What Fills You Up??

A couple of years ago, I asked our church leadership team, "Why we do church?"  Here was the common reoccurring response:  "We do 'church' on Sunday mornings (the corporate gathering) in an effort to be recharged.  We do it to plug in, to be filled up, so that as we go back out into 'the world,' we have a full tank."

Now, this full tank could either be poured out into others, or it could be used to simply "sustain" each individual until they gathered corporately again to have their tank filled once more. 

                                 

There are hundreds of blogs I could write about these responses, looking at the philosophy of 'church,' the theology of the gathered community of believers, etc... but I'm not going to do that in this blog.  Instead, I want to ask this question: "If church is a place to be recharged and to be refilled, then what fills you up?" What really gets you excited about your relationship with Jesus?  What makes you feel closest to Him?

Let's be honest with each other.  There are realistically only a select few who get "filled up" by singing songs as a group and then listening to a preacher talk for 25 minutes.  Those select few, bless their hearts, leave a Sunday morning time of gathered corporate worship having met with Jesus.  They leave refreshed and filled. 

But that is only a select few! 

What about the rest of us?  It is highly possible that just singing and listening are more draining than life-giving.  We leave with our tanks emptier than when we came.  Or, best case, we leave with the same levels in our spiritual tanks. 

So why do we keep practicing 'church' this way if – for the majority of people – it doesn't recharge us? 

What if – and this is a BIG "if" – what if our Sunday morning gatherings turned into a time where we shared how we had been filled up throughout the week?  What if, once we recognized how God created us to be recharged, we intentionally did that Monday-Saturday?  And then Sunday morning (without throwing out the preaching/teaching and corporate worship in song) became a time where we shared those filling times with others?  What if Sunday morning became a time where we spurred each other on in the ways we are filled?  Do you think we'd have a more effective witness to the world around us?  Do you think we'd be encouraged more, challenged more, more equipped to pray for others, and more ready to go out and do it again the next week? 

I realize these questions could take years to answer.  And I also realize there are a lot of other people out there who are smarter than me who have already written many books on these questions.  I'm just joining the conversation.

These are the things that roll around in my mind on a Monday morning, when sitting down for coffee with a dearly trusted friend at 6:15am.  I'm not ready to stop practicing the "church" the ways it has been practiced for the last countless years.  But I am wondering if we could do it better. 

So what fills you up?

Hebrews 10:24-25b "Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works.  And let us not neglect meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another....."