Photo by: Duane Bryce Wildlife Photography (Creative Commons)
I love Sunday mornings – always have, always will.
I like the early morning hours every day but there is something about Sunday that – to me – is special, and it is not attending a church service.
At least not always.
I believe that it was my spending time alone on Sunday mornings as a child that opened my eyes to the reality of a creator and God used that time to reveal himself to me even before I ever read a single word in the bible.
I would get up and go outside, walk around our neighborhood, sit along the bank of the ditch that ran behind our house – usually used as a battle ground for dirt clod and potato fights – and just be.
I enjoyed the calm, the quiet and I loved the stillness of the morning.
To this day, I get up earlier on Sundays than other days – especially when I don’t HAVE to get up for work or anything else and commune with God.
I guess I was doing that all along I just didn’t realize it back then.
Don’t get me wrong, I do love the place we choose to worship – commonly, if not mistakenly referred to as church – and I love the people that we’ve gotten to know but besides them there is nothing there so unique that cannot be duplicated at my home, a park, inside my car or any other place I happen to find myself or on ANY given day of the week.
Now, I understand the idea behind services on Sunday morning as it is that day that Christ rose from the grave – and THAT is not in question. But I challenge the idea that I must always GO to a building to accomplish the praise and worship portion of my responsibility to God.
And “yes” I consider it a responsibility. After all, he not only created me but provided a path for me to be reconciled to Him.
I am also not arguing against an organized service or a paid clergy – I believe there is enough scriptural evidence to support both and I fully believe that scripture commands us to join together as a group of believers to offer our praise and worship to God Almighty but I have yet to see wher he provided a schedule or say “Thou Shalt attend all services.”
I believe that both the building – though not always as elaborate as they can get – and the paid employees are necessary as means to achieve God’s plan of spreading His message.
However, the folks that work at the building for worship – are in NO WAY better than you or me in God’s eyes. They have the exact same access to God that every single person ever born or to be born has – direct and immediate.
In most cases, they have been educated in scripture, trained to lead worship and teach God’s word.
I can respect and support that.
Though many of the people teaching Sunday school classes to adults, youth and children have no more training or education than someone that only just started to follow Christ and in some cases they have more training and experience than the paid staff.
My issue stems from the fact that – often – worship attendees are made to feel like they are not doing their duty by missing a service on a given Sunday or fail to attend regularly.
I fear this causes new Christ followers – and those that have not begun relationships with Christ – to walk away from the place of worship because they’re not shown the love that they all – that WE all – desperately desire.
The point is that I don’t think God is going to be upset with us if we miss the worship service a Sunday or two – but I fully expect him to ask why we didn’t worship him Monday thought Saturday with the same intensity.
Mick Holt 
11 Comments
Mike I agree with the basics of what your message is that we can and should Worship God everyday and anywhere. We should have an attitude of worship all the time.. but I would disagree to an extent as do we need to come to church regularly. I would reference Hebrews 10:25
Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB)
25 not staying away from our worship meetings, as some habitually do, but encouraging each other, and all the more as you see the day drawing near.
The scripture tell us that we need meet regularly especially as we see the end days approaching.. Attending church is more than just sitting and singing and listening to a message. It is GODS house a place to come and communion with HIM and fellow believers. We are to have individual worship like you talked about but God also designed us a a social being and we need to fellowship with one another.. We have a responsibility to grow individually and corporately. The church is also where God has placed HIS messenger the Pastor to teach and Shepard the flock. Yes pastors and staff are men and they stumble and fall too and are not perfect. But God has anointed them and called them to do His work so we need to be under the authority that God give them.
I understand that some people may have to work on Sundays to support their family’s or they may miss a week or two for vacation ( But they could to church on vacation where ever they are too) So we will not all have “Perfect” attendance but I fear when people take to coming together to worship to lightly. so have said I can worship by watching TV or by radio, But if one can physically go I think we need to be in the church.
Acts 2:42 Holman Christian Standard Bible
And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and to the prayers.
We need to be were we can be taught in church by a pastor, the fellowship of other believers and communion and prayer. One way God has set up for us is to be in church. While I totally agree that we need to take a greater responsibility fir private individual discipleship and growth we can NOT neglect the assembling together for corporate worship.
In my years in ministry I have seen far to many people slip into the habit of not attending church by just taking a”few weeks off” It does not take but a few Sundays to develop a bad habit. I also am always amazed at the difference in attendance from a Sunday AM service to a Sunday PM service and the difference with attendance around Christmas or Easter to the rest of the year.
I even challenged my church in my sermon that we need to quit making excuses to stay home..I am so glad that Jesus did not stop half way up to Calvary and said this cross is to heavy and gave up. Every week I hear members tell me lots of excuses for missing church ( I am too tired,It is Family time, I need my rest for work Monday,etc..) It saddens me.and I am sure God takes it even more seriously.
Some people are more faithful to their social or civics clubs, organizations, gyms or hobbies than they are to giving God a few hours a week to come and worship with fellow believers.
Well I better stop before going into a full sermon. ha ha
I do appreciate you blog and agree we all need to do a better job of Worship God throughout the week And we must grow individually but not neglect the importance of fellowship in church under a Pastor.
God Bless and keep sharing.
Roger Bunner
Roger you’re right, I was not advocating – at least I did not mean to – ceasing church attendance. The gist I was trying to get across was that I have seen in the years I have been attending churches that sometimes – certainly not all the time or by all – people are made to feel like they don’t do enough are not “plugged” in enough and my concern is that this can lead to further attrition.
Paul said and I agree that we are not to forsake the gathering together of others. I believe that is why Jesus modeled living life with the men he chose to be his disciples – thought I don’t know that he expects us to have 12 really close friends YIKES – I do not feel that we can be as successful in our walk with Christ with out others – some that have been there and can help us (Pauls) and other that will get there and need our help (Timothys).
Hope that clears up where I am coming from. If not:
PEOPLE – go to church, be with other Christ followers, worship as a team but if some of your fellow worshipers cannot make it for some reason cut them some slack. Jesus was perfect NONE of us are even close.
I have a home church in the mountains where I live, but circumstances with my parents have brought me *down the hill* on a regular basis. So, yes, I have missed *regular* attendance the last few months. But, though I believe gathering together as believers is important – (ever notice how predators like the stragglers in the herd?) – I also know that God knows the condition of my heart.
And He alone knows that I am striving to worship Him in every single moment of every single day in my life. He doesn’t judge my *spotty* attendance at church, and it’s not like He can’t find me unless I’m sitting in a pew – (nor does it mean that I can’t find Him!)
Worship is a condition of our inner posture. It doesn’t need a building to be expressed. I also find more *communion* with God when I am outside in His creation. But, I also believe that a sense of worship will also lead us to share that experience with others.
GOD BLESS!
“God knows the condition of my heart”
Exactly – and as I said, I am not saying that people should stop going to church all together. Simply that as God knows the condition of my heart, if circumstances dictate, the people that claim to follow his lead should be more forgiving towards other followers.
Thanks for stopping by.
Some of the greatest Christians I know (those who live for Christ in actions on a daily basis) don’t go to church on a regular basis. instead, they commune with God each day.
I do think church is good, but we must be careful not to replace religion with a relationship with Christ. Going to church won’t save you from hell only knowing Christ as Savior and Lord will.
TC, you’re so right about turning it into “religion” and that was really my point thanks for saying better than I did. 🙂
Thanks for stopping by – Hope you had a great Chirstmas and wonderful New Year –
I had a wonderful Christmas. I hope you did as well.
I find my commenters generally sum up my posts better than me. But I think you did a great job. Enjoyed reading.
Thanks.
I think you make a good point here. We don’t want to be legalistic. Yet I think there is something about church. We were made to live in community. It’s not simply just about us and our worship – it’s about everything else that the church entails as well. What I would add is that a church is a group of people and not necessarily a place we attend Sunday morning – so you can still have a relationship with a church Monday – Saturday.
Don’t misunderstand I am not abdicating that we all stop going to church – I don’t feel we can complete this journey as effectively as God would have us trying to do it on our own – all I am saying is that if our heart is in the right place then genuinely worshiping on a Tuesday morning in your car means as much to God as going to the building on Sunday.
Thanks for stopping by.
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