The Importance of Church Attendance
There seems to be an alarming exodus from the church where a lot of people have had bad experiences with unhealthy churches and so they've developed a Lone Ranger mentality. I want to urge people who have had this experience to find healthy, well-balanced churches because the Scriptures, from first to last, teach that the Christian life is to be lived within the context of a family of faith. The Bible knows nothing of Lone Ranger Christians. Far from being born again as some kind of rugged individualist, we're born into a body of believers, of which the Lord Jesus Christ is the head. Hebrews tells us that we should not give up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing.
Spiritual growth is simply impossible apart from membership in a healthy, well-balanced church. It's the church through which we receive the Word and the sacraments as a means of grace, and therefore it's crucial that we emulate the early Christians who devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship and to the breaking of bread and to prayer.
While it is in the church that we enter into worship, experience fellowship and are equipped to witness, church membership itself, of course, does not save us. Walking into a church doesn't make you a Christian any more than walking into a garage makes you a car. We're rescued from God's wrath, forgiven of all our sins and declared righteous before God solely by grace through faith on account of Jesus Christ alone.
I'm not urging you to go to church so that you can become a Christian, but as a Christian you want to be part of a healthy, well-balanced church because God has ordained this as the vehicle through which we could worship Him, through which we could experience oneness with one another, and through which we can be equipped to go out and impact the world.
Spiritual growth is simply impossible apart from membership in a healthy, well-balanced church. It's the church through which we receive the Word and the sacraments as a means of grace, and therefore it's crucial that we emulate the early Christians who devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship and to the breaking of bread and to prayer.
While it is in the church that we enter into worship, experience fellowship and are equipped to witness, church membership itself, of course, does not save us. Walking into a church doesn't make you a Christian any more than walking into a garage makes you a car. We're rescued from God's wrath, forgiven of all our sins and declared righteous before God solely by grace through faith on account of Jesus Christ alone.
I'm not urging you to go to church so that you can become a Christian, but as a Christian you want to be part of a healthy, well-balanced church because God has ordained this as the vehicle through which we could worship Him, through which we could experience oneness with one another, and through which we can be equipped to go out and impact the world.
Hank -- first let me say that generally I agree with you. But let me suggest also that your advice is practical (as opposed to absolute) when you say that "Spiritual growth is simply impossible apart from membership in a healthy, well-balanced church." It's crucial for those of us who desire spiritual maturity to recognize there are traditional practices we have used over the centuries that have served us well, but that may or may not translate across cultures and through all generations.
ReplyDeleteI myself have not always pursued church membership, for example, and I have sometimes sat under some fairly weak preaching. This is because at many of my stations (with the Air Force) I have attended chapel rather than gone out to find a church. I have done that because the military is my "mission field", and many of them may be found in the chapel from week to week. My family and I have often chosen to work among them rather than in the "safety" of a church, because we believe that's where God has called us to minister. (When we do so, we generally seek the fellowship of like-minded believers in groups like the Navigators, Officers Christian Fellowship, etc., to ensure we are constantly being challenged, since the preaching of chaplains can be a hit-or-miss game).
This rather gets to the heart of my missionary friend "Jailbreaker's" argument about form versus function (http://philippianjailer.blogspot.com/2009/03/gospel-culture-part-2.html). His observations spring from working in what he calls the "rocky soil" of Japan, but he also observes that the soil in our own country is changing.
Food for thought. I urge you to read Jailbreaker's complete discussion on this.