Church Is Meant to be a Grace-Trip not a Guilt-Trip
STEPHANIE RAQUEL
Listen to this devotion
“And
let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but
encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is
drawing near.” Hebrews 10:25 (NLT)
Utterly exhausted. And way too tired to clean up after dinner or get ready for bed.
That
defined my Saturday night as I conked out on the couch after getting
five kiddos to sleep. This was followed by a miserable combination of 2
a.m. insomnia, finally falling back asleep at 4 a.m., only to be
startled back awake by a small child, and then woken up again by my
out-of-town-husband’s alarm clock blaring at 6 a.m.
I dozed back asleep, only to wake up right in time to leave for church, with a serious case of the Sunday morning blues.
Ugh.
Although we live only five minutes away, every fiber of my being wanted to stay home, snuggled in my PJs.
Please God, don’t make me do this. Can’t I just skip it today?
I tried to convince myself it didn’t matter if we showed up or not.
Ultimately, I decided to go, even if we were late … and by some miracle, we arrived mere minutes before the sermon began.
And the topic? The Prodigal Son.
Oh,
isn’t that just like the enemy of this world to want me to forget how
much God loves me when I feel like running away? Surely the enemy wants
to leave me in a spiritually isolated place.
During the message,
the Holy Spirit reminded me to keep praying for the prodigals in my life
— several who used to be very close to the Lord — and also reminded me
that just a few days prior, I’d gone to a counseling appointment with a
dear friend, and we’d started talking again for the first time in more
than five years!
Wouldn’t the enemy of our souls want me to
forget that prodigals can still come home, that our God is still in the
business of bringing dead things back to life, and He still abounds in
grace?
No wonder the enemy worked overtime to keep me out of
church that weekend. Thankfully, I felt enveloped in reminders of God’s
grace instead.
Today’s key verse, Hebrews 10:25, is the antidote
for days when we’d simply rather skip church. It says, “And let us not
neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one
another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near.” To
me, this says, let’s keep connecting with one another and encouraging
each other — until Christ’s return.
Digging deeper into the
preceding verses, we see that through Jesus, God orchestrated a new
covenant for His people. Verse 18 explains, “And when sins have been
forgiven, there is no need to offer any more sacrifices.”
For the Hebrew people addressed in this book, this was major news.
No
more sacrifices? Christ’s death was enough, once and for all? This
reminder was all about God’s infinite grace! And I’m fairly certain the
world could benefit from us extending more grace to others!
Whether
it’s the crazy driver who cuts me off in traffic, the friend who’s let
me down, or even my own heart when I haven’t been the kindest toward the
people in my home, spiritually isolating ourselves leads to all kinds
of non-gracious activities. Why is that? Because we all benefit from
walking in grace.
We live in a world that tempts us to abandon corporate worship and walk away from our faith. Hello, January.
But
this passage shows us God never designed church or corporate worship to
be a guilt trip. Instead, church should be a grace trip — a reminder to
keep gathering and encouraging, and continuing to show His infinite
grace to everyone around us.
Because whatever excuses we have for not getting there, God has more than enough grace to go around.
Lord,
thank You for Your grace. And thank You that it’s designed for the
whole world. May we keep meeting together and encouraging one another
until You return or draw us home. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.