“I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord!’” –

Psalm 122:1 (ESV)

Bree hit the snooze alarm and felt a twinge of guilt. The usual litany of excuses scrolled through her mind. It had been a long and exhausting week. It seemed like she was running somewhere every day, didn’t she deserve a day to sleep in?

When the alarm sounded again, she just turned it off. She vacillated between her feelings of guilt and her desire to roll over and go back to sleep. 

She had already been to church twice this month, and she usually made it there half the time, she reasoned. Sleep won out, and she admitted to herself that her own attitude did not always match up with scripture about being glad to go to the house of the Lord.

We’ve all been there. There are seasons of our life when we faithfully attend, and seasons when we don’t go at all. Most people fall somewhere in between.

We are blessed to live under grace – church is not a legalistic requirement, and God is not tallying some kind of attendance list to judge us with. Church attendance falls under our liberty as believers, but there are solid reasons we should want to go.

It is at church that we hear of God’s beautiful creation and how He daily takes care of us.  It is at church that we hear how much He has loved us by sending His only son Jesus to die for us.  It is at church that we hear of how He adopted us into His family through the power of the Holy Spirit.

We must each confess that we don’t always have that gladness which David expressed.  We don’t always make time in our busy lives to be nourished by God’s Word. We must also confess that we get easily distracted.  We need the forgiveness that God so graciously gives!

We thank God that He always welcomes us back! He keeps His Spirit alive in each of us and leads us back to His word and worship. We thank God for faithful leaders and teachers who keep this family – the Body of Christ – together. 

In Hebrews 10:25, we read that we should not neglect the fellowship of believers. God wants us meeting together! 

In Hebrews 3:13, we are told to exhort and encourage one another so that we are not prey to sin’s deceitfulness. What a powerful picture this provides of the purpose of the Body of Christ.

Exodus 20:8 tells us to “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.” While we are not bound by the legalistic constraints that this once implied, we honor God by setting aside a day for worship and fellowship. We invite blessings into our lives by availing ourselves of this opportunity to hear God’s Word preached and bring Him our worship and praise.