My name is Liz. I'm (almost) 22, and I'm originally from Texas. I was raised in a secular household, but I attended preschool at a local United Methodist church. My mom then enrolled my sister and I in the children's choice, since I liked music and it was free. As I got older, I began hearing my peers talking about the youth program. When I was in the seventh grade, I convinced my mom to let me start attending the youth groups. I was hooked immediately, and the church became a second home to me over time. I was involved in the choir, praise band, Bible studies (including the Disciple Bible Study), and eventually started attending church and Sunday school regularly my junior year of high school. I still, to this day, feel so immensely blessed that I got to experience the church I did at such a young age. I was never told I had to believe anything, and I was always allowed to question what we believed and what the Bible said. My Bible study group varied widely in biblical interpretation, ranging from very literal to much more metaphorical. Because my family never taught me I had to believe anything, and because the church allowed me to question, my faith always felt as though it was my own, and never something forced on me.
I left for college, where I coincidentally ended up attending a Methodist affiliated university, and ended up adding a minor in religion. This led to a very strange and unusual time in my spiritual life. I was never able to hook up with a church in the area I felt comfortable with, and I was unable to attend many of the Wesley Group functions due to my busy schedule. But I did a lot of reading scholarly commentaries on the Bible and learning about the Bible from an academic point of view. My faith wasn't really being fostered, but my knowledge of the Bible and of what it says was. I also was able to take classes like religious pluralism, primal religions, and world religions, where I was able to broaden my knowledge of what other people believe as well. While my soul could have used the nourishment, I think this was a really important time in my life. I was able to explore my beliefs freely, and now I feel the call back to find a faith and a faith community again.
It is important that in my four years of relatively little spiritual interaction, I spent two summers serving as an intern with Project Transformation, which were two of the most influential and amazing experiences of my entire life. I lived in a Christian community where we worked, worshipped, and played together, and then I was paid to spend my days with some of the most amazing, underprivileged kids I have ever met. I probably saw God more in those two summers than any other point in my life. It was hard, tiring, and breath-takingly beautiful.
In the next six months, I am graduating from college with my BFA in theatre design and production, returning to Project Transformation as a site coordinator, and then moving to California with my boyfriend in September to start a new job. This coming year will be an immense new adventure, and I feel like I need to reinvest in my spirituality for this. And I think this blog will be a good way to do that. I'll have a place to talk about faith, my beliefs, the beliefs of other's and how we all seek to establish a relationship with a God who is so very powerful, good, and omnipresent.
I'm not sure what this project is going to be like yet, but I feel like it's an incredibly important part of my faith journey, and I'm excited to see where it will take me.
