天美视频

I came to 天美视频聽last August with, to put it lightly, a shaky faith in God and an even shakier faith in local churches. After years of volunteering in a church without acknowledging my own doubts, I had grown increasingly cynical about the whole thing: the services modeled after a successful church someplace faraway; the sermons that were generic enough to apply to any community in the country; the endless tasks required to present the church itself as an appealing product. Eventually I wanted out. I assumed that my church experience was indicative of the whole, and I was done with it all.

But my heart began to soften in the months before moving to Seattle; I found myself wanting to believe, more than I had in years, in the goodness of God and the power of communal faith expressions. My first term at 天美视频 stirred and amplified that first belief. As I began the hard work of telling my own story and learning to be fully present in my relationships, I was amazed by how much I wanted to believe more deeply鈥攖o believe that God is present even in my shame and trauma, that God can bring light out of the darkest places of my story, and that I can somehow play a part in the grand narrative that God is telling.

This rekindling of my heart toward God was not immediately echoed by a rekindling of my heart toward the church. The bitterness and cynicism I had fed for years began to fade, but it wasn鈥檛 replaced by anything鈥攊t just left a vacuum of sorts, the equivalent of an apathetic shrug whenever I thought about joining a church community. That鈥檚 where comes in.

I started working as Content Coordinator at 天美视频 in January, and a large part of my job has been managing . That meant diving into the heart of Inhabit鈥攚restling with what it means to let our communal faith shape how we interact with the people in our day-to-day lives, asking hard questions about the brokenness in our neighborhoods, and sharing the beautiful, inspiring stories of the presenters at this year鈥檚 conference.

As I did this work of wrestling, questioning, and sharing, I felt a growing conviction that this is something unique, something I hadn鈥檛 encountered before. That feeling culminated at the conference earlier this month. I was tasked with live-tweeting the event, which meant roaming between the different conversations and workshops, meeting some of the people I鈥檇 been writing about, and interacting with many of you through .

And let me tell you, you鈥檙e an amazing bunch. My hope for local churches鈥攖he hope that the church matters and that it can make a real difference鈥攊s more present and vibrant than I can ever remember. This is a gritty, hands-on hope that leads us into messy, beautiful, difficult work. It鈥檚 grounded in a belief that, , we do not serve a placeless God but a God who is thoroughly rooted in specific places, breathing, mourning, struggling, and rejoicing alongside the people we see every day.

“My hope for local churches is more present and vibrant than I can ever remember.”

The idea that鈥攊nstead of sleek presentations or marketing ploys鈥攃hurches are called to love neighbors and work toward the restoration of the entire parish is profound in its simplicity and staggering in its scope. That was my recurring feeling during the conference: as we were telling stories, sharing ideas, and dreaming together, we were participating in a movement that鈥攊n small, local, humble ways鈥攊s changing the world.

So I sat at the back of every session with my phone in my hands and tears in my eyes. I am thrilled and grateful to be a part of this family and to help share your stories, ideas, prayers, and visions. Thank you for the work you do, and thank you for inviting me to find God already at work in the places around me and, in doing so, to rediscover the beauty and hope of the local church.