Meat and Potatoes

When I moved to Austin four years ago, I went church hopping. Church hopping is my least favorite part of moving. It's like after you have gone through all of the unpacking, sorting, and decorating to make your new house a home, you still have the quest to find your community. Part of community for me is found at a church. But let's face it, a church can be the best community when you are a part of it, but when you are on the outside looking in, it can be unfamiliar and uncomfortable.

When I go church hopping, I have flashbacks to younger days when my mom, sisters, and I would go to different churches in search of the one that fit. There is nothing more uneasy than being a young girl searching for acceptance walking into an unfamiliar Sunday school class full of children who already have friends. Oh I didn't like it. And during service, my mother made us stand up or raise our hands when the pastor asked if there were any visitors. Of course that meant that directly after the service, people would come greet you or they would farm you off to a visitor's center. Even as a young child I never felt comfortable with this configuration because it was intimidating and uncomfortable.

When I moved to Austin, not only was I fighting flashback of my childhood, but I was church hopping alone. The key to finding a church for me, a single female, is quite simple in theory. My college friend Hector put it best, "when you go to church you need your meat and potatoes." The meat is the sermon and the potatoes are the worship, music, etc. In practice finding the right combination is harder than you think.

Determined to find a church I could call home, I went to a different church each week. Some churches served tasty meat but didn't serve my style of potatoes. Others had the best potatoes but tough and dry meat. Sometimes I would go back to a church, but three months in, I was still church hopping. During month seven, I attended Riverbend church with my friend Chris' aunt. While I enjoyed the meat and potatoes, I still wanted to make sure there wasn't more out there. Attending other churches, my thoughts still went back to the Riverbend meat and potatoes. It didn't take me long to get another helping...once I did, I knew that I had found my community...my hearty meal.

Over the past few years, Riverbend has been a source of stability, comfort, and growth in my life. Through Riverbend, I have enjoyed singing in the choir, experienced forming a young professionals group, Untitled, and made life long friends--all of this in ways that glorify God.


Recently we started a new chapter at Riverbend under the guide of our pastor Dr. Dave Haney. In addition to our Heritage, which is traditional, and Celebrate, which is choir led, services, we added Resonate. Resonate is our third service--a band led worship service. The meat is the same in each service, but the potatoes are organic. Or as Riverbend would say it, "One Message. Three Expressions."


When Resonate started, I am not sure that anyone knew exactly what to think or how to feel about the new style of potatoes. But now two months in, Resonate just clicks...the potatoes are just right. I left service on Sunday and I felt like I just shared something special with each one of the people who attended. I felt a connection...a community. And it was awesome. Finding a community makes all the church hopping I have done in my life worthwhile.

- RXW

What Rox: I was honored to recently tape a radio commercial for Riverbend Church. Click here to listen. For more information about Riverbend, go to www.riverbend.com.