Broken and Beautiful

I had just graduated college in May, and like many new graduates, I had no idea what was next. (It didn’t help that I had earned my Bachelor in English…sorry, Mom). Being a part of the Co-op oriented me. The staff there came around me; they fed me spiritually and—just as importantly—literally; they drank coffee with me; they gave me a place to live and space to process; best of all, they helped me discern the next step that God had planned for me. It was so much more than a summer internship: it was a community.  

Going into the Co-op, I had sensed a call to ministry but didn’t know what that might look like. I felt directionless. But the Co-op wasn’t a one-size-fits-all kind of internship; they tailored my experience to what I thought God might be calling me to, and that allowed me to learn a ton about different aspects of the church, God, and myself (for instance, I quickly learned that children’s ministry was not one of my spiritual gifts). Maybe my favorite thing about the Co-op was that it allowed me to forge relationships with the staff and congregation; I never felt like just an employee, because people took the time to get to know all the interns. This is always helpful when you’re in the process of discernment, because it allows people to know you and call out gifts that maybe you had never seen in yourself. For me, that was when I was given the opportunity to preach for the very first time. I grew up in a tradition that didn’t recognize female pastors, so this was an incredibly impactful experience. I was anxious, but I never felt alone in it. The staff read and reread my sermon, listened to me preach, and offered me notes and encouragement. I felt supported and surrounded in a way I never quite had from a church before. 

None of this is to say that I wasn’t challenged by the internship, though—seeing behind the scenes of a church can be a really disorienting and even disillusioning experience. I often wondered if we were getting it right. But, I never felt without hope. In moments when my faith for the church waned, the Holy Spirit revived my spirit through the very people who sometimes were the source of my frustration. When I felt like I had nothing left to give, I would sit in the sanctuary and listen to words of truth and healing, and speak them for the people around me, too, through verse and song. I saw people delivering meals to widows and the grieving, and got to be a part of it, too. We ate and we celebrated with each other. We cried and prayed and laughed together. It was in these moments I really felt that we were being the church as it’s supposed to be: broken and beautiful and walking in grace and redemption. 

I am so glad I spent my summer at OU, and for every opened door, every relationship, every lesson, every ounce of growth, every moment I was newly aware of the Holy Spirit, every time I felt growing pains, every stretching moment, every challenge, and every day I felt like I truly belonged. Thanks be to God.