“I don’t get anything out of it.” You’ve probably heard it as a reason for someone no longer going to church and maybe you’ve actually had the thought yourself. You walked out of church and thought, “I just don’t feel like I got anything out of it.” People come to church with certain expectations, certain standards that they expect to be met for them to consider church a valuable experience. What are those standards? In my experience, there are usually two big ones. 1) In our entertainment saturated society, I think that people apply the same expectations to church as they do to other forms of entertainment. What is that standard? Feelings or emotions. Does this make me feel a certain way? If I don’t feel something, it must not be doing anything. 2) The second expectation that people might carry with them into church is: Is church going to fix my problems and change my life for the better? If I don’t see some immediate evidence that, then church isn’t worth my time or effort. Instead of placing OUR EXPECTATIONS on church, I would ask you to look at what GOD PROMISES about church, this place where God’s Word is proclaimed and heard. And my prayer is that we see how God’s promises far exceed our expectations.
Let’s begin by looking at Isaiah 55. While we only read a small portion of Isaiah chapter 55, the entire chapter describes the blessings that God’s Word brings to those who hear it. God so desires for people to receive the blessing that come form his Word that he uses imperatives like, “Come… Listen, listen to me…Give ear…Seek the Lord…” This is a message that God himself promises is powerful and effective. That’s the point the Lord makes when he says, “As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish…so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it” (Isaiah 55:10,11). Did you notice where the power and effectiveness of God’s Word comes from? It does not depend on the person who hears it, or how they feel while or after they have heard it. The power and effectiveness of God’s Word comes from the promise of God – that God promises that his Word is powerful and effective.
Does that mean that it’s wrong to be emotional when hearing God’s Word? Absolutely not! God made us emotional beings. How can there not be emotion as you stand at the grave of a fellow Christian and hear Jesus say, “Because I live you also will live” (John 14:19)? How can you not be overwhelmed when you see an ultrasound or hold a newborn in your arms and think, “I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made” (Psalm 139:14)? Or the relief and peace that comes when God, “As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us” (Psalm 103:12). There is nothing wrong with emotion. But when someone says that you HAVE to feel a certain way to know if God is really working, then we have made the effectiveness and power of God’s Word dependent upon our feelings. And not only does it rob God of his glory, it also robs a person of the confidence that God intends to give to all those who hear his Word. When you start depending on feelings, life becomes pretty uncertain.
Can you imagine if relationships were solely based on feelings? Your spouse wakes up one morning and says, “I don’t feel like I love you anymore.” So…you’re not a spouse because you don’t feel a certain way? A parent sees their toddler throwing a temper tantrum and thinks, “I don’t feel like I love you right now.” So…you’re not a parent because you don’t feel a certain way??? Feelings fluctuate but promises made by someone who is committed to keeping those promises bring confidence and certainty. When someone says, “I don’t feel like I’m getting anything out of church” quite bluntly, it really doesn’t matter how you feel. Thank God for that! God’s promises are more powerful than our feelings.
Now I think that we also need to be careful with that previous point, and not to use it as an excuse. That is not an excuse for churches to use archaic terminology or vocabulary that those in worship cannot understand. I recently sat through a worship service where such lofty theological terms and archaic language was used that I didn’t have a clue what it meant. Nor is the promise of God’s powerful Word an excuse for poor preparation and presentation of sermons. Nor is it an excuse for NOT trying to apply God’s Word to relevant and contemporary issues in people’s lives. Nor is it a excuse for not trying to listen. While we CANNOT make God’s Word more powerful, we can put up barriers to people hearing God’s Word. We want as many people as possible to hear God’s Word because we know what God’s Word is capable of doing in those who hear it. We were reminded of that in Romans 10.
The Apostle Paul writes, “Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message and the message is heard through the word about Christ” (Romans 10:17). God’s Word is always relevant no matter when or where you live, or what you are specifically going through in your life. God’s Word comes with the powerful message of the law which points us to the source of every problem that we have in our lives. It points us to sin and how it has affected us and the world we live in. Our personal sins cause us heartache and guilt as we think about how we have treated others: our spouse, our children, our parents, our friends. It shows us our sins in our use of our time and money, misplaced priorities and selfish decisions. God’s Word declares that the wages of our sin is death, that our sins have not only brought trouble into our lives here, but our sins are deserving of God’s eternal punishment in hell. That powerful message of God’s law is meant to lead us to the even more powerful message of Christ Jesus.
The Bible’s primary message is how Christ Jesus has come to rescue us from what we could not rescue ourselves from. Jesus enters our sin-broken world and he lives for us, perfect in love, understanding and priorities at all time. Jesus goes to the cross and there he suffers the death we deserve, taking the punishment of hell for every sin that we have ever committed. Jesus rises from the dead to show us that he has not merely come to take away our problems for awhile, he has come to take them away forever. This is the promise that God fulfills every time he rescues a person through death to live with him in heaven. Until that day, Christ helps us through the problems of this life, not always fixing the problems immediately, but promising to use them for our blessing, giving us the strength and forgiveness to get through them and then to rescue us from them permanently. The powerful message about Christ is one that we and every person needs to hear and keep on hearing. It is the message that God the Holy Spirit uses both to 1) create saving faith in a person, 2) and to keep a person in saving faith. This is God’s powerful message for all people to hear.
But how about little children? How much does a little child really get out of church, or the parent who is wrestling with that little child, valiantly trying to keep them relatively quiet in church? If you’re a parent of a small child you might at times walk out thinking, “I’m not sure what my child or I am even getting out of church today.” If you’re ever felt that way you’re not alone. In Luke 18 we’re told of an account where Jesus’ disciples seemed to have felt that way. We’re told, “People were bringing babies to Jesus for him to place his hands on them” (Luke 18:15). The word for “babies” is one used to describe infants, children that are not even able to walk. And Jesus’ disciples looked at those babies and thought that it was a waste of time for them to spend time with Jesus. Jesus words are pretty pointed, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these” (Luke 18:16). To be part of God’s kingdom, faith in Jesus is required. And Jesus says that these babies, these infants, had faith in Jesus. How is that possible? Remember what the Lord said in Isaiah 55:9, “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isaiah 55:9). I might not understand how that’s possible but who am I to tell God that he’s wrong? As the message of Christ works faith in the hearts of little children, so it continues to work in them every time they hear it.
While I see the struggles of the parent trying to keep a squirmy child quiet during church, there is no better place for that child to be. They, just like you, are being exposed to the powerful message of Christ which God promises to work through. And please do not underestimate the power of the Holy Spirit working through that message. When you hear a two or three-year-old sing “Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so” God has worked powerfully in that child through the message about Christ they have heard. In addition, that child sees a parent who believes that hearing God’s Word is so valuable that they are willing to repeatedly wrestle that whiny child and walk around in the back of church. What an impact that makes on that child! Parents, keep up the good work because you and your child are definitely “Getting something out of it” whether you feel like it or not. That is God’s promise to you.
That’s really what it comes down to, isn’t it, God’s promises? It doesn’t really matter how we feel or what happens after we walk out from this place. God promises that he is working powerful through his Word, and through that Word of Christ we are getting exactly what our faith needs. Yes, it is good for us to be here at church. God promises it! Amen.
