Jesus called Christians to love God, love people and make disciples. Those were his command and call to all Christians everywhere at all times. And, so that is the focused mission of the church. We worship and celebrate God and God’s work in and through us. But, much of that celebration can only be realized when we are obedient to doing what he calls us to do- upon seeing God at work through people serious in following him and loving what he loves. In short, Jesus told us how to live and how to love and how to serve. He never told us how to have meetings, though he mentioned some elements that might be part of our gathering together.
Our mission is to love God, love people and make disciples. That can only happen in face to face contact with God and people, doing and loving in ways that bring the presence of Christ into the daily lives of people. The rub comes when Christians pull away from the needed obedience to that call and simply focus on gathering. It is the gathering that many define as doing what the church is called to do. That is particularly expressed in recent generations by “going to church” rather than “being the church” and doing what God called the church to do. You can still hear people say from time to time, “Where do you go to church?” Or, “Where is your church?” The not-so-subtle implication is that what happens in a building on Sunday morning is what we were called to do and be. It is the essence and everything else peripheral. However, the command and call are the essence and the gathering event is a natural outcome of an obedient church. The errant thought is that a church is defined by a gathering event. Yet, the gathering event defines what is central to the church and its level of obedience to the command and call.
Some may object and say, “The early church gathered. In fact, the term ecclesia, that translates in English as “church” means the gathering or assembly. I am well aware of that. They will say, “We gather because as the body of Christ, we must be connected.” That is true. But, which is cause and which is effect. What draws the gathering together? Why does the gathering occur in the first place? Is it to be a worship event alone? In fact, can we even find one of those in the Scriptures? What is the relationship between following the command and gathering as a people?
The answer as to which is cause and which is effect is found in the gatherings themselves. Some gatherings excite us and some do not. The church that gathers as the priority, but is not engaged in growing people and loving people and demonstrating love for God through doing his will, find their gatherings rather humdrum, lacking substance and exhilaration. In fact, churches that put gathering first and allow it to be the primary focus will find their gathering dry and lifeless in time. Monitoring the length of the service will become an unhealthy preoccupation.
Instead, gatherings that excite us the most are when we gather together and hear stories of lives changed, of people transformed, of emotion-filled experiences of God growing people who were formerly hopeless and lifeless. It is seeing God in action in the world that excites us most. It invigorates the gatherings themselves.
The gathering rarely propels people into transforming action. The transforming action of love and discipleship always propels people into thrilling gatherings. It is no mistake that the apostle Paul spends much time telling us how to live, love and help other grow and very little time about how to gather (1 Corinthians 14 as perhaps the only true passage addressing gathering content whereas the entirety of the epistles are about living out the Christian life). Every epistle is filled with how we love and help others grow and grow ourselves. Similarly, John went into great detail telling people about love as less of a gathering and talking activity than getting intimately involved in meeting the needs of people and living out the commands of God (1 John 3-4). We get no words at all from him on how to hold a worship service.
The worship service is central to Christianity’s expression of adoration before a holy God. But, as a gathering time it will only be as strong and vibrant and thrilling as God intended for it to be when we are not just about singing to God, but building people up in the faith and loving the unlovely and usually unloved. Jesus inferred that these are his brothers and sisters and mother.
Get involved in loving and building people up at their point of need and see what happens to your worship services and church gatherings. I guarantee you that they will not need to be based upon stellar sermons and moving music to be great, exciting gatherings. Living out the cause of Christ will bring the worship of Jesus Christ to a new level