MEMBERSHIP: Lessons from cancelling church…

Lessons from cancelling church…
Posted on December 22, 2013  in Blog, Membership
If you’re reading this, I missed worshipping with you today.  And I hope you missed worshipping with us.  After sort of moping around the house a little bit (without knowing why at first) I took some time to try and figure out the reason.  Here are a few random things I didn’t expect to learn this morning after church was cancelled due to the ice-storm:
1. We can’t take corporate worship for granted.
I really missed gathering with God’s people to sing, to join our voices together in praise to our Lord.  Yes we can do that on our own, yes we can do that with our families (ours was a little chaotic with little ones), but nothing can replace meeting with our local churches to make joyful noise!  One day the invisible church will join together in one place, at one time to do this.  It’s what we’re heading towards.  See Revelation 5:11-14.
2. We can’t take fellowship for granted.
We were supposed to share a meal together after the service this morning, to interact, to sit across the table from someone we maybe don’t know that well in order to get to know them better.  I missed being part of a bigger family today, united in Christ through faith in His name.  This will be re-scheduled in a couple of weeks.  I’m glad.
3. We can’t take the proclamation of God’s Word for granted.
I was all geared up to preach when I went to bed last night, especially after a week’s worth of praying, reading, digging, studying, writing, thinking.  The preparation was still beneficial, but I missed the delivery part.  Now, not all of us are preachers and teachers, but we’re all called to go, we’re all ambassadors, we’ve all been given grace to make known to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ (Ephesians 3:8).  Imagine you never had one more opportunity to communicate to someone in some way the love of God in the gospel?  Pondering that question might move us to re-think taking the opportunities we do have.
4. We can’t take ministry to shut-ins for granted.
After spending a lifetime worshipping weekly with God’s people, now they can’t.  I realized I don’t think about them enough, pray for them enough, or touch base with them enough so that they know we love them and consider them a part of our family.  As Canada gets older it’s going to be really important that we do this well as a church.
That’s what comes to mind.  Maybe you can add to the list…
See you on Christmas Eve, or next Sunday.  I’m really looking forward to it.
 
Photo credit: Vichaya Kiatying-Angsulee, freedigitalphotos.net

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