We make too little of God's people. There, I said it. Our priorities are fixed concerning matters related to work. And even among our time playing, we have a great tendency to preserve such a window that nothing will hinder us from what we enjoy. We make much of church, as far as the "activity" of church. Call us legalistic, we may be. Call us in love with the Lord, we likely are. But don't call us in love with God's people, because we care far too little about actually meeting with them.
When is the last time you missed a main church service and actually felt compelled to call or visit face-to-face with people you know and love who are a part of the same church to tell them you wouldn't be there, or weren't there? On the other side of that coin, when is the last time you missed a service and were actually called by a church member? And when was the last time both of these happened? I am not for a moment saying the impetus of a call from either party should be driven by legalism. However, it should be happening. But the fact is we care little about the body around us.
This is hardly becoming of the gospel. We do rightly to get together and make so much of Jesus as we sing together, as we collectively give our tithes/offerings for the sake of the advancement of the gospel, and as we listen to the gospel proclaimed as the Word is read and preached. In this we do well to rejoice. This is the glorious purpose for which we can, do, and should gather. But not to be lost in all this is that we are gathering. We are gathering with others for whom Christ's blood was shed.
Ultimately what I am coming to realize is that our ability to connect with Christ is every bit ours as individuals. But we have an entire week to engage with Him in our many moments of solidarity. We have but one window on the weekend to gather together to engage with Him. My point is that it is a unique opportunity to connect with Christ which is only enhanced as we engage with Him both with one another and even because of one another. That is, we all worship as individuals, but His glorious power is so wonderful that despite all our many differences, backgrounds, sin struggles, joys, pains, trials and temptations, He unites us to worship as a body.
I am challenged by the words of Jesus who tells us that our being made "one" would be every bit powerful in speaking to the world and causing belief (John 17:21). I believe this is nothing more than the echo of Jesus' previous words of what it is to "love one another" (John 13:34-35). But how do we love when we don't miss the ones who are missing? And how do we love when we don't show to worship Christ with the local body to which He's called us? And how do we expect the world to want any bit of what we have? Why would they? Ultimately the gospel commands us to commit to one another. It commands us to gather together. It commands us to love one another. Our Sunday gathering is not the totality of this, but it is the introductory level of commitment that we should affectionately show Jesus, and His people of whom we are built together with. We miss the greater gospel application, even in all our affectionate singing, in our copious note-taking, in our weeping during communion, if we don't as greatly celebrate Christ's people around, with, among us, and prioritize meeting together with them.
This is the call of Christ. It is not a call to never miss a Sunday, but it is a call to feel something missing when you do miss gathering with God's people. Too, it is a call to let God's people know they were missed when they weren't there. This is the Gospel. This is what it calls of us, and in this we make much of Christ.
I think the disconnect comes when we make the distinction between the time we spend with our friends and the time we spend with our "church family". Christians spend Wednesday nights in a small group, "doing life" with others, but I think the fact that we make that we even have those terms shows how flawed our viewpoint really is. When I have dinner on a Tuesday night with my unchurched friends, am I not still "doing life" with them? And should I call those people my "heathen family"?
ReplyDeleteWhen I read about the Apostles in Acts, I don't see them scheduling time to "do life" with each other. They simply lived. When we really come together as a community it's not a matter of checking fellowship off our weekly list of to-dos, it's a another night of hanging out with our buddies. And when one of my buddies is passionate about something, he tells me about it, gives me the sales pitch, and tries to get me to buy in to whatever his hobby-du-jour is. Why don't we have that same passion for our eternal hobby that we can't help but try to sell to those around us?
What I'm trying to get at is this: We all have our circles of friends (friends from work, friends from school, etc) and but there's always a line between your "friends from..." friends and your "just plain friends" that we hold to keep up our professional reputation/appearance. When we all know that our "friends from church" are just as sinful yet just as loved by God, do we really need to make that distinction? If we're acting differently around our friends who love Jesus than we are around our "just plain friends", maybe we need to take a look at what we're doing with our "just plain friends" that we're trying to hide.
I hope that the Body sees me not a "friend from church" or a member of a congregation, but as a buddy. I hope we're able to "do life" even when the thing we're doing isn't studying the Bible. I hope that when I get to introduce my "just plain friends" to my "friends from church" I can simply say "This is Nathan, he's a good friend of mine," and the fact that we go to the same church doesn't matter, because in the end, we're just plain friends.
*I realize that this comment rambled a bit and had entirely too many quotation marks in it. I hope you read each one of them while thinking of Chris Farley giving air quotes.