Two men came to look for Jesus and he told them about death. Put a seed into the ground and let it die. Only then can it grow. Seeds outside of soil… - Lyz Lenz

He would help. But it wouldn’t be a regular thing. Help is such a misleading verb. We emphasize the person aiding. The help. The helpers. People are thanked for their help. But the verb implies a request, a cry, an appeal for aid. Aid was given, yes, but I didn’t want to have to cry out in order to be helped. Help, it seemed, only came when things were dire. When I had reached an emotional limit. When the trash was overflowing and when the carpet was littered with toys and there was toddler shit on the floor and I was sobbing. I wanted to be seen. I wanted my emotional fragility to be seen as much as I wanted the sticky countertops to be seen.

When I first interviewed her for this book, the woman who would become my pastor, Pastor Ritva, told me “If churches are dying in America, let them die. If faith is dying in America, let it. After all, we believe in resurrection. There can’t be new life without death.

Why did I stay in churches that I didn’t like for so long? Why did any of us? Because we loved the people there, and we had been taught God was big enough for all of us, and we had the audacity to take those lessons at their word.