What Is Saving Your Life Right Now?

Before I can answer this, I need to go back a step. Or two.

Over the weekend we did too much. Way, too much. As in, Sunday we went up to the caravan for a day trip. Monday, which was supposed to be swimming followed by rest, resulted in going to B&Q and me reaching a point where my legs couldn't hold me up any more. Tuesday was somehow ok... So we did Way Too Much again. But, it was a grand day of fun. But then yesterday... Oh, yesterday. The only useful thing I did all day was help get the washing out in the morning. I couldn't get myself food, close a window, anything. Mr had to pick up everything for us, and look after both of us. I couldn't even manage to follow a TV programme, and it was tough. Today has been much better, and I even did some art. Aaaaand we're getting help tomorrow. So things will be ok.

So. What is saving my life right now? Well, I could give a long list of gratitudes about the wonderful things in my life, but I just want to focus on one: my husband.

Mr has picked up all the pieces of broken me in the last day or so. He's sorted laundry out, and made sure I've eaten food. He's looked after the bunnies and carried us all through. He's held me as the tears have flowed, and even held me through my anger.

I read this the other day. I'll be honest, the first thing I did was go and give my husband a massage. Because I know he loves them. And because I wanted to say thank you. The post talks about that accepting love. That's what I have found in my husband. Mr's love for me is Christ-like.

Even when I am screaming, he will take me in his arms and hold me.

When we were in the swimming pool and he challenged me to go underwater for the first time, he talked to me about the power of fear and faith. Then he held me, his strong hands promising me I wouldn't drown as I dunked under, and bringing me securely back to the surface. I had complete trust in him.

Mr has taught me positive thinking.

Mr believes in my art.

Mr will hold me when I despair over our life... Benefits, thrush, ME, sex...

And he will lift me and give me hope. Hope for a better life. But also acceptance in this. Fun, freedom, laughter.

And if you don't know me, it sounds like my focus is on my husband and not God. But God is showing love to me through him. God is giving him the strength to keep giving when he feels like he can't. Without God, our marriage wouldn't be the fortress of love which has been built.

The love and care, shown to me by my husband, gifted through God, is what is saving my life, right now.

I lied.

There is an attitude within the Church today, where if one hears a fellow Christian no longer attends Church, then they must be fallen. Heck, I once thought like that.

Today, I met a couple of people from my old Church, and they asked me where I went now. I lied, saying me and my husband occasionally visited X Church, but we often weren't well enough. I had to say that, to satisfy them. So they didn't feel like they had a rescue mission on their hands to bring me back from the "dark side".

I already have people in my life who think I have fallen astray because I no longer attend Church - if anything, I have a better relationship with God than ever.

Up to here, I have used the word Church to refer to that building at the end of the road where Christians gather. That is merely a Church building.

Real Church? Where two or more people are gathered in God's name. That's me and my husband, that's our marriage.

Church is there to bring Christians together, to outreach to the world. Church is there to encourage, uplift and inspire. To worship together. Church is there to teach. Church is there for debates, and to help those in need. And yet, I have struggled to find that in a Church building - I have found that in the people around me.

In a Church building I feel hurt, I feel pain. In a Church building I feel lonely and out of place. I am misunderstood and neglected. I feel uncomfortable.

I have found Church in my marriage. I find Church in my everyday life. Not just something that happens on a Sunday. And I have found it at a level which works with my health. Yes, me and my husband aren't well enough to attend a Church. After our last visit there I nearly had to take my husband to A&E as the sitting up made his back so bad. [Ironically the service that day had been reaching out to people in need in the community. Obviously, because we had pushed ourselves to attend the service, we can't have been in need.]

The Church building lacks debate. It festers indoctrination, bringing a generation up with beliefs they don't understand.

Breaking free has allowed me to think for myself, make my own decisions on right and wrong and be responsible for my own beliefs. I have found out so many things that I have been told are in fact merely tradition, and they have no mention in the Bible.

The Bible! Christians think that stepping away from the Church building equates to stepping away from the Bible, worship, prayer… Not for everyone. My husband and I read the Bible. We pray. Together and on our own. And worship, man, worship is every moment of our lives! Worship is waking up and knowing that whether or not I can move from bed doesn't matter, because God is amazing and has given me this day and this life. Wow?!

Attending Church every week won't help me bring anyone I know to God. But loving every single person I meet might make a small difference in this world. Stepping away from Church has enabled me to have a relationship with Jesus rather than being a Christian.

My husband and I serve each other, as partners and through love. We may not be helping the community, but without each other's support we would need carers. We encourage each other to pray, to love, to worship and to read. We debate, oh how we debate. We challenge each other's upbringings and beliefs with our own, and with other peoples. We open our minds to see things from other angles, and we accept what the Church struggles to: the disabled, the depressed…

I may not attend a Church building, but my relationship with God? Amazing. When my husband and I had no where else to go, we found our own Church. Just because it's just the two of us, and just because we don't have a spire, does that make it any less important than the one at the end of the road?