Can I Be A Christian Without Going To Church?

Here in America we often hear people say, “I don’t have to go to church to be a Christian!”  Or, “All I need is the Bible!”  In a perfect world, I might agree with you… but we don’t live in a perfect world, do we?  During biblical times and in many cultures today, the idea of being a lone ranger Christian is a foreign concept for good reasons.  In this post I want to talk about why being part of a church family is vital to spiritual growth.  When we think of family, we typically think of our blood relatives.  In this post I would like to talk about how we are also called to be part of a spiritual family.

Need For Accountability

For me personally, I have never had the drive to read my Bible or live out the Christian life without a community of people encouraging me to do it.  The truth is, I am lazy unless I am held accountable…  That is one reason I went to seminary.  I didn’t need an MDiv to do what I wanted to do because I was already doing it.  I just knew I wanted to learn a lot of things, but didn’t have the drive to learn them without a professor holding me accountable. 

On another note, when it comes to what I say or do, and how I live, I am very much influenced by those who I’m around most.  When I was in college, there was a time when I spent most of my time with people that were not a very good influence on me.  I had no Christian community at the time encouraging me to grow in my relationship with Christ. So instead I grew in my relationship with the world…

Church As Family

American individualism says, “All you need is yourself!”  The Bible says, “You need the church!”  When I say this, I do not mean what tends to come to mind when we hear the word church; I don’t mean a white building with a steeple where we sing songs and hear a sermon at on Sunday mornings.  What I mean is we need the people inside of the church.  Church isn’t a Sunday morning event or a Wednesday night Bible study.  Church is a people… it is a family.  We are called to do life together, not attend events together. 

At my church we have groups called “Life Groups.”  Why do we call them that?  Because we want people to do life together.  It’s not just a Bible study one night a week, but the hope is that like the church in Acts 2:42-47, we would daily be there for one another, encouraging one another in the ways of God.  When we are saved, we are saved to a new family.  That doesn’t necessarily mean we have to leave our blood family.  It just means that the church is meant to be our family too; it is a family to those who have no one else and it is a family to those who do.

Final Thoughts

So to bring things full circle… can you be a Christian without going to church on Sunday mornings?  Technically yes, we are saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ.  However, I highly doubt that anyone is actually capable of walking with Jesus without a family of believers coming alongside them spurring them on.  My encouragement to you today is simple… don’t try to do the Christian life on your own.  You will fail!  Find a church family to be part of and invest time not just on Sunday mornings, but seek to build relationships and do life with these people throughout the week.  That is what it means to be part of a church… church is family.