I said a few weeks ago that I have been a part of seven different churches in my life. What I didn’t say is that six of those churches have been in the past six years. But from the day I was born until the day I went off to college, I went to Bethany Bible Chapel in Cedar Falls, IA.

We in the youth group went our separate ways after graduating, but in the past year two of us have ended up in Des Moines, and we are once again at the same church. Christy and her husband Kyle started coming to Two Rivers a few months after Amanda and I, and as we introduce them to our friends, someone always asks how we know each other. Well, we’ve known each other our whole lives, I say; but each time I say it, it sinks in a little bit more how unusual this is.

Owing to our culture’s lifestyle of moving across the country every few years in pursuit of a job, as well as our intrinsic divisiveness, it’s rare for someone to remain at the same church through his childhood and adolescence. But my experience at Bethany was by no means unique. Our family photo album contains pictures of me as a baby playing with other babies (including Christy) with whom I would graduate eighteen years later; all in all, there were maybe five of us within a year of each other who were together from the nursery to the last day of high school youth group.

Christy and I have reminisced about our upbringings, and one of the many things we share in common is that we know the Bible better than just about anyone we’ve met outside of Bethany. We had the benefit of a phenomenal Sunday school program that covered just about every story in the book, and we were both involved in something called Bible Quiz which is essentially competitive Bible memorization. Add to this our Bible-centered summer camp and Wednesday night kids’ club, and you understand.

But Bible knowledge is only one aspect of our rich experience growing up at Bethany Bible Chapel. The picture I mean to paint is that Bethany provided a solid church environment for raising a family. In my generation, there are dozens more who attended Bethany for as long as Christy and I did because their parents understood this. And though life has led most of us away from that particular gathering of Christians, many have gone on to work for the Kingdom in such diverse roles as church planters, Bible college professors, and full-time youth camp staff—as well as nurses, software developers and waitresses, whose work is equally valuable to the Kingdom if it is done in the name of Christ.

Next to God and good parents, it was the dedication of the Sunday school teachers and the camp counselors and the Bible Quiz coaches and the youth leaders that made us who we are.