The growth of my faith was triggered by a comment I overheard from the upstairs hallway of the atrium building one Sunday morning at our original church campus on South Panther Creek Drive. I had chosen to attend the worship service that corresponded with the Sunday School hour so that my two children and I could be “finished with church” in one hour. At the time, younger children started out with their parents in church, and after a children’s sermon, the little ones were taken to a classroom for the rest of the hour. A call for volunteers to help staff that class for “just a month” put me in the upstairs hallway, waiting for the children, and listening to Rob Renfroe leading his Pastor’s Lecture Class in the glass block-walled room below. What Rob said was that the Christian faith was a journey, one in which you continue to grow and mature. I had grown up in a Bible-reading, church-attending family. I knew the “facts” of the faith and truly believed that Christ had died for my sins, but beyond that my faith was more like a series of Christian “activities” than a progression into an ever-deepening, more intimate relationship with Christ. When I completed my volunteer assignment, I joined Rob’s class. The children attended Sunday school at the same hour and went to the worship service with me afterward. Week after week, Rob challenged my thinking about what it meant to be a Christian, how the faith journey should continuously transform my life. My two children are now in their 50s and I’m in my mid-70s. I am forever grateful to God for prompting me to volunteer for “just a month” so that I was in the right position to overhear Rob that morning. And I pray that I will continue to grow and mature to the end. Kay Walter
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