31 Oct Pastors’ Blog
Don’t go to church!
That might seem like an odd headline for a blog written by a church leader, but let me explain.
When Jesus birthed the world’s first church in Jerusalem around 2,000 years ago the church was essentially a community of believers who met together in homes, public spaces and sometimes in the Temple. Church wasn’t an event or a place to which they went. They were the church.
As people did life together they grew in their faith. It was a culture of mutuality – people receiving spiritual sustenance and giving spiritual sustenance.
The concept of going to church on a Sunday to receive a spiritual lift to keep them going the rest of the week would have been something foreign to them.
So, also, would the notion that someone can be a Christian without belonging to a church. Of course, you can, but it’s not advantageous.
Whether I view church as a place from which I make occasional spiritual withdrawals or as something which I, as a Christian don’t need, the consequences for either choice isn’t beneficial.
In the Bible book of Hebrews 10:25 it says that we should not neglect meeting together. This has nothing to do with filling seats at a Sunday service and everything to do with the mutuality I mentioned.
Not only will others not benefit from the life of Jesus I carry but I’ll miss out on the spiritual life and strength which they can impart to me.
But it goes one step further.
The Bible has much to say about sowing and reaping and this isn’t just about money.
There is a principle which God has established by which we are enriched as a consequence of enriching. A farmer knows this full well. If he sows nothing, he grows nothing.
To make church peripheral, or to even pull away from it completely, means that we are withholding what God has given us to sow into the lives of others. And this will be to our detriment. God’s flows into our lives will be hindered or halted.
Jesus’ church needs each and everyone of us to be wholeheartedly committed not only to him but to each other.
With every blessing
Andy Robb
Senior Pastor