Why Go to Church?

Many of the people I talk to who don’t go to church can see little point in doing so. They will tell me they have no quibble with religion – in fact some say they believe fervently in God, and have their own personal, private religion, and that they feel no need to belong to a church, which is only really interested in their money and time, which would be better given to charity and voluntary work – after all what does the church do with our money and time to help the disadvantaged?

 

I can see a lot of uncomfortable truth in what they say! After all churches can become very inward looking and forget that their existence is for their non-members not their members! There is also something quite freeing in the concept of not feeling one has to go to church.

 

But... and there is a big but coming, it is not the way God envisaged relationship with Him would work. As Christians, we worship a God of three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Before mankind was created they existed in fellowship together – and in a sense the creation of mankind was meant to extend that fellowship. And yes, each individual can have a relationship with God, but throughout the Gospels Jesus point to the fact that this relationship has to be worked out in community. He tells us we must ‘Love one another as I have loved you’. He tells us we must learn to forgive one another – more than 77 times! We can do neither of those things unless we are in deep relationships with other Christians, and if we think we can do that by having faith on our own it won’t work!

 

I think people avoid the possibility of deep relationships, and sometimes we in the Church are just as guilty – having an outward friendliness with very little depth- because it is not easy to have loving deep relationships. Those of us who are married or have been married know all about this. Even with someone to whom we have felt deep attraction and shared large parts of our lives there can be difficulties in relationship, and sometimes they break down completely! So how much more difficult is it to have deep relationships that can survive hurt and pain within the Church?

That, of course, is the challenge Jesus left with us as a church – to demonstrate to the world that the love of God can overcome the hurt and pain we inflict on each other, and bring full restoration to relationships. Once hurt within the church, many of us retreat into outward friendliness – but God is asking that we walk ‘in the light’ with each other – sorting out hurt and pain as we go.

 

The truth is that if we get to that stage, the rewards of the deep friendships we make and keep are enormous, and together we discover the immense love that Jesus demonstrated in his death on the cross for us, and together we demonstrate to the world how important that is for everybody. Then going to Church can be one of the most exciting things we do.