In 1988 my husband, daughter, and I visited EPCOT Center in Florida for the first time. I’d enjoyed visits to California’s Disneyland and Disney’s Florida Magic Kingdom several times, but something about Epcot took those experiences to a new level.
All the time I was there, and for an extended period after returning home, I found myself feeling refreshed, inspired, exhilarated, edified. I found myself contemplating the wonders of God’s creation in ways I never had before, and appreciating with new eyes the gifts He had given to mankind by which they could also create magnificent experiences to delight the heart and stimulate the mind.
In later years we took our best friends to Epcot, and the rest of Disney World, to share the experience with them. And still later we were delighted to take our grandchildren. Every time we went, I still experienced the same magical effect I had on my first visit, and was even more refreshed by seeing it have the same effect on my guests.
It is only in recent years that it has dawned on me that those feelings of refreshment, inspiration, exhilaration, and edification are precisely what I should be feeling week in and week out year around when gathering with others for worship and learning about God… what “church” should be like.
