Spirituality: Our Return to Church After 10 Years

In this deeply personal episode, we’re sharing our journey back to church after more than a decade away. From growing up in the faith and attending a Christian college, to feeling completely disillusioned by disconnected preaching, religious shame, and a string of churches that never quite felt like home—this episode is our honest reflection on what it means to seek, wrestle with, and ultimately return to a spiritual community.

After years of moving, searching, and feeling spiritually untethered, we finally visited a church that reminded us of everything we loved (and missed) about being part of a faith-filled space. For the first time in a long time, we felt grounded, inspired, and connected to the message.

If you’ve ever felt burned out by religion or unsure where you belong spiritually, this episode is for you. We’re talking about compassion, humanity, and the courage to keep searching until something resonates. Because sometimes, you have to kiss a few frogs to find your church home.

Chapters

• 0:00 Introducing Our Faith Journey
• 5:23 Our Religious Upbringings Compared
• 16:15 Judgment Within Church Communities
• 21:37 Returning to Faith for Our Child
• 26:10 Finding a Church That Resonates

Transcript

Jaclyn: 0:02

All right, welcome to The Freq Show. I'm Jaclyn Steele Thurmond, joined by my husband, Sam Thurmond, and today I think this is episode 49, but sometimes our podcast episode or our podcast editor, Ien, she'll be like, hey, did you mean to say this number? But it's actually this number and I'm always like, yes, I lose track, but I think this is episode 49. We're going to talk about spirituality today and our return to church after like 10 years. So how should we start this episode? Because I feel like we could go a myriad of ways with this.

Jaclyn: 0:40

Well, let me just start by saying why I think this is important. Okay, I think as a society, the pendulum has swung so far from like super religious, super strict sort of ways, to now on the other end of the spectrum where, like, if you talk about faith, it's taboo, and people are offended by the name of Jesus, and I want to be upfront about what we believe and who we are, and I also think that, as a creator and as somebody who's on this side of the microphone, if you are spending your valuable time listening to me, I think it's important that you know who I am, just like I would love to get to know you. I think being transparent and being authentic and being honest is, unfortunately, a little rare these days, but absolutely important for the kind of business and legacy that I want to build and leave.

Sam: 1:47

Yeah, well, I think it's honestly it's easy to do. When you're sitting here and you're recording a podcast and you're putting it out on social media, it's easy to try to paint a picture of what you think people want to hear from you or what you think their perception of you is. So I think it's very easy to kind of change the way you act a little bit, or how you speak, or what you talk about, what you don't talk about. But you're right in that the pendulum is swinging quickly to more authentic, seeking more truth and just, I guess, less fear of.

Jaclyn: 2:46

Speaking your mind.

Sam: 2:47

Yeah, speaking your mind. I'm kind of rambling, I can't get my words out, but

Jaclyn: 2:54

Well can I add to what you just said.

Sam: 2:56

Well, all I wanted to say was there's just not a lot of value, I think, in pretending to be something that you're not.

Jaclyn: 3:04

Yeah

Sam: 3:04

You can ultimately

Jaclyn: 3:05

Completely agree.

Sam: 3:06

Fake it till. You make it certainly, but it's just not sustainable.

Jaclyn: 3:10

No, it's not, and also it's not who I am or what I want to do, but I think you know what I was going to say. Touching on what you said there over the last. I mean, it's been a decade where people are talking about, oh, it's so important to be authentic, it's so important to be real, and I completely agree. But I think also, when it comes to faith, the pendulum is swinging and I see a trend where people are going okay, I've tried the super religious way, I've tried the non-religious way, and there has to be some kind of intersection between these two worlds that feels real and authentic, but also that gives me that sense of groundedness and peace that I have been searching for. That I haven't found in the no religion kind of space or no faith kind of space, cause I wouldn't say we're super religious, but I would say we are very faith-based.

Sam: 4:08

Yeah, well, I think that's where truth lies for us is in that space, and I think that's why people are coming back to faith and specifically Christianity, because there's so you. You can't make sense of the world in so many ways right now. So people are seeking truth and they're seeking that foundation, and that's why I think it's important, because Christianity provides that.

Jaclyn: 4:41

Oh, definitely. So I think the next thing that I want to talk about is just a very short synopsis of my background with the church, and then you can give a very short synopsis of your background and how you grow up. But I grew up immersed in the church. My grandfather on my dad's side was a pastor and also a missionary, so my dad grew up much of his childhood in Japan as the son of a missionary and then came home to the United States as a PK, as a pastor's kid, and so I grew up in a very Christian Sam's laughing at me because I'm using the lingo, but that's what I grew up in. And then I went to a Christian grade school, I went to a public junior high, and a public high school, but still very Christian as far as like how I was in those situations. And then I went to Baylor University, which is a Baptist Christian school for college, which I absolutely love, and I am so grateful for the way that I grew up.

Jaclyn: 5:48

I feel like I grew up in the Midwest with a very distinct sense of a moral compass, a pretty clear understanding of what's right and wrong, and that served me so well in so many scenarios. But as I got older and through my parent's divorce and the kind of disintegration of my family, I realized also that I had been very sheltered from the world, and so when I started traveling, when I started working professionally after college, I realized, wow, there is so much more out there that I have not experienced and so many other perspectives that I haven't taken into consideration, that I feel like, as a human being who has compassion and empathy, it's my responsibility to understand somebody else's faith and to listen to them and be open to different ideas. And, interestingly, being so open to different ideas and open to different religions and open to different types of spirituality I mean I have shelves of spiritual texts in my library that are not based on Christianity. They are based on people's experiences of interacting with God. What I found in being so open to those things is the common thread was Jesus, which I find to be so mind-blowing. You know, you go from growing up in this super conservative Christian household to going to the other side of the pendulum, not forgetting my faith, but just becoming so open to what is out there and what's possible. And I have found, through that full circle experience, all of these threads, through all of these books leading back to Jesus.

Jaclyn: 7:48

And I think what happened was is, after college, going into the real world, getting married to you, church hopping as we moved from place to place to place to place to place and hearing all of these pastors preach all over the country, there was this common thread of inauthenticity and such a lack of compassion and such a focus on judgment. And to me, the problem was is we are losing the Christ in Christianity. Because when I read the words of Jesus, it's very much based in empathy and compassion, and love. And, yes, he had righteous anger, but he had a lot of compassion, empathy, and love and he was hanging out with people that society didn't deem worthy right.

Jaclyn: 8:37

And in all of this church hopping, I just saw so much such a removal from what I felt like was the actual message of Christ and it felt so religious and so regimented to me that it felt out of alignment with who I understood Christ to be. Not that I'm an expert, but it felt inauthentic and it got to the point where I don't know. We visited so many different churches. But it got to the point where I was like I really don't want to spend my time going and listening to these people, that I don't feel like they're even believing their own message or they're even living out their own message, and so I became disillusioned.

Sam: 9:22

Yeah.

Jaclyn: 9:23

That is a very roundabout and not such a short synopsis of my path, but I want to hear yours.

Sam: 9:30

Yeah, I didn't grow up in a super religious household. My parents both had faith, both believed in God, but I wasn't pushed in any way to go to church or conform to that lifestyle. When I was a very young child, we went to church, but for the majority of my childhood, we just didn't go to church. I will say that God was important in our home and that was always enforced or reinforced. I'll say, but it was not a—I wasn't in a very structured religious household by any means, and I have an appreciation for that, because I was able to kind of chart my own path in that way, free of judgment. There was certainly a moral guide provided by my parents and I always, you know, for the most part tended to stay inside those boundaries, so it wasn't a big concern for them.

Sam: 10:43

I'll say but yeah, I think it enabled me to kind of go out into the world and have my own experiences and form my own opinions. So for that I'm grateful, while at the same time, you know, we're raising a small child currently and I think, on the other hand, it is important to make sure that, you know, he's exposed to church and exposed to God and we pray and those sorts of things. So there is that foundation, because, while I wasn't, I didn't necessarily grow up in that, I'm also aware that without that you can go down a different path. Thankfully I didn't, but at the same time I think that having some structure in place from a faith standpoint, going to church, praying, and reinforcing that importance or that focus in your life is

Sam: 11:49

So I'm glad that we found our way back to church now especially and that's honestly probably one big reason why we've found ourselves back in church now is raising a child and wanting to make sure that he's exposed to that and our beliefs in that sort of thing.

Jaclyn: 12:24

Yeah, I think a moral compass is so underrated in a world where we're encouraged to not judge anyone and anything goes, and there's just not a lot of structure and not a lot of morality. I find that returning to that moral compass and being aware of the judgment because I don't want to be a judgmental human being, but I also want, do want to judge right from wrong

Sam: 12:52

You can't be so empathetic that you can't, that you there isn't an ability to call a spade a spade, it doesn't mean that you don't have love for people. I think it's the complete opposite of that, and I'm not sitting here trying to preach that we should judge, but I think that there's a delineation between not speaking truth and just anything goes, because I don't think that that necessarily having anything goes, I don't think is love.

Sam: 13:35

No, it's not, you talked about Jesus and Jesus spent time with prostitutes and tax collectors and those sorts of things. It wasn't because Jesus approved of sinful actions. It was he was spending time with them because they showed faith and he was accepting them as imperfect because they were displaying their faith more so than

Jaclyn: 14:14

In that case, you know too, because I don't want it to sound like we're being judgmental in any way.

Sam: 14:23

It's a very difficult kind of thing to communicate because you're not judging but at the same time you have to.

Jaclyn: 14:30

Well, I think the easiest way to explain it is Christ consciousness. When there is a sense of Christ consciousness, meaning like there's compassion, there's empathy, there's kindness, there's a willingness to connect, then you know that there is that thread connecting us right Versus somebody who says they know Christ but they've got that judgmental, religious sort of perspective where you feel like in their presence you're always being judged or sized up.

Sam: 15:01

Yeah, and I hate that. Well, I think we're having this part of the conversation, and correct me if I'm wrong but I think we're probably having this part of the conversation about explaining ourselves as not wanting to be seen as judgmental because that is how we think the world works, and maybe we have been on the other side of that, where we

Sam: 15:32

I know you have But-.

Jaclyn: 15:33

I was told I shouldn't marry you by church members.

Sam: 15:37

They might've had some points.

Sam: 15:38

Yeah, yeah, that was an interesting time

Jaclyn: 15:43

should we go into that

Sam: 15:45

I'm trying to get a point out, but what I'm saying is is we're talking about how we're not being judgmental. We're not approaching this from a judgmental place because we don't want to be seen as judgmental, but the core of it isn't about what we are casting judgment on anyone else. It's about ourselves and it's about doing it for ourselves and our own salvation. It's not about judging other people. So the point of going to church and the point of following a faith isn't to judge other people. It's for yourself.

Sam: 16:22

It's to look at yourself and assess your own being and get yourself right, versus oh, I go to church, I believe these things, and now you're not doing this? Right, you shouldn't be doing that, that sort of thing.

Jaclyn: 16:37

That's such disgusting behavior But also, I think one of the biggest roadblocks for people who may be interested in Jesus but don't want to go to church is because they don't want to be judged and they don't want to be treated like oh hey, let me bring you into this club and you're a sinner and I'm going to help you be saved from that. That's just not authentic. And so, going back to what we were saying about judgment, I do know what it feels like to be judged.

Jaclyn: 17:05

Like I said after Sam proposed, two people in the church called me and both are men, and said hey, I don't think you should marry this guy. He is holding a beer in his Facebook profile picture and I just don't know if he knows the Lord. And one of these guys is part of the most predominant Christian family in the history of the United States. I'm not going to mention names because I just don't want to call anybody out, but the most famous Christian family in the history of the United States. And he was calling me, telling me this, but I just knew in my guts that you had the heart of the kind of man that I wanted to marry and you exhibited the behaviors of the kind of man that I wanted to marry.

Jaclyn: 18:03

I wasn't super worried about you knowing church history. I wasn't super worried about you being able to reference a bunch of verses in the Bible. What I wanted was you to be open to what having a relationship with Christ was really like, and you already were that way.

Sam: 18:19

Yeah, and that's the funny thing is nobody ever even asked me directly.

Jaclyn: 18:25

Well, and that's what happens, they're blanket judgments that are thrown about that don't have teeth to them, because nobody asks. What do you actually think? Let me get to know you.

Sam: 18:36

Yeah,

Jaclyn: 18:36

And that's again.

Sam: 18:37

And then I called them. I called them directly to have the conversation and they never answered the phone or called me back.

Jaclyn: 18:44

Cowards. Cowards. But, that was also after, or that was a couple of years before we stop actively going to Church I think I felt like there was such a pileup of all of this judgment from all of these people in my past judging you, judging other people and it just felt heavy and gross and not something I wanted to be a part of.

Jaclyn: 19:12

And when we moved to Scottsdale and had a child, there's something that happens when you have a child and if you haven't had one yet, you'll understand when you have it but there's something that makes you want to go. I want to protect this child, I want to ground this child and I want to figure out how to put a village around him or her that is going to help them become the best version of themselves that they can be. And we both felt a call to go back to church around the same time. This was a couple of years ago and we found a church in Scottsdale that was very popular, super cool, pastor's, pretty famous, and we loved the music. But after going for a while, we just did not connect with the pastor. Again, it felt and I'm super sensitive to this, it's hard for me to take my ego out of it but it felt like he was kind of hammering us rather than inviting us. Does that make sense?

Sam: 20:17

Yeah, it just didn't. It kind of felt I characterized the church kind of and I'm not speaking poorly of it, but my perception of it was kind of like an Instagram church, Like you go there to take a picture and listen to the music and that sort of thing. And there were very good aspects of it, but I agree in that the sermons and the messaging just didn't resonate and ultimately didn't feel inspired by God is the way that it felt for me.

Jaclyn: 20:52

Yeah, the frequency just felt a little off.

Sam: 20:55

Yeah, and I'm sure that there's a ton of good and people that come to Christ through that church. So it's not again not casting judgment, it just wasn't the right fit.

Jaclyn: 21:11

Yeah, and I think to kind of wrap this up so we don't go on forever, a few months ago or a couple months ago, my friend Chrissy, invited us to her church and we went and there was something that just clicked this pastor he's in Scottsdale too. He was so human behind the pulpit. I could like cry talking about this, because I think my soul craved it on such a deep level. But he was so human behind the pulpit, talking about his struggles with depression, talking about struggles in his life. There was such a humility to his person, Yet he was preaching Jesus's gospel and so for me, as somebody in the audience, it felt so real and so honest and so far from what I had been hearing for so many years and I could have sought harder right.

Jaclyn: 22:16

So a lot of that is on me, but what I think I was missing from church so much was that human element of come as you are and let's be compassionate, let's be empathetic, but let's also be truthful and speak the truth in love. And so now, in going to this church for the last couple of months, we have seen over and over that being demonstrated, and it's been such a breath of fresh air, to feel like this person is being so real and so honest about their experience. Yet he is guiding us in real life through his firsthand experience on how Jesus meets you in these places. So he's not coming from a place of like I've figured it out, I understand it. Here it is.

Jaclyn: 23:11

He's like hey, I've struggled with this, this is where Jesus met me. Let me teach you what I have been taught, and that kind of perspective shift is just. It really resonates with me and it's the kind of frequency that I want to live on too. Where I go, hey, I struggle with X, Y and Z, whether it be body image or shaming myself or never feeling like I can do enough. I struggle with these things. But this is where Jesus met me, or this is the lesson I learned in this, and I want to share that with you in hope that it will encourage you, because we're all human, we're all experiencing these things. So that honesty, that vulnerability is just priceless for me.

Sam: 24:02

Yeah, and one thing I would mention was the journey that we were on being out of church didn't mean that we necessarily fell away from our faith. You know, I picked up the Bible. I've always read the Bible kind of from passage to passage, but about two years ago I started reading the Bible cover to cover and to really try to understand it. Well, I professed to be a Christian and these sorts of things. I should probably read the book and have a better understanding of it and just in that process had so many things revealed to me in that process. And I say this because even outside of the church and the steeple outside the church doors, we were still pursuing our faith and our understanding.

Jaclyn: 25:00

Oh, very heavily.

Sam: 25:02

But what I am thankful for is now going back into a church setting is my expectations are different. I have a better understanding of what I believe and I also don't expect the

Sam: 25:22

don't expect everything the pastor says to necessarily align with what I think, and I'm okay with that because it's more about where is the source of the message coming from? Does it resonate with me? And I'm okay with things not necessarily being perfect, because it's an unrealistic expectation where I think, as you know, 10 years ago, whatever it is, if we went into church and there was a message that didn't hit right.

Jaclyn: 25:57

Yeah, necessarily. I remember one preacher like openly talking about gay people in such a negative way and I think in the sermon I was like said out loud, like I can't believe he just said that because it was so rude and so mean and just so ugly.

Sam: 26:28

Yeah, yeah,I think I mean that just one instance not necessarily what I'm talking about but there would've been a point were we've been very easy to just say okay this isn't right this isn't the place for us sort of thing based off of one small thing, not talking about that instance, but approaching it from a standpoint of you know, this has to be perfect or this has to be 100% aligned all the time.

Jaclyn: 26:52

Well, that instance stood out to me and I think my biggest takeaway in this experience over the last 10 years was there was a part of me that gave up on the idea of being part of a church that I feel like I could really stand behind. And my lesson here is you have to kiss a few frogs, just like you need to visit many colleges before you find the one that really feels like home. Don't give up on the church. Continue visiting places. If you're interested in Jesus and in Christianity and faith, Keep visiting places until you find one that feels like there's just that frequency alignment of. I can get behind this. I don't have to agree with everything that they say, but for the majority of the experience I just feel so elevated. So that's been my biggest takeaway. Question should be. You usually leave me with the question. I feel like the question is the hard part, but if you're honest with yourself, do you have a curiosity about faith and are you willing to pursue that curiosity?

Jaclyn: 28:02

Yeah, Good one All right. Thank you so much for listening Live on purpose, live on frequency.

Jaclyn: 28:12

Thank you so much for listening to The Freq Show with Sam Thurmond and, me Jaclyn Steele Thurmond. We would love to connect with you via our website, beckonliving. com, and on social media.

Sam: 28:22

You can find us on Instagram and TikTok @beckonliving and you can join our email list to receive uplifting messages, podcast and business updates, and discounts on high-frequency products, just for our freqy community

Sam: 28:33

Cheers to high frequency living!