TLP 175: Your Family Needs to Go to Church, Part 1 | the purpose

I'm going to say that outside of a relationship with God and the sincere understanding of His Word, this is the next best tool for the Ambassador Parent.

Why This Series Matters for Christian Families

Welcome to Truth.

Love.

Parent.

Where we use God's Word to become intentional, premeditated parents. Here's your host, A .M. Brewster.

On our last episode, which was a miracle by the way, I mentioned that most of you will likely already have your minds made up about the series we're starting today. By the way, if you're wondering why the last episode was a miracle, you should definitely check it out.

Anyway though, this series is a five-part study in why your family needs to go to church. Now, no doubt some of you have had some bad experiences with church. My goal for you would be to discover a new perspective.

Not necessarily a new perspective on the people in your local church, the people who treated you poorly, or whatever bad experience you had, but a new perspective on God's plan for.

You.

And for those of you who already attend church regularly, my goal is for you is that you just put your church to the test. Yes, it may sound like on one hand I'm encouraging those not going to church and to go, and on the other hand, discouraging the ones who are already going from going.

And that may be true. That's why I want you to stick with me over the next five episodes. Every Christian needs to assemble with other believers. But not every body of professing believers is assembling in the right way or for the right reasons.

So, my plan is to discuss the purpose of church today. But over the next four episodes, I want to talk about the motivation, the kind, and then the consequences of participation and the consequences of neglect.

Of course, we'll talk about a lot more as well, but I want to remind you of our purpose for season seven. Just like we discussed in episode 172, only truth can set you and your family free. And as we learned last time, only God's Word provides that truth.

So, if God's Word says anything important about this thing called church, we need to.

Listen.

What the Church Is and Why It Is Not a Building

So, let's jump right in. In their article, Why You Should Go to Church Even if You're Not Sure of Your Beliefs, the art of manliness suggests we should go to church for the following 12 reasons. One, greater social support.

Two, a chance to remember, reorient, reflect, and recenter. Three, build discipline. Four, garner rhythms of ritual and routine. Five, have a stronger marriage. Six, develop successful, well-rounded kids.

Seven, enjoy a rare chance of communal singing. Eight, breach your echo chamber and connect with people from different walks of life. Nine, contribute to greater free thinking and diversity of ideas. Ten, lessen bitter partisanship.

Eleven, find ample opportunities for service. And twelve, achieve greater mental and physical health. Sounds pretty good, right? Of course, they didn't include any biblical passages for their conclusions, but there were links to research.

Listen, here's my problem. Though some of those ideas may have loose hold in biblical truth, and though many of those things may happen to someone who regularly attends church, those aren't the reasons God created the church.

But first, we need to define what church is. And this one's kind of tough. The Greek word translated church is ekklesia. Generally speaking, in the Greek, that word simply referred to an assembly of people.

For example, in Acts 19, we read that many of the Ephesians were ignorantly stirred up into an uproar against Paul and his traveling companions. And in verse 32, we read,. Now, some cried out one thing, some another, for the assembly was in confusion, and most of them did not know why they had come together.

Now, that may sound like some of your churches, but the word assembly there wasn't referring to a gathering of saints. No, it was a pagan angry mob. But most of the time, ekklesia is used in the Bible.

It does refer specifically to a group of believers who are assembled together. In fact, the first usage of the word in the New Testament comes from Jesus himself in Matthew 16, 18. He says,. However, the first written usage of the word was probably in the book of James.

James was likely the first New Testament book ever written. And in chapter 5, verse 14, we read,. Now, I hate to cite that verse and then move on, but this isn't the time to exegete that particular passage.

Needless to say, please understand that the church is not the place we go to be healed from all of our ills. Anyway, the point is that the word church never referred to a building. It always referred to a group of people who gathered together.

And I'm sure you can tell that's very different from the usage today. You may be driving down the road with your kids and one of them says, I think that's my friend's church. You glance out the window and you're likely not going to see a throng of people on the side of the road.

You're probably going to see a building, one that is potentially empty the time that you're driving by it. The first thing we need to do for us and for our families to stop using biblical words the wrong way.

I keep harping on this because it's so important. Teach your kids that church is the people, not the building. It's the people, not the service or the programs. That right there will help some of you overcome some of your issues with the ideas of church.

To you, church was a place where religious rites were performed, services experienced and standards were expected. However, others of you are put off even more from the whole idea simply by hearing that church is more about the people than the programs.

True Church Membership and the Call to Assemble

So, let's continue deepening our understanding. First, just because people walk into a church building or participate in a service or light a candle or preach a message, it doesn't mean they're part of the church.

It also doesn't matter if you're a member or a charter member for that matter of a local assembly of believers. What matters is whether or not you truly have a saving relationship with God. In Acts 2, we learn a lot about the beginning of the church.

And in the last verse of the chapter, we read, Earlier in the chapter, when the people heard Peter preach during Pentecost, this happened. Now, when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and to the rest of the apostles, Then verse 41 tells us, True church membership happens when you're born again.

Whether you like it or not, if you are a born-again follower of Christ, then you are a member of the church. And as a member, you have responsibilities. Responsibilities? That's right.

Of course.

In fact, it wouldn't make sense any other way. God is a God of change. His whole purpose is to redeem lost men and women and then to joyously engage those individuals in redeeming other lost men and women so that he can have a relationship with them for all eternity.

God doesn't save us so he can drop us right back where we were. No, he has a plan for us, for our kids as well. So, let's discover that right now. And of course, we have to start with the verses you were all expecting.

Hebrews 10, 24, and 25. They read this way,. And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works. Not neglecting to meet together to assemble, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day drawing near.

Here we see the ever-important injunction to not neglect the ecclesia. This is pretty impossible to get around. The whole purpose of the church is to gather, to assemble, to meet. If we neglect that assembling of believers, then we're ignoring the command of God.

It doesn't really matter if we don't like it. I mean, seriously, that argument holds as much water as your child's impassioned plea that they don't have to eat their vegetables simply because they don't like it.

The reality is that we must meet. But why? Well, here are just a few reasons. Number one, this passage tells us that it's part of how we stir each other up to love and good works. And two, this passage also tells us that we're here to encourage each other.

Now, there are just two of what are commonly called the one-anothers. Most people agree that there are about 30 one-anothers listed in the Scriptures. It's been my plan for a while to dedicate 30 TLP snippets to highlighting each of the one-anothers because if you and any of your family members are born again, the one-anothers should be a daily part of your family life.

And perhaps now would be a good time to start that endeavor. We'll see. But the point is, we can't minister to each other by doing the one-anothers to and for other believers if we're not together with those believers.

And we're going to talk about this more later, but you can't fulfill the one-anothers when you tune in to an online church. This is another reason that Paul, under the inspiration of God, refers to us as a building and as a body.

Each of these similes are a picture of the fact that each believer in the assembly has a special and necessary role to play. If for some reason your appendix decided to neglect the assembling of your body parts today, there would be a problem.

And let me say, there are a lot of churches out there suffering from an appendicitis. There are a lot of amputated local bodies out there. And some of that may have to do with the fact that you and your family don't assemble.

Equipping the Saints for Ministry and Maturity in Christ

Okay, so the first reason we need to assemble is solely because God commands it. The second reason is so that we can fulfill our responsibility to our brothers and sisters in Christ. But, you may say, I don't know how to do the one-anothers.

I wouldn't be any help to my brothers or sisters. Well, that's another reason we need to go to church. In Ephesians 4, we learn that God gave the church certain people with a very important job. Starting in verse 11 we read, "...until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness and deceitful schemes.".

Now, this passage should sound very familiar. We've discussed it before back when we talked about TLP's theme verse, which just so happens to be the next verse in the passage. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into Him who is the head, even Christ.

There's some more of that body language there. But let's continue reading. "...from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.".

Are you starting to see the grand and glorious plan? God gave the church men whose sole responsibility was to equip the saints, that's those of us in the church, and to do the work of the ministry and building up the body of Christ so that we can introduce more people into the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, so that we can all become mature just like Jesus Christ and not be easily led astray by failure philosophies.

Because instead of that, the church is to be filled with people who speak to each other in truth and love so that they can all grow together into the head, Jesus Christ. And the passage says it once again, it ends by saying that the whole purpose of this is to grow and build itself up in love.

The church exists to magnify Christ, unify us together in His truth, and subsequently be built up, strengthened, matured, and equipped to introduce others to the body. That is the purpose of the assembling of believers.

Yes, there's so much more that can be said about that. And next time we're going to discuss why the art of manliness list was no good. But let me review and put a finer familial point on today's discussion.

Number one, born-again believers are to assemble together because they love God and He commands it. Number two, God commands it so that we may play a vital part in the process of teaching and being taught, ministering and being ministered unto, loving and being loved, reaching and being reached.

And three, lastly, we do this so that the church may grow, not only quantitatively as new people are added, but also qualitatively as we are matured into the image of Christ. Aren't those three things you want for your family?

Don't you want your kids to know God and submit to Him? Don't you want your children to be built up in Him? Don't you want your kids to be used by God to spread His truth and to love this dark and dying world?

Well, then you all need to go to church. Now, still, you may be asking, but we have the Bible. Your last episode was all about how the Bible is all we need for parenting. Can't we do all that without the pomp and circumstance of, quote, going to church?

Not only that, but you may be thinking, you haven't seen my church. I wish it were full of people who spoke truth and love and were dedicated to equipping my family and helping us mature in Christ, but it's not.

It's full of a bunch of dead hypocrites. First, I'm very sorry to hear that. And second, we are going to talk about that in a couple episodes. And third, all I can say is that isn't how God created it to work.

He's a communal, relational God. It makes all the sense in the world that following Him would lead us into redemptive communal relationships. Perhaps the closest local church isn't the right one for your family, but not assembling with believers is not a sustainable or Christ-honoring option.

You need to give serious thought to what we've read from God's Word today. Our episode notes are linked below if you'd like to go back and review the verses and points. And if this episode really resonated with you, please definitely share it on social media.

And while you're there, I encourage you to like us and follow us so you can receive other valuable parenting resources. I'm going to say that outside of a relationship with God and a sincere understanding of His Word, the church is the next best tool for the ambassador parent.

But more importantly than the benefits your family may receive, the best reason to gather with believers is that it pleases the Lord. I'll see you next time.

Truth. Love. Parents is part of the Evermind Ministries family and is dedicated to helping you become an intentional premeditated parent. Join us next time as we search God's Word for the truth your family needs today.