“Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give.” Matthew 10:8
“Rescue the perishing.” It is a phrase we seldom hear any more in most of our me-centric, self-centred, often feelings-based fellowship meetings. We can easily equate how well a service went, how well the preacher spoke, how good the praise and worship time went” by how good those things made us, personally, feel. People often come out with comments like, “I did not enjoy …… in church today.” A wonderful response to that, which few of us would ever dare to say, would be, “Well, that is too bad, but then again, we do not gather together to worship you!”
Our primary reason to gather together should be to worship our Saviour, Yeshua, and Yehovah, our Heavenly Father. Secondly, we gather to fellowship one with another, with fellow sojourners on this walk of faith – and to be taught, equipped and trained to live our lives in a way that honours Him as well as to be witnesses of His grace, mercy, forgiveness and ever-open-arms to those who have not yet experienced the depth of His love towards them. The building or home wherever we meet is, in many ways incidental – but it should be a place into which we can invite and welcome those who have not yet met or experienced Yehovah personally, where they can be introduced to a living and loving saviour. Our meetings together should be a lifeboat for desperate, drowning people, not a yacht for the well-healed, not a place for those who consider themselves already members of “the club” or a select and elite, social, spiritual circle. His church is meant to be a hospital for the hurting, not a country club for the mighty. May that challenge our hearts as we gather together during Shabbat.