If you live in Holly Springs NC, and if you’ve ever left a church or felt displaced from your church after being engaged for 5-10 (or more) years, then these thoughts are for you…

1. Finding a new church home is HARD.

You may have moved to holly springs NC recently and while the new job & new house is exciting, you are saddened because you left a great church community back home.

Your old church wasn’t perfect but you were okay with that because you were comfortable there. You trusted the pastor, had connections with other families & probably had some skin in the game. You never expected perfection there – you were just grateful for Godly friends & spiritual connections.

The reason finding a new church is so hard is because the community & church family you had took 5 or 10+ years to cultivate. It’s years of friendships, years of service, years of financial investment. Nothing can compare to that.

Was it a waste? Absolutely not.

Is it replaceable? Absolutely not.

It is possible to ever feel the same feelings you once had about your “home church,” especially after just a few months of “visiting around” or even giving it a full year at a new church somewhere else? Yes, It’s absolutely possible.

2. The key to finding your new church home is changing your mindset. You have to switch from evaluation mode to cultivation mode.

Isn’t it a weird feeling showing up at every church you visit with an evaluation mindset?

Is this my kind of music? I need the perfect blend of new songs, familiar enough that I can sing along…

Is the preaching dynamic? I need the pastor to make me laugh, teach me something I don’t know, and also have a mysterious enough of a personality to pique my curiosity.

Did the people notice me? I want them to celebrate my arrival & call me a VIP (but don’t overdo it or you’ll freak me out)

What programs does this new church have for kids? Do I like this place? Is it comfortable, do my teens dig it? Are the people weird? Am I weird? 😜Lol

**Sigh** “…I just miss my authentic church Community back home.” 😔

You’d think after visiting eight or nine churches, you would have stumbled across a perfect one by now, but they’re all just “not a good fit for your family.“

What if you switched your mindset?

What if you started cultivating instead of evaluating?

Cultivation is effort. It requires patience. And it’s a process. Nothing that requires cultivation happens overnight. A cultivator is a learner. They want to grow. They want to challenge and explore, and most are very open to a much deeper journey than one that starts and ends with evaluation.

Next time you visit a church, don’t ask, “Did I like it?” Instead, ask “how can I  add value?”

Don’t ask “was it a perfect fit for us,” ask “how can my family help this church reach & disciple other people.”

Listen, I genuinely want every single person in Holly Springs to find a good church home. And I DO NOT, for the life of me, believe Oasis Church is right for everyone. No way. I love Hope, and Vertical Life, and the Point. I even have affection for the more traditional UMC, Presbyterian and other Bible believing, Bible preaching churches.

And I’m convinced that if you picked ANY one of these churches and start planting roots, with a cultivation mindset, you’ll eventually have what you once had at your home church.

If you’ve already visited 5 or more churches in the Holly Springs area and none of them really “hit the spot”

Then let me encourage you to stop, pray and ask the lord to help you pick one, maybe even the one you felt most interested in, and go back. This time, stick around for a few years and see what happens. 😎

See you in the gloom,

Bill Rose