Why Christians Need Churches

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You know the guy—the one who says he’s a Christian but never, ever attends church.

Maybe he says he loves Jesus but can’t stand the church because of the hypocrites. Or perhaps he’s the ‘just me and my Bible’ type who decided he’s better off without the church’s interpretations. Or he tells you he experiences God the best when he’s out in the forest, on the golf course, or hitting his favorite fishing hole.

Or maybe he’s just been attending Bedside Baptist with Pastor Pillow lately.

Whatever reasons are given for not going to church, it leaves us with the uncomfortable question: can someone be a Christian while deliberately staying away from Christ’s church?

Maybe the question is not fair.

After all, it is somewhat ironic that one of the most outwardly explicit attributes we associate with Christianity—going to Church each Sunday—isn’t actually explicitly mandated in Scripture. Nowhere does it read “and thou shalt attendeth services each Lord’s Day morning; being sure to returneth in the evening.” I sort-of wish it did!

Sure, the preacher in Hebrews warns us against “giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encourage one another … .” Yet notice he doesn’t mention anything about meeting together at a specific time or place or require us to sit in a hard wooden pew while doing so. Certainly we could find a more comfortable or entertaining place to do our encouraging!

So why are we so insistent that people put on their Sunday best and head to the Lord’s ‘house’?

The CRCNA is what’s called a confessional church. Simply put, we don’t just tell people we believe in the Bible, we confess what we believe the Bible says about Christianity’s most important doctrines. To do so we use documents that summarize all that Scripture teaches about these particular topics. So they’re quite helpful in quickly answering questions like this.

The 29th article of the Belgic Confession summarizes what the Bible teaches a Christian ought to look like. They are people who “flee sin and pursue righteousness. … They love the true God and their neighbors without turning to the right or left, and they crucify the flesh and its works.” They “fight against the great weakness that remains in them by the Spirit all the days of their lives, appealing constantly to the blood, suffering, death, and obedience of the Lord Jesus.”

Yet it doesn’t say a thing about how often they show up at church.

But those beautiful words about how to “recognize the distinguishing marks of Christians” aren’t just floating out in the ether by themselves. They follow a list of three marks that distinguish true churches from those who just “claim for themselves the name of ‘the church.’”

Such “true churches,” our Confession summarizes, “engage in the pure preaching of the gospel; make use of the pure administration of the sacraments as Christ instituted them; and practice church discipline for correcting faults”—activities (or, as they’re more often referred to, means) that can only be practiced in regularly gathered communities.

Scripture’s logic, then, is that true Christians are produced by true churches. And true churches can’t produce true Christians out of people who don’t ordinarily avail themselves of the ordinary means God has given for doing so.

The thief on the cross would be quick to remind us that one can find salvation by grace alone through faith in Christ alone without ever darkening the door of a church. And, praise God, he’d be absolutely right!

But the Bible calls us to more than mere salvation “as one escaping through the flames” (1 Cor. 3:15). It calls us to live life in such a way that “whatever we do, we do for the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31). Those who seek to live such a truly Christian life will quickly realize the hopelessness of doing so apart from regular doses of the ordinary means of grace the Bible prescribes to keep us on the narrow road that follows Jesus—doses that God has best equipped his church to provide (Acts 2:42).

So although the Bible doesn’t explicitly command church attendance, it also makes clear that you can’t truly understand what Christ has done for you, nor fully show God your gratitude for his salvation, without parking yourself in a pew every seven days and being immersed in these ordinary means of grace.

That’s why true Christians will ordinarily attend a true church each Lord’s Day. And no, Pastor Pillow will not be preaching there.