So i’ve been writing some challenging [hopefully] pieces on church of late and it’s time for your input.
A lot of people have got this vibe of, ‘You HAVE to belong to a local church!’ otherwise… well i’m not really sure what the otherwise is, but the being part of a local church seems to be a pretty insisted upon thing.
And what i am trying to figure out – and i really hope you can help me – is this: Just what do you mean by ‘local church’?
i am hoping a number of you who feel so passionate about this thing [and i think it’s great that you do] will jump in here and tell me your opinion – not a cut-and-paste off the internet or your pastor’s idea or a link to a podcast of a preach you once liked the title of. From you, your perspective and your opinion…
When you say, ‘It is important that you are a part of a local church’ what exactly and specifically do you mean? [List a bunch of things in terms of the essential elements not so much the this-would-be-nices]
For example:
Are you talking about something that happens on a Sunday and has to?
Does there have to be building?
Does it mean a full-time and other staff?
Must there be singing there?
What else? Please be as specific and exhaustive as you are able.
i am really hoping to get a number of responses from a range of people to be able to get an idea of what YOU understand when you say the words ‘local church’ to me.
And go… [Thank-you for your time!]
Some of the posts which led up to this one if you didn’t see them:
[My take on the question, ‘Did you go to church today?’]
[Excellent passage by M Scott Peck on Why Your Church Map might be misleading]
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Are you talking about something that happens on a Sunday and has to? NO IT DOES NOT HAVE TO HAPPEN ON A SUNDAY … I OFTEN Go TO CHURCH AT MY FRIENDS HOUSE ON A TUESDAY OR THURSDAY
Does there have to be building?NO AGAIN … TODAYS CHURCH WAS ON TOP OF TABLE MOUNTAIN
Does it mean a full-time and other staff? NO JUST GOOD CHRISTIANS GATHERED TOGETHER
Must there be singing there? T’WOUD BE NICE
What else? Please be as specific and exhaustive as you are able. SOME NUMMY SNACKS AND DEF SOME TEA
The caps feel a little unnecessary, but thanks for the response.
I reckon church is any gathering where believers devote themselves to fellowship and study.
The way I see it, Christ only has one Church and so the local church simply refers to the followers of Christ in any given city (eg the church in Corinth, Ephesus, Benoni or Stellenbosch. It has nothing to do with the guys on that corner who follow Calvin or the guys on the other side of the road who adhere to Luther’s teachings. Paul had some words against this in 1 Corinthians 1:10-17.
But the body of Christ is all about community and so one who follows Christ should naturally be involved relationally with other members of the body in their local area. For iron sharpening, encouraging, rebuking, praying, teaching etc etc. That hopefully extends beyond Sunday services and may not necessarily even include those kinds of meetings.
Woooah this is a complex one. Here are some of my thoughts.
I consider serving and loving the ‘Global Church’ AKA His Bride to be crucial for any Christian. If you can’t love and sacrifice for your brothers in Christ, how can you even begin to love and sacrifice for the world out there? If you’re not a part of Christian community somehow, you’re standing against the unity that Christ prayed for.
That being said, Christian community is not equatable to local church, but its a good start. The easiest way for most people to unite with other Christians and serve is through a local church. It allows us to establish relations, team up on projects, and schedule gatherings that give us valuable input.
Ideally,a local church serves to bring together the Christian community without becoming an artifact on its own (by having the MEETINGS take higher priority than the PEOPLE). We have to face it though, we have a tendency to drift apart without some form of established gathering at a venue, because we don’t naturally incorporate each other into our lives as much as we should as Brothers and Sisters in Christ.
So yeah, I think local churches are a big deal… and if you don’t consider them important enough to be part of one, maybe you have an issue at the ‘meeting’ oriented nature of them, but that doesn’t stop you from being part of one for the people.
To answer some of the questions then:
A church doesn’t have to have Sunday meetings. It helps because most people can make it.
There doesn’t have to be a dedicated building, but there should be one more places where believers can meet and you can know where to find it or direct people to.
A church should have a leader to qualify as a church, and a leadership team if it’s big enough to warrant. Authority and leadership among believers are Biblical Institutions (this could be a whole separate discussion)
A church meeting doesn’t need to have singing. I feel, however, that any believer should try to have group worship somewhere in his life and the local church is a convenient place to have it.
Wo Jan, best answer yet, i really dig what you have to say here and especially this line:
That being said, Christian community is not equatable to local church, but its a good start
Thanks for thought and time and attention. I totally believe that it is a good and maybe the best start but also not necessarily the best thing for everyone [although gathering is and breaking bread and accountability and so on – just think for some people it is healthier for them to find those things in other places]
Love it
b fish
Hi Bret
Just an example of my experience of local church the past two months. Just before my husband was diagnosed with leukemia (quite a hectic one with poor prognosis from a medical point of view) we were part of a local church for about a year. We were involved in small groups and other structures of the church, but we felt community were missing and were busy with looking for other groups to connect with. So as the situation turned out, i have attended another local church 2 times without him (he worked shifts) and a home group 3 times (he joined once). Then we got the diagnosis – now we are both under 30, married under 2 years, so this was quite an unexpected thing to happen…
local church is not about the sunday meetings, or permanent staff or the size of the congregation, but about Christ’s body who supports each other. The worhsip for me is a must, cause it is such an awesome way to connect with God…but worship does not only mean a band….Amazingly God healed my husband within 10 weeks, and sunday we attended both local churches, one in the morning and one in the evening…the difference was at the one church everyone knew him when he walked in with me, and it was a joyous celebration. at the other he was introduced as the person being prayed for…the church where everyone knew him was the church where he never even attended as yet…THAT is church to me…
further more church is far more than just local, it is actually globally! what a privilege it had been to find encouragement, and scripture, and confirmations from across the world in this situation…all my doubts of whether or not the church is functioning as it should was a bit shaken by this. previously i was sceptical, and kind of negative…but wow, maybe the problem was with my own perspective, and ideas…you must just be willing to be vulnerable, far more than what i ever imagined…
sorry if it was a bit off the topic, but just my experience at the moment
Hey Brett!
I think God gives us a lot of freedom, and grace, and he meets us where we are at. I think it’s about our heart being open to Him, as that’s what he sees and cares about, much more than external appearances or ways of doing things. The Pharisees were convinced they were serving God the best because they were doing things to the letter of the law, but Jesus had the harshest words for them. I think that’s because their way prevented people from coming to God, so I take from that that whatever we’re doing, we need to make sure we’re not doing that. I don’t see Jesus getting mad that people weren’t meeting in a certain way on a certain day, doing certain things.
You don’t have to be part of a local church to be a Christian. That’s Jesus PLUS something else.
Having said that, there are definitely some advantages to being part of a local church, and I enjoy it, I feel God working in me and I get to see him working in others, and so why not?
I can share a story from this past weekend to highlight what I mean by a “local church”. We went to breakfast at a restaurant on Sunday before church, just me, the hubby and bub. We sat next to a guy who, toward the end of our meal, turned to us and said that he had noticed we prayed before we ate. Would we be able to recommend a local church to attend as he was in town for the day? We didn’t know of any churches nearby, so after chatting for a while, we felt comfortable to invite him to our service in a nearby city, and he hopped in our car and came along. He later told us that he had prayed that he would find a church where he could worship.
It was really encouraging for me to know that God had answered this man’s prayer by us happening to sit next to him in the restaurant, and that he would happen to overhear us praying. I think being part of a local church definitely helped us be able to direct him to something that he was familiar with, and knew what to expect. The man was able to sing and worship God with a group of believers, and to be encouraged meeting other believers in the city he was visiting. While it doesn’t have to have happened in that way — in a building, with singing, at a certain time on a certain day — the fact is that people are familiar with places of worship in our culture, and they expect there to be a meeting time and place. This makes it easier to reach out to people who are searching. He commented afterward that he was amazed at how multi-cultural our gathering was. That’s another thing I like about being part of a local church — it can be a beautiful reflection of the community that surrounds it — and presumably this is easier to accomplish having a building with doors open and service times advertised, where people can just walk in off the street.
Miss you guys!
Lots of love, T xxx
Hey T. That’s great. Thanks for sharing and what a great story of being able to reach out and invite a random (to you at least) to connect with your community. I like the idea of it not being the only way but being what you say is the best way. I certainly don’t believe you can be Christ-following without church, but just have a browser idea of what that church may or may not look like. But yeah some great points. Thanks for taking the time.
Hey brett. If you ask my kids can you go to church they say no you can’t. I ask why? They say because church is a group of people who spend time together and want to be like jesus.
Local? I guess people you can interract on a daily basis with.
Thankx Malc. Looks like your kids are keepers! Wisdom of a child.