from the body of believers you belong to is necessary in order to avoid spiritual disaster in your life.
Where do I get this from? Hebrews 3:13: “
Encourage one another daily … that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.” Let me point out two critical words in this passage. The first word I want to point out is the word “hardened”. This is the worst possible place you could ever be in life. This is where everything begins to fall apart. When our hearts become hardened, they become like rocks. They’re not sensitive to the Spirit’s promptings. They’re not soft, therefore they don’t let the seed of God’s Word grow. We become bitter, jaded, hardened, skeptical, angry, judgmental, harsh, and complaining. This, in turn, results in all sorts of relational problems, it can result in depression and anxiety, it results in chaos in the home, it results in insecurity and pride, and worst of all, it results in an attitude of apathy in our relationship with God: we don’t care about communing with him, we don’t care about learning from him in his Word, we don’t care about growing closer to him and confessing our sins and rejoicing in his presence regularly. All that is thrown out the window and we begin to live shallow, empty, meaningless Christian lives. All of this is a result of a hardened heart.
But, there’s a
reason our hearts grow hard like this, and here’s the reason:
we refuse to allow God to minister to us through the primary vehicle he has chosen to meet our needs:
the local church. Which brings us to the second word from this verse I want to focus on: “daily”. Wow. There’s a word we weren’t expecting. EVERY day? Yes. That’s what it says. It says we should be encouraging/exhorting one another every single day. Now that doesn’t mean we have to have a formal church service every day. Nor does it mean we have to have home group every day. It just means that you need to be in contact with other believers on a daily basis, whether formal or informal, in order to keep your heart from getting ruined by the deception of sin. As we speak into each other’s lives, as we pray for one another, as we convict and comfort one another, we become strong, discerning, and soft-hearted.
So, here’s my summary of Hebrews 3:13 then: We need
daily ministry from one another, formal and informal, in order to avoid spiritual disaster.
Now … here’s my question for you: do you really think that going to a church service 2-3 times per month satisfies this requirement from Hebrews 3:13? There’s absolutely NO WAY that it does. Here’s the typical mindset concerning church these days: “I’ll go maybe 50%-60% of the time on Sunday, and that’s it. Maybe I’ll come to an outing here or there. But beyond that, I’m fine.”
This mindset, however, reveals how deceived we actually are. First of all, let me say that church is not JUST for our benefit. It’s also for the benefit of others. Most people view the church like they do a business: does it meet my demands and needs? Nobody asks: “Am I meeting the needs of the people of Target or Walmart”? We don’t think that way. We only think, “Does Target or Walmart meet MY needs.” And, unfortunately, we take that same mindset and transfer it to the church. But the church is NOT A BUSINESS DESIGNED TO MEET OUR DEMANDS AND NEEDS. It’s a place of worship where we 1.) worship God, 2.) minister to others, and THEN, 3.) get our needs met.
This is why Paul says the church is like an actual, physical body (1 Corinthians 12). All the parts are dependent on one another. All the gifts are necessary to minister to each other. WHEN YOU DECIDE to minimize your involvement in the local church, you’re not just hurting yourself, you’re hurting your brothers and sisters in Christ. When you minimize your involvement in the local church, when you “pull yourself away” from the local church, it’s as if you are ripping a finger off of a human hand; it’s as if you are ripping an eyeball out of a human face. And let me humbly remind you of something: the body of Christ is just that: the body of CHRIST. Therefore, when we tear off a hand or tear out an eyeball of the body of Christ, it’s as if we are mutilating
Christ himself. Remember what Jesus said to the apostle Paul when Paul was persecuting and killing Christians? He said, “Saul, Saul! Why are you persecuting … ME!” In other words, the way you treat the local church is the exact way you treat Christ because the church is the body of Christ.
How can we minister to one another if we’re never around each other? How can we pray for someone we barely know? How can we teach them or instruct them or rebuke them if we don’t even know them? We don’t know there areas of sin and weakness … because we don’t know them. We feel we have no authority to speak into their lives … because we don’t know them. We don’t want them to speak into our lives … because they don’t know us.
Church, do you know what it means to be a true disciple of Jesus Christ? Do you
really know what that means? If you are minimizing your involvement in our church, you are 1.) hurting yourself, 2.) hurting others, and 3.) publicly declaring that you have no idea what it means to be a follower of Christ. How ironic! In an attempt to hide who you really are from every one by not being involved, you are inadvertently
revealing who you really are to every one.
You say, “But I can’t come because of my kids”. That’s like saying you can’t go to the doctor because of your kids. We make time to go to the doctor, we make time to go to the grocery store, we make time to go to the dentist, for goodness sake, we make time to exercise, we make time to eat three meals a day, we make time to relax, we make time to sleep, we make time to do ALL THESE THINGS that take care of our physical self, but we do very little to take care of our spiritual self. And then we wonder why life is such a struggle? We wonder why we can’t sleep well, why we fight a lot, why we feel empty, why we have all these fears and worries, why our marriages are constant strains, why we lack so much motivation and purpose?
Maybe you find another couple to babysit with. Maybe you and your spouse switch off. Maybe you hire a babysitter for half the time. There ARE solutions.
Hebrews 10:25 says, “Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another…” It is true that some get “in the habit” of not meeting together. I feel heartache for them. They’re hurting themselves, hurting others in the body, and they are inadvertently revealing who they really are by hiding.
IMPORTANT: As the apostle Paul said in 1 Corinthians 4:14, and as I reiterated last Sunday, “I do not say these things to shame you, but to admonish/instruct you.” Paul’s ultimate desire wasn’t for them to feel horrible about themselves or “get something off his chest”. His ultimate desire was
their well being. And this is my desire and Craig’s desire and everyone else’s desire who has faithfully attended home group for the past five years of this church’s existence. They would all tell you that it’s not always easy, but they would also tell you how enriching and necessary it is as well. May God speak to your heart about this issue, and may your heart receive his Word.