Come & See

Stepping Up for Jesus

I don’t know how many of you remember David Clark. (He passed away in January of 2021.) He sang in the choir at the West Campus traditional service. David was a family friend since my father-in-law was in high school. We used to jokingly tease him because every time he traveled with my in-laws, invariably someone would call out, “Hey, Mr. Clark! Remember me?” David was a beloved and well-remembered high school math teacher, and his students seemed to be everywhere!

Well, I had my own “Hey, Mr. Clark!” moment recently. I used to teach in Birch Run and ran into a former student working in a local doctor’s office. Once we established that I really was the Mrs. Lebsack from fifteen years ago, we started chatting about her life and family. We talked about her kids and what her husband did for work. As the conversation went on, she shared some concerns for which I was able to give suggestions.

Now last week, I admitted to being a bit embarrassed with my Pathway Reboot. If you missed that article, you can find it here. You see, when I was back at the doctor’s office a few weeks later, I made a point to check on my former student to see if she had tried any of the ideas I had suggested and if things had improved. We chatted some more and, while things had improved to some degree, she admitted that she was simply overwhelmed and needed support from friends and family. I then asked if she had a church home. She admitted that she didn’t. She had grown up in the church but hadn’t found a church to attend as an adult.

I know some of you are thinking that my embarrassment comes from waiting so long to get around to talking about church and my faith, but that’s not it. We know as good church-people that Jesus is always the correct answer, but I had no idea what her faith journey (if she even had one) looked like. It took time to build the relationship to a point where something as personal as faith could be introduced into the conversation. The embarrassment came from forgetting things that I used to teach all of you when Grace first merged! (insert rosy-red cheeks and maybe a face palm here)

You see, we have on the Welcome Center at both campuses business cards with “Come & See” on the front and information about the church on the back. I used to carry a stack of those with me so I could hand them out when I invited someone to check out Grace. Here I was talking to someone that didn’t have a church home and was interested in Grace, and she had to scribble stuff down on a sticky-note as I told her about my church! I had totally dropped the ball.

Now, the good news is that we’re called Grace for a reason. Is God mad at me because I didn’t have a fancy card in my pocket ready to go? No. However, it would have made the conversation so much easier, and she probably would have been far less likely to lose the business card over a sticky-note that looked like all the other sticky-notes on her desk. I now have a couple of cards tucked into my wallet. Hopefully, when I see her in a couple of weeks, I’ll be able to pass on one of the cards to her.

So, how about you? Do you still have a few “Come & See” cards on hand? December is prime invitation-to-church time. Statistically, people are more receptive to an invitation to join you at church during the holidays than other times of the year. I challenge you to swing by the Welcome Center on Sunday to pick up some “Come & See” cards and be on the lookout for someone to invite to Grace this month!

Stepping up with you, in His strength! 

Monica Lebsack

Lay Leader

At Grace, one of my responsibilities is to publish a weekly article in our e-newsletter, GraceNotes, about discipleship. Specifically, about the various components of our Discipleship Pathway and how a person could journey along it. This is my most recent article.