Redeeming This Time

Guest Post By David Van Bebber

The Church at large is certainly in what can only be called uncharted territory. With state and city governments putting in place stay-at-home mandates and limiting the gathering of groups to no more than 10, Christians have been forced to conduct worship services in their home.[1] While some see this as a problem,[2] and it is a problem for the bride of Christ not to gather corporately on the Lord ’s Day, Christians should be challenged to redeem this temporary situation for God’s glory (Ephesians 5:16).

While far from ideal, the current situation allows families to gather in front of the television on Sunday mornings and worship together. This is obviously a great opportunity for families to participate in family worship. I wholeheartedly affirm families worshiping via digital platforms for the time being on the Lord’s Day. I think that the current circumstances provide for a great opportunity to practice family worship, but I believe Christians should be thinking about how to further redeem this time to train themselves for hosting of community groups in their home.

To encourage you to redeem this time further, allow me to explain a few reasons why this time can translate into the advancement of community groups and discipleship for your church. Next, allow me to demonstrate a few ways you can prepare for conducting these groups and common objections regarding hosting a community group.

How this time can translate into the advancement of community groups

1. This should be a reminder of the importance of your home in the advancement of the Kingdom.

It does not take long in the study of church history to find that hosting worship gatherings in a person’s home was common practice in the early history of the church.[3] Places like Acts 2:46“And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts,” (emphasis added)[4] demonstrate that the church gathered in homes early on. This was a key piece for the early practice of discipleship.

Acts 5:42 & 20:7-10 establish that homes were a vital place for early Christian gatherings. While there were not physical church buildings until sometime in the 3^rd century, Christians gathered in the temple courts (Acts 2:46), in lecture halls (Acts 19:9), but mostly in homes.[5] As Everett Ferguson notes, “For the most part, the church was dependent on members or supporters (patrons) who owned larger houses, providing a place for meeting.”[6]

So while meeting in your home away from the normative and Biblical gathering of the body is far from ideal, this time does allow you to practice a method of worship that was vital to the early church.

2. This should not be your long term practice of worship.

The church should gather together corporately (Hebrews 10:25; 2 Timothy 2:22). Gathering with your family around the television set in your pajamas and with a cup of coffee in your hand is not gathering with the body of Christ. It should be awkward for us as believers to not be in the Lord’s house on the Lord’s Day. This awkwardness should remind us of how important it is to be with our church family. Each of us should be reminded of that each time we are forced to participate in some type of an online service. We should long for the time we are able to gather with our church family each time we have to worship through digital means, and we should repent for taking the cooperate gathering of the Church too lightly in the past. 

Don’t be discouraged. Gathering in your home should remind you how important the gathering of believers together outside of the church should be. Parents should be leading their family in worship. This might not be a regular practice for some, but our circumstances allow you the chance to lead a small Bible study and talk about Scripture in the comfort of your own home. In many ways, this is exactly what community groups do. You can redeem this time to practice a habit of studying the Bible in your front room and even with a cup of coffee. (I don’t think however it would be all that comfortable to be sitting in your pajamas as you invite friends from your church to gather with you and Bible study at your home.)

3. This should be missional.

Husbands are called to be the spiritual leaders of their homes (1 Corinthians 11:3). Parents are supposed to train up their children to follow the Lord (Proverbs 22:6). Gathering with your family in your home should not only help you train your children to be missions minded, it should cause you to look at your greater responsibility to use every resource you have for the advancement of the kingdom.

Conducting worship in your home during this time, when the church is forced to scatter, should be a reminder that you have a resource, your home, which you can use for the advancement of the kingdom. Too often we don’t think about our homes as being a place where we can advance the kingdom and share the gospel with others. There are times when some individuals are not quite comfortable with attending a worship service. Further, Sunday morning gatherings are actually the gathering of the bride of Christ. That is not say that Sunday morning worship gatherings are not a place for the lost, but evangelism should actually occur outside of the walls of the church building.

Gathering in your home for a Bible study is a great place to invite a lost friend. Community groups in many churches have missional focus. They serve to advance the gospel, and they are places where the lost can come to Christ. This time period should remind you of the valuable resource your home is as a place to conduct missions and evangelism.

Ways to prepare for conducting future community groups

I’m a pretty big fan of the idea the practice makes perfect. Because you have been forced to conduct worship services in your home, this allows you to work through some of the “kinks” that could occur if you were to host a community group. This likewise takes away a few of the excuses you might have for hosting a community group. Here are a few the practices that you get to improve on as you meet with your family during this time where you cannot meet with the gathered church.

1. Get comfortable singing.

Let’s face it, most of us only sing only in our cars when no one is listening (and quietly in church). It’s a little uncomfortable to sing in a small group. I have been singing in church my entire life, but a few months ago I gathered with a group of pastors and as we set under the stars around a fire and sang some hymns. At first it was a little awkward for me. Then I was reminded of who I am singing to. I’m not singing to impress anyone around me. I’m singing out of a joy that I have for the Lord.

Since community groups are essentially a time for believers, and maybe some of their unbelieving friends, to gather and worship, singing is one excuse a person could make for not conducting a community group. If you are conducting a worship service with your family and not including singing, then there is something lacking in your gathering. One real advantage to conducting family worship during this time is that you can be reminded of the importance of singing in corporate worship, and you can get out some of those jitters and insecurities you might have when gathering in a small group and singing songs of worship.

2. Get comfortable teaching.

I’ve been pretty fortunate. I have taken classes in teaching at the graduate level. Not everyone gets this advantage. In fact, a lot of times the only training a person gets when it comes to teaching the Bible is what is see in a Sunday school class or in other Bible studies. A serious reservation when it comes to hosting a community group is that an individual can rightly say they’ve never had to teach before and don’t know how to do it. 

If you are meeting with your family around the television screen for family worship during this time, you are getting a chance to teach. Hopefully, your pastor is providing you with some type of a discussion guide or outline of the message that he is preaching. If you are leading a discussion about the sermon with your family, you are teaching. You might not know all of the answers, but you are now forced to seek out those who do.

3. Get comfortable praying.

I am always amazed that individuals are so hesitant to pray out loud in corporate worship. Unfortunately, I have made the mistake of calling on a person to pray who refused to accept that invitation. Some people simply get nervous speaking out loud. This nervousness translates to a person’s confidence to pray audibly in a group of people. If you are conducting worship services in your home due to the nature of the nation’s response to COVID-19, then you are surely praying out loud with your family as you are gathered around your television screen.

Again, practice makes perfect. Because you’re in your home with your family and leading them in prayer on a weekly basis, you are now engaging in the practice of praying out loud in a small group. There is always the excuse “I don’t know how to pray,” but be reminded of Romans 8:26. Praying out loud with your family should give you a comfort and knowledge that you can pray in other group settings. Leading a community group will definitely force you to have to pray out loud, but now you’re getting practice at it.

4. Get comfortable with using media.

Not all community groups’ use media to revisit a sermon based content, but many community groups do use sites such as YouTube as a means of conducting song worship. It can make a person nervous to use media with a small group gathered in their home. There is a chance that it might not work, and there’s a chance they might have some technical inabilities to use media. Both of those situations can be embarrassing. 

Chances are, if you are gathering your family to watch an online sermon, then you have to work through some technical issues. You know what it’s like for things not to work. You are prepared now for the times when media does not work. Technical challenges and media not working right are serious reasons people don’t feel comfortable hosting a community group. Because of this time, where meeting with your family on a weekly basis to conduct worship is a temporary norm,  you are again practicing the exact skill set that you would have to use when conducting or hosting a community group.

5. Get comfortable discipling others.

A major emphasis at First Baptist Buffalo this year has been discipleship. We just finished up a sermon series on it. One of the key elements that we focused on was the idea that discipleship occurs both inside and outside of the church. Discipleship in many ways is simply “doing life together.” This is a key element of community groups.

In a small gathering individuals are more likely to open up and disclose information and needs they wouldn’t regularly share with others. The practice of conducting family worship in our current setting should remind you of the importance you should be placing on discipling your children. This again gets you in the habit and the practice of discipling others. Hopefully, it will give you a greater heart and a greater desire to invest in others spiritually. Your home is where this can and should start.

Conclusion

None of us know how long the current state stay-at-home orders and the implications of this virus are going to last. Eventually, the stay-at-home orders will be lifted. The spread of the virus will subside. But the need for the Church to be discipling others and engaging others with the gospel will never pass. During this time believers should make the most of this opportunity. We have a chance to practice discipling our family, worshiping in our home, praying over the needs of others, and singing songs of praise to our Lord and Redeemer. And so I’m encouraging each of you to redeem this time to train yourself to expand the kingdom by getting in the habit of gathering in your home for time of Bible study and worship.

On the other side of this pandemic the church will need a vibrant and vital effort. God has a purpose for this pandemic. My hope is that he will give believers a greater longing for the gathered church. A greater love and better practice for the scattered church using its resources to be mission minded.

Bibliography

[1] Kate Shellnutt, “When God Closes a Church Door, He Opens a Browser Window,” Christianity Today, March 19, 2020, accessed March 25, 2020,  https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2020/march/online-church-attendance-covid-19-streaming-video-app.html.

[2] Nathan Rose, “Six Reasons Why We Are Not Live Streaming Worship Services,” Liberty Baptist Church Blog, March 24, 2020, accessed March 25, 2020,  https://www.lbcliberty.org/blogfull/2020/3/24/six-reasons-why-we-are-not-live-streaming-worship-services?fbclid=IwAR1VzlnEOt5SIR4cbAXE_UpxV7tyjyeuKWXFLEtW9c0HqyJ_c1WwmQx62xM.

[3] John Polhill, The New American Commentary: An Exegetical and Theological Exposition of the Holy Scripture, v. 26. (Nashville, TN: B&H Publishing Group, 1992), p. 120.

[4] All Scripture taken from the English Standard Bible unless otherwise noted, (Crossway, Copyright © 2016).

[5] Everett Ferguson, “Why and when did Christians start constructing special buildings for worship?” Christianity Today, November 2008, accessed March 25, 2020, https://www.christianitytoday.com/history/2008/november/why-and-when-did-christians-start-constructing-special.html.

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