Journey of a Janus pt 8, Home at last

The alarm woke up early that morning, and I honestly couldn't think for a minute why I was getting up so early. Finally it came back to me, that I was going to the Three C Course that morning. Bella asked me if I would take the Three C Course about a week ago and I said yes and found out about two days afterwards that it was a Saturday morning class. (Important note...read the fliers) I kept my word, but I wasn't too happy about it that morning...Janus Torrell is not a morning person.
The class was small and we had about five of us total plus our teacher. Our teacher was our local campus pastor Troy McMahon who probably is a morning person because he started us up pretty well and gave us a few things to read and write along with and gave us a pretty good overview of what Community Christian Church was all about. (Yes for those that emailed me thats what CCC stands for.)
So, I hope I am remembering this properly, the three C's also stand for Celebrate, Connect, and Contribute. It was not a long class but it was a very interesting one. I am afraid I can't really give you the presentation without getting too far off topic, but I wanted to at least tell you why they call it a Three C Class. The website is a little better at explaining things than I am.
In the last part of the class we got to do a little of question and answer about things and while the class was good on it's content alone what I saw that morning, as tired as I was, amazed me. I had wandered and gone to many churches since I was very young, more churches than I care to remember, but this one was different.
When you read the book of Acts and the writings in the church way back in the early A.D. days you wonder why these people risked their lives, gave generously, and enjoyed going to church. I never looked forward to it before after that brief time of Sunday school years ago. I went because I was told "Janus, you need to go to church." It wasn't a joy to me, it was a chore, something you did to keep God from being mad at you. This church doesn't make it some drudgery chore.
I have read the Bible off and on (more off than on admittedly) over the years and I always read about stuff like joy, forgiveness, and love. I didn't understand it. The things I understood before were guilt, rule following, and fire and brimstone. If you do read the gospels and Acts and really try to understand it, you find out that Jesus came and died and rose again because of love and forgiveness, he came here to free us from those guilts and legalistic practices that I tried to do. In fact if you read the gospels you find out exactly what he thinks of loveless rule following. (Hint he doesn't like it.)
I don't know exactly when or where this finally sunk in, I don't keep a diary. I do remember though that I finally understood it. It was like chains were broken off and a pressing weight I had carried for a long time was taken from me. I do remember sitting in that class room on the second floor of the church, and listening to Troy speak and realizing that he meant everything he said and I couldn't find a trace of legalism or hypocrisy in him.
I must of gave him many of my trademarked Janus deep thinking scowls, while I was sitting there trying to figure out if he was a real follower of what God was all about. I hope I didn't come across as rude, but I kept waiting for a catch. Their wasn't one. After taking this course and being face to face with a follower of Jesus and having no way to avoid dealing with it (I was in a class room with five people, kind of hard to vanish in a crowd) I realized that I found a church I could call home.
We are going a bit long today I realize but I want to just leave you with a few little nuggets of verbage before I close out.
I have met all the campus pastors, at least at my home church and I found out that Troy, as good of a person as he is, is not the only person that had this inner light that made me want to come here. He was the first I got to really see face to face, but not the last, I saw it with ever person I had met there.
I went to take another class that we called the Alpha 2 course. (I took it before part 1, which I am currently in.) I met my good friend Rob in there, along with his wife and some really great people. I have been going to CCC for quite a while, and I am still amazed that I have not run into anyone that just goes there because they feel they have to. I have found a place where the people really believe what they speak, and its not a ritual but a celebration.
Some of you that are reading this that are a bit far away and I really wish I could invite you to go to the same place I do, because it took me a long time to find it but I haven't regretted it since. You can see the lessons on the website I linked to above after every week, and you can see some great stuff. If you are reading this and you aren't in a church no matter where in the corner you are and you want to know what this great thing is all about I would tell you that is worth it.
Find a place, and be with others to help you grow and don't just be an attender...celebrate with it, connect to it, and contribute to it. I have learned and grown in ways so much in just a little time, compared to years of aimless wandering. Find a place where the love of God can be felt and where you can return it. If you love God with all your heart and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself...you will get it. It would be the greatest thing that could ever happen to you.

Thank you for reading my story, sorry that it get's a bit long in some parts but this is not something that I can easily squeeze into one little entry. Later on I will make a link that puts them all together in order for ease, but otherwise this testimony is finished. As cheesy of a cliche as it is though, it's hardly the ending for me, I am finally just beginning.