Each Sunday, churches all over the United States have a few basic things in common…
They have a church service that involves the three M’s (Music, Message, Money)—then everyone goes home—confident they’ve done all God asks of them for another week.
But have they?
Sure, the Bible says in Hebrews that we are not to forsake that special, corporate time together for worship, but is this all we are not to forsake? Recently I searched scripture for what else we are called to do as a church and the following are just a few of the things I discovered.
- The church is a community Those who believed what Peter said were baptized and added to the church that day—about 3,000 in all. The Believers Form a Community 42 All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper[a]), and to prayer.
- The church is a fellowship (same scripture)
- The church is to gather to learn from the teaching of the leaders (see above)
- The church is to share with one another and help out others in need. You can’t do that as a ‘Lone Ranger.’
- Members of the church should encourage and strengthen one another (And he went through Syria and Cilicia, strengthening the churches. Acts 15:41,).
- Pray for one another. Acts 12:5, So Peter was kept in prison, but the church was earnestly praying to God for him.
You’ll just have to take my word for it that this list could go on and on and on.
So how is it that the church today seems to have boiled Christianity down to one hour a week, primarily on Sunday morning?
What about the other 167 hours a week?!
That’s been troubling me for quite some time actually.
Well, today we ended our United series at Southbrook in a unique kinda way. Instead of ‘doing church,’ we decided to go out and ‘be the church.’
That’s right, we sent people out over 7 different locations all over the Charlotte and Monroe areas! After gathering at our campuses for a brief time of praise and worship, we showed people to 7 different tables with 7 unique opportunities to serve and then sent them out.
Within 15 minutes the building was pretty much empty.
But it never felt so full!
And we served.
- painting
- feeding
- clothing
- repair work
- planting
and anything else that was asked of us.
I hope this lesson sticks but even if it doesn’t—we’ll be doing this again!
Want to join us?