Philippians 1:1–2 "Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus. To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi, with the overseers and deacons: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ."
Why should you go to church? I'm going to give you three reasons.
1. For your family
I'm constantly amazed at Christians who tell me how much they want their kids to grow up to share their values, to find godly purpose in their lives, to regularly hear and adjust to good doctrine, and to find a believing spouse–all the good stuff they got at church–and yet they make church optional for their family. Church has never been optional for the disciple of Jesus, and eternity is fellowship, it's not just you and Jesus, Jesus is marrying one bride, He is not marrying a multiple personality disorder.
Hebrews 11:39–40 says it pretty plainly: "And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect." We have so customized our Christianity that we have gotten to the point where is not Christianity at all. It may not be fatal to your faith, but it has every chance of being fatal to the faith of your children, and their children, and their children after them.
We have so customized our Christianity that we have gotten to the point where is not Christianity at all.
The real trouble is that church is designed to be a commitment, a discipline in responsibility, serving, ministry, accountability, and community relationship. All the good you got out of church was because there was a volunteer base sacrificing their time, talents, and treasures in obedience to The King and His Kingdom. The epitome of selfishness is to benefit from previous generation's sacrifice, and yet be unwilling not only to serve, but to even attend.
So many Christians are like Hezekiah who said after receiving a prophecy of future desolation "Why not, if there will be peace and security in my days?” (2 Kings 20:19). It's a shameful attitude. And it does not help to complain about being hurt in church before. That is only more reason to get involved. The one who has been hurt in churches more than all others combined is Jesus Christ Himself, and yet He still attends, He still serves.
More than your kids, church makes communities better too. It takes a village to raise a child, but it takes The Gospel to raise a village! Church is the agent of change God chose. He didn't choose narrow focused non-profits, they may help individuals in society, but they cannot change society's trajectories. If you don't believe me ask yourself why, with all the new para-church non-profits, is homelessness, drug addiction, abortion and every other social ill on the increase.
It takes a village to raise a child, but it takes The Gospel to raise a village!
2. For you
The primary purpose of the church is discipleship.
So many try and solve the problems of the world before they live the solution in church. Commitment is hard, but it's impossible to successfully preach a gospel of community while expecting the church to hire for every position. Volunteering gives us all opportunity to see human interaction, to see character flaws, blind spots, and to gently point them out.
The current driving worldview in our communities is equity, or equality. It is an attempt to bring all measures along the lines of race, gender, and other identities to achieve equal outcomes for everyone. But Christ said "Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends." (John 15:13). There are two glaring faults with equity that are glossed over by a lack of critical thinking.
Firstly none of us got anywhere by parents, mentors, or teachers seeking equity, we got ahead by those people laying down their agendas, their time, their income, their health, their sleep, for us. We cannot expect the rules of life to suddenly change and current desired outcomes to derive from such selfishness as equity. Predictably equity as an end produces selfishness, depression, childishness, childlessness, and loneliness.
Secondly we all ought to know by now that we all have blind spots in our characters. A blind spot, by definition, is not something that you can recognise without outside help. If we aren't in a family who truly cares for us then we are going to go through life being offensive, rude, bad tempered, people pleasing, lying, forgetful, negligent, and any number of other horrid things unaware of how they are driving people away from us.
The primary purpose of church is discipleship, be discipled, and disciple others. It's time to recognise that true love calls you out on your character defects just as your true friends are those who tell you that you have spinach stuck in your teeth. It is no friend who thinks, "well I wouldn't want to say something offensive." Those kinds of 'friends' would prefer that you look foolish.
A blind spot, by definition, is not something that you can recognise without outside help.
3. Because the Bible says to.
"And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near." Hebrews 10:25 (NLT)
It couldn't be plainer than that. The gathering of God's people started in Genesis 4:26 where people not only called on God, they also called themselves by His name, and—in case you missed it—they were recognised for doing so, they stood out, they gathered, they weren't doing so in secret.
1 Corinthians 14:26 "What then, brothers? When you come together, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation. Let all things be done for building up." Did you catch the clause? "When you come together, ..." It's a necessary arrangement for the practicing of the 9 gifts in 1 Corinthians 12. There are many others, Christ addresses the seven churches in Revelation 2 and 3, Paul and John address their letters to distinct churches; Paul instructs Titus and Timothy to appoint elders in the churches, and gives qualifying attributes to do so. In Hebrews 13:17 says "Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account." How are the elders of the church to give an account for those who do not even attend who won't commit? Lastly Jesus in the first to use the term "church", He designates it "His church" in Matthew 16 and 18. Jesus also gives us ways of handling conflict within the church. Those not in a church remove half of the ways in which Jesus has provided for conflict resolution (more in the Biblical Conflict Resolution class).
Church is good for you, it is good for your family, it is good for others. Get involved, be devoted to a vision greater than yourself. Get good at helping others when they need it—loving neighbors. Get good at receiving love—be a neighbor, even when it comes in the form of discipleship.
Church is good for you, it is good for your family, it is good for others.
Come to church, it's time to belong again!
Brandocrasy