A blog by Adam W. Christman

Tag: online church

  • Spiritual Disciplines: Gathering for Worship

    “Some Christians try to go to heaven alone, in solitude. But believers are not compared to bears or lions or other animals that wander alone. Those who belong to Christ are sheep in this respect, that they love to get together. Sheep go in flocks, and so do God’s people.” -Charles Spurgeon

    In this week’s post, I want us to continue to look at the spiritual disciplines by looking at the subject of worship. In previous weeks, I defined the spiritual disciplines as the same as a good faith attempt to follow Jesus. More specifically, I said that it is “following Jesus in the overall style of life he chose for himself.”1 Jesus chose a life of attending corporate (i.e., gathered) worship services in order to focus on and respond to God. Can Christians learn something about going to church from Jesus? That’s a great question! Thank you for asking. The answer is both “yes” and “no.” I want to dispel some mistaken conceptions with the “no” side of the answer, and, in the brief length of a blog post, I want to show you just some of the riches of what the Bible has to say on the “yes” side of the answer. We will start with the shorter list of those two, but before that, let’s briefly define worship.

    I think Donald S. Whitney defines worship well in his book Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life. He writes, “Worship often includes words and actions, but it goes beyond them to the focus of the mind and heart. Worship is the God-centered focus and response of the soul; it is being preoccupied with God. So no matter what you are saying or singing or doing at any moment, you are worshiping God only when He is the center of your attention. But whenever you do focus on the infinite worth of God, you will respond in worship as surely as the moon reflects the sun.”2 Worship is certainly much, much more than singing songs to God. Worship can be changing your baby’s diaper. It can be a moment of reflection and prayer before you step into your place of work. It can be the washing of the dishes at the end of a long day. Worship can be more than singing and reading God’s Word and responding to what God’s Word tells you in a sermon, but it is certainly not less than that.

    Christians cannot learn about going to church from Jesus if by that you consider church to be a kind of service industry that tunes up the tires and engines of your spiritual vehicle. Churches are not interchangeable entities that simply perform the same functions at higher or lower levels of efficiency. Allow me an analogy here. In my neighborhood, we have two Jack in the Box locations. (Very spiritual example, I know.) One Jack in the Box has a perfectly fine track record with me and my family. We get what we pay for. The staff there are professional and timely. The other Jack in the Box has a staff member who has engaged, on multiple occasions, in short-changing our order, demanding we pay him after the fact for things we spoke aloud in our order, and has openly rudely criticized us (“you should have said you wanted that when you first made your order”). I’m not perfect, but I’m also not petty enough to get into it with that manager any more. I simply don’t want to do business at that location any more, so I don’t. I get the exact same products, but I also get them accurately and without undue criticism. It is a worldly—or, really, a biblically ignorant—way of thinking to consider a church to function like any other business. It is worldly to think the church needs to fit everything I want out of a church. It needs to have a great preacher, great music, a beautiful place to meet, hot coffee when I show up to service, and it better only have smiling faces of people who have no problems. And if those people do have problems, well, they better have nothing to do with me. But church is not a fast food place or an auto shop. Church is family. Church is a gathering of God’s people. The gathering of God’s people is meant to glorify God, not you. The gathering of God’s people is to make God known, to encourage one another, to serve as a hospital for the broken, not as a beautiful museum for the saints. If we think church is an American corporation we can simply change for another at our whim or convenience, then no, we can learn nothing about this from the life of Jesus.

    “When a Christian shuns fellowship with other Christians, the devil smiles. When he stops studying the Bible, the devil laughs. When he stops praying, the devil shouts for joy.” -Corrie Ten Boom

    Jesus does, however, show us life in the gathered community of God’s people. Jesus participated in the weekly gathering of corporate worship. Luke 4 records Jesus’ rejection in Nazareth, but the context of that rejection occurs around Jesus reading and expounding on the scroll of Isaiah. For our purposes, the most relevant verse is 16, which says, “He came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. As usual, he entered the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up to read” (emphasis added). A more literal translation using the Greek word order3 would read, “… He entered according to the custom of his on the day of the Sabbath…” The phrase “as usual” (or, “according to his custom”) translates κατὰ (according to) τὸ (the) εἰωθὸς (custom) αὐτῷ (his).4 I highlight the Greek phrasing here in order to show that the phrase “as usual” or “according to his custom” is not an addition by a modern translator or editor. The Gospels tell us Jesus’ habit was to attend the weekly worship service at his local synagogue. Psalm 95:6 says, “Come, let’s worship and bow down;
    let’s kneel before the Lord our Maker.” Picture what that looked like when Jesus obeyed that directive in the synagogue in Nazareth and when he was in the temple in Jerusalem. God expects us to worship. Jesus did just that.

    If the Bible reports that the perfectly holy, perfectly loving God the Son attended the weekly gathering of God’s people, then the Bible has something to say to mankind in all periods of history, but especially to us in the age of so-called online church or the myopic practices of individualistic Christianity.

    “The single most important activity of your life is to worship God. You were made for this—to offer your whole life, in all its parts, as a hymn of praise to the Lord.” -Sinclair Ferguson

    Jesus’ participation in the weekly worship service of God’s people shows that it is a necessity, not mere tradition or cultural preference. Notice that Jesus spends a lot of time with his disciples and that the disciples spend a lot of time with one another. These decisions are not accidents or coincidences. These gatherings, these times of worship,5 are part of the design. Jesus sang hymns with his disciples at the conclusion of their Passover observance, aka the Last Supper, before they went out to the Garden of Gethsemane in Matt. 26:30. Jesus read the Isaiah scroll and expounded on it in Luke 4, as referenced above. But he also would have stayed silent and listened as others did so when it was their turn.

    “Be united with other Christians. A wall with loose bricks is not good. The bricks must be cemented together.” -Corrie Ten Boom

    We know Jesus focused on and responded to God in a variety of moments, but I want to encourage you not to miss the night leading up to Jesus’ betrayal by Judas. All four Gospels record that moment at various lengths. Luke 22:42 records an incredible moment in Jesus’ worship through prayer that night. In it, Jesus prays, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup away from me—nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” Truly, this response to God is the best response to God. May it be true of you and I that we respond to him in that same way every day.

    “To gather with God’s people in united adoration of the Father is as necessary to the Christian life as prayer.” -Martin Luther

    Christians today can follow Jesus’ example in the spiritual disciplines by engaging in daily private worship and public worship at least once a week. (Your church may have more than one opportunity to worship together.) Make no mistake: you must have both regular private and public worship in order to best follow Jesus. He deserves our best, but you know what? You deserve your best, too. Engage in daily private times of reading the Bible and praying. Maybe play a worship song on your phone that you can sing along to. But don’t stay isolated! Make sure you at least attend your local church’s worship service in person every week, unless you are limited by illness or mobility. You need it. May we not be indifferent to the regular, disciplined worship of God! May it be true of us what Hebrews 12:28 says, “Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe” (ESV).

    I want to close with a quote from A.W. Tozer. He said, “If you will not worship God seven days a week, you do not worship Him on one day a week.”6

    1. Link to the original post giving an overall introduction to spiritual disciplines here: https://adamwchristman.com/2025/08/19/an-introduction-to-spiritual-disciplines/ ↩︎
    2. Donald S. Whitney, Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2014), 106. ↩︎
    3. Readers should be aware that Greek word order does not function the same as in English. Greek grammar communicates the function of the various words through their forms, rather than through their arrangement in the sentence. Word order in Greek, therefore, is not limited to “subject-verb-object,” as in English. Rather, it is flexible enough to allow for options that will create emphasis on what the writer wishes to emphasize. So, while I am providing here a word order-based literal translation, that does not make it a better translation than the CSB version quoted previously. It is done here for the sake of understanding. ↩︎
    4. Please forgive how the Greek letters look. I did my best! WordPress isn’t a perfect platform. ↩︎
    5. John chapters 7 and 8 show Jesus spending time at the Feast of Booths in Jerusalem, which would have included times of corporate worship. ↩︎
    6. John Blanchard, ed., More Gathered Gold: A Treasury of Quotations for Christians (Welwyn, England: Evangelical Press, 1986), 344. ↩︎

  • Spiritual Disciplines: Service to Others

    “WANTED: Gifted volunteers for difficult service in the local expression of the kingdom of God. Motivation to serve should be obedience to God, gratitude, gladness, forgiveness, humility, and love. Service will rarely be glorious. Volunteers must be faithful in spite of long hours, little or no visible results, and possibly no recognition—except from God for all eternity.” -Donald S. Whitney

    The biblical witness regarding salvation is very simple. Believe in Jesus as the Christ, the Son of God. By believing, you will have life in his name (John 20:13). We are saved by grace through faith, not through works, so that nobody can boast (Ephesians 2:8-9). That is, we are saved from the consequences of our sin, which is death (Romans 6:23). We are saved by grace, or in other words, by God’s free gift (also Romans 6:23). That grace is delivered to us through faith (Eph. 2:8-9; Rom. 10:4, 9-10).

    Many theologians and pastors have remarked that, in all the religions of the world, there are truly only two concepts for how people are saved from sin. One concept is the Christian concept, expressed to us clearly in the Scriptures, that we are saved through faith in Christ. The other concept is that people are saved by works. Some things can be true at the same time. When people ask who you are, you can tell them your name, but it is also accurate to tell them what you do for a living, or who you are in relation to your family. But a theology of salvation (soteriology) does not work like that. Only one can be true, and not the other.

    Why do I bring this up? Today we’re talking about service and I want to be sure to communicate that Christians serve BECAUSE we are saved from sin, NOT IN ORDER TO BE saved from sin. Christians do not trust in our own works to save us or make our presence in the future state palatable to a perfectly holy God. No. We trust in the work of Christ, whose work was to die on the cross and then to rise to resurrected life on the third day. A preacher I know recently preached a series of sermons called “SAVED TO SERVE.” I think that sums it up very well.

    Let’s talk about how we can learn about the spiritual discipline of service from the life of Jesus, starting with that most important part of it.

    Jesus’ purpose on this earth was to live a perfect life, die for us, and rise again. That is service! It is service on behalf of all who will believe. There are some elements to notice about this act of service from Jesus.

    1. This act of service cost Jesus personally. Notice, he did not send someone else. God himself died on the cross for our sins, not a man, angel, or animal.
    2. This act of service was for the benefit of others. You may rightfully point out that all service is for the benefit of others. But among sinful man, motives, means, and results can be debated endlessly. Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection, however, concludes debates. He lives again on the other side of death. There can be no argument in the face of the King of Kings. His service was to the benefit of all who will believe. Our faith in him would mean nothing if he did not die and rise again (1 Corinthians 15).
    3. This act of service was motivated out of Jesus’ love and joy. Jesus’ twin motivations of love and joy for us is clearly seen in the Scriptures. Romans 5:8, “But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Love was on display on the cross in the bloodied form of that Jewish rabbi. But look also to Hebrews 12:2b as it comments on Jesus’ motivation. “For the joy that lay before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Reuniting us to himself gives Jesus joy just like the joy of the angels that Jesus himself described in Luke 15, verses 7 and 10. How could it be any less than that?
    4. This act of service was conducted not only out of righteous motivations, but also righteous means. Please don’t misunderstand me. The persecutions of the religious leaders, bloodthirsty crowds, and dangerously apathetic Romans were not righteous. What we see in Jesus’ sacrificial act of service on the cross is a man who did not sin at any point along the way. He was pierced because of our acts of rebellion against God (Is. 53:5), not his own. And when he suffered the betrayal, trials, and crucifixion, “he was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth” (Is. 53:7). The eyewitness Simon Peter, son of Jonah, declares in 1 Peter 2:22-24 about Jesus, “He did not commit sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth; when he was insulted, he did not insult in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten but entrusted himself to the one who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree; so that, having died to sins, we might live for righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.”

    So much could be said about the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, but the above paragraphs should suffice for our study on the spiritual disciplines. Let’s turn to the second clearest picture of Jesus and service with help from the Gospel of John.

    A look at John 13 allows us to move the camera from Jesus’ death and resurrection to the night just before Jesus’ betrayal by Judas. It’s been another long day, a day of walking and dust and sweat. Preparations had been made to borrow the upper room of somebody’s home. They were planning and expecting to observe the Passover. But there was no servant there to get them ready. These men needed to be ceremonially clean in order to engage in the observation of Passover! Even so, there was nobody to kneel down with a towel and basin of water in order to wash and dry their feet. This kind of job was a dirty job. It would have featured on one of Mike Rowe’s TV shows if they had existed back then. It was unenviable, time consuming, perhaps humiliating to wash the grime and potentially animal feces off the feet of whoever was coming to dinner. The washing of feet is a job for a servant.

    Jesus, the King of Creation, who has the Name Above All Names, the One who knew he would die in less than 24 hours, knelt, took up the towel, and did it himself. He washed the feet of the twelve disciples and, presumably, his own. Judas, then, the famous traitor who would hand Jesus over for thirty pieces of silver, was among this number. Can you imagine washing the feet of someone who betrayed you? Jesus did that. He did it before the betrayal, yes, but he did it knowing that the betrayal was coming. And don’t forget Peter’s betrayal! Peter would hang back from Jesus’ side as his master was brought before the kangaroo court we see in the Gospels. When pressed by the people nearby whether he was one of Jesus’ disciples, he cussed and insisted he did not know the man! Jesus knew Peter’s betrayal was coming and Jesus washed his feet anyway.

    In the context of another prophetic pronouncement of his coming betrayal and crucifixion, Jesus famously declared in Mark 10:45, “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Matthew’s account of that same moment reflects these words on Christians and service. Matt. 20:25-28, “Whoever would be great among you must be your servant . . . even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve.”

    “That’s all well and good for Jesus,” you might be thinking, “but that has nothing to do with me.” My friend, if that is what you think, you are mistaken. We are to follow Jesus, just as the first disciples were called to do (Matt. 4:19).

    John 13:14-15 record these words from Jesus, “If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you.” Some of you reading this may come from a congregation or a denomination that regularly holds foot washing services on an annual or more frequent basis. For those who are unfamiliar, some churches hold a service where they plan and then conduct a time where those in attendance have the opportunity to wash the feet of another person in attendance. It is a humbling experience. My point is not to argue that your church should have a service like this. The point is to show that Jesus’ life is characterized by personal service done on behalf of others and so ours should be characterized by the same.

    “In the Discipline of service there is also great liberty. Service enables us to say ‘no!’ to the worlds’ games of promotion and authority. It abolishes our need (and desire) for a ‘pecking order.’” -Richard Foster

    If Jesus’ acts of service were personal, ours need to be personal, as well. We live in a digital age. We live in the age of drive thru food, coffee shops, banks, and more. We live in a world that we have shaped in our own image.1 We have curated online church with music from this church, preaching from that church, inspirational videos from our favorite Christian influencers, and we call that the Christian life. Meanwhile, we lay back and are spiritually gluttonous. We feed and feed and feed on only the morsels we choose, neglecting those dynamics of the Christian life we prefer to avoid. We prefer not to put up with the bad smells of the bodies of other people. We prefer not to deal with their (in our opinion) bad driving or bad parking. We prefer not to use a public restroom. We prefer not to walk down the street, or drive a few minutes, or catch a bus in order to attend a worship service. “Online church” is not what God had in mind. We are embodied souls!2 We need to spend time in spaces with one another in times of singing, reading, praying, and, yes, service to others. We need to do it ourselves. We cannot outsource service to somebody else. We have to use our own hands to lift the fallen. We have to use our own feet to go to the outcast. We have to use our own voices to encourage the downcast. We have to use our own backs to bear the burdens of one another.

    If Jesus’ acts of service were for the benefit of others, ours need to be for the benefit of others, too. On social media, there is almost no content worth reading or viewing. Among all the fluff of wasted time are videos of people who feed the homeless or helping a family experiencing poverty. There are so many of those videos that now there are parody videos mocking them! We do not serve in order to be seen. Matthew 6:2, “Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. Otherwise, you have no reward with your Father in heaven.” You may notice the Scripture address there and remember that it comes from the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus also said this in the same sermon, “In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven” (Mt. 5:16). We best serve when we do it in ways that causes people see the good works, not us, and give glory to the Father, not to us.

    We best serve when we do it in ways that causes people see the good works, not us, and give glory to the Father, not to us.

    If Jesus’ acts of service were motivated from love and joy for others, so ours need to be, as well. Do you remember the Greatest Commandments? They come into play with regards to everything we do, including our acts of service. Love God, love people (Luke 10:27-28). Love—real love, not the cheap, uncommitted, convenient kind of appreciation that so commonly passes for lovenowadays—and joy go together. Read your Bible, pray, and develop your love for God and others. Don’t hold back from service simply because you think you don’t love people enough, though! Sometimes, it is through our acts of service that we mature in our love for God and others. Charles Spurgeon preached a sermon titled Some Marks of God’s People. In it, he stated, “He who serves God, out of love to him, is the one who really and truly serves him. The Lord of love, the great King eternal, immortal, invisible, needs no slaves to grace his throne. He wants those to do his bidding who serve him with delight and pleasure.”

    If Jesus’ acts of service were conducted by righteous means, then we need to do the same. Service must be done with a joyful, loving motivation, but also a joyful, loving means. Imagine a children’s ministry volunteer serving joyful preschool kids with a scowl on his face. (Depending on your church experiences, it might not be too hard to imagine!) Such things should not be. We conduct our acts of service with love, not lashes. Sometimes, we can serve in such a way that we never voice negative words, but our posture, demeanor, facial expression, and other elements communicate a bad attitude anyway. It is not the way of Jesus. James 1:20, “for human anger does not accomplish God’s righteousness.” I am not telling you to force yourself to “feel like serving.” Nor am I saying to “only serve when you feel like it”. (You will soon come to a place where you NEVER feel like it, which is not the way of Jesus.) What I mean is, develop self-control, that flavor of the Fruit of the Spirit. Let God be in charge, and in submission to him take control of your face, body language, and any other element that communicates to people so that you can serve in such a way that they are blessed rather than more burdened.

    I want to close with some bite-size thoughts on practical service and even one of its benefits, followed by one more quote.

    Service does not care whether the task is large or small. Service is content to serve in hidden ways, not in the spotlight. Service is free not to calculate every result. Service is happy to minister to all, great or small, poor or rich, etc. Service ministers simply and faithfully, regardless of mood or feelings.3 Service is a pattern of life, not limited to one or two instances. Service builds community.

    “Therefore, the spiritual authority of Jesus is an authority not found in a position or a title, but in a towel,” Richard Foster.

    1. I would argue that this has resulted in a world twisted out of God’s own design, but that’s another subject. ↩︎
    2. Another subject worthy of its own series of posts. ↩︎
    3. I know I already made this point, but it is so important! ↩︎