Do you think it is important to regularly attend church?

[stephenosborne0]

When I look at scripture, I see God providing extraordinary detail regarding how to build the Tabernacle and later, the Temple in the Old Testament. Obviously, He was very serious about His people meeting corporately and worshiping. It was pretty much the only place that the Jews could experience Him through a priest.

Once Christ died and the veil to the Temple was torn, those of us who put our faith in Him became "temples" in the sense that He now lives inside of us.

That said, the fellowship of other believers is crucial. Almost the whole New Testament is written to individual churches for encouragement, discipline, etc. Paul spends a ton of time addressing issues like hypocrisy, sexual sin, arrogance and others. So, obviously churches have had issues since the very beginning! But, you would NEVER hear any of the writers indicate that we should stop meeting.

I have wondered recently what Paul would say to us today...my guess is it would go something like this, "I've been beaten, bruised, bitten by snakes, imprisoned and shipwrecked just to be sure that you are encouraged to continue meeting together. Now you've shut down the church over a virus with a 99% survival rate??"

[TMC50]

Yes! Through this whole virus thing has been tough on my family but the wife still goes every sunday.

My kids and I watch Mass on sunday mornings together. The kids asked the other day when they will get to see Jesus again in church and it threw me off because I did not know how to answer them. We are simply not taking the kids out of respect for the capacity of the church. I know our church has been at capacity all masses so we just watch the live stream mass.

The hardest mass to miss was the Easter Mass. Man watching it at home just was not the same.

[BLACKFINTURKEY]

Yes and we were doing great even during this pandemic but in the last weeks I think we have fallen into exactly what society has wanted us to do and we have been less than attentive.

[TradHunter]

Biggest hypocrite I deal with is the one in the mirror. If a man has reasons not to go then who are you to judge him? If a man decides to go to Church every Sunday, then what gives you the right to call him a hypocrite?

[elhefe]

Absolutely yes

[RattlesnakeDan]

I have to be careful what I write, I must be led by the Holy Spirit and keep this as short as possible.
I got "born-again" in 2006 after losing everything in a bad economy. I spent every minute with God listening and replying for months before finding a Christian church to attend. And I found the right church through prayer so I didn't have to guess where to go. I was soon in charge of bible studies, praying over others, teaching on tongues, healing, running the kitchen, men's retreats, kids bible studies, organizing ushers and janitors, running the mission trips fund raising etc.... and when I left they came against me for leaving saying I was not welcomed back even though grown men were crying when I left. I was seeing every side of a church.
Since then I have been a director of a big church in California, breakfast ministries with the homeless in an all hispanic area, welcomed as a member of an all black churches. I visited as many as 5 churches a week and went to 3 different churches a day in some cities where God led me to pray over others. I even wrote a book called "Would God really talk to me?". I realized that God's power was used little in church and many people's religion is church, but the rest of the week is far from Him. I am accused of writing harshly and loving people in person and that is true but Paul did the same thing. Jesus spoke harshly and with authority. I do not "officially" belong to any church at this tim, but witness and pray with and over daily, the young lady at the checkout line or the homeless man on the bench in the park. I pray in tongues daily because it has the power of God in it, we pray healing over our loved ones daily and refuse to allow sickness to remain. All that to say that most people, Christians would be best served belonging to a church and doing their weekly and sometimes weakly worship As for me and my house we will serve the Lord anywhere and everywhere we go whether in a church or outside of a church building. I do miss very much good worship with fellow Christians but it isn't always available.

[atcfisherman]

AMEN!!! Christ is the head of the body of believers. We need to lean on each other, encourage each other and affirm the Word of God to all.

However, the church was never a place for the "perfect" because only Christ was perfect. There are hypocrites in every facet of life. We must look past them, lift them up in prayer and strive to be Christ like in everything we do.

There are so many hurting people and we need to show them the love of Christ by living it out in our lives and caring for them as Christ would do.

[kerrbow]

New Testament church models ----1. Jeruselem - They called the masses unto them to share the Gospel of Christ and the people came and were saved. 2. Antioch- disciples were sent out into the world and people were saved. God uses people for His glory no matter if they attend church every time the doors are open and He uses people for His glory if they never set foot inside a church. The bottom line is the term "using people for His glory". No matter if you go or don't go makes no difference, you must be about Kingdom's work to bring honor and glory to Him whichever you choose. Humble yourself just as Jesus did, and do the Father's work.

[joey1656]

Absolutely...

[sendit]

Yes I think it’s an important role in living the Christian life. Why not be around like wise people? For all the folks that mention being a hypocrite just look into this or any forum, you have to be able the separate the wheat from the chaff.


God Bless you and this free country we call the United States of America!

[gfulton]

No I can be just as close to the Good Lord sitting in a blind watching the sun come up over the Pease river.

[Kmart49]

The Lord knows I need it! While I've been a believer most of my life, I stopped prioritizing attending church after college and that continued for many years. Thankfully my wife pushed us back on track and it has become a priority in our home and something we are teaching our children.

With all of that said, I still miss church occasionally. That is especially true during hunting season but that kind of comes with the territory.

Not being able to attend due to Covid was extremely disappointing for me. While we did watch our services online, it just wasn't the same. Thankfully our church has started to open back up over the last few weeks and I hope it stays that way.

[woodsman]

Great article, thanks for sharing.

To your question, I will say it doesn’t matter what anyone thinks. Jesus told us it’s important, so it becomes a question of obedience. The reasons why it is important become apparent when we simply trust and obey. I can testify that this has 100% been the case in my life.

I will qualify the above with the predication that the body of believers we plug into study ALL of God’s Word, and live it out. We aren’t required to be perfect, but God does require that we fully submit to Him. If this hasn’t happened in your “church experience”, keep looking. And if you find a perfect church, DON’T JOIN IT! It won’t be perfect anymore.

Hard to type some of these things in a loving, diplomatic way, but these stated comments that it’s acceptable to solely commune with God in a vacuum outside His Body—while growing in popularity and are evolving in our culture—are completely unbiblical. Beware, danger ahead.

These are not human judgments, rather what God has made plainly clear to us. Contrary to popular belief, Jesus explicitly instructs us to judge one another with righteous judgment. This ain’t the looking down our nose at somebody type thing, but we are absolutely known by our fruit, and we are to be involved in one another’s lives to help each other out. Can’t put a blindfold on and just say, “you do you, I’ll do me.”

Anyway great topic. Sadly it is controversial if were not looking at the playbook though. God bless.

[Man]

No

[overcomer401965]

Roman's 10:13-14
For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.
How then shall they call on Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher?