Regular Worship Attendance

WHY DO WE MAKE SUCH A BIG DEAL ABOUT THE IMPORTANCE

OF GOING TO CHURCH EVERY WEEK?

This question is prompted by a situation that many of us have experienced at one time or another. The scene goes something like this:

“My daughter doesn’t make it to church very often. When I ask her about it, she simply shrugs and says she doesn’t want to be a hypocrite about it. She says that going to church when you don’t feel like it is being dishonest to God and to yourself. ‘Besides,’ she says, ‘it isn’t as if you have to go to church every Sunday.’ What can I say to her?”

First of all, let me say something that may shock you. CHRISTIANS DON’T HAVE TO DO ANYTHING!   We’ve been freed by Jesus from such mere duty, the “have to's” of knowing God only in His law and relating to God only out of fearful obligation. Jesus fulfilled our obligation to divine laws and suffered our consequences for violating it. His love inspired Christian “love to's,” not “have to's.”

I’ve often explained it this way to Confirmation and Bible classes: A Christian can do whatever he pleases, but what pleases a Christian? It is the nature of a Christian to find pleasure in doing what pleases his God and Father.  The Christian in tune with God recognizes immediately that skipping church just doesn’t feel right. Every unwillingness to worship God, every refusal to hear His Word, every putting ourselves ahead of God is sin. In fact, as the Epistle to the Hebrews warns, skipping church is one of the most serious sins. Hebrews 10: 23 and following says ... “Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another--and all the more as you see the Day approaching. If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.”

Skipping church robs the soul of joy in praising God. It robs the spirit of the love, truth, and power God gives through His Word and Sacrament. It robs the Christian of the mutual comfort, admonition, and encouragement that comes from being gathered together with other Christians.

The best evidence for this is the statement, “I DON’T HAVE TO GO TO CHURCH!” Those are not the words of someone who considers themselves a dear child of a loving heavenly Father. Those are words of rebellion coming from a sinner who views God as a Lawmaker and Judge, not a loving Father. Those are words of independence that come from a spiritual slave, not a dearly loved child and heir of God.

But isn’t it hypocrisy to appear at worship when your human nature prefers to stay home? Isn’t it somehow dishonest to be doing one thing when you would really rather do another? Well, is it hypocrisy for a mother to sit up all night with a sick child when she’d rather be in bed sleeping? Yet that’s not called hypocrisy, my friends, that’s called LOVE! The real hypocrisy is to call Jesus our LORD and then deny His lordship over our life unless we are feeling in the mood. The real hypocrisy is to claim Christian gratitude for all of God’s blessings while living like an ingrate.

Mercifully, God forgives us for this hypocrisy. We need to confess it, not rationalize it. God does not want excuses for our lack of love for Him and His Word. And if we try, Jesus will cut through our excuses like He does when He says, “He who belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God” (John 8:47).

Sometimes I don’t feel much like going to church either. My heart just isn’t in it and there are a million places I’d rather be. But I go anyway, not because I “have to,” but because I “love to” -- I love my Lord and I think about what would give Him pleasure. And I have discovered something in the process: God can do remarkable things with my feelings and with my attitudes when I’m there in His house.