Articles
“Do You Want to Help?”
“Do You Want to Help?”
One reason many people do not do more for the Lord is that they do not know how to really contribute to the upbuilding of the church. Let us give you here a few simple things by which you may be able to help the cause of Christ:
1. Be regular in attendance. You help the Lord’s work by your faithful presence. Your absence from the assembly hurts in a number of ways.
a. It is discouraging to the other members who want and need the fellowship and exhortations of every member.
b. It is discouraging to the preacher. He spends hours each week in preparing lessons to help members go to Heaven. Your absence means that you cannot be the recipient of the work he has done.
Consider again these words: “Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.” (Heb. 10:23-25, NKJV)
2. Join in the singing. Wholehearted, joyous singing is one of the greatest means of worship to God and of encouraging one another. It hurts a service for us to sit and look around not singing at all or singing half-heartedly. Join in enthusiastically.
Remember: “speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord” (Eph. 5:19, NKJV).
3. Give as you have received from God. Remember that Jesus loved you and gave His all. Think of the great work that can be done by this church as it is enabled by every member giving as prospered. Remember: “On the first day of the week let each one of you lay by in store, as God has prospered him” (1 Cor. 16:2).
4. Be an encourager — not a critic! Words of criticism discourage and hinder. If you ever must criticize, be sure that you do so with the proper spirit and proper information and to the proper person!
5. In short, to build up the church: attend it up, teach it up, sing it up, pray it up, pay it up, live it up, and never give it up.
Forrest D. Moyer, August 1993
The Noun and the Verb
As is often said, words mean things. How we phrase what we say and what exactly we mean by it is also meaningful. This is quite evident in our “religious talk.”
We can use the same terminology yet mean something very different by the words. For example, one might say, “I’m going to worship.” That is a biblical phrase (see Acts 24:11). Yet here is an important question: is the person using “worship” as a noun or a verb? What’s the difference in terms of one’s intentions?
If one says, “I’m going to worship,” using worship as a noun, then he means that he is going to a place where worship is supposed to happen. In that sense, one can “go to worship” and yet not really worship personally, for he might be going “to worship” as a spectator. He didn’t really worship; he just watched others worship. If one just sits there without truly participating, he has only gone “to worship” in the noun sense.
On the other hand, if one means “worship” as a verb, then he means that he is going to actively participate in worshiping God (going in order to worship God). It should be clear that when Paul said he was going to Jerusalem to worship, he didn’t mean that he was going to a place in order to sit and watch others do it. His intent was to actively worship God. While “worship” can be used as a noun (cf. Rom 9:4), our intent ought always to be the active participation in worshiping God.
The same might be said about “church,” a word (better, ekklesia) that is used in Scripture to mean an assembly or congregation. If one says, “I’m going to church” (and I realize that’s not a phrase many like), that could mean going to a place (the building) or going in order to assemble with God’s people. Which do you think more closely fits the biblical concept?
The difference between the noun and the verb says much about our own concepts. That should make us think about what we mean we speak such common phrases because it says so much about our intent. Do I intend to sit and watch or do I intend to actively participate?
Doy
