Looking for a home church

We've been to many churches, some for years, others for a while, but for whatever reason we haven't found a place where we could really belong. So we sometimes check out new churches, like this morning.

This one is close to home (which I like), decent service time, and the seating in the sanctuary is comfortable stadium style and no matter where you sit, you can see. We hadn't been there for even five minutes and my attention was drawn to the musicians (who were playing during praise and worship). They had the usual piano player, but also had drums, a fiddler, two horned instruments, several others I couldn't see what they were doing, and a guy playing the bongos. As I watched the bongo player, I got a big smile on my face. He was big and smiling and his face was filled with joy. He had the flow and skin color of a Jamaican. And he loved playing the bongos. He played with such grace and flair. So I watched him and I thought that surely in heaven, he would also be playing the bongos. And I thought how awesome it would be to be in heaven, swaying to the beat of those bongos, just praising Jesus, caught up in the moment and in the praise and in the joy. I continued to watch him, everytime he was playing, and I loved it.

The sermon was good--the pastor talked about living the same life on the outside that you were living on the inside. To stop putting on a show for the benefit of others, to make them think you are someone you aren't. After the closing song, I felt a certain vibration around me and I grabbed my purse and program and quickly stepped out into the aisle because I felt like I was about to get tromped on if I didn't move. And darned if the people didn't stampede down the stairs and to the exits. We kind of wanted to look around a bit, but were afraid to get out of the traffic flow for fear of being trompled. (Similar to trampled, but trampled wasn't quite the appropriate word for this situation.) I figure we can look around next time we go. A girl needs her joyful bongo fix. And I caught the sound of tamborines briefly, not during the music, but after several baptisms. I kind of like tamborines, too.