I've been thinking a lot about this thing we call church lately.
Why do we go to church anyway? After all, it's sometimes a lot to put up with isn't it? Don't get me wrong, there are the good things, the things we enjoy. But, there's also a lot of stuff we could just do without isn't there? There's the couple with the crying baby that can't seem to get the concept of a mother's room; there's the deacon who fools everyone with his show of piety when you know full well he's anything but that during the week; there's the well-meaning elder who, bless his heart, couldn't give a cohesive sermon to save his life; and then there's the monthly church potluck, an event filled with culinary land-mines of runny jell-o, meat dishes of questionable origin and potato salad teetering a little too close to the edge of rancidity for comfort. The list could go on and on....the gossip, the posturing, the power trips, the hypocrisy. All of this and more begs the question, "Is it all really worth it?" Wouldn't it be easier to just stay in our own world, carry on our own private Bible study, our own personal worship service, have our own private religion between just us and God? You have to admit, sometimes it would be a lot less of a hassle, wouldn't it? So, why do we do this church thing anyway?
Well, there's the obvious answer. God says do it. There's that pesky little scripture that tells us "Do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together." But why?
My sister called me the other day. There's a handful of States separating us physically and we're both not that great at phone conversation so, when she called me, after several months of not hearing from her, I knew something important was on her mind. She had stopped attending church as a teenager sometime back in the early 80's, ditching it along with pretty much everything else having to do with religion in favor of going out to "find herself." Now, twenty or so years later she realizes that she had, in fact, left a very huge and important part of who she was behind. She asked me a lot of questions during the course of our conversation, but they could all pretty much could be summed up as: "How can I find my way back?"
There were so many things I could have told her. I could have explained the importance of repentance and faith. I could have encouraged her to get into her Bible and get on her knees. But that's not what I led with. Not that she doesn't need, at some point, to do these things. She does. I just didn't feel it was where she needed to start. So, what did I encourage her to do? Get to church.
Sure she could have studied on her own, prayed on her own, been nourished in her faith on her own, but that is just not how God wants us to walk in relationship with Him...on our own. He wants us to be connected to others, to be in an environment where we can support, encourage and carry one another's burdens, and yes, put up with one another's imperfections and baggage. It's all part of the package.
In the western world we are conditioned to believe in the "pull yourself up by your own boot straps" mentality. We embrace the ideal of "rugged individualism." We are a very individualistic centered society. It's so easy to bring that mentality into our walk with God. The problem is God really isn't all that into the "individual." In His word, there just isn't a whole lot of focus on the "me", the "I" of our faith. Rather, the focus throughout is on the "we", the "us", the community of believers. Yes, we come to Him individually in repentance and faith, yes, we are individually restored to a relationship with Him. But, after having been individually restored, we then lay down our lives, our individual identities, and are placed into a community of believers, into the body as it pleases Him.
Hebrews 8:10, quoting Jeremiah, says, "For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people."
Ephesians 2:19 - 22 tells us "Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit."
We are His "people" (plural). We are "fellow" (not individual) citizens. We are 'members (plural) of the household of God." We are "fitted together." We are being "built together (not separately)."
Not much gets built if the bricks are all scattered around doing their own thing.
The bottom line is, as I expressed to my sister, God doesn't want our faith to be about only "my" walk and "my" relationship with Him. He wants our walk of faith to be outward, focused on the "us", "our" walk together. He want's us to get outside of ourselves and get connected to the body. Serving each other, encouraging one another, building one another up, and collectively witnessing and ministering to a world that desperately needs it.
I told my sister that I would pray that God would continue to work in her heart to return her to that community some day. Yes, she'll be returning to some hassles. There will always be hypocrisy. There will be one or two annoying "super" deacons. It's sure she'll hear the occasional boring sermon. And, unfortunately, the need to keep a keen eye out for rancid potato salad will never go away. But all of those hassles pale in comparison to the sense of shared purpose and community that doing this life together will bring her.
As we said our goodbyes and I hung up the phone, it hit me what a blessing it is to be there already. Hmm...I wonder what the mystery meat will be this Sabbath.