An often-heard question from the lips of children is, “Do I have to go to church?” The proto-typical parental response is, “No, you get the privilege of going to church.” What about your view of church attendance, do you get to go to church or do you have to go to church? Is church attendance a privilege or just an obligatory duty?
The ultra-conservative congregation where I first became a Christian gave me some of my own initial impressions of church attendance. Sunday morning attendance was obvious, and Wednesday night and Sunday night attendance were expected. A verse I frequently heard was Hebrews 10:25, “Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.” In addition, an unwritten rule for being a deacon or an elder was faithful attendance. If a brother’s name were not considered for the deaconship or eldership, a common reason stated would be, “He is a good man, but he does not come on Wednesday night.” Even if this brother’s work schedule prohibited Wednesday night attendance, the implication was that he should be striving to change his schedule or perhaps there was some kind of hidden unfaithfulness. In other words, if he is a good man, then why has God not blessed him with the time off to attend?
What does church attendance mean? Is attendance really a proper biblical gauge or measure of faithfulness or faithlessness? What exactly do we mean by church attendance? Does church attendance mean any and every activity of the church, or are we talking primarily about Sunday morning worship? My conservative upbringing taught me that if the elders designate times to meet, such as Wednesday night and Sunday night, then the members ought to honor the authority of the elders by attending those set times. If you “forsook” (a favorite word of my conservative congregation) meeting with the saints, then you are disrespecting the elders and working against their spiritual obligation to tend to your soul. Now, who would want to be guilty of working against the soul-care of the elders?
We ought to honor the times set by the elders for the care, development, and growth of our spirituality and faith. However, such honor given to elders assumes the elders have taken the time to know what the schedules, obligations, obstacles, and challenges each member faces. Elders cannot simply throw out times to meet, or blindly depend on traditional meeting times to meet the needs of an ever-growing and ever-changing congregation. For instance, in today’s culture, businesses operate 24/7, and young people especially are prone to have to work nights and weekends. For many today, even Sunday morning worship is becoming a luxury to attend. Elders today have an awesome responsibility to schedule congregational times of faith development and soul-care amidst a sea of changing times, work schedules, and other obligations. I am uncertain that any congregation in our present culture and society could schedule meeting times to accommodate all members at all times.
Nevertheless, elders must try and they must be creative in the times and opportunities they structurally offer members of the congregation. A hint of one creative response comes from church history. Pliny the Younger (61-112 AD) was a Roman magistrate who wrote a letter to the Emperor Trajan on how to judicially deal with the growing number of Christians under his jurisdiction. After torturing two Christian slave girls for information on what Christians were doing, Pliny reported this interesting little nugget to Trajan: “They had been accustomed on a fixed day to meet before dawn and sing antiphonally a hymn to Christ as a god.” Why were these Christians meeting before dawn? The answer is that these slave girls, like the majority of slaves that were Christians, could not meet any other time due to the nature of their work. For Christians in the first century, church attendance at least meant you loved and cared for one another to the point that the Body of Christ was willing to rise before dawn in order to be together. How many elders and congregations today would be willing to rise before dawn to meet the needs of its members? Just what does church attendance mean to you, dear brother and sister? In the following weekly bulletin articles, we will explore this question more in-depth. Until the next time, I pray you do not “give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing.”
--Terry
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