6131 Dearborn Road, Evington VA

This morning, once again, I found myself unable to return to an in-person Sunday service. This season has been full of spiritual warfare and obstacles, sickness, hospital rooms, financial strain, family needs… all of it pressing at once.

And yet, somehow, God keeps coming to me right where I am.

As I was driving down this quiet Virginia back road, I saw the most breathtaking sight, the Historic Church of the Good Shepherd in Evington. Google saying it was built in 1871. Beauty and history, but more than that… a place that has held the whispered prayers of generations.

I didn’t sit under a sermon this morning.

But this church, this holy place, preached a sermon to me. I breathed in the scent of fallen leaves, that deep, earthy reminder that seasons change, that dead things fall, and yet nourishment is happening under the surface… even when we don’t see it.

I prayed right there…

And I heard the Holy Spirit whisper:
“Remember… YOU are the church.”

The Church is not a building.

Jesus made it clear: “Where two or three are gathered in My name, there am I in the midst of them.”
— Matthew 18:20

Paul said:

“Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit?”
— 1 Corinthians 6:19

We are the dwelling place of the Spirit.
We carry the Church in our bones.

The Church is not a location, it is an identity.

Not a street address, but a people.
Not a building, but a body.
Not brick and mortar, but flesh and Spirit.

That old historic building reminded me of this: the Church is every place we stand where Christ stands with us.

Today reminded me of something I don’t always want to admit,

Sometimes God teaches us the most profound truths outside of the sanctuary.

Sometimes the quiet road becomes the pulpit.
Sometimes the fallen leaves become the altar.
Sometimes the whisper of God becomes more powerful than the microphone of a preacher.

I lifted my own prayer there, outside the church door, and I asked God to keep hearing my humble cry.

And I felt peace settle deep.

What if every place God sends us today,
every store aisle
every hospital hallway
every school classroom
every back road
every unexpected stop,

what if those are all church too?

What if the Lord has been trying to tell us this all along!

Don’t wait to enter a building to become the church, BE the church everywhere.

I’m so grateful the Holy Spirit met me today in Evington with falling leaves and a quiet breeze, reminding me that God is still guiding my steps, even in a season I never expected.

I can’t wait to see where God leads me next, whether that’s a sanctuary full of people or a silent roadside with only the voice of the Lord and the autumn leaves testifying that He is still with me… and He will never leave.