“I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord’” (Ps. 122:1).
Are you taken with joy as you consider going to your church on Sunday or as you attend during the week for Bible studies, prayer meetings and other congregational events? Many churchgoers fail to experience excitement at the prospect of attending the Lord’s house. Why?
Scores of churches are not “the house of the Lord.” Numerous churches have become more drama than sanctuary; diversion than enlightenment; happiness than holiness; worldly psychoanalysis rather than Scripture; center of business development rather than a voice of the prophets; man-centered (anthropocentric) than God-centered (theocentric); felt needs rather than Christian necessities. Christ is not their first love, the holy Bible is not their standard for life and practice, and they have left their eternal moorings.
Has your church compromised her “ekklesia-ship?” Has she forsaken her being called out of the world? The loss of the distinction between the world and the church results in the church resembling the world, and the world having less and less resemblance to the church. The result is that the church becomes less and less Christian and more and more worldly, and churchians lose their gladness for God’s house.
Compare your attitude with Christ’s attitude. Even as a youngster, Jesus chose to be in the church sitting at the feet of His “teachers, both listening to them, and asking them questions” (Lk. 2:46). He expressed concern when those closest to Him did not realize that if they wanted to be with Him, they had to come to His “Father’s house” (Lk. 2:49). You meet with Jesus in the church (Lk. 2:27). The disciples “were continually in the temple, praising God” (Lk. 24:53). Conversions occur at church (Acts 16:14).
Is your church a crowd of people rather than a body of believers? What influence does your church have upon the lifestyles of its members? What influence is your church having upon the community surrounding it?
The true church consists of those Christians bought with holy blood and those whom God has saved in order to sanctify (I Cor. 1:2). Those gladdened at the thought of entering their Lord’s sanctuary know that they have been called out from common living to uncommon living – called out for holy purposes – called out for the cause of Christ. Their lives are to be holy exercises in Christlikeness.
How many Christians are out of breath even as they sit in their pews? Their churches have become worldly by making Christians overactive by emphasizing programs and other activities over the primary relationship the churchman is to have with Christ thereby contributing to the fractured family and the disorder in individual lives. They are out of breath with their attempts to sustain the church by worldly methods.
Has your church fallen into the mode of protecting territory rather than taking new ground? Is your church self-limiting in wanting to maintain the status quo rather than involving itself in the labors of the Holy Spirit. If your answer is in the affirmative, is there any wonder that the congregation does not enter into your sanctuary with gladness?
Be mindful of the insights provided by your Puritan brethren:
- ” The excellence of the Church does not consist in multitude but in purity.” John Calvin
- “If the Church be holy, be holy if you will be of the Church.” Richard Baxter
- “We read not that Christ ever exercised force but once, and that was to drive profane ones out of His Temple, not to force them in.” John Milton
“Let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more, as you see the day drawing near” (Heb. 10:24f.).
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