“Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God” 2 Peter 3:11-12
As churches all around the country begin to come back together to worship, it has this sense of a fresh beginning. Like spring after a hard winter. Each week we get closer and closer to normal, but what exactly is normal? Have you ever wondered how the apostles would react if they were able to visit our churches? Or if they were able to live with us for a couple of weeks?
Granted, we definitely live in a more technologically advanced society but would our gatherings and personal lives look familiar to them? A group of blood bought children of the Most High God, overflowing with love, following in their savior’s footsteps, pursuing holiness and eagerly awaiting His triumphant return. Though society and culture change throughout the centuries, this brotherhood of Christ followers should still be knit together with the same common threads of love, devotion and holiness. It should still look and feel familiar to the saints of the past.
Called to be different
Since the beginning of time the worshipers of the one true God have always stood out among their fellow man. We see it in the Old Testament with the nation of Israel and it continues into the New Testament with the followers of Christ. We see throughout scripture the great call to not be conformed to this world.
“But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light, once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people.” (1 Pet. 2:9-10)
“But as he who has called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct.” (1 Pet. 1:15)
The word holy means to be set apart and consecrated, the Greek word used for the church throughout the New Testament is defined as the called out ones. The entirety of scripture is God’s desire and design for us to be different from the world around us, set apart for His glory and His purpose. But just as anything, this mandate from God has the potential to be changed and deformed over time.
Instead of being a holy and chosen race, the church could easily trade that in to be conformed and become just like everyone else. A holy people with conviction in their hearts to serve and proclaim King Jesus, could just become a social group whose purpose is to make everyone comfortable and feel good. The same can be true in the homes, schools and occupations of the called out ones, we can so easily exchange serving God with every part of our lives, totally sold out, to only for a couple of hours on Sunday. The church can become ashamed of the Gospel of Christ which saved our souls, just so we don’t look weird to those around us.
Don’t settle
These changes happen slowly and subtly, but thankfully we have been given this great gift of having time to evaluate and take inventory of our lives and churches. So let us not come out of this time eager to get back to the normal way of things, but let’s press onward to something greater. Let us not settle for what we have had, but crave and pursue to give more and more of all that we are and have to the King of Kings. Consider the reaction if one of the apostles came to live with you for a while. Would our lives and gatherings be familiar at all to the saints of old? Maybe a better and more serious question is, what does God think of our lives and gatherings?