“Do I need the church?” Hmmm…. If you start feeling uncomfortable about what I have here I beg you to stick with me a while. I don’t intend to beat anyone up. I am mindful of Isaiah’s words in prophesying that Jesus does not break bruised reeds or snuff out smoldering wicks and I think a lot of us fit in those categories. But I recently read something I think I was supposed to agree with but found I didn’t. It put high emphasis on the need for the church, stating how being away from it will adversely affect your relationship with God. That part I agree with. What I took issue with was the other part of the idea, which was when you cut the church out of the deal you can still be a Christian. The more God teaches me about the church the more I see this as dead wrong.
Now, a lot of this is attitudinal. I know a lot of people who for reasons beyond their control cannot make it to the gathering of believers. We call certain people our “shut-ins” because they can’t leave their houses. Others have jobs on Sunday that are their only means of support. Still others may live debilitatingly far from other believers. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in his book Life Together, astutely points out that none of us is guaranteed a body of believers in which to belong – but that’s not really our problem is it? The real problem is when by God’s grace we are given a body to meet with and we decide, “Nah, it’s not important.”
Consider – no letter in the New Testament is written outside of the context of a church. You are thinking “Philemon.” Go ahead, take a look. Paul wrote him a letter, v. 1… and to the church meeting in “your home” v. 2. The two to Timothy and to Titus are chock-full of church matters. Of course, we have to take God’s word personally – but it is equally imperative (and widely overlooked, dismissed, and fought against) we take it communally.
The fact is, most of what God calls us to is impossible outside the context of the church. How are we to demonstrate our love to our brothers and sisters if we never see them? How can all people know we are Christians by our love if we never associate with them? How can we demonstrate Jesus’ power in destroying dividing walls of hostility if we never set foot inside the walls where our brothers and sisters are? How can we show the most excellent way of love if we have no one to show Jesus’ radical love to? “Yeah, but I don’t really have anything in common with or even get along with anyone at church.” That’s the point! Jesus Christ is our unifying factor, forming us into one body, teaching us to love each other deeply from the heart! So, if we call ourselves Christians but purposefully stay away from the church, not only do we obliterate our witness of God’s power in the world (and to the principalities and powers in the heavenly realms), we also stand on incredibly shaky ground, testing the limits of what it means to be a Christian.
Please understand, I don’t mean to be harsh. It’s just simply too easy to slip into the world’s ways of thinking without even meaning to. So we need to be clear about what God thinks about the church and strive to help as many as possible understand that. God help and bless us all….