In April 2022 I moved here from Puerto Rico. A month later, I faced the time to follow through on the “when you get to the U.S., you gotta find a local church” part of God’ s plan. It was the first time that I was physically going to a church in over two years. I was scared. I was scared of getting the same types of experiences that I had in churches in the past. I was scared of how a church would receive the data of my past and that it was going to lead to rejection. I called my adoptive father to express that I knew I had to go and I was scared. And then I went to church.
When I stepped in, I looked around and said some form of “I don’t know what I am doing. Where am I supposed to go?” Great first impression, I know. There was brief conversation where I found that the greeter worked in the same organization that I did. I went inside and knelt down to pray, as was my custom in the church I had been at.
Afterwards, people at BridgeWay started coming up to me and greeting me. They all shook my hand and introduced themselves. Okay. So the Pastor did a light tap on the shoulder. He is contractually obligated to be nice, so I gave it a pass. But it felt like it was the norm.
When I saw that worship started and there was no drums, I looked at God and said “I see what you are doing”. It was his way of saying that there was space for me to walk into without stepping on anyone’s toes.
I felt seen by God and humans.
I had to mask my reaction to being in local church for the first time in more than two years. I was about 98% successful. I masked my reaction to realizing that almost everyone ONLY shook my hand. I was at a place where what I needed was for people to show restraint and do forms of physical touch that I interpret as invitation. This was the deciding factor in why I checked the box to become a member on day 1. I had seen everything I needed to see.
Pastor Bear asked “How did you find us?” I said: “Google Maps.” Bear responded: “Oh”, and left. Twenty minutes later, he came back. Pastor Bear asked “So, how did you find us?” I understood the assignment. I had to make my response funny for posterity purposes. In my comedic matter of fact tone, I said: “Google Maps.” Internally I did the autistic “What do you want me to do, lie to you? I got nothing else to give.” Externally, I shared about other things I did to learn more about the church. I could tell that my response was a bit… different.
At some point, Sheri introduced me to Church Center app and helped me get set up.
Later on, Pastor Andrew and I had a conversation about music and percussion. When he heard that I played percussion, his expression was like those cartoon characters whose eyes jumped out of the rest of their face. That night, I got an email from him thanking me for attending BridgeWay and that he enjoyed talking about percussion. That was not expected, and it spoke volumes about the culture of the church I had just decided to stay in.
As I type this out, I remember that the church was still in a full-time lease at the time, and so there was no setup and teardown. People had more bandwidth during that time. Everyone who didn’t have to deal with small children were intentional about taking the time to make me feel welcomed.
And to top it all off, this was at a Perrin-less time. Dave and Tracie were on vacation with their family, so BridgeWay had no unfair advantage. Pastor Bear didn’t preach that day either, so I didn’t have to bear that influence either.
Once the church returned to being fully mobile, I personally found the Sunday setup and teardown to be a blessing. It was easy for me to navigate as a neurodivergent because it was predictable and consistent and I could master the social rules. It was therapeutic. God used this time to teach me how to navigate relationships in a healthy way (and helped me get better when I failed the litmus test).
As we get closer to a season when we won’t have to be mobile anymore, part of me is not wanting to see it go away without something equivalent to replace it with.
As I type out my experience of how I was welcomed to BridgeWay, I can see how the absence of Setup and Teardown could give everyone the bandwidth to do their part to live out the Bible’s admonition to Welcome one another. But having the bandwidth isn’t enough. There is a need to see how God wants us to steward that bandwidth when the time comes. And I wouldn’t be surprised if we are doing the series on the one-anothers now because God wants us to use the one-anothers to steward having that bandwidth back and the space that gives us more options on how to walk these one-anothers out.
