Sunday mornings are sometimes the unholiest day of the week, for me at least.

My eldest refuses to wake despite the multiple shoulder taps. Even on school days, it’s not this tough.

Taps turn into pats. Pats into shakes. Shakes into a yelling (the son’s).

My youngest, jolted, starts screaming for milk.

A pungent whiff. The youngest is stewing in his pee. I am tempted to curse over his crying.

Why does he always have to choose Sundays to leak his morning brew?

I am reminded that I am under-caffeinated and my own morning brew is, by now, cold and too acidic.

I lift the blinds and let sunlight in. Both sons hiss like vampires, scorning the rays and ready to suck the life out of me.

But the only thing that’s doing the sucking so far is Sunday morning.

Yells, fights and struggles

My eldest yells. Rudely.

On normal days he wouldn’t get away with it. But we’re going to be late for church.

Breakfast. They hate what I woke an hour earlier to prepare.

Toys go missing, and I negotiate a peace treaty between the two brothers.

I frown in shame that the compromise is for my eldest to bring a toy sword to Sunday school. (Who does that?!)

Perspiration creates a butterfly-shaped blot at my shirt pits. I think about the friendly ushers who are going to greet me with a stare at my armpits, as if studying a Rorschach test.

Someone’s about to cry. (It’s me.)

The clock races. I ask for strength to not raise my voice.

I hear God reminding me – this is church too.

So I say a quiet prayer while dressing my kid for the third time. (He’s spilled, pooped and done an inappropriate stripper routine by now.)

I hug my other son but he pushes me away. (I stopped his screen time.)

I hum How Great Thou Art as we leave.

I forget the bags after the doors are locked.

I keep humming, even though I don’t feel like it.

Even though I feel like pushing God away.

God shows up in the mess

This is church too.

These are sacred moments. The mini altars where God meets me. The epiphanies about how wretched the human heart (mine) is.

The micro sermon about forgiveness and the Father’s love.

Church is not a Sunday performance or necessarily the “Sunday best” version of ourselves.

Church (for me, at least) happens by the door while putting shoes on for my kid, at the table with spilled Milo and in the whispered apologies to one another.

I remember. God has always shown up in my mess.

Faith is something I have to keep practising – especially in the chaos.

So we arrive flustered and late to Sunday service with my hair half-gelled and my shirt now mixed with my son’s teary snot.

I realise that grace got there before us. Christ died for me.

And He doesn’t care if my son’s shirt is backwards or that my shirt pits are still stained.

He cares about my soul beneath the seams. He cares about my heart.

And there, He makes His home.

Josiah with his wife, Tricia, and their two sons. Photo by Janelle Ho.

Church happens on the way to church. We just take six days to congregate.

Church happens on the way to church. God met me on the way.

Church happens on the way to church. And grace got there before us.

This article was first posted on Josiah Ng’s Facebook page and is republished with permission.

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