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.

As we study the gospels we find that Jesus was frequently in conflict with the man-made traditions of the Jewish religious elite. In particular, many incidents involved Him purposely breaking the time-honored, but erroneous, rules that had been established for keeping the Sabbath day as a day of rest (Matthew 12:1-13; Luke 13:10-17; Luke 14:1-6; John 5:1-16). Of course, Christ’s actions weren’t surprising. In the Old Testament Hebrew, the Sabbath commandment consists of thirty-nine words. In accordance with those thirty-nine words, the Jewish rabbis devised their own list of thirty-nine ways in which a person could break the commandment. Then they took each of those thirty-nine ways and broke it down into thirty-nine divisions. This gave them a grand total of 1,521 ways by which one could break the Sabbath. Getting a tack in your sandal was considered carrying a burden on the Sabbath. Killing a flea was considered hunting on the Sabbath. Even eating an egg that was laid on Saturday was considered a violation because the hen had worked on the Sabbath. It’s no wonder that Jesus railed against such traditions.

While I certainly wouldn’t say that the traditions of the American way of “doing church” are as bad as those the Jews used to keep their Sabbath day, they sometimes seem about as entrenched. Try changing something in the typical local church and see what you get! What’s surprising is that so many of our traditions have little or no scriptural basis. Consider that for the first 300 years or so churches were simple “house-churches” (Romans 16:3-5; 1 Corinthians 16:19; Colossians 4:15; Philemon v.1-2; James 2:1-3; Acts 2:1-2; 2 John v.10). That means no: committees, deacon boards, business meetings, Sunday schools, Bible schools, Bible conferences, church budgets, choirs, Christmas plays, Easter dramas, Fall Festival parties, missions boards, youth missions trips, senior-citizen outings, or Christian schools. The congregations didn’t have pew-filled sanctuaries, baptisteries, education buildings, fellowship halls, gymnasiums, or life-activity centers either.

So how did they “do church”? Well, there were multiple house-churches in a city. When a congregation grew too big for the confines of a home, that was seen as an opportunity to begin a new offshoot house-church. All of the house-churches of a given city made up the one “church” of that city. There were pastors, men who were more typically called “elders,” “overseers,” or “bishops” (Acts 14:23; 20:17; 1 Timothy 3:1-7; Titus 1:5; James 5:14; Philippians 1:1; Ephesians 4:11). There were deacons, men who performed necessary menial acts of service in the congregations (Acts 6:1-7; 1 Timothy 3:8-13). The congregations met each Sunday to commemorate the fact that Christ arose on a Sunday (Acts 20:7-8; 1 Corinthians 16:2; Revelation 1:10). Since many of the early Christians were slaves, and since the Roman empire did not consider Sunday to be a special day during this time (this was before Constantine’s reign), it is likely that services were typically held on Sunday night.

And what did those services look like? They were free-flowing services where each Christian was encouraged to contribute to the service by somehow using or exhibiting his spiritual gift (Romans 12:3-8; 1 Corinthians 12:1-31; 14:26; Ephesians 4:7-11). However, everything was to be done in an orderly manner (1 Corinthians 14:40). There was praying (James 5:13) and singing (Ephesians 5:18-19; Colossians 3:16; James 5:13; 1 Corinthians 14:15). Since the headings of many of the Psalms tell us those Psalms were written to be played on specific instruments, perhaps instruments were sometimes used in the services. Obviously, though, there wasn’t a piano or a pipe organ sitting in the corner somewhere.

There were no pulpits, but there was certainly teaching and what we now call “preaching” (1 Timothy 1:3; 4:6,13,16; 5:17; 2 Timothy 4:1-5; Titus 1:9; 2:1). It seems that the Lord’s Supper was observed each service. This was called “the breaking of bread” (Acts 2:42-47). In the earliest days, a “love feast” (a meal designed to help the poorer Christians) was served in conjuncture with the Lord’s Supper (Jude v. 12). Real wine was used during the Lord’s Supper and the love feast (1 Corinthians 11:21). The house-churches were expected to practice church-discipline as well (1 Corinthians 5:1-13). Perhaps they did this by using the guideline laid out by Jesus (Matthew 18:15-17).

As for the money, the Old Testament law’s elaborate system of tithing (Leviticus 27:30-34; Deuteronomy 12:5-7,17-19; 14:22-29; Numbers 18:21-32; Malachi 3:8-12) was not taught. Why would it be? You couldn’t bring a tenth of your harvests and livestock to a house, and there was no longer a need to support the Levitical priests who ministered at the temple. So, what many now call “grace giving” replaced the commands concerning tithing. Under “grace giving,” cheerful and generous giving was expected as each Christian gave in accordance with his prosperity (2 Corinthians 9:6-15; 1 Timothy 6:17-19). And how did the congregations disperse the offerings? The money went to aid the needy (Acts 20:35; Ephesians 4:28; James 1:27), help fellow Christians who were struggling (Acts 11:29; 1 Corinthians 16:1-2; 2 Corinthians 9:1-15; Galatians 6:10; Hebrews 6:10), support the apostles in their missionary work (Philippians 4:10-20; 1 Corinthians 9:1-14; 2 Corinthians 11:5-9), and meet the basic needs of the pastors (Galatians 6:6,10; 1 Corinthians 9:7,11; 1 Thessalonians 5:12-13).

And make no mistake, each and every Christian was to be actively involved in hands-on service to Christ out in the real world. The role of the “preachers” was to equip all Christians with the doctrine and knowledge to be able to carry out the work of ministry (Ephesians 4:11-12). The pastors did have authority to lead the congregations (Acts 20:28; 1 Thessalonians 5:12-13; 1 Timothy 3:5; Hebrews 13:7,17,24), but the leadership was to be the kind of servant-leadership that Jesus exemplified (1 Peter 5:1-4). The ultimate authority in all the churches rested with the apostles (1 Corinthians 5:1-3). They were the ones who ordained the pastors (Acts 14:23).

But why am I telling you all this? Well, I assure you that I’m not trying to take us all back to those early days of the church. Even if we wanted to go back to such a seemingly ideal time, we couldn’t because we no longer have genuine apostles the likes of Peter and Paul. I’m also not saying that there is anything patently wrong with: church buildings, committees, Sunday Schools, Bible Schools, missions boards, youth missions trips, senior-citizen outings, Christian schools, etc. I mean, the fact that you are reading this on a very modern tool called the internet isn’t lost on me!

No, my purpose in this post is to help promote a little more tolerance among us Christians when a church comes along and says, “We’re going to try something different.” Since what we consider to be the “traditional” way of “doing church” is as different from the churches of the New Testament as apples are from oranges, who are we to say, “Oh, that’s wrong; they can’t do that”? C’mon, we’re so off the New Testament blueprint now that Peter and Paul would hardly recognize us. So surely we can use a lot less of the attitude, “Our way is the only way.”

Actually, the more I study the church, the more I realize that it is a living, breathing thing, and as such is constantly growing and evolving. The Lord doesn’t want congregations who are trapped back in the year 100, 1600, 1900, or even 2000. He wants us out there on the cutting edge of society, relating to people where they are, and keeping up with the times. Think about it, isn’t that exactly how Jesus ministered to the people of His day? So even though there is certainly a basic, Bible-based template for what constitutes a local church and how that church should function and be led, there is a lot of God-allowed (even God-ordained) play in the particulars of how a given church goes about its mission. And just because a congregation operates differently from your preferences, don’t automatically assume that it is in the wrong.

At one point, however, the market began to be atypically flooded with large quantities of pearls. As a matter of fact, there were so many pearls available that merchants began to seriously question their authenticity. Were these new pearls merely well done imitations produced by man? The answer was, no. Upon examination the pearls were found to have actually been made by oysters.

Finally, after further investigation, the mystery was solved. As it turned out, the Japanese merchants had figured out a way to cause almost every pearl oyster to produce a pearl. The merchants knew that a pearl is formed when some kind of foreign substance (a parasite, a grain of sand, etc.) gets lodged in a certain part of the oyster. To ease the irritation caused by the substance, the oyster begins to secrete a protective fluid called nacre that covers over the substance. This process continues and the nacre eventually hardens into a glorious pearl. This takes a few years. So what the merchants were doing was harvesting oysters, purposely inserting artificial substances in them (substances such as beads or tiny bits of shell or buckshot), placing the oysters back into the ocean by means of nets, and then harvesting them again a few years later to retrieve the pearls. The larger the artificial substance, the larger the pearl.

When the market became glutted with pearls, wealthy buyers began to demand that each pearl be put to a special test to see whether or not it had been artificially created. This test involved the use of X-ray. Under X-ray, the false “hearts” created by the artificial substances could be seen. In this way, the genuine pearls could be identified and priced accordingly.

This illustration reminds me that, sadly, our churches are home to some “fake” Christians. On the outside, these people look saved. They carry Bibles, know the lingo, pray, sing the hymns, put money in the offering plates, etc. But on the inside their hearts are false. They don’t truly know Christ as Savior. They aren’t born again (John 3:3). God the Holy Spirit does not dwell inside them (Romans 8:9). They aren’t in the family of God (John 1:9-13).

I have no delusions that we will ever get it all sorted out this side of eternity. For one thing, lost people don’t always act lost. For another, saved people don’t always act saved. We can rest assured, though, that Jesus knows how to X-ray each person’s heart and there simply is no fooling Him. I can honestly say that being placed under His X-ray doesn’t frighten me one bit. Does it you? If it does, you need to ask yourself why that is.

Just this week we’ve uploaded six new sermons to the ever-growing list. They are:

1. “Eli: A Man Who Failed As A Father”
2. “God’s Temporary Rejection of Israel”
3. “Making Room For Jesus”
4. “Praying In Jesus’ Name”
5. “Praying In the Holy Spirit”
6. “The Overcomer”

Now, I realize that many of you are like me in that you find it hard to find time to listen to a sermon. I understand that. But I just want you to know that the site is there to provide you with spiritual help and Biblical truth whenever you need it.

On the subject of Biblical truth, let me especially recommend that you click on the resource “A Guide for God’s Plan of Salvation.” Trust me, there’s a little more than John 3:16 there. I spent untold hours writing that guide and it is choked full of Bible verses and doctrinal facts. I start with the statement “There Is A God” and launch off from there. Really, if you used your daily devotion time to simply cover one section per day and read the verses for that section, it would be time well spent.

Another rich resource is the one entitled “What We Believe.” Again, if you used your devotion time to just cover one section per day and read the verses, you’d be blessed. The “Prophetic Events” section alone has ten different parts to it. And when you break them down into bite-size devotions, they make for great studies.

Well, I’ll hush now because I don’t want to “oversell” the product. All kidding aside, though, it’s a good website. Other sites might be snazzier and feature more graphics and such, but they’d be hard pressed to offer any more help in teaching the Bible. We’re just meat and potatoes. But what else would you expect from me? You’ve read my blog, right?

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.

In the realm of the church there has long been a tendency to marvel at those who have been forgiven and restored of sins that we deem uncommonly serious, even scandalous. These are the “exciting” and “interesting” Christians. All the while there has been a parallel tendency to yawn at those Christians whose lives have been marked by decade after decade of consistent holy living. It’s a shame, really, that we so take for granted these who are every bit as much “trophies” of God’s grace as those who have sinned spectacularly and been redeemed.

So I guess you can take this post as a call for you to show some highly consistent Christian just how much you appreciate them. Walk up to the person and tell them by way of a conversation. Send them a card or an email. You could even write them a letter. You can’t realize how much such a thing would mean to that person. We are so thankful for the likes of Moses, David, and Saul, murderers who found forgiveness and were mighty servants of God. But let’s also remember to be thankful for the likes of Joseph, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, and John, men who served God just as mightily without the unnecessary baggage of such sin.

-If you are doing it because no one else will, it’s a job. If you are doing it to serve the Lord, it’s a ministry.

-If you are doing it just well enough to get by, it’s a job. If you are doing it to the best of your ability, it’s a ministry.

-If you’ll do it as long as it doesn’t interfere with other activities, it’s a job. If you’re committed to staying with it, even if it means letting go of other things, it’s a ministry.

-If you quit because no one praised you or thanked you, it’s a job. If you do it because you know it needs to be done, it’s a ministry.

-It’s hard to get excited about a job. It is almost impossible not to get excited about a ministry.

-People may say “well done” when you do your job. The Lord will say “well done” when you complete your ministry.

-The average church is filled with people doing jobs. A great church is filled with people involved in ministry.

McConnell ended his article by saying:

If you have a job in the church, give it up and find a ministry! God doesn’t want us feeling stuck with a job, but excited, fulfilled and faithful in a specific ministry.

About all I can say to that is, “Amen!”

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.