You’re taking us where?” This was my reaction when Sterling RP Church became a potential call for my husband. “Sterling, America,” as it calls itself, is a town in the heart of the Great Plains, a mile long and a mile wide, with a population of 2,500.

The idea of adjusting to a new church culture was daunting enough, but now to adjust to the lifestyle of a close-knit farming community seemed an even larger task. I had lived near cities my whole life, and I wanted this to work well for all involved.

I was thrilled to be moving into the RPCNA, a denomination that made sense. But surely the Lord wasn’t going to plop city dwellers in the middle of the country. That’s exactly what He did, and I praise Him for it. Although I took some time learning the way of small-town life and ministry, I quickly discovered that it’s ok—better than ok. God had a great many lessons to teach me by bringing us here, lessons that could benefit all of us, no matter how urban or rural our surroundings.

It’s ok to be little. Sterling’s size is the foundation of so much of what people know it to be. In a day of big box stores and bulk discounts, a town in virtually the middle of nowhere seems unrespectable. When you meet multi-generational families in a town like this, you understand their contentment. This contentment starts with the understanding that a town, church, industry—you name it—doesn’t have to be bigger to be better. The challenging parts, and the most wonderful parts, of a small town are grounded in it not being big. There is so much more to life and people that one can truly appreciate when things aren’t so big. Should we despise the day of small things? Certainly not. I’m so glad I’ve learned not to.

It’s ok to be safe. It took me time to grow into the comforts of Sterling. In the early days, I was overly vigilant in letting the children play outside or stray too far, and I regularly locked our cars and home. Not too long after our move I began to realize just how different Sterling is from anywhere else we have lived. Imagine a beloved dog sitting in a Radio Flyer wagon tied to a bike. One boy peddling, one boy pushing. This was the sight we passed on our two-block trek to church one Lord’s Day, a sight that is increasingly rare in our day of paranoid parenting. Needless to say, this nostalgic, Rockwell-esque scene took me back to a different time. Sterling is that idyllic and that serene most of the time. We do encounter crime here, but it’s truly a rarity.

And I’ve adjusted. Those car and house doors are now rarely locked. The kids ride their bikes all over town to see friends, pop downtown for a smoothie, attend sporting events, or run to pick up a loaf of bread from the store. My kids are aware of potential dangers, but our community has a way of looking out for one another. People know the kids that live here and aren’t afraid to call out suspicious behavior. There is an accountability among the residents that supports a safe environment for all of us. I’ve embraced the peace of relaxed parenting, and our children seem to be happier for it.

It’s ok to be friendly. The warm welcome and hospitality we received from our new community and church family confirmed this. In the suburbs where I grew up, it was popular to have six-foot privacy fences and was absolutely normal to not know much about your neighbor. Occasionally you may say hi or speak to one another if there was a disturbance in the neighborhood, but welcoming new people wasn’t a norm. Sterling is a town where neighbors still introduce themselves and welcome you to the neighborhood with warm baked goods or baskets full of vegetables from their gardens.

At first, this was unnerving to me. I had dreams of being the kind of home that people felt free to drop in any ol’ time. But in these dreams my house was clean, my hair was fixed, my children behaved, and the dog wasn’t using a visit as an opportunity to flee the confines of our home. Oh, and did I mention that there would be freshly baked goodies cooling on the stove? Reality check: in a town that is so small that it’s easier to pop over than to call, visitors get what they get. My guests often find unkempt hair, evidence that no one has picked up recently, and probably an argument between two siblings that can’t agree on how to play a game. Oh, and yes, the dog ran out the door, followed by two more children chasing him. Yet this is ok, and we smile.

Even our elderly neighbors have welcomed our children into their lives, and our children regularly ask to visit with them. We have found unexpected close friendships with people both inside and outside our church. I’ve embraced the idea that running down to our local grocery is a social event in itself. I enjoy being recognized and called by name as I walk in the door. It’s proper etiquette to exchange a smile and a nod even with a stranger, and it would be socially unacceptable to not give at least the “two-finger-steering-wheel wave” to every passing car. Living in a small town will definitely get you outside yourself and into the lives of others.

It’s ok to be known and noticed. When we first moved to Sterling, I felt as if I was experiencing a glitch in the Matrix. I might wish the bank teller good evening and turn around and see her again in the grocery store. I’m a visual person, so I easily remember faces and struggle to remember names. As the same faces kept popping up around town, I quickly realized I needed a new system to keep everyone straight. I had to slow down, talk to them, and reprogram my brain to remember more than just their face. As I get to know them, they are getting to know me, and now comes the most uncomfortable aspect for me in living in a small town: I lose my anonymity. This loss is what I find to be the most challenging, but also the most sanctifying.

A friend of mine had a dish towel with this quote:

Life in a small town: If you don’t know what you’re doing, just ask your neighbor. They probably do.

While tongue in cheek, there is a certain truth to it. Sometimes it’s good to know that your neighbor is paying attention to what you do. It’s a real and present reminder that we’re not living life isolated and alone. What we do, how we live, matters. There are very few places to hide around here, and we share life together on many levels. People are sinners, and that means at some point someone or something will rub you the wrong way. It’s not easy to avoid uncomfortable situations or people. We have to face those we might have offended and those who might have offended us. There are people hurting right in front of us every day, and it’s painfully obvious if we choose to ignore it. In a small community, you are forced into a more transparent, more vulnerable life. Isn’t this how we are called to live, anyway?

Believe me, transparency and vulnerability can be both frustrating and glorious, and this life is definitely not always comfortable. One very surreal moment in living this way came when we lost two children to miscarriages in one year. Most every family I know has been touched by this tragedy, but that reality became clear as the people of Sterling came out of the woodwork to care for and love us. Miscarriage is still dealt with in a socially awkward way, as there are no accepted norms of how to deal with it. This was a particularly difficult time for us, but God used it to show His care for us through our community and bring us further into the fold. I grow more in tune with comforting those with the comfort I’ve been given (2 Cor. 1:4).

Loving our neighbors and being loved by them has taken on a more tangible reality for us. By no means have we “arrived,” but we have definitely been further stretched and sanctified. The Lord has used Sterling in our lives to better shape us as we interact with our neighbors. Are these attributes exclusive to small-town, rural America? Not at all. But it’s more evident in smaller communities as these attributes are almost inescapable.

I always thought I was naturally friendly, kind, and loving. I considered myself an open book. How wrong I was when truly confronted with the reality of my heart. So, these lessons learned were not at all what I expected in moving to a rural community, but I can see they are the lessons I needed to learn.

—Emily Wood

Emily Wood lives in Sterling, Kan., with her husband, Dr. Joel Wood (pastor of Sterling RPC). They have five children, Emma, LJ, Esther, Jonathan, and Effie, and a schnauzer named Marshall. Emily enjoys traveling with her family, homeschooling her children, and ministering beside her husband.