ALYSSA BOHON: How God has blessed me as a member of this church.

Eight years ago, I came to Virginia to attend a wedding with friends from Patrick Henry College (my husband was in Kuwait with the army at the time). At the wedding reception, I sat at a table with several couples whose main topic of discussion was a new church plant that they were about to join.  One of the couples was Jonathan and Tella (not yet married) and another couple was Derek and Tricia Archer.  They talked about things like a church covenant and the New Hampshire Confession and their excitement to be part of something that they believed was well-grounded in the word of God. It sounded fantastic and made me wish I could have been a part of it. I never did get to attend the very first meeting of Winchester Baptist Church. But four months later, I was moving into Berryville to get a rental place ready before Caleb’s return to the states and to classes at Patrick Henry College. We were planning to continue attending Guilford Baptist (now Sterling Park) where Caleb had been a member, but discovered that the new church plant in Winchester was closer to us. I went there one Sunday in January and was immediately offered help with moving by several people. A few weeks later, I had Caleb attending with me and about nine months later, a new baby. We never had to church hunt. We were at home, and all along the way we were loved well.

Every church experience has hard things and good things. Often the good things come out of the hard things. One of the hardest things I’ve experienced at WBC has been the high turnover in membership. In a small church like ours, members really feel like family, and when anyone leaves, the gap is really felt. Perhaps due to the dynamics of this area, it seems that people are always moving here or moving away, and we have had to say goodbye to many dear friends. Sometimes people just left the church for reasons of preference, and that loss hurt too. But through those experiences, I saw how God continued to meet the needs of the body by sending others to fill the gaps that were left, and we continued to be a living, growing body of believers. People are fallible, but God is faithful.

Another thing that I’ve continued to learn at WBC is to value faithfulness over my personal preferences. Through the years, we’ve met in some less-than-ideal situations that did not satisfy my ‘felt need’ for sacred space. I’d ride home from church daydreaming about siting in a pew-lined sanctuary with real hymnals and a real pulpit and just that sacred feeling that is so hard to get in a rented space….and none of which are Christ’s requirements for his church. He requires faithful preaching of His Word, observing the Lord’s Supper and baptism, and serving one another in love. A little bit like the tradition-craving people in the book of Hebrews, I have had to be reminded that where Jesus Christ the Lord is honored as supreme, that is where I can worship. From the very first Sunday at WBC, I saw that giving glory to the Lord Jesus Christ was the priority of the church’s leadership. The sermons and the Scripture readings and the songs were for that purpose. This a church where people who are hungry for the word of God and the gospel of Christ will be fed. It doesn’t matter a lick if the pastor likes sports and not literature, and I like literature and not sports. When he stands up to expound the word of God, the Holy Spirit uses it to sanctify me. I love that. I love to see the miracle of Christ building his body, and creating unity out of diversity in this place. May He continue to be glorified by our love for Him and for one another.

— Alyssa Bohon