I remember when we first started going over the spiritual gifts in our church and I was shocked that I scored 10’s all the way across the board in writing. I knew that some people were gifted writers, but I didn’t realize that it was considered a spiritual gift. I’m not sure why I was so surprised because writing has always come natural to me. To say that I’ve been frustrated over the last few weeks with this article is an understatement. No matter how many times I have sat down to write this piece, the words just refused to flow naturally. I knew this was an article that God wanted me to write, but I could not understand why He wasn’t helping me write what He had instructed me to. Today, I understood. I had to go through today to be able to fully convey how important this concept is.
Today was my first day back to church since everything shut down back in March. Two months of watching the service via Facebook. Two months of longing to sit in the same pew I’ve sat in for the last two years. Two long months of wanting nothing but to hug and hold people that have become my family over the course of my time at my church. Before today, I had a pretty good grasp on the concept that fellowship is important. But today, I understood exactly how much we need that fellowship.
I have typed out this article about five times now. I have typed it, reviewed it, attached it to an email for a second set of eyes to look over, just to discard the email and delete the entire article and start fresh. It never felt right, it didn’t look right, and it just didn’t have a natural flow to it that most of my work does. But today, I understand that it just was not the correct time for the article to be published. God needed me to experience what I did today for me to write this article properly.
The last few months, we have all been in isolation as the world has been crippled by world governments trying to stop the spread of a virus. All around the world, people have been watching church services from afar. We’ve been watching from our homes, praying and worshiping from our living room couches. Since the world seemed to come to a screeching halt just two short months ago there have been many people making comments about how they were perfectly fine with staying home and worshiping. The comments have been made that the church is not a building, it is a people. The church is us. As true as this is, God tells us multiple times in the bible that we were not made to be alone. In fact, God gives us our first clue to this within the first chapters of the bible when He tells us that no suitable helper for Adam was found amongst the creatures He had placed on the earth. It was because of this God created Eve (Genesis 2:20).
There is Something that Takes Place When We Come Together
Our pastor has been saying for months that there is a certain feeling that happens when God’s children come together. Matthew 18:20 says “For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.” It is not that Christ isn’t always with us, but I can tell you from personal experience that there is a different feeling worshiping from home versus worshiping with others who share the same belief. It is not the building or the beauty of the sanctuary. There is an electrifying feeling that hits you like a bolt of lightning, sending a spine-tingling sensation from the roots of your hair clear down to the tips of your toes. It is a presence that will drop you to your knees in awe and wonder, and it can only be found when God’s children come together.
Not only is there something that takes place when we are together, the longer we are apart, evil will find ways to tear us down. It starts subtly so that you may not notice what’s happening and it happens in different stages.
We Become Vulnerable When We Are Isolated
There really is truth behind the old saying “safety in numbers”. When we are isolated and alone, we become weak and vulnerable to the spiritual attacks that evil likes to wage on our minds. Science proves that people who are isolated notice changes to their sleep patterns. People begin to experience hallucinations and for those that battle mental illnesses, it becomes almost debilitating. Not only is there scientific evidence that isolation is horrible for human beings, Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 says “Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their work: If one falls down, his friend can help him up. But pity the man who falls and has no one to help him up.” It goes on even further in verse 12 to say that “Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.”
Once we become isolated, we are no longer as strong as we are together. Yes, Jesus is always standing behind us, holding us up in the waves of life, but when we have others to help create a cord, the more strands there are, the stronger the cord is. The more of us that stand together in the name of God the harder it is for Satan to weasel his way into each of our lives. It is when we become isolated, and we begin to become weak that evil can get its foot in the door, without us even realizing it is there.
We Become Discouraged
This is the first step in Satan’s attack against us. Hebrews 10:24-25 “Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another – and all the more you see the Day approaching.” If we are not getting the encouragement we need from others, the discouragement festers and grows like a cancer. The world feels like it’s falling down around you and you start making small, negative comments that are either only meant for yourself to hear or you make them in such a way that people around you think your handling the situation with a little bit of humor. After a while, without encouragement from other Christians, you find yourself making comments like “things are never going to go back to normal” or “whoever keeps playing Jumanji, please don’t roll the dice next month”. This is the perfect opportunity for Satan to sneak in more misfortune to make you feel even more discouraged. During a normal time, you would have other Christians to lean on and support you.
I cannot even tell you how many times over the last couple of months I have had to keep telling myself that everything was going to be okay. In the times that I got too overwhelmed, God made sure that I had the encouragement I needed in the form of a card in the mail or a phone call from someone else in the congregation.
We Suffer Alone
Suffering alone is the second step to Satan’s attack on our minds. When we become discouraged our first thought is not to call someone else and whine and cry about our misfortunes. We live in a society where we have been groomed to not reach out for help when we need it, especially emotionally. If we are struggling spiritually or mentally, we have been taught from an early age that it’s selfish to expect others to care about what is going on in your life all of the time. If you reach out to someone regarding these matters, you are seeking attention. But the bible tells us differently. 1st Corinthians 12:25-26 “so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.” We, as Christians, are the body. When one suffers, we suffer with that person. When we are isolated and separated this cannot happen in the way that God intended it to. When we suffer without our fellow Christians to help us through the darkness, without the encouragement needed to make it through, we become even more discouraged than we previously were.
I too have fallen into this trap. When I’m suffering, I don’t want people to hear or see me cry, so I tend to suffer in silence and after a while it leads to an even worse outcome. I get more and more discouraged and it becomes harder to defeat evil on the spiritual battlefront.
We Become Stagnant
This is, by far, the most dangerous of things that happens to us when we become isolated. It starts out so small that we don’t even notice it and by the time that we do (if we do) we’ve already let down our guard. The moment you become stagnant is the moment you put down your sword, that is the word of God. Just like discouragement, it starts out small. It could be something as small as forgetting to read a daily devotional and then the devotional doesn’t get picked back up again for days. It could be as big as not logging on to the live service one Sunday because it’s just not suiting your fancy, and you’ll start going again once you’re physically able to, but once that day comes, you’re already used to staying at home on Sundays.
I didn’t realize how stagnant I’d become over the last two months. Yes, I had tried to write, but I was getting frustrated with it. I was getting discouraged and instead of calling someone in my congregation for support, I suffered alone in my own thoughts and disappointment in myself. My stagnation was also harder to recognize as I have been taking the last month to water a seed that I planted two years ago. In providing this person with bible verses and studying different areas of the bible with him over the last month, it was harder to recognize that I had stopped growing in my own walk. It wasn’t until this morning, when the doors were open to the church, and I almost didn’t go because I was tired from a weekend of house cleaning that I understood just how stagnant I had become. I realized in that moment I was under attack. I know if I have been, other Christians are being attacked the same way.
This is why it is so dire to find a church to call home. As important as it is to go and learn about God’s word and as important as it is to go to worship our creator, as a more mature Christian and as a baby, just taking their first steps in their walk with God, our church families are our cords. We hold each other together, we fight for each other, and we make sure that our brothers and sisters don’t lose their way in the darkness. And it is a family that I am proud to say I am apart of.