July 29, 2022

Hebrews 10: 25  (NIV)

Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another – and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

Often the road to forsaking the Lord begins with missing the assembly with believers on the Lord’s Day. Vince Lombardi said, “Once you learn to quit, it becomes a habit.”*

We like to use this verse as a command to attend church every Sunday and as a condemnation of those who don’t follow the command. Faithful church attenders can feel smug about how much they are doing for the Lord when they take up space in a pew each week. With such a stance, we read too much and not enough into the meaning of these words.

Too much: The writer of Hebrews does not mention Sunday or first day of the week.

Not enough: The people to whom he was writing probably met together a lot more than one hour a week.

Too much: It is not something we do for God.

Not enough: We should get together with our community of faith as often as we can for the sake of each other.

The frequency and format of our worship services are fairly recent developments. The Book of Acts gives us a peek into the life of the newborn church and it has little resemblance to how we do it today. For them, meeting together as a body of believers was a bit of a challenge. People did not have weekends off from work and the closest thing to a church building was a synagogue which might be available for their use as a place to assemble – as long as it wasn’t the Sabbath. It wouldn’t be surprising if some found it more convenient to stay home and worship God from there.

Meeting together as a church, whatever day or hour it occurs, is not an activity we are commanded to do for God. Yes, our worship is for God, but our meeting together is something we do for ourselves. We need each other. The encouragement we receive from our fellow believers fuels our ability to stay strong when we leave the shelter of the church.

There is another good reason to make the effort to attend church: your witness. Bob Russell says, “Church attendance slowly and quietly testifies to the world which side you’re on.”* When others see that church attendance is a priority for you, they will also suspect that God is important to you.

When believers encourage each other, it’s like lighting two matches and joining them together to start a fire that is greater than the sum of the two flames. The writer of Hebrews didn’t say it but I will: go to church. Every Sunday. Join a small group and attend every week. Participate in every opportunity for fellowship that you can. Then go out and set the world on fire.

God often speaks to us through the witness of the church.*