Church Meetings on Purpose
The Script for the Video Follows:
You drive to the high-school campus to watch the basketball team. But when you arrive, you can’t believe your eyes: that’s the basketball team out there running the bases on a baseball field. Not a hoop in sight.
Things get even more weird when you join a friend for a game of chess and discover that you’re playing on a Monopoly board. It’s obvious: any game requires the appropriate setting. Building the body of Christ is not a game. But that too takes a setting that fits the work.
To create any effective setting, you need to be clear on the aim of the activity. In basketball, players aim to sink more baskets than the other team. Setting: two hoops and a court. In chess, players aim to checkmate the other king. Setting: a board of 64 squares. What about the aim and setting for a church meeting? This calls for a bit more discussion.
The setting of a church meeting should vary to suit the aim. Meeting occasionally to hear a special out-of-town speaker will call for one kind of setting. In this discussion, we’ll call this a “special” meeting of the church. The week-after-week meeting of the church will take another kind of setting. We’ll call this the “regular” meeting of the church.
First, the aim. Church tradition tells us the aim of our regular meetings is to worship, getting everyone to honor and revere God. That aim prompts us to hire “worship pastors” and to call church buildings “houses of worship.” But that’s Old Covenant, Tabernacle and Temple, practice.
For the regular church meeting, the primary New Testament aim is to build one another up. As I Cor. 14:26 says, “When you come together . . . . Everything must be done so that the church may be built up.” God gifts and works in each of us so that we may all participate in building up and strengthening each other. This glorifies God.
What setting would best support this aim of a “regular” church meeting? Here’s a 260-seat theater-type setting. Total strangers occupy 79 seats. Familiar faces account for 59 places. Casual acquaintances sit in 53 chairs. You’ve had frequent contact with 44. And 12 are trusted friends. Today,13 seats are empty.
And here’s a 9-seat circular setting. Trusted friends sit in all 9 of these seats.
Which setting, then, is best for the regular meetings of the church? Which setting allows the members of Christ’s body to carry out the aim of building-others-up? Keep in mind Jesus’s new command: “Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.” These words launched dozens of one-another commands throughout the New Testament. Let’s think of six calls to one-anothering as we consider this best-setting question.
In Romans 15:14, Paul tells Christians, “ . . . you yourselves are competent to INSTRUCT one another.” Which is the best setting for one-anothering instruction? The theater or the circle?
The author of Hebrews urges us to “ENCOURAGE one another daily.” Mutual encouragement works best in which setting? The theater or the circle?
In Colossians 3:16, Paul tells us to “ADMONISH one another with all wisdom.” Which setting best allows us to warn and caution each other? The theater or the circle?
Paul again, over in Ephesians 5:19, reminds us to be “SPEAKING TO one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs.” This kind of reciprocal support takes place best in which setting? The theater or the circle?
Hebrews 10:24 calls for us to “MOTIVATE one another to acts of love and good works.” Such inspiring reminders take place best in which setting? The theater or the circle?
In 5:16, James urges us to “CONFESS your sins to one another and PRAY for each other.” Such confession and prayer work best in which setting? The theater or the circle?
So the one-anothering love Jesus calls for includes instructing, encouraging, admonishing, speaking to, motivating, confessing to, and praying for. All these involve speaking. Yet the traditional setting for church meetings follow an unspoken, theater-seating rule: Shhhhh. Keep quiet.
How can anyone instruct, encourage, admonish, speak to, motivate, confess to, and pray for when the setting means the “view from the pew” is row upon row of the backs of heads?
Just as playing basketball and chess require their proper settings, so it takes a favorable setting to build the body of Christ.
Ephesians 4:16 explains how Christ builds his body: “From him the whole body . . . grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.” For each part to do its work, all the parts must see each other, hear each other, and have freedom to speak up in the regular meetings.
Does the theater setting have a place among church meetings? Yes, it works best for occasional, speaker-focused, special meetings. But the smaller, circular setting works best for the regular, week-by-week meetings in which anyone may speak to build up the body of Christ.
