Trigger warning. This essay is not about any parishioner who may have a legitimate reason to miss Sundays. They may have a job that force them to work on Sundays. They may be ill or housebound. They may be on a much delayed vacation. This essay is not about them. It is not about any particular person. This essay was written about what appears to be an epidemic in American Christianity. Apparently there is bad teaching out there that is leading more and more people to think of Sunday morning service as just one more option among many for Sunday morning. More and more people seem to consistently prioritize other events over spending time with God in the service.

The other day I overheard a parishioner saying that “god says we can talk to Him anywhere, don’t have to be in church”. Of course this is true. It is also over simplified. When people avoid meeting god in the church they often talking to a god that they invent themselves. That is because the true god often makes us feel uncomfortable. The God of our backyards rarely challenges us.

So the question is not where can we talk with a god? The question is where does god agree to meet us? Meet us in a full way. A way which can challenge, and transform us.

There is in genesis 28:10-22, the story of Jacob’s ladder. Jacob who is traveling stops in a valley for the night. He sleeps. He dreams. He dreams of a ladder to heaven. He dreams of angels and he dreams of god. In the morning he declares the place he slept Bethel which means house of god.

Now days we think: how cute, Jacob thought that god has a house. But is really such an odd idea, that God would have a house?

Ah! You say god is omnipresent (everywhere). To which I reply, yes of course but scripture teaches us that god is in heaven. Try Matthew 6:9 when Jesus teaches us to pray “our father who art in heaven “.

Then you might say that god is in all of us. To which I reply that scripture teaches us that Jesus ascended to the right hand of the father in heaven. Luke 24:51- Acts 7:55

But what about the indwelling of the Holy Spirit? Yes it is true that believers receive the gift of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. It is true that in the mystery of the trinity that means that the “being” of god is with us. Yet the person of Jesus and the person of the father are in heaven. I know, confusing.

Scripture shows us that while God is God and therefore impossible for us to fully understand, he interacts with humans in a particular way. In the Garden of Eden: “And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day,” (Genesis 3: 8). In some fashion God’s interactions with us are localized.

Think of the exodus; Moses goes up Mt. Sinai to meet with god. God then directs the building of the tent of meeting. The tent of meeting. Its name says it all. It is the tent where god met with the people.

This of course later translated into the temple in Jerusalem. Remember in Deuteronomy god told the people that they were to worship him in the place he would designate. Not anywhere they please, but where god says to. Deuteronomy 12:5

Yes there were instances of worship elsewhere. But on the whole god was pretty insistent on his rules. Think of what happened to Aaron’s sons when they offered unauthorized fire. (Leviticus 10). Or what happened to Uzzah when he touched the tabernacle without authority to do so. (2 Samuel 6)

The point being that god interacts with people in a localized way. Even Jesus did the festivals at the temple and indeed as a boy Jesus referred to the temple as “my Father’s house”. Luke 2:49

Well you might rely on the fact that all that was Old Testament. The temple is gone and new times are here. To which I say, yes and no.

The temple is gone but scripture still indicates that god interacts with us in a localized way.

When Peter declared Jesus to be the messiah the son of the living god. Jesus responds with on this rock I will build my Ecclesia (Matthew 16). Which is a Greek word meaning an assembly and is often translated as church. Jesus did not say he was going to build an individual believer here and another there. He was going to build an assembly.

Elsewhere Jesus says where two or three are gathered in my name I am in the midst of them (Matthew 18:20). He did not say if you call on my name in your Camaro I will be in the passenger seat. Not if you talk to me in the parking lot by yourself I will be there. But where two or three are gathered in my name.

In the Old Testament the temple was the father’s house. People could talk to him and pray to him anywhere but if they wanted to meet with him they went to his house.

In the New Testament, and by extension today, you can talk with god and pray to god anywhere. And believers carry the person of the Holy Spirit within them. But if you want to “meet with god” you have to go to the assembly.

Please no jokes about having an assembly in your hot tub. Ananias and his wife Sapphira thought they could play fast and loose with the assembly in acts Acts 5. It did not turn out well for them and that was New Testament.

Remember Jesus refers to the assembly as himself (Acts 9:4) Elsewhere in scripture the assembly is referred to as Jesus’ body (1 Corinthians 12:27 among others).

There is a real spiritual identification between Jesus and the assembly/church.

Paul talks “we are the temple of the living God” (2 Corinthians 6:16).
In Hebrews it is said not to neglect to gather (assemble) Hebrews 10:25

There are many reasons for believers to attend Sunday services. There is, as I said before, less chance of avoiding the hard bits of the gospel. There is mutual encouragement to be given and to be received. There is the arena is which our faith and our spiritual gifts can mature. In short, time is the assembly is where we meet Christ and grow in Him.

In Matthew 22:1-14 Jesus tells a parable about a wedding feast. The king invites people. They do not want to come. He invites more people, he even has his servants go into the streets and bring everybody, willing to come, into the wedding hall. But when the king is walking through the hall he spots one man who was not wearing a wedding robe. (All the other men were wearing jackets and he showed up in a dirty t shirt.) The king threw him out. It’s not right to disrespect the king.

To sum up. God is god. God chooses to interact with people in a localized way, even today. You can talk to god in your shower. You can pray to him in your garden. But if you really want to spend time with him, and build up a solid relationship, as he invites you to, then you have to go to his house, and his house is his church.

You don’t want to end up not being known by God. Matthew 7:21-22

We’ve been taught that we are to be in a personal relationship with God. Let us not forget that real relationship means spending time with Him.