The last three years of my life have been ones of serious introspection. Because of my dysfunctional childhood, I spent the better part of my first fifteen years of adulthood believing it to be my "responsibility" to reconcile with my family, and to create a bonded, cohesive family unit that would give my kids something I always longed for but never have. I believed a lot of psychological mumbo jumbo until I realized that I was pursuing toxic relationships that were destroying me physically, emotionally, and spiritually, and that the legacy I owed my family was to break free from those toxic relationships and become the person I was born to be instead of letting other people define who I should be and consistently coming up short in meeting THEIR expectations. In short, it was a coming of age that was long overdue.

I am increasingly beginning to understand what coming of age means. I don't believe anything happens without a reason, and that includes our move back to the Texas Panhandle. While at times being here has been exasperating and downright infuriating, the truth is, this is where I am from, and this is who I am. The closest large community is so much like Enid, Oklahoma, where I grew up, that it is not even funny, and, in fact, is sometimes painful in the recollection of memories. The move here has forced me to come to grips with who I am, as well as with who I was meant to be.

One of the things we haven't found here is a church we truly call "home". Sure, we tried one church for well over a year, and tried to stick with it despite really knowing the church wasn't us. Eventually, we had to accept the fact that this was not a church home for us and explore other churches in the area. Every church led to the same conclusion: while we found nice people in each of those churches, and those churches may be right for THOSE people, they were, again, not right for us.

Deep down, in the recesses of my mind, I knew where this was leading. I just chose to ignore it for so long. For over 15 years, I have had various pastors and friends encourage me to branch out in my own ministry, in home fellowships to people that don't necessarily feel comfortable in church buildings, to give them an opportunity to worship, to grow and learn. I have always had a reason not to, I have always felt myself to be ill equipped to lead anything, let alone something so important as a group of believers. But I'm running out of excuses, and I am realizing that I am better equipped as a leader than I realize, and that, in fact, my awareness of my inadequacy is probably my greatest asset, as I'm more likely to seek counsel than someone who thinks they have all the answers.

It feels odd to "come of age" at such a delayed age; to begin to understand and accept responsibilities I should have begun accepting many years ago. But it is, at the same time, liberating, and, as they say, it is better late than never.