YOUR PLACE IN THE CHURCH

“I love to tread the hallowed courts.

Where two or three for worship meet.

For thither Christ Himself resorts,

And makes the little band complete.”

-Henry F. Lyte

         We have already seen from the Scriptures that when you were born again the Lord added you to His church. You became a member of that one body of which Christ is the head (1 Cor. 12:12-13). But the visible church is upon the earth composed of the saved in each community. Altogether these groups of Christians are called the “Churches of Christ” (Rom. 16:16b) If you had been living in Corinth in the New Testament times when you became a Christian, you would automatically have become a member of the “church of God which is at Corinth.” (1 Cor. 1:2a) It would not have been necessary for you to “join” the church. The fact that you became a Christian added you to it. So, it should be today.  When Christ as the head of the church receives a soul, then those in any community, as members of His body, must receive him also (Rom. 15:7). Thus, if there was a simple New Testament church in your community when you became a Christian, you came into that church. (If you became a Christiaan elsewhere then you should make known your desire to become a member of the church in your locality.)

         Though you are only a babe in Christ, yet you are a member of the body on an equal standing with others. You are a part of the family. Just as in a home the older brothers and sisters care for the younger and accept responsibility for their oversight, so has God ordained that each church should have elders to maintain an oversight of the flock. We who are younger are to be subject to them in the Lord (1Pet. 5:5).

         However young in the Lord you may be, there is a place for you in His church—a work which He wants you to do (Mark 13:34). Every young man should be able to take some part in the public worship. When a family gathers around its table there is a feeling of unity and freedom for all to express themselves. So, when we Christians gather around the Lord’s table, there should be that atmosphere of freedom which will enable us to express that which is in our hearts, whether in public exhortation, in song, or in prayer.

         Although it is not according to the Lord’s will that the women take a public part in the worship (1 Cor. 14:34-35), yet their sphere of work is just as important as that of men. Their work is to be primarily in the home. And in a private capacity (Acts 18:1-3, 26; Tit. 2:3-5), but they also play a definite part in the propagation of the Gospel (Phil. 4:2-3). Women can be just as effective soul winners as men, even though they may work in a different sphere.

         Now that you are a Christian, the Lord desires that you faithful attend the meetings of the saints (Acts 2:42; 20:7). “And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and good works; not forsaking our own assembling together, as the custom of some is, but exhorting one another; and so much the more, as ye see the day drawing nigh.” (Heb. 10:25). We need the blessing that comes from our worship and fellowship together.