How I Found the Right Church (And How You Can, Too)

I’m going to give you my testimony about how I found my church, and in so doing, tell you how to do the same.  It’s rather simple, and you’ll see that here.

You simply ask the Lord Himself all by yourself in your own words, and then you expect an answer whether or not you get it immediately.  In faith.  If not immediately, you still expect it as if you know it’ll come in due time.

That’s it in a nutshell.  Okay, let’s go home.  🙂

Well, wait—I haven’t given you my testimony.  Because the church the Lord led me to did turn out to be the right church.  There are several reasons for this; but first, the testimony.  🙂

1981 was the year I received a certificate in electronics theory and application at Maryland Rehabilitation Center in Baltimore, Maryland.  It was also the first year of Ronald Reagan’s presidency and my last year with Second Genesis contingent upon my graduation from the center.  I was 24 years old.

During a shower I was taking at the center (I was a resident there), I heard God speaking to me.  He said, “I want you to go to a church and join it.”  My response wasn’t exactly obedient:  Haltingly, I said, “Let me just try to do it my own way.”  I forgot about it for a while, but God knew what I would say, and He knew what would happen in the future.  He knew I would end up asking Him where it is.

Now, when God spoke to me in the shower, it wasn’t audible.  I heard it in my spirit.  The way I heard it had nothing to do with what I was thinking, so it wasn’t a preconceived idea.  (I had received the Lord as my Lord and Savior in 1976 but never joined a church.  The guy who led me to the Lord had offered an invitation to his church, but his church was a Japanese church, so I declined. So for 5 years, I was without a church.)

Soon after I left the center with the certificate in hand, I moved back with my mother in Gaithersburg, Maryland, and then landed a job in Reston, Virginia, and began my daily commute from Gaithersburg to Reston and back.  Later, because of the distance, I moved in with my boss who had hired me.  I discovered that he was a pot smoker, and I inhaled.  However, I did not want to let it grow in me and get into trouble again.  (I remember saying to him and his other roommate, “The reason you don’t believe is because you have no faith!”  I had completed several Good News Mission Bible correspondence courses in 1976 and 1978 on the book of John and the epistles of John, so I knew a little bit about faith before I joined my church.)

So I moved out of my boss’ house to a police officer’s home in Herndon, Virginia, whom I thought would definitely not allow pot smokers in his house.  Boy, was I wrong!  Two of his roommates were both pot smokers.  Here’s why:  The police officer is a SWAT member with jurisdiction in Washington, DC.  That means he has no jurisdiction in the town he lived in!  So he’s got no problem with pot smokers.  Talk about double-standard!  As far as I was concerned, my new landlord’s credibility was shattered.

So, I got to thinking.  I wanted to quit smoking cigarettes, too and go “straight as an arrow.”  I really wanted that, but I knew there was something terribly wrong with my addiction to nicotine, because as far as I was concerned, I should be able to quit easily!  There should not be any problem with quitting!  This thing is not fair and not right!  I already tried to quit around two times, but I’d started again.  Then I started thinking about going to church.  (I quit cold-turkey successfully after I’d asked the Lord personally to deliver me instead of depending on the faith and prayer of someone else.  This was a short time after I joined a church.)

I had another serious problem.  I had no idea how to determine which church I should be going to, much less evaluate any that I could choose.  Asking someone else for advice was definitely out, because I don’t know him and can’t trust him—even if he did think he knows.  I realized soberly that if I’m going to “go all the way” with being brought up in a church, I must go to the right church, because I don’t want to be brought up the wrong way and be deceived.  But I can’t even trust myself to figure out which church, because I knew nothing about what makes a church the right church.  I also knew well enough to realize that I can’t pick and choose a church according to my personal tastes and preferences and believe only certain things—because I knew, based on my past experience with a Catholic church in Massachusetts, that there are probably false churches around (and I don’t mean just Catholic churches, necessarily).  That means I can’t just join any church and expect it to be the right one.  In other words, leave myself out of the church selection process.  That’s why I figured the only person who would definitely know best is God Himself.

So one day during the summer of 1982, while I was walking a street in Herndon toward the SWAT member’s townhouse, I asked God aloud, “Lord, where is the true church?”  I heard a reply, “Are you sure?”  I simply repeated, “Where is the true church?”  I was, by asking Him, also challenging Him.  And then I fully expected an answer.  I had no other way to find out, so I left it totally in His hands.  (Now, other people in my church got there through my pastor’s radio ministry.  But I didn’t listen to the radio… for obvious reasons.  Besides, I was partial to music, not radio chatter.  Further, I played tapes, not the radio.)

So, in two or three weeks’ time after that prayer, I walked to a nearby shopping strip and went to the end of it, whereupon I stood in front of a Bible bookstore.  Ooh!—a Bible bookstore!  I felt drawn to enter it, so I cooked up an excuse to enter it: to buy a test record for my stereo system.  Truth was, I didn’t want to go in there, because I knew what it meant.  But I entered, and the employee, Lynn Q., told me where her church was and encouraged me to go there.  She was a member of Calvary Temple.  I said I would go after my two weeks’ vacation in Maryland.   She implored me to go before the vacation, but I promised that I would visit.

So, some time after the vacation, I did follow up on it.  First, I scoped it out earlier so I could get an idea of where it was located before I went to the first service.

I knew that I did in fact ask God for this answer, so I really had no excuse not to go there.  Who am I to refuse?  I realized soberly that I did ask God for this!  I knew it would be worse than stupid for me to back out of it, thinking God (I felt) would not listen to me anymore.  I didn’t want to dishonor God by changing my mind.

So I did go there on a Wednesday night after attending an AA meeting in Leesburg.  I think I remember not feeling like going (I probably had a long day), but I went for it, anyway, in honor to God.  It was, after all, worth checking out.

That night, Glenn Thorpe was teaching (he is no longer living today, gone to be with the Lord).  The service started with a worship service.  Everybody stood up, sang and praised God, some with hands up.  When I heard that and started doing what they were doing, something happened to me.  I felt something leave my head, straight up.  That was a particularly strange sensation, I thought.  I didn’t know what it was.  (I know now.)

After the sermon service, there was (what we call) an “altar call.”  The altar call is simply a gathering of people at the front of the podium for healing or for prayer.  This one was for healing; so I thought, “Let’s try it out.”

I came up front with a bunch of people, and Glenn Thorpe was presiding.  He said to put our hands on wherever the pain was and command it to go away in the name of Jesus.  I was aching in the back of my legs like I’d been digging dirt all day, so I put my hands on my back and commanded it to go away.  Guess what?

I looked up at the ceiling and half-exclaimed, “It’s gone!  It’s gone!”

There was no mistaking it.  I dared not move a muscle.  It was definitely gone.  Completely gone.  Gone!

At some point, I turned around to go back to my seat.  Some of the pain returned, but I refused to acknowledge the return because they were definitely, completely gone—and because I wanted this to be a true fact.  (This is similar to Peter’s experience from walking on water: he did walk on it, but he sank into the water.  Same thing here.  But my pain did not completely return, and I don’t remember the pain lingering long, either.  Note: Peter did not expect to sink.  He walked on the water in faith, but he was distracted.)

Along the way to my seat, I remember saying to myself with full realization, “I’m convinced.  I’m convinced this is the right church,” and I became a member.  Years later, different events, characteristics of the church’s history in hindsight, transparency of the pastor, healings, and the Holy Spirit (and whatever else I missed) all made it clear that it was indeed the right church.

Here’s some of what you need to know before you select a church:

1. It’s very important that the pastor be not only spirit-filled (baptized into the Holy Spirit) but also be led by—and be submissive to—the Holy Spirit of God.  I’m not talking about being born again, but yes, that’s another requirement.
2. The church needs to be a full-gospel church.  If you know a church only believes a part of the Bible, what’re you doing considering joining it?  You can’t base it on your preferences.  You won’t be “trained up” right.
3. The pastor must be called of God to lead the flock, and he must have been ordained of God through the laying on of hands by those who are already ordained in their callings.
4. The Bible must be the final word in all matters of doctrine.  The pastor sets the doctrine for the local fellowship according to the Bible.  If he is going to answer to God for his calling, he must, then, have authority over all facets of church operations, including a school if one exists.  But at the same time, he is to submit to the leading of God’s guidance concerning the direction of the church.  Jesus Christ is, after all, the head of the church—not the pastor.  And it is not in man to direct his own steps (Jeremiah 10:23).

But if you’re not sure where to find a church, you can always ask God directly, like I did.  Take a step in faith and believe God for an answer!  I know He answers prayers if my request is in line with His will in the Word.  I know He’ll do for you what He did for me, because He changes not and He is not a respecter of persons.

In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.
(Pro 3:6)

O LORD, I know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.
(Jer 10:23)