How God lead me to my Church
Living in New Hampshire I had gone to the same Church since I was six years old. It is practically my second home and all the people are my second family. So when I moved to Alabama for college, leaving my Church was one of the things I was saddest about. I knew there were amazing Churches there and great people, but it was hard to think about leaving something that was already so great for something unknown. Birmingham also has the most churches per capita in the entire country so how was I supposed to choose?? I went from living in a place where there were barely any churches in the area to having so many choices. It felt exciting but also overwhelming. I was eager to find my church home and get plugged into a community. But little did I know, God had already been orchestrating the Church he was calling me to before I even graduated high school.
It all started back in January during my senior year in high school. Every year our youth group did a retreat in the winter called Deep Freeze and there’s always some kind of guest speaker- usually a different one every weekend. Out of all the weekends we could’ve gone, our church was scheduled to go to the one where Miles Fidel, pastor of Auburn Community Church (ACC) in Auburn Alabama, was speaking. Now already off the bat, this was significant for a lot of reasons. I knew I was going to Samford at the time, so I thought it was really cool we had a speaker from Alabama. I felt like I was supposed to go up and talk to him at some point but I never ended up doing it. ALSO what was so cool was prior to the retreat I was feeling led to reach out to someone also named Miles but I didn’t know him very well. I tried to convince myself for a week that I was making things up and the Holy Spirit wasn’t really telling me that and it was all in my head. But of course I show up for the retreat and the Pastor has the same name and literally says, “There may be someone God’s calling you to reach out to but you’re too scared. If that’s you take this boldness card.” So I was like ok God I see youuuu. I was also overall incredibly moved by the messages that weekend. Miles focused his messages on anxiety and depression during a season where I was really struggling with my anxiety. I had never related more to a message on a retreat and took away so many practical ways to help in my mental health and spiritual journey.
When I got home I looked up how far Auburn was from Birmingham and it was two hours. I thought Man I guess maybe I could drive there every now and then just to visit the church and hear him preach again. I decided to start listening to the ACC podcast when I had the chance. One day I was listening to it in my shower and I heard Miles say, “hey to our Birmingham location…” BIRMINGHAM?! I was so so excited! I had no idea they had a Birmingham campus! I knew I was definitely going to try the Church when I got down to school.
Ok so flash forward to the first month of college. I tried ACC for the first time and absolutely loved it. I was hesitant at first because we watch Auburn through a screen in the city hall, but it still operates just like normal church and the messages were so powerful and engaging I get just as much out of it watching a live stream. However, I kept thinking maybe I should still try other places just to make sure.
Then a couple of weeks later, Miles came down to Samford to speak at our convocation service we have every Tuesday. After listening to the message, I knew I wanted to talk to him since I never got the chance back in New Hampshire. When I approached him, he asked me where I was from and I told him what I just told all of you. He started freaking out and immediately gave me the biggest hug and said “You were at the camp in New Hampshire?!” He told me that this was so crazy because he originally wasn’t going to go and speak that weekend. He rarely ever travels out of state to preach and his wife was towards the end of her pregnancy and he was all around really busy. But, he felt like God was telling him to go to NH for ONE GIRL. And he never found out who it was until this day.
When I tell you I almost cried. I didn’t even know how to react honestly I was just so in awe of the Lord. Only he could orchestrate something so big that I know it impacted a lot of people, and yet so personal to not only confirm the plans in that current time in January but also my future Church almost a year later.
Being a part of ACC Birmingham my first year now has been awesome. I’ve joined a college group, gone to worship nights, and started getting involved in the kid’s ministry. I think this experience is definitely unique too because the Birmingham location has only been established for two years and doesn’t have its own building and is just now in the process of getting a campus pastor. But it is growing more every week and I think it’s going to be so cool to be a part of what God is doing and how he is going to grow this over time.
What God is doing in the life of both the Auburn and Birmingham community is SO powerful! I can’t recommend listening in online to the sermons enough when you have the chance!
-Regan
My roommate Megan and I at one of the ACC Bham worship nights!!!
