Church: What’s the Big Deal?
The Rev. Lou Tiscione, Pastor of Weatherford Presbyterian Church (PCA)
There have been times in the history of the Christian church when people centered their lives on Sunday worship. I have a good friend, who is also a pastor who remembers hearing from his father that no matter what the conditions were on a Sunday morning, going to church on the Lord Day was certain. Surveys have been taken during different times documenting Church attendance.
It seems that we are now in a time in which many, even professing Christians, express apathy towards worship on Sunday. People always seem to have a “better offer” than church on Sunday. Church growth advocates respond to this situation by suggesting programs for making church more relevant to peoples’ needs.
But God commanded His people to “keep holy the Sabbath day” (Exodus 20:8). The Christian Sabbath day was affirmed by the Apostolic church to be the first day, Sunday. Each Lord’s day is a celebration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
My question in the title of this article is addressed to those who profess Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. Therefore, this is directed to those who have been born again by the Spirit of God. God ordains salvation. First, He effectually calls a dead person to come to life. The effect of His call is regeneration. All men are born dead in sin. God must raise a sinner from death to life. This is what Jesus said is being born again (John 3). The result of regeneration is conversion. That is, God converts a sinner to a saint. In doing so, He gives two gifts. One is the gift of faith and the second is the gift of repentance. These gifts are exercised by those who receive them. The result of turning from sin and turning to Jesus is justification. Justification is a legal term. God’s declares a sinner to be in right standing before Him only by the merit of Jesus Christ. The Spirit of God covers the sinner with the perfect life of Jesus Christ and transfers the sinner’s sin to Jesus. This is called double imputation. After justification, God adopts the sinner into His family. Those changed by God become heirs of His promise in Christ, namely heaven. Following adoption, God begins His work of sanctification. Literally, as justification covers the sinner with perfect righteousness, sanctification is God’s action of making the sinner righteous on the inside. The sinner responds to God’s work in him. God promised to make us more and more like Christ. The end result of sanctification is what is called glorification. God promised us glory. Every believer will be in glory, eternally. The comforting fact of glorification is that God sees us as already glorified. I would encourage you to read Romans 8:30 and notice that all of the verbs are in the past tense, even glorified.
Christians, those made “new creations,” don’t merely go to church. Christians are the church. The visible church, the one we see, is defined as those who profess faith in Jesus Christ and their children. Church, that is the gathering of God’s people on Sunday to worship Him, is a very big deal, or it should be in the life of everyone who professes Christ!
The heart of the matter is God made everyone for worship. Men and woman will worship someone or something. To worship is to bow down to and serve the object of worship. The object of our worship is God. The “big deal” of church is to be a part of a believing community that understands the priceless privilege meeting Him on Sunday morning.
The worship manual of the Old Testament church and the New Testament church, the book of Psalms gives the answer to the question. Psalm 122:1 says, “I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the LORD!’” God places in each believer a desire to gather with God’s people to declare His praises and to hear Him speak both in the reading of Scripture and in the proclamation of Scripture. As a result, believers are edified, or if you choose to use this word, fed.
Yes, God commanded corporate worship. But a believer grows as he understands that corporate worship is more than a duty; it is indeed a big deal to join with all the heavenly host, all the saints in heaven and to be led into the presence of the holy God by His only Son our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
