- 00:00
- where the information comes from.
- 00:02
- Some of it I've reworded a little bit but most of them come directly from Nine Marks.
- 00:08
- And we're just going to read through them and if you have a question or want to make a comment you're welcome to but you're going to look first at what should the church expect from me if I join it? What should the church expect from me if I join the church? Well the first thing the church should expect that you would attend services regularly.
- 00:29
- You know one of the things that is a frustration is members that are MIA, missing in action.
- 00:38
- You know they're they they're never there and the church the assembly on the Lord's Day is not something that Christians should see as optional.
- 00:50
- In fact one of the great dangers of COVID has been that it has rewired the brains of many people to think that gathering is not essential.
- 01:02
- Because hey I can do it on Facebook or I can do it on YouTube or I can get on the I get on the zoom call and have my gathering on zoom.
- 01:14
- And while all the things all of those things have value I mean there's I mean we have a camera right here we're recording tonight.
- 01:20
- Obviously there's some value in those things but at the same time the attendance is where we grow together in faith and it's also where the shepherds get to see the flock and talk to the flock and obviously there's more than just the gathering but you know if I don't if I'm a pastor of a church and I don't see a member for a week or two weeks or three weeks that to me there's a concern there.
- 01:50
- That tells me I need to be finding out what's going on with this person and why are they why are they choosing not to be in the body.
- 01:57
- Is it a is it a genuine forsaking of the assembly or is there something else going on in their life? Is it not necessarily because the way we would see it is forsaking the assembly you know that's the if that's the Hebrews 10 passage which tells us not to forsake the assembly.
- 02:12
- Forsaking the assembly is the road to leaving the body and if somebody's sick for three weeks that's not them gonna leave the body that's just something that happened right or if somebody's dealing with something at work or whatever you know we have a we have some people here who are police officers and paramedics well they work two Sundays out of the month and so we know we're not going to see them on those two Sundays in the month you know I'm saying so so there there is an expectation of membership that you would be there and certainly regularly be there.
- 02:46
- The second one on the list is to attend communion regularly regularly particularly is what it says attend communion particularly.
- 02:53
- For our church that's kind of superfluous because we do communion every week but let me give you an example of how even in a church like ours this would take place.
- 03:03
- Let's say that there's a church member who's coming but refusing communion.
- 03:08
- Now there may be a time in your life where you come into the body and you don't feel like you should protect.
- 03:14
- For whatever reason you may you know for first Corinthians 11 tells us to examine ourselves right and so there is a time where you may come in and you feel like you shouldn't partake and you don't.
- 03:27
- Okay but if I see that two weeks in a row three weeks in a row four weeks in a row three months and you haven't partaken then that's going to cause a question what's going on in your life for the last two three six weeks that's causing this because shouldn't be like that you know what I mean and I do think sometimes that's a misunderstanding of the of how communion works you know we don't have to be perfect to take communion because we can't be you know I mean you can't expect perfection to take communion.
