By Pastor Bob DeKlavon
It is one of those verses of scripture that gets wrested away from its full meaning at a time like this.
It is Hebrews 10:25 and Christians have used this verse as guilt inducing for many years.
Here is what it says:
“Not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more, as you see the day drawing near.”
For many people in my spiritual age and background:
—if the church doors were opened—we were expected to be there.
Sadly, one of the markers of spirituality was whether or not someone attended ALL services.
Now—let me be clear—someone who does NOT attend church probably IS lacking in spiritual maturity.
But just because someone comes to every meeting available—does not guarantee a spiritual giant.
In fact, I have known people who have neglected their families in order to be MOST active in church.
Years ago, a minister said to the Lord—“You take care of my lambs and I will take care of yours.”
Meaning—he would neglect his family for the sake of church activities.
Guess how his children turned out?
Assembling together IS important but it must be done with consideration for other verses of scripture.
And…it needs to be seen with a fuller understanding of this verse of scripture.
What I want to point out is what this verse says beyond the fact of getting together.
Notice the phrase midway through the verse that oftentimes gets forgotten:
“but encouraging one another…and all the more…as you see the day drawing near.”
Our English word ‘encourage’ literally means: ‘to put courage in.’
So, the writer of Hebrews says: when you come together—"put courage into one another.”
Further, he notes—do this even more as you see times getting tougher.
So, when you put the thoughts together—we MUST have times when we are together.
But getting together is NOT the only reason to assemble.
If we are growing in our faith—our attitude in gathering should be one of “coming to give.”
In other words, I want to get together with other Christians so I can give courage to them.
And, with the technology available to us now—we can ‘assemble’ with others even when not with them.
For years, I made it a habit to pray the following prayer whenever I was meeting with other Christians:
“Lord, help me to encourage one person tonight {or today} so they will be stronger in their faith.”
Then, when I walked into the room where we were meeting, I came with an attitude of giving.
I was not coming just to ‘show up.’
I was coming to let “Jesus show up” through me as I looked to encourage others.
I have said this many times over the last weeks but, right now, it is hard to physically assemble.
However, it is ‘easy’ to encourage others and, especially, because many need comfort right now.
Each day, would you pray the prayer I offered above?
Would you let the Lord guide you as you seek to encourage others-even if we can’t assemble right now?