Recently  God called our family to make a change. It many ways it wasn’t an easy decision. It meant taking a new look at things we’d always felt were right or wrong. It meant going someplace we said we’d never go.

But in other ways it was easy. Because after a lot of prayer, counsel, and discernment, we knew it was where God was calling us.

This change also meant a new routine and thus, I find myself not regularly seeing the friends I had been seeing regularly.

Yet, I haven’t really connected with a new group of friends.

The old group of friends can’t understand why we’d make this decision.

The new group people seem like they already have their circles.

And I feel like this:

Alone.

And I remember, that with God, I’m never truly alone. He’s got a plan, a purpose and a reason for this season.

Does this happen in our churches?

What about our church guests?

When I run a report of first time guests who didn’t return for a second visit, I want to hear their voices.

I want to ask:

Did you feel welcome or unwanted?

Was there confusion and chaos or did you feel calmness and clarity?

Did you feel alone or did you feel like you were among family?

Every Sunday we have first time guests who are doing something they’ve never done before: coming to our church. Which means, they aren’t doing whatever it was they did any previous Sunday.

Any change has the potential to cause someone to feel alone.

I pray this is never the case in our churches.