And so how can you, as a Christian, ensure that such a thing doesn’t happen to you? The answer is simple: You must do that which is necessary to keep your fellowship with Christ maintained and strong. How do you accomplish this? You do it through such things as: daily prayer, daily Bible study, weekly church attendance, cheerful giving, frequent witnessing, and regular confession and repentance. I know, I know, these things have been promoted so much they’ve become virtual cliches of Christianity. But they’ve been promoted so much because they work!

In Jeremiah 6:16, the prophet Jeremiah says to the people of Judah:

Thus says the Lord: “Stand in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, where the good way is, and walk in it. Then you will find rest for your souls…”

By encouraging the people to ask for the old paths God was telling them, “The things I’ve had you do before will still work and keep you in right fellowship with me.” To those Jews that meant keeping the moral specifics of the Mosaic law, bringing their sacrifices to the temple as acts of worship, offering up their prayers to God, confessing their sins and repenting of them, and looking to God for their guidance and protection. Sadly, though, those people would have none of it. Jeremiah 6:16 ends with the mournful words:

…But they said, ‘We will not walk in it (the good way found in the old paths).’

Now, I do realize that the “old paths” for the Christian today aren’t the same as the ones the Old Testament Jews were to walk. However, the basic template is still the same: adherence to God’s word, worship, prayer, confession, repentance, and seeking God’s guidance and protection. The Christian whose life evidences these things need never worry about rotting or sinking because his spiritual boat will be solid and worthy of sailing the seas of life. As we all know, those seas can sometimes be stormy, choppy, and downright dangerous, but the Christian who is walking God’s in old paths won’t sink. How can he when he has the Lord Himself as his captain?

Have you ever met a professing Christian who couldn’t settle down in any one church? I have. Have you ever met one whose church letter never seemed to translate into much holy living? I have. Have you ever met one who seemed to think that church membership was some kind of get-out-of-jail-free card in regards to sin? I have.

I’m not trying to devalue having your name on a church roll, but I would like to point out that it’s not exactly the end-all-be-all of living the Christian life. I forget who it was but some famous preacher once said, “The Lord has some the church doesn’t have, and the church has some the Lord doesn’t have.” That sums up the situation pretty well, doesn’t it? As another preacher once said concerning the “dead wood” on our church rolls, “We’ve got some members even the C.I.A. couldn’t find.”

Unfortunately, the church growth movement that swept this county some years ago has wired us to equate spirituality and God’s blessing with the number of names on a membership roll. Again, I’m not railing against church membership, but I do want to remind us that the great commission calls for the making of disciples, not just church members (Matthew 28:18-20). Give me a choice between a disciple and an “empty bottle” church member, and I’ll take the disciple every time.

I’ll reserve judgment on where God would have had that farmer be that Sunday morning, but any pastor will tell you that a lot of people sit in church services and think about some kind of “hay.” Their minds aren’t really on worship. They don’t pay much attention to the Sunday School lesson or the sermon. They barely mouth the words during the singing. They couldn’t rename even half the prayer requests or the announcements. Their bodies are at their posts, but their minds are AWOL.

Is such a thing pleasing to God? Of course not. He wants more than mere zombies who dutifully report for roll call. Certainly this goes for church attendance, but it also goes for Bible study, prayer, witnessing, and giving. Any time we are engaged in doing any of these things, our minds should be fixated on the task at hand. No “hay” should divide our thoughts and focus. Remember this the next time you find your mind drifting as you try to do something for the Lord.

But what bothers me about our little county (approximately 15,000 in number) is how easily we blur the line between authentic Christian conduct and rank worldliness. Some of the same people who go to church every Sunday morning don’t mind doing a good deal of drinking and carousing on Saturday night. Some of the ones who rant and rave about the sexual sin of homosexuality evidently don’t understand that adultery falls in that same category. Some of the ones who are quick to request prayer for themselves or their families are also far too well versed in backbiting, gossiping, and rumor spreading.

My point is that a lot of people love to hear about Christ, the Bible, forgiveness, grace, and salvation, but the numbers dwindle significantly when the topics become repentance, godly conduct, separation from the world, and personal holiness. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not promoting a works-based plan of salvation here. I myself sin every day and have to spend more time than I should asking the Lord for forgiveness of those sins. But with me sin is the exception, not the rule. It occurs outside the norm. It’s the uncommon, not the common. That’s what salvation has done to me (or better yet for me).

Perhaps an illustration will help me say what I’m trying to say. Little Billy was dressed for church in his Sunday best, but his mother wasn’t quite ready to go. So he went out in the back yard and started playing in the dirt. In just a few minutes his clothes were absolutely filthy. When his mother saw him she was furious. Passionately, Billy said, “Mom, I’m real sorry. Please forgive me.” She replied, “Okay, you’re forgiven but go change.” But Billy didn’t want to go back in the house and go to the trouble of dressing again. So he said, “No, I’ll just go as I am.” You see, he wanted forgiveness but not change. And, unfortunately, there seem to be a lot of Billys running around out there these days.

Now here’s the test question: Do you think that man will honor the “deal” that he made with God? The answer is: There’s a pretty good chance that he will go to church that first Sunday, but if nothing else changes he won’t keep up the attendance for long.

You see, it takes more than a quick moment of desperation to create a lasting turnaround in your life. As a pastor, I’ve seen so many people who were going through difficult times make grandiose boasts about what all they were going to do for the Lord if He helped them out of their messes. But how many of those boasts actually came to pass, even after the Lord gave the help? Maybe there were two or three, but right now I can’t even remember there being that many.

One Sunday morning I preached and gave an invitation, and a woman promptly made her way to the altar and knelt for prayer. When I went over and asked her why she had responded to the invitation, she told me something along the lines of she wanted to dedicate herself more completely to Jesus. She was crying hot tears and her face was something of a mess from the running makeup. I knew that she was sincere. I also knew that she was a good Christian woman who had some areas of her life that could have been more submitted to Christ’s lordship. So I prayed with her and asked the Lord to help her be even more devoted to Him. The emotion of the moment was almost palpable.

But did that woman even show up for the evening service that same Sunday? No. As I looked around the sanctuary that night and didn’t see her, I was in virtual disbelief. That was the moment when I truly understood for the first time just how fickle and inconsistent we are when it comes to serving the Lord.

Jesus knew us all too well. On the night of His arrest, He took Peter, James, and John into the garden of Gethsemane with Him. He said to them, “Stay here and watch with Me.” Then He walked alone a little further into the heart of the garden and prayed, “O My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will” (Matthew 26:39). Following that prayer, He returned to where He had left Peter, James, and John at their watch-post. And what did He find? Rather than keeping diligent watch, they had all drifted off to sleep.

After a fairly strong rebuke, Jesus summed up the problem by saying, “The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak” (Matthew 26:41). In my opinion, those words perfectly describe why that Christian woman didn’t come back for church that Sunday night. Her spirit was willing, but her flesh was weak. When she had devoted herself more fully to Jesus in the altar that morning, she had meant it. In that moment, she couldn’t have meant it any more. But, unfortunately, that moment had soon passed and the rest of her life had come crashing back in upon her.

I’m saying all of this to encourage you to work at eliminating the fickleness from your walk with the Lord. Try to avoid the roller-coaster devotion that marks the lives of so many people. I know that your flesh is weak. So is mine. But we can’t keep using that excuse to consistently fail the Lord and not live up to the commitments we have made to Him. And, by the way, we needn’t expect Him to keep sending mountain lions to keep us committed either.

Even as Fristoe traveled to the home, he had to question why the wealthy couple would be so gracious to him. The mystery only deepened when he met them and realized that they were strangers to him. It wasn’t until all three were comfortably seated in an exquisite living room that he got his explanation.

The couple’s son, an officer in the Royal navy, was stationed on the other side of the world, but he had heard that Dr. Fristoe was to be in London. It was the young man who had sent instructions for his parents to be so hospitable to Dr. Fristoe. As the couple described their son, Dr. Fristoe did indeed remember him. The officer had been on a ship that had put into Norfolk, Virginia for repairs years earlier when Fristoe was serving as the pastor of a church there. The officer had attended Fristoe’s church and gotten to know the preacher quite well. Fristoe had invited the young man into his home for dinner on multiple occasions. There the two had enjoyed long discussions on the subject of religion, and those discussions had led the young man to believe in Christ as Savior. Dr. Fristoe had even baptized him.

After the officer’s ship had pulled out of Norfolk, he had kept in touch with Fristoe. Upon hearing that Fristoe would be preaching a revival in London, the officer had cabled his parents and instructed them to extend the invitation to the evangelist. After the explanation was all given, the couple ended it by saying, “Dr. Fristoe, you are here because of our son.”

The spiritual parallel isn’t hard to spot. Christian, when you journey to heaven and arrive at that indescribably beautiful place, God the Father could rightly look at you and say, “You are here because of My Son.” Take some time today to thank Jesus for the awesome fact that heaven awaits you when you leave this world.

Disciples Road Church is certainly no exception to this rule, and since our church is small, the summer slump looks especially bad on us. Vacations, family reunions, camps, etc., they all take their toll. Pastors try everything to keep folks coming during the summer. We’ll start a series on marriage or prophesy, two subjects which are always popular. Some pastors swap pulpits with each other for one Sunday morning. Others bring in special guest-speakers. These are all attempts to keep the flock interested in coming to church rather than going to the lake, the ocean, the campground, the ball-field, or wherever.

Mind you now that I’m not saying that all such trips are wrong or sinful. As a matter of fact, I missed a couple of Sundays myself in July as I got away and did some things with my family. But, as is so oftentimes the case, there should be moderation and balance when it comes to missing church. Yes, I missed two Sundays last month and had a preacher friend of mine fill my pulpit, but those were the first two Sundays I had taken off since we started the church four-and-a-half years ago. Do you see my point? God doesn’t mind you missing a church service every now and then if He approves of the reason, but far too many church-goers don’t ask for His approval before they make their plans, plans that cause them to miss church.

During our lunch, my pastor friend and I especially talked about how people could do their summer stuff and yet still attend church if they put just the slightest effort into it. For example, instead of leaving out on Sunday, they could do so on Monday. Or instead of checking out and driving back on Sunday, they could check out and drive back on Saturday. Rather than schedule the reunion or the family get-together on Sunday, they could schedule it on Saturday. And if they attend a church that offers Sunday night or Wednesday night services, they could attend those even if they had to miss the Sunday morning service. You see, with just a small amount of planning and effort, the amount of church services that people miss in summer could be greatly reduced.

Of course, the world and all that it has to offer gives us absolutely no help in this area. For an example, I’ll use my son Ryan’s basketball camp this summer. He is a rising high school freshman, and the high school basketball coach likes for his players to attend the Clemson Tigers basketball camp in Clemson, South Carolina. And what were the dates for that camp? They were June 17th (Friday), 18th (Saturday), and 19th (Sunday). My question is, why couldn’t those dates have been June 16th (Thursday), 17th (Friday), and 18th (Saturday)? After all, it’s summer and the kids are out of school. It would have been easy for them to have showed up on Thursday. You see, whoever set up that camp seemed to go out of his way to ensure that the kids were there on Sunday rather than in church.

This same kind of thing plays out time and time again in baseball tournaments for so-called “travel teams.” I assure you that if tournament directors scheduled their tournaments for Friday and Saturday rather than Saturday and Sunday, the teams would still be there. So why do they schedule them for Saturday and Sunday? All I can figure is that the schedulers are lost people who don’t give a rip about church.

But I don’t mean to lay all the blame for the annual summer slump at the door of lost people. Let me tell you the dirty little secret that we Christians don’t want to acknowledge: The average church-goer actually likes missing church every now and then. People will bend over backwards and move mountains to get to a place where they truly want to be, right? I mean, if a destination becomes a priority, the masses will be there. As the old saying goes, “Hell or high water couldn’t keep them away.” This shows us, then, that church isn’t truly a priority with most people. Even the ones who regularly attend can be knocked out by just the slightest problem or misalignment of the stars.

On this subject, I’ll admit that church has become its own worst enemy. It is now so much a part of the fabric of our lives that we take it for granted, don’t we? It’s so easy to think, “What’s the big deal if I miss a service? There will be another one next week.” Well, I suppose there will be, if you live another week to see it. But who’s to say what blessings you will miss at church if you skip for a reason that doesn’t pass God’s test of approval? You might miss the sermon that would change your life. You might miss the song that would carry you through the rest of your week. You might miss the prayer request for which you could make a major difference. You might be the source of encouragement that helps to keep your tired, frustrated, out-of-heart pastor going. You might be the reason that some visitors decide to become a part of your church. I’m telling you, you just never know.

So, in closing, I plead with you to consider these things any time you are planning to miss church. This goes for the summer months as well as all the other months. I guess what I’m trying to do with this post is get you to think deeper and more spiritually about your church attendance. It’s certainly not a subject that you should be blase or flippant about. Remember that Hebrews 10:24-25 is still in the Bible:

And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.

The woman then launched into her story. “Dr. Roberson, you know that for twenty-two years I have sat in a certain seat in the balcony to your left.” “Yes, that’s right,” said the preacher. “Well, this morning I went to my place, and a man was sitting there. I told him that was my seat, but he just said, ‘It’s not yours today.’” After the man’s refusal to move, the woman had gotten mad, left the service, and stood outside to wait for Dr. Roberson.

And how did the venerable old pastor respond to her complaint? He said, “Ma’am, you have heard me preach again and again on dying to self. How long has it been since you died?” Then he got in his car and went on his way.

During the service that night, while the choir was singing, Dr. Roberson looked up to the balcony, but he didn’t see the woman in her usual seat. Finally, after scanning over the sanctuary, he found her sitting in a new seat in the lower section. When their eyes met, she just smiled. Roberson used to love to tell that story and end it by saying, “She died. And I haven’t had a problem with her since.”

In Luke 9:23, Jesus says, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.” Keep in mind now that a cross was an instrument of death. Nobody took up a cross and lived. And so, Christian, I’ll just ask you, how long has it been since you died? Have you died today? Have you ever died? Please understand that the only way to properly live for Christ is to attend your own funeral afresh and anew each morning.

You say you went to church Sunday. Fine, but what did you do Monday? You studied your Bible Tuesday night. Okay, but what did you do Wednesday? You prayed a great prayer Thursday. Excellent, but what did you do Friday? You see, occasional flashes of brilliance in serving the Lord just don’t compare to a life that is wholly devoted to serving Him 24-7. So, how’s your case for a promotion right now?

George Matheson was a blind Scottish pastor in the late 1800s. While he was serving as the pastor of a church in Innellan, he preached to only a handful of worshippers one stormy winter’s Sunday. He left the service discouraged because he felt that his sermon had been especially good. But what he didn’t know was that a stranger in the congregation would never forget the sermon or the blind preacher who delivered it. Over seven years later, that man would recommend Matheson to become the pastor of St. Bernard’s Church in Edinburgh, a call which would lead to thirteen years of highly fruitful service for Matheson at the church.

In the parable of the talents, Jesus taught that the one who is faithful over a few things will be made ruler over many things (Matthew 25:14-30). While He gave this parable within the context of a teaching on prophecy and rewards in the afterlife, the basic principle can apply in this life. A proof text is His parable of the faithful steward (Luke 12:42-48), which isn’t found within the context of a prophetic teaching.

God is always on the lookout for good stewardship, and He always takes special notice of a George Matheson who will faithfully preach to the best of his ability for a bad-weather, poorly attended Sunday service. So don’t ever take lightly any opportunity that comes your way to do something in service to Christ. Remember that no job is too small for a servant big enough to do it well.