When we begin to understand that our time is minuscule. We may decide to become more intentional about our living. We may seek not to be wasting our time with only the “urgent” and putting out fires and addressing dramas and then whatever spirit, time and energy we have left over is all we have allocated to apply to what we deem as really important. So we begin to ask ourselves, “Why do I have to go?” Of course we know we don’t have to do anything but we have gotten into the habit of spending the majority of our life doing things, going places, and living on automatic pilot. So it is right and good to ascertain the reasons behind our choices and non-choices as we want to live as authentically, mindfully and awake as possible. With that in mind I share with you the following quote from an unknown named author. The quote is an answer for us as we ask ourselves about Church attendance.
“Christianity is fundamentally a story about where we are going: into the company of God’s grace, in the harmony of the restored creation, through the mercy of God’s incarnate love. Church means giving up the fantasy that we can find fulfillment and righteousness by ourselves. It means doing things at inconvenient times with some eccentric people in sometimes clumsy ways - because life and salvation are team sports, and on judgement day God will have nothing to say to us if we think we can come without the others.”
You cannot be a singular or solitary Christian. You must be with the gathered hot mess and be Church. Faith never lives by itself. It and we have been wired for a communal reality and eternity. Why do I have to go to Church? Because I cannot and will not be a Christian by myself. The hotter the mess, the more human and real it is and the greater glory to God.