The Church Online: How Do We Gather Virtually?
It may well be the first time in many people’s lives that church has been suspended. The idea that the church, God’s people, wouldn’t meet on a Sunday strikes many Christians as odd and even a watching world notices the empty parking lots. There must be a child somewhere that believes God actually answered their prayers and is helping them miss out on a boring Sunday School teacher. In the midst of this COVID-19 outbreak, the Christian church is asking how do we remain faithful when we choose to not gather together in person on Sunday?
It is interesting to note that even the name of our gatherings—the church—should bring to mind a gathered people. Throughout Scripture, the word we translate as church is ekklesia, meaning “an assembly, community, gathering or congregation.” Church has never been about a building, but rather a people who have gathered together to know and praise our God. Even in Jesus’s day the synagogue, a place where Jewish people gathered weekly for prayers and the reading of Scripture, was the fertile soil in which God chose to start his new community, the church.[1]
From the very beginning, the Christian church was a gathered people. In one of the earliest descriptions of the early church in Acts 2:42–47, they had “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” In Acts 20:7 we see that the pattern had become standardized largely on the first day of the week (Sunday). By the time Paul is writing to the Corinthians, he can presume they are gathering weekly when he encourages them in 1 Corinthians 14:26 on what to do when they get together. The fact that this becomes standard is clear when the writer of Hebrews encourages his readers to “not neglect to meet together, as is the habit of some.” (Hebrews 10:24–25 ESV)
When Christians gather much happens. Our faith is fueled by the hearing of God’s word. “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17). Paul reminds Timothy to “devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture” (1 Timothy 4:13). There is also a special connection with your pastors who preach the word. They are commanded, like Timothy, to “preach the word” (2 Timothy 4:2), and to be like Paul who had declared “the whole counsel of God” to the Church in Ephesus (Acts 20:27). There is something distinct about hearing the word of God from the man/men who love you, know many of your struggles, difficulties, and doubts, and who know they will give an account for your soul (Hebrews 13:17). We are to offer prayers in the church (1 Timothy 2:8, 3:14–15). We are to let Scriptures dwell in us richly demonstrated by “singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in [our] hearts to God” (Colossians 3:16). And we are to see the Bible in action as we partake of the ordinances—baptism and communion. As Augustine would say, these are the “visible words” of Scripture and we celebrate them when we come together (1 Corinthians 11:17–34). Importantly, we get to encourage one another and stir each other up to love and good works through our meeting together (Hebrews 10:24–25).
The question then is: can we do this virtually? As is often the case, the answer is both yes and no.
It is amazing what technology can allow us to do these days! We can read Scripture with a friend in Brazil over the phone. We can pray with a group of people from Ethiopia, Colorado, and the UK over Zoom, Facetime or Google Hangouts. Pastors can comfort a sick person in quarantine without ever being exposed directly to the virus with the help of a smartphone, tablet, or computer. We can pop on our favorite worship song on Spotify or on YouTube and belt them out as loud as we want (because no one else is listening in the shower!). And most Christians we know have at least one copy of the Bible in their house if not multiple copies and versions.
Yet, for all the amazing advances, there are things we still can’t do with technology. Ask any military spouse and they will tell you Facetime is amazing on a six-month deployment, but it will never replace a hug or the presence of their loved one sleeping quietly (or even snoring) in the bed next to them. A friend’s encouraging word over the phone and their smile from the front step when they stop by unexpectedly are completely different.
Even at Table Rock Church, no size of Google Hangout plan can adequately let me connect with the variety of people and gifts we have on any given Sunday. The joy of singing praises to God with other people (good voices and bad!) always outweighs my best days under the shower nozzle. And the word of God preached to me with eye contact, visible passion, and the Holy Spirit can rouse my soul in ways that no podcast or video ever could.
Therein lies the difficulty. We want to use technology to help us stay connected with one another in a time apart, and we don’t want to expect the technology to do what it can’t. We take great comfort that where two or more (even several dozen) are gathered that God is there with them (Matthew 18:20), yet that doesn’t make that gathering the same as the church gathering. We don’t believe virtual means can ever replace the gathering of the church on Sundays in person, and we don’t want it to. But it can help us in many ways that are useful in times like our current concerns: it can help us connect, it can help us study Scripture with one another, it can help us pray well for one another, and much more.
During this season where we have suspended our Sunday services, we pray you will find our digital/virtual resources helpful. We do not intend to simulcast a typical Sunday service because we don’t think a virtual environment can actually simulate the multitude of ways we bless one another in that time. We do plan to give you more resources that we believe can help you in all the ways a digital environment can help. We pray this approach will do two things: 1) equip you the best we can during this season apart, and 2) leave you longing for the time when we can get back together. May those two goals be your prayer as well as we continue to press on into our Lord and Savior together, though apart. We are praying with you that this season would be exceptionally fruitful as we grow in our abilities to study, pray, and care for one another remotely and would we all pray that God would bring us all back together soon.
Praying with you and for you!
Ryan, Andrew, and Luke
[1] See Matthew 12:9; 13:5; Mark 1:21–29; 3:1; 6:2; Luke 4:16–38; 6:6; John 6:59.