I Went to Church Yesterday

I went to church yesterday.

The Scripture commands all believers to attend corporate worship. The book of Hebrew issues the specific and solemn admonition that we must not neglect "to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near." 10:25. This admonition comprises two elements:

• a negative prohibition against neglecting or forsaking or ceasing to meet together. In other words, corporate worship is of such a crucial nature that believers are to apply themselves to this responsibility and privilege with unrelenting dedication and unyielding commitment.

• a positive charge to incite or stir up one another in this endeavor. In this regard, two reasons are given. First, the undeveloped observation that some have already begun to ignore the need for church attendance. The text indicates that this practice was not a mere lapse into uncharacteristic inattentiveness but rather a sustained and continued custom. Second, we are to encourage one another to attend corporate religious services "all the more", that is, to an even greater degree than we would normally do, in view of the coming Day of the Lord. The urgent need to join the congregation of the righteous takes on its highest importance in view of the approaching eschatological consummation when Christ will come again to gather his own unto himself into a state of conscious, eternal heavenly bliss and to consign those that have rejected him unto an equally conscious and eternal state of condemnation and punishment in hell. Our awareness of this end time reality intensifies our need to encourage our brothers and sisters to attend corporate religious services.

Many times this verse is abstracted from its broader context. The immediate context incorporates the previous verse, 24, which exhorts us to ".. consider how to stir up one another to love and good works.” The writer’s emphasis is clear: encouraging our brothers to attend worship services is a part of our overall responsibility to stir them up (not to irritate or nag them) to do good works. These good works are the necessary proof that we have indeed been justified by faith alone apart from our works and that our faith in Christ Jesus is the authentic, Jas 2:14-17. Even further, stimulating our brothers and sisters to attend church is also a concrete expression of our loving our neighbors as ourselves. It confirms the biblical truth that we are our brother’s keeper and that therefore we are to encourage and build up one another, 1 Ths 4:18; 5:11, to exhort one another daily lest we become hardened by the deceitfulness of sin, Heb 3:13. It confirms and promotes our ecclesiastical unity as one body, the body of our Lord Jesus Christ, whose systematic and symmetrical development requires the effectual outworking of each part in a dynamic interdependence so that the entire body grows and builds itself up in love, Eph 4:16. Lastly, it affirms our status as an other-worldly people eagerly looking forward to the Second Coming of Christ at which time we will worship him, the Lamb on the throne, in unbroken continuance with all the saints from every nation, tribe people and language. This is the immediate context.

The larger context lies between Heb 9:1-10:18 whose verses expound the incomparable effectual self-sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Briefly and broadly, 9:1-10 addresses the limited dimension of the blood of animals repeatedly shed by the high priest under the Old Covenant which could only provide an external, ceremonial cleansing. By contrast, Jesus' blood, shed once for all in the sacrifice of himself as our great High Priest, is able to purify the consciences of those who trust him, 11-14. For this reason, Jesus is the mediator of a new covenant because his blood attains forgiveness of sins, 15-22. Sinners can find salvation only in Christ's once for all substitutionary, atoning sacrifice, 23-28, which is the fulfillment and substance of all the portraits, copies and shadows contained in the Old Covenant, 10:1-18.

In the light of this great indicative of Christ's effectual sacrifice come the three imperatives to draw near to God with a sincere hearts and full assurance of faith, 22; to unswervingly hold to our confession of hope which is rooted in the covenant faithfulness of God, 23; and, 24-25, the verses occupying our major attention, to encourage fellow believers to be faithful in attending worship.

In summary therefore, the urgency of corporate worship is reinforced by the effectual, atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Those that have had (and that are still having) the full benefits of Christ's redemption applied to them by the Holy Spirit, should therefore contemplate worship not as a disturbance of their rest, an interruption of their routine, a naked duty to be performed, an occasion for the public display of (contrived) piety, and so on, but as a sincere expression of joy, humility and gratitude in response to Christ's salvation of their souls and in anticipation of the unrestrained and unrestricted demonstration of such joy and piety when Christ gathers up his own in the great eschatological harvest. For these reasons, we must strive to experience these great truths in the fellowship of the saints and also to encourage our fellow-believers to do the same. The effectual atoning sacrifice of Christ constrains all believers to meet together in corporate worship and to exhort one another to so do.

But I would not have known these truths had I not gone to church. I went to church yesterday.