.  We just quit going.

We attended Cross Point Community Church for a little over two months after coming to Nashville as newly-weds.  Cross Point is a good church.  The pastor, Pete Wilson, is an excellent speaker.  His sermons are thought-provoking, intellectually rich, and contain lots to chew on throughout the week.  The church is debt free and works hard to serve and impact the community.  It was the best protestant church I'd ever attended.

But it still felt incomplete.  We had joined an amazing Community Group (which we are still blessed to be a part of), but weekly church was still a chore, a burden, an obligation; to be quite honest, church was a pain, and we eventually just slipped out of the routine.

I used to feel guilty for the way we just quit going, and the excuses we made for why we weren't going to church anymore; while our excuses may have been less-than-adequate, I can now see (and be forever thankful) that God placed that dissatisfaction in us so that we might search for the fullness that we have found in the Orthodox Church.

My Goal

I am not creating this blog for anyone in particular; I am writing this for myself.  My goal is not to convince anyone of anything; my goal is not to prove anything; my goal is not to speak on behalf of the Orthodox Church; my goal is not to educate people about the Orthodox Church; my goal is not to provide my interpretation of scripture; my goal is not to state my unwavering beliefs and my personal doctrine.  My only goal is to chronicle our journey into Orthodoxy as best I can, so that I look back and see where we have come from.

I plan on posting about things I've learned in the Orthodox Church that have challenged me, changed me, and comforted me.  Some of these things will probably not sit well with Protestants and others.  If you want to have an honest, open discussion, I am all for it, but if you want to bicker and call names and act like a child, I have no interest in conversing with you.  I don't claim to have any answers, just thoughts.

Naturally, I would love for others to benefit from this, but if no one reads it, or no one likes it, or no one agrees with it, I will be just fine with that.