Speaker 1: As a 12-year-old I left my parents' church it was an Anglican church that was some way from home and I joined the local Baptist church.
Speaker 1: I left a church that was very formulaic, very regimented, to an unscripted church with better music, with young people and with a pastor who wasn't bored of his own sermons, a place where I felt and saw Christian faith being lived.
Speaker 1: I became very involved in Scripture Union, in their camping program, both as a camper and then as a leader.
Speaker 1: I saw at these camps Christian community Christians living together, all of it in the artificial temporary community of a week-long camp.
Speaker 1: I saw young people, young adults and some very cool older adults having a lot of fun, living and experiencing life.
Speaker 1: We saw people talking genuinely, deeply, with a commitment, about faith, their love of God, caring for others, a desire to see others come to God.
Speaker 1: It was raw and it was real.
Speaker 1: There was no pretense.
Speaker 1: There was honesty about their failings, preparedness to acknowledge doubt, admitting that they didn't have it all together and acceptance that they didn't have all the answers.
Speaker 1: I experienced as a kid and then as a young adult, the blessing of that sort of Christian community.
Speaker 1: I, along with many others, would get to the end of a week-long camp where we'd been kayaking on the river, living in tents, no showers and a toilet being a hole in the ground and saying can't we just stay here?
Speaker 1: Christian community that was so real, was so wonderful.
Speaker 1: As a young adult, I read the passage that Alex preached on last week from Acts, chapter 2, and I'm going to read it now.
Speaker 1: So, acts, chapter 2, from verse 42.
Speaker 1: They divided themselves, the apostles' teaching, into fellowship To the breaking of bread.
Speaker 1: Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles.
Speaker 1: All the believers were together and they had everything in common.
Speaker 1: They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need.
Speaker 1: Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts.
Speaker 1: They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favour of all people.
Speaker 1: And the Lord added to their numbers daily those who were being saved.
Speaker 1: As a young person, we'd go, wow, is this the way?
Speaker 1: Is this how it should be?
Speaker 1: Of course there were older Christians who would consider that we were expressing the naivety of youth, but this was also the 1980s.
Speaker 1: Christians are often a tad behind the secular world, but the 60s and 70s had seen the rife of hippie communes and people living together and sharing everything, and that followed in the 70s and the 80s amongst the Christian communities of people sharing, actually living together and honest exploration about what did it mean to live in community with each other.
Speaker 1: The 1980s had a plethora of Christian books around Christian community and shared life and being the salt and light of the world.
Speaker 1: I enjoyed a positive church, better than I had before anyone.
Speaker 1: We had a great group of young people and we hung around every Sunday all day and we experienced the lived community together.
Speaker 1: Mine was so much better that many of the campers who came on the camps and after a week of Christian community they'd say things like this community is so awesome, so why does my church suck so badly?
Speaker 1: There was a mismatch between their experience and their expectations and that certainly wasn't isolated.
Speaker 1: People held so many expectations of our community that wasn't matched with their own experience for some of them and reality for some of us that there's a journey of finding our place in christian community where we feel that we fitted, where we found a church or community that suited us.
Speaker 1: We found our tribe or our people.
Speaker 1: Clearly, some did drift away or walk away or abandon faith and church and Christian community.
Speaker 1: There was also an exploration around whether Christianity could be expressed without Christian community.
Speaker 1: I don't need to go to church to be a Christian.
Speaker 1: Well, that's true.
Speaker 1: We're saved by God's grace, not by our works.
Speaker 1: Our decision to be a Christian, to follow Jesus, to live as one of his disciples, is ours and our decision alone.
Speaker 1: We don't become a Christian because of our birth, by our parents dedicating us or baptising us as infants.
Speaker 1: We don't become Christians because we live or lived in a Christian country or because of our ethnic identity.
Speaker 1: We are all offered the opportunity to repent of our sins, to ask for God's forgiveness and acceptance and accept that forgiveness, to commit ourselves to God and to following him.
Speaker 1: We accept that the actions of Jesus on the cross is the complete and final work needed for salvation.
Speaker 1: Therefore, my attendance at church doesn't earn my salvation.
Speaker 1: I'm not condemned and shouldn't feel guilt over the fact that I don't attend.
Speaker 1: However, the experience of Christian community was, or could be, that we read in Scripture a strong, communal and community-flavoured Christianity a strong, communal and community-flavoured Christianity, which has led me to a real struggle with the notions of Christians not seeking some form of deliberate Christian community.
Speaker 1: In that context, I want to turn to our text for today, which is Hebrews, chapter 10, starting at verse 19.
Speaker 1: And it's often titled called to persevere in our faith.
Speaker 1: So Hebrews, chapter 10 from verse 19.
Speaker 1: And it's often titled called to persevere in our faith.
Speaker 1: So Hebrews, chapter 10 from verse 19.
Speaker 1: Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the most holy place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened up through us, through the curtain that is his body, and since we have a great hot priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with full assurance that faith brings having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water.
Speaker 1: Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who has promised is faithful.
Speaker 1: Let us consider how we may spur one another on towards love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of, and again at verse 25.
Speaker 1: Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another.
Speaker 1: At times, this passage has been used to cajole and almost beat people up about attending church, hoping it would keep them in the faith.
Speaker 1: We've seen a steady decline of Christianity in Australia, even in the most recent periods.
Speaker 1: We've seen the Australian census record that in 1991, 70% identified as Christians and by 2002, then reduced to 40% and 2011 marked a clear tipping point of decline.
Speaker 1: But we still have people leaving the church.
Speaker 1: There's a fair bit of research showing that those leaving the church are across all age groups other than those over 70.
Speaker 1: Those over 70 only seem to leave church or stop attending when they physically can't attend or bluntly they pass away.
Speaker 1: But across each generation and each age group they leave not just one congregation to go somewhere else, but to leave church and religion.
Speaker 1: But I don't want to dwell on those who stop believing.
Speaker 1: I want to think about us as believers.
Speaker 1: It is to the believers that this passage speaks.
Speaker 1: The passage calls for us to persevere in our faith, to hold on to our faith, to continue to believe, to not lose heart, to not get distracted by the world, to hold on to the hope for the future.
Speaker 1: And it is in that broad context and call to persevere in our faith that we are reminded not to give up meeting.
Speaker 1: I don't judge and none of us should Circumstances prevent attendance at church or in Christian fellowship health, transport, family needs, all sorts of things.
Speaker 1: I can recall three periods in my life where I didn't attend church on a regular basis.
Speaker 1: When I was 18, I was working at a mine site.
Speaker 1: I was rostered to work six weeks on, one week off.
Speaker 1: That is for six weeks.
Speaker 1: We worked seven days a week, 12 hours a day.
Speaker 1: It's 42 days straight.
Speaker 1: There was no church.
Speaker 1: I have to say this period actually strengthened my faith because in the absence of church and Christian community I needed to wrestle and identify my own faith in that situation.
Speaker 1: But for six months I didn't get to church.
Speaker 1: In my early 20s I spent two years.
Speaker 1: Some might regard this as not the greatest example, but I spent two years working as a barman in a hotel.
Speaker 1: It was my last year of teacher's college and again the year before I went teaching.
Speaker 1: I'd spend every week working Sunday through to Friday at the bar.
Speaker 1: I'd close the bar at 1am on a Saturday night and open it again at 11 o'clock on Sunday.
Speaker 1: I never had the opportunity to go to church.
Speaker 1: I did meet with Christians elsewhere, informally, but I had no regular Christian community.
Speaker 1: And then, just after Cherith was born.
Speaker 1: There was a period of time when I rarely got to church.
Speaker 1: We had three young children.
Speaker 1: We'd renovated our home in preparation for Cherith's arrival, but we'd run out of money as she started crawling.
Speaker 1: The need to put down something on the floor, the need to build a fence, the need to pay for back area and secure the house all became overwhelming.
Speaker 1: Saturdays and Sundays were the only opportunity.
Speaker 1: We couldn't afford to pay people to do it.
Speaker 1: It just had to happen.
Speaker 1: Afford to pay people to do it?
Speaker 1: It just had to happen.
Speaker 1: Attendance can be difficult.
Speaker 1: At the moment I work six days a week.
Speaker 1: You know fairly demanding business and work.
Speaker 1: There's lots of ways I can usually fill a Sunday.
Speaker 1: We juggle family who are here or further away who need our help.
Speaker 1: Sometimes we collapse at the end of a Saturday, just exhausted.
Speaker 1: We are all real, valid and justifiable being there.
Speaker 1: Skip church for all those reasons.
Speaker 1: But the exhortation is there don't stop moving.
Speaker 1: But that exhortation doesn't focus necessarily on weekly attendance or attendance on a particular day or in a particular format, but we are called to meet together.
Speaker 1: Why Is it?
Speaker 1: Simply because we're told to.
Speaker 1: Surely it's got to be more than that.
Speaker 1: Why do we come here?
Speaker 1: Perhaps for us each week or each fortnight.
Speaker 1: What can we learn from scripture?
Speaker 1: In the Old Testament we can see the actions of attending the temple or other collective acts together.
Speaker 1: There were sacrifices, there were symbolic acts, there was prayer.
Speaker 1: Even in the Old Testament, there were clearly acts of singing and song.
Speaker 1: Whilst I'm sure some songs were supposed to be performed by one or by a group, to others, even as a non-musical person, songs are to be sung together.
Speaker 1: These were collective acts of church.
Speaker 1: In the New Testament we see the community of apostles and followers and in the early church, meeting together was a vehicle for care, looking after widows and orphans of the disadvantaged.
Speaker 1: They had experiences of holding together against oppression and persecution.
Speaker 1: It was time to celebrate the Lord's Supper, of baptising people, sharing in a song of teaching, of proclaiming the good news.
Speaker 1: For long periods in our history, church has been a place where this was the only place where people would hear the scripture.
Speaker 1: It was the only place there was a Bible and the priest was the only one that could read it.
Speaker 1: It was the only place to be taught.
Speaker 1: There was no other way to read or understand.
Speaker 1: It was a time to hear stories and messages.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it was outside the church there was nothing.
Speaker 1: In times of persecution, attendance was at high risk.
Speaker 1: There was a desire and a need to huddle together to support each other.
Speaker 1: Recently, the Australian National Church Life Survey asked why we, those of us in the church go to church, and here's the responses.
Speaker 1: Survey said that 62% of people come to worship and experience God.
Speaker 1: That's pretty encouraging, isn't it?
Speaker 1: 28% said they come to partake in communion or other formal things such as confession or baptism.
Speaker 1: 22% said we come for encouragement or inspiration.
Speaker 1: 15% said they come for a sense of community, 13% for time to pray and reflect, 13% to learn, 8% to ensure that their children got to church and 15% because they thought it would be wrong not to go, or it was habit or they didn't have a sense of duty.
Speaker 1: From my own observations and experience, I've seen the following I've seen people coming to church to sustain their fragile faith, to get a faith boost just enough to get them to next week where people's own struggles, that they seek solace and forgiveness, are needing to come back next week for more.
Speaker 1: Seeing that during a busy, crowded week it might be the only time to stop and pause for a few moments to worship, to pray, to open the Bible to think about God.
Speaker 1: I see faithful people early in their faith, eagerly seeking knowledge and understanding and experience.
Speaker 1: I see those whose faith is based or significantly enhanced because of collective singing and worship.
Speaker 1: There are many, over many generations, who build their faith and understanding and their truth on the songs that we sing, more than the sermon or reading.
Speaker 1: I also see people looking for their place, their tribe, their people, a place to belong and to be accepted.
Speaker 1: I suspect that for many of us, our reasons and our motivations change over time, change according to what is going on, our age and stage.
Speaker 1: Hopefully, it is the more positive of those reasons of worship and encouragement and community and prayer, rather than the more mundane sense of duty.
Speaker 1: As our society makes it less popular to be a church-going Christian, the greater the importance of being with and surrounded by others who share our beliefs and our values.
Speaker 1: We find comfort together.
Speaker 1: I suspect that we find community.
Speaker 1: I believe that we are designed to be community people, not isolated individuals, but together, families, community and connection.
Speaker 1: I personally appreciate the experience of connecting with people who are like me but also not like me.
Speaker 1: I don't need to be around more lawyers.
Speaker 1: I don't need to be around more bald, white, overweight, middle-aged men.
Speaker 1: There is something about being wonderfully connected to people who are different from us with a common belief.
Speaker 1: Christ's work is to bring people together into fellowship across ages, gender, race, background, education, social status.
Speaker 1: We see who is there the Greek and the Jew, the male and the female, the slave and the master.
Speaker 1: There is something inherently good about the width of God's family and we should desire to be part of that here and now.
Speaker 1: We want to be part, as Christians, of the eternal fellowship of believers.
Speaker 1: Should we not, then, want to be part of that reflection here and now?
Speaker 1: We are encouraged to continue to meet together, not because we have to, but because it is good to.
Speaker 1: This call, in my view, is to continue to meeting together.
Speaker 1: That could take many forms.
Speaker 1: It doesn't necessarily mean formally in a formal church on a Sunday morning.
Speaker 1: This might be in home churches or home groups or some other interactive community when there is intentional meeting, faith-based faith, interaction.
Speaker 1: That is, meeting together.
Speaker 1: Coffee with the girls or drinks with the boys probably doesn't count, but where there is the sharing of scripture, praying in community, it probably does.
Speaker 1: For many of us, it is the church in the formal sense, and I hope it is here with us, but it doesn't have to be.
Speaker 1: Alex, in his sermon a couple of weeks ago, had made a comment about it earlier today.
Speaker 1: It's the breadth of churches and denominations.
Speaker 1: This means that your meeting together might be in some different format or style or expression, but those experiencing God, worshipping, inspiring and encouraging community should be there for you.
Speaker 1: Each church and our church should reflect on whether and how we provide that valuable, positive part of church.
Speaker 1: We are who we are and that won't suit everyone, but we should consider how we create the best community and worship we can for our community.
Speaker 1: We must not give up meeting together.
Speaker 1: I want to encourage you to continue to meet together.
Speaker 1: I want to encourage you to focus on the good parts of our community together.
Speaker 1: I want to encourage you to come, and regularly, not because you have to, but because it is valuable to you and to those around you.
Speaker 1: I want to encourage you that it might not just be about what you get out of church.
Speaker 1: It might be that your presence and your contribution, your interaction, are very meaningful to those around you.
Speaker 1: I take great encouragement by the young families and young kids here, our future and our presence.
Speaker 1: I take great comfort of people who are elderly or older have sustained in their faith their whole journey.
Speaker 1: I take great courage and comfort by young adults in the midst of all the distractions of the world, setting aside time and coming.
Speaker 1: I want to return to the story that I started with around Scripture Union.
Speaker 1: Scripture Union camps were a wonderful experience for campers experiencing authentic Christian community.
Speaker 1: I went on to become a camp leader and a camp director and then for a period of time I worked for Scripture Union running the camping program.
Speaker 1: But in many ways my fondest memories was that of being a camp director leading a team of volunteer workers running a camp for teenage kids.
Speaker 1: I remember wonderful moments of fellowship with leaders getting camp ready.
Speaker 1: We would go down to Dwellinga by the river, set up tents, dig toilets, put up slalom courses, and I remember that it would frequently happen that we would sit around the campfire with the leaders waiting for the kids to come the next morning and one of the leaders was going.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't it be great if it was just here without the kids?
Speaker 1: Yet we all quickly realised that we actually loved serving and leading the kids.
Speaker 1: They were the reason we were here.
Speaker 1: These often young adults leading and serving.
Speaker 1: The camp was always about the kids.
Speaker 1: We were there to serve.
Speaker 1: We were there to teach them whitewater canoeing or whatever other activity we were doing.
Speaker 1: We were there to teach them something about God and expressing Christian community and sharing our faith and love At those times.
Speaker 1: You reflect that the camp is clearly for the kids and that never changed.
Speaker 1: But most of the time the people who got the most out of it were actually the leaders.
Speaker 1: It was in serving that they were blessed and rewarded.
Speaker 1: It might be that you don't feel as connected or in the community, the fellowship.
Speaker 1: You might find blessing and connection by finding some way to serve and in doing something rather than just being here.
Speaker 1: You might find the benefits of meeting together and persevering both easier and more encouraging by serving.
Speaker 1: If you don't feel you are getting much out of church, consider how you might contribute to be involved In doing so.
Speaker 1: You might be surprised how much more engaged and rewarded you feel about being part of the community.
Speaker 1: Coming to church doesn't make you a Christian, not.
Speaker 1: Fellowshipping doesn't cut you off from God's grace, but we are encouraged to keep leading because it is good for us.
Speaker 1: It should be beneficial to us.
Speaker 1: It gives us an opportunity to serve.
Speaker 1: So, in the words of Hebrews, chapter 10, let us not giving up leading together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another, and all the more as the day approaches.