03.17.07
Why Church?
So you believe that you are a Christian, but you don’t see a need to darken the door of a church? Goodness knows there have been plenty of reasons of late to put all but the most loyal members off of “the church scene”. At the time of writing yet another prominent evangelical has just been exposed for his participation in immoral and illicit activities; this is but the latest in a string of scandals that have swirled around prominent church leaders in recent decades. These debacles seem bring a ring of truth to the complaint that the church is full of hypocrites and not a desirable place to be.
Nothing I have said so far is apt to move you out of your comfortable bed on a Sunday morning. If anything, so far, what I’ve said may cause you to pull the covers up a little tighter around you chin, smug in the conviction that at Church, there is nothing good that will move you from your resolve. Indeed thinking there is nothing at church that will make you a better Christian you may more reinforced in a belief there may be some things there that could make you a worse one. But have you considered whether this is what Jesus has called you to do? When you say you believe in Jesus, is your refusal to go to church consistent Jesus’ teaching as revealed in the Bible (after all, there is only one Jesus who can be known and that is the one found in the Gospels). Could it be, that the Jesus you purport to have faith in, calls you into a commitment to a local Bible believing congregation? If He does, then perhaps, your self-imposed isolation is just a wee bit hypocritical as well!
In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus commends Peter’s confession of Him as “the Christ, the Son of the living God.” (Matthew 16:16) and promises, starting with him (Peter), that He (Jesus) would build His church. The key point of the passage is the declared intent of Jesus to be about the business of building His church. When we then turn to the book of Acts, starting with chapter two, who do we see front and centre, but Peter himself, acting as Jesus promised he would? He is there laying the first foundation stones of Jesus’ church by his bold preaching. On that first day of Pentecost and just days after Jesus resurrection, thousands respond to the message and join the first congregation of believers founded at Jerusalem. As you read on in the book of Acts, you see the church growing and congregations being planted in ever widening circles outward from Jerusalem, to Samaria, to the Gentile peoples, to Asia Minor, to Greece and then, at the end of the book, all the way to Rome itself.
At each step along the way, as people responded in faith to the preaching of the Gospel, they were baptized, and were formed into new local. In those days, the name of Jesus was all but unknown. Yet, as the Peter, then Paul and then numbers of other missionary preachers proclaimed Jesus as Saviour, an amazing thing happened; many believed in Him and committed their lives to be lived for His glory. But, they were still relatively few in numbers within a very big world that was anything but friendly toward them. Consequently, nobody had to urge them to band together and form congregations. Their survival instincts told them that they do it or perish. Since only human allies they had for preserving their newfound allegiance to Jesus was each other, to one another they clung for support and encouragement.
Now I’m not saying that these new congregations were little gardens of Eden. That snake Satan found his way into these little groups and created considerable havoc. If you read Paul’s epistles to the churches, you become aware of the fact that most of these letters were written to address some serious problems. Some were moral, some were doctrinal, and some came down to power politics. In short, the problems that the very first generation of congregations had were in fact the very same ones that occur in churches in our own day. Yet in spite of this, nobody wrote an epistle suggesting Christians stay home because the church is full of hypocrites! In fact just the opposite was the case. The writer of the book of Hebrews urged his readers that they not neglect “our own assembling together, as it the habit of some” (Hebrews 10:25).
My point to you is this. If that first generation of Christians persisted in their meeting together even though they faced the same problems churches face today, how is it that you think you can be exempt? Why do you think it ok for you to worship God alone in front TV or in your garden, when very first Christians knew they needed to worship together! I would suggest the reason is that they understood better than you that Jesus’ intent was to build His church, and as His servants, they were determined to be His tools to see it done. Now what about you? Do you want join them in that job? This coming Sunday, put down that TV flicker, pick up your Bible and get to church!
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