Perhaps you have heard someone say something like, “I love God, but I’m not really into church.” Or “I don’t need to go to church to worship God; it’s more of a private thing for me.”
There’s a common misconception, a common misunderstanding, that our faith is private. There’s confusion between a private faith and a personal faith.
Our faith is personal, but it’s not private. If faith is really personal, if it has personally transformed someone, then it’s definitely not private.
God has not only called a believer to Himself, but He has called others to Himself and He wants us to worship Him together.
So throughout Scripture we see God’s people gathering for worship. Throughout the Psalms we see the community of faith come together to worship (Psalm 95:1-2 for example). After Christ came, the early church gathered together to worship Him. Acts 2 describes the early Christians devoting themselves to the teaching of Scripture, gathering together and praising God together.
But why? Why is it important that we worship together? Why does a worship leader or worship pastor lead corporate gatherings? What’s the point?
First, our gathering shadows eternity.
In Psalm 150, there is a connection between praising God in the sanctuary and God being praised in the heavens. The command to praise Him in the heavens is being fulfilled today. The command is being lived out perfectly. He is praised perfectly and purely by the angels. He is praised perfectly by believers who have died.
When we gather to praise Him corporately, our gathering is a foretaste of the eternal gathering, where people from every tribe, tongue and nation will worship Jesus (Revelation 5:9-12).
Second, worship gatherings provide supernatural encouragement.
God values private worship, the worship we offer Him through the course of our days, but God also greatly values the gathering of His people. It provides supernatural encouragement that’s not found anywhere else. God designed the faith to be communal. He designed the faith to be interdependent. There are supernatural things that He does in our hearts through the gathering of His people.
