[date]
Dear ________,
Meeting with you [recently] was a great blessing to me. It is encouraging to see how ardently you have kept reading the Word, listening to Bible teachers, and witnessing to others since I last saw you about _____ years ago. . . .
I believe you said you hadn’t really been part of any church for about two years now. That really weighs on me because I am concerned both for the well-being of the churches and for your own soul. By a biblical standard, being a vital member of a local church is quite indispensable, and becoming a voluntary church drop-out is a cause for grave concern. In Hebrews 10, it is mentioned as one of the marks of falling away from Christ Himself. I recommend your careful consideration of the whole surrounding context for a deeper understanding of them, but here are two important verses by themselves:
24And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works:25 Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching (Heb 10.24-25).
Two things here are both apposite and opposite: personal ministry and forsaking church meetings.
Positively, we are urged to “consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works,” and what amounts to the same thing, “exhorting one another,” especially as “the day [is] approaching” (i.e., the Day of the Lord, that Judgment Day we talked about when Christ returns from heaven). These Christian duties are not optional for the believer. Failure to carry on continually this loving ministry of considering, provoking, and exhorting is sin.
Negatively, the Christian readers are warned against “forsaking the assembling of ourselves together.” It is assumed that they are already in the habit of assembling themselves; otherwise, forsaking it in the future would not be possible. The whole New Testament in general assumes that Christians are attending members of a local church, and that this religious, personal attendance upon the public worship on the Lord’s Day (i.e., Sunday), with its teaching and learning of the apostles’ doctrine, its fellowship, its participation in the Lord’s Supper, its audible praises in songs and prayers, and its financial giving, are expressions of their sincere Christian faith. Note the patterns of worship in Acts 2:42 and 1 Corinthians 16.2:
42And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers (Acts 2.42).
2Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come (1 Cor 16.2).
Hebrews 10.24-25 is stressing that the kind of “considering, provoking, and exhorting” ministry it has in view is really quite impossible apart from faithful, persistent assembling with other Christians in the context of a local church. This personal, informal ministry of each faithful Christian is not only something she can do for others’ benefit, but in a real church with real Christians, it is a benefit we receive from our fellow church members.
We need to keep up spiritually-intimate accountability relationships in the context of a well-ordered church to keep our fickle hearts from leaving our first love, even Christ Himself.
One more point I would make from these verses in Hebrews. Voluntarily dropping out of church meetings is tantamount to apostasy (falling away) from Christ. This apostasy is a very dominant concern of the whole letter/sermon of Hebrews, as those very familiar with its whole content know very well. Even the immediate context of these two verses make that very apparent, because the next two verses give a warning which is nothing less than terrifying to a true believer:
26For if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, 27But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries (Heb 10.26-27).
Do you see that in the mind of the writer of Hebrews, forsaking the assembling of ourselves together is one visible manifestation of sinning willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth?
Dear, dear ______, have you ever stopped to think that if all Christians were to imitate your pattern in the last two years, there would be no churches at all? Pastors like me could not carry on a ministry as we do because we would have no fellow worshipers, no hearers, and no helpers in this great spiritual work.
My precious sister in the Lord (that is how I regard you), when was the last time you remembered the Lord Jesus Christ in His holy Supper, taking that symbolic bread into your mouth and raising that sacred cup to your lips, to the praise of His once-for-all sacrifice that saves His people? How can you possibly be satisfied to deprive yourself of the spiritual benefit that comes to those who attend upon these biblical ordinances and instruments of God’s grace to our souls?
Christians generally have understood these things about the importance of being a vital part of a local church for centuries. For example, the 1689 London Baptist Confession
of Faith says,
All believers are bound to join themselves to particular churches, when and where they have opportunity so to do (XXVI.12).
But we live in a time when individualism is stressed so much that our living as part of the body of Christ that gathers each Lord’s Day is considered strictly optional. The “electronic church” is no substitute for the flesh-and-blood relationships of a local church. We need you and you need us!
One more thing you said draws forth my comment in this letter. You testified to me that you have never, ever doubted your salvation, that you have always had great assurance of salvation, or something to that effect. Certainly we should seek and prize the great blessing of a well-founded, biblical assurance. I am wondering if you ever seriously examine yourself with an open mind to consider, with Judgment Day honesty, whether you really are “in the faith,” as Paul exhorts us,
5Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates? (2 Cor 13:5).
Here’s another translation of the same verse:
5Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!
Do you routinely examine yourself spiritually? Do you really test yourself concerning “whether you are in the faith,” i.e., whether you are saved? If so, doesn’t your voluntary abandonment of meeting with fellow Christians for worship each Sunday make you wonder what is wrong with you spiritually? I grant that you may be truly saved; I hope and trust that you are. But surely you are not very healthy spiritually while you continue in disobedience to these directives from Christ revealed in His Scriptures. I call you to a sober, prayerful, self-examination in the light of Scripture, and I pray for your repentance in these crucial areas of living as a Christian in fellowship with other Christians.
Now I have no idea whether it would be God’s will for you to come to [the church where I am a pastor]. Scripture does not require that of you. But I do know it is God’s will for you to attach yourself in faith and humility and in a commitment of worship and support to an evangelical church somewhere. So I exhort you to do that promptly. Of course I welcome you warmly to visit us in ________. Bring your husband if you will; I would love to meet him. Also, consider how you can do more in this regard to be a good example to him, that he might become truly saved.
Maybe I would not have been so bold to say these things to other people, but because you are a no-nonsense and straightforward person yourself, I am presuming that you will understand and appreciate my loving candor with you. I pray it may be so. Please let me hear from you soon, and let me hear good news of your Christian faith and love.
Your friend in Christ,
______________________