Should Churches Meet Indoors Despite Government Restrictions?

Now that it's been almost a full year since coronavirus restrictions began, is it time for all churches to open up and begin meeting, even if it's in defiance of government orders? That's just one of the questions we'll be answering on today's edition of Core Christianity. Hi, this is Bill Meyer, along with Pastor Adriel Sanchez, and this is the radio program where we answer your questions about the Bible and the Christian life every day. And we would love to hear from you. If you've got a question for Pastor Adriel, you can call us right now at 833-THE-CORE.

That's 1-833-843-2673. You can also post your question on our Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter accounts. You can watch us on our YouTube channel. And of course, you can email us with your question at questionsatcorechristianity.com. Well first up today, we have a voicemail question from one of our listeners that came in earlier this week.

This is Richard from Sacramento. I just had a question about what churches can do during the pandemic. It's still gone on for a year now, and certain places have been open for a long time, and certain places there's still a lot of restrictions, and it's hard to know what to recommend all churches should do. But I guess I'm wondering, after such extended periods of time, is there coming a time when the church should just say, we're going to meet indoors and worship again, despite the restrictions and despite the advice and suggestions of certain civil authorities. And I'm wondering if that time is approaching soon, or what you would have to say about that. Thanks.

Hey Richard, I really appreciate your question. And this has definitely been a really difficult time for many churches, certainly has been a difficult time for our church, sort of navigating how to respond to the coronavirus pandemic, and what it looks like for us to shepherd the people of God well, to care for them, to care for the souls that have been entrusted to us. And I don't think that it's my job or the job of any individual pastor to tell all churches what they should be doing in response to a situation like this, because each individual church is governed, hopefully, by a group of elders, a plurality of elders who are called to care for that flock and make the wisest decisions for the good of the people there.

And the fact of the matter is, is we're all in different places, we all have a little bit of a different context, and so we have to be willing to exercise wisdom, patience. Early on, there were some really prominent pastors, I think, who were saying, we really need to just defy these government orders and start meeting indoors, no masks, no social distancing, that kind of a thing, and sort of spearheading this charge. And I spoke to a lot of pastors of smaller churches, congregations like the congregation that I pastor, who really had a hard time with this because the people in their church, especially the people who respected these prominent pastors, were made to feel like, oh, well, maybe my pastor is not being faithful, maybe we're not really worshiping God the way we're supposed to be worshiping God because we're meeting outside and we're observing this mask mandate or people are social distanced, that kind of a thing. What it did, tragically, was it helped to create frustration, confusion, even division within the church. And so again, I don't think it's the job of any individual pastor to say, here's what everyone needs to do because that assumes that you know what's best in each particular context.

And frankly, you don't. As a pastor, you have to exercise the wisdom that God has given you to care for the flock, the people that are in front of you, and to be obedient to God's word. And for us, we've continued to do that over the last several months, many months throughout this pandemic. It's been difficult and the circumstances of our worship have been made more difficult, but we're still able to glorify the Lord week by week. Now, there's a really important distinction, I think, that needs to be made here. And one of the things that this entire season has shown me is that there's a lot of confusion about worship in particular. There's a lot of confusion about the difference between the circumstances of our worship and the elements of our worship. You see, circumstances of worship has to do with where we're meeting. Are we meeting inside or outside? What time are we meeting at? Are we sitting in pews or seats?

You know, that kind of a thing. Those are all circumstantial pieces of worship. The elements of our worship are what make a worship service a worship service. Is the word of God being preached faithfully?

Are the ordinances that Jesus gave to the church being administered? Are we gathering together as the people to pray and to worship the Lord? Those are the elements of worship. Jesus made it very clear in John chapter four, when he spoke to the woman at the well, that Christian worship isn't relegated to a particular place.

It's not on this mountain or that mountain or in this building or that building. You can worship the Lord outside. You can be faithful. We can be faithful as pastors, worshipping the Lord, leading our congregations in worship, outside or inside. It really is up to each individual congregation as they navigate these mandates and what's best for their congregation to really come to a decision with a clear conscience before the Lord. I think of what the apostle Paul said, and I think this is an important word for all of us as we've been thinking about these things. In Romans chapter 12, verses 17 and 18, he said, �Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all, if possible, so far as it depends on you.

Live peaceably with all.� So don't just defy because you're inconvenienced or for the sake of defying, that kind of a thing. No, we're seeking to live peaceably with all men and to worship the Lord faithfully, and you can do that outside or inside. Again, let me just say, a church that worships outside and is observing mask mandates or social distancing is not less faithful because they're doing that. The question is, is Jesus Christ being preached? That's the primary question we need to ask ourselves, not, �Are we inside? Are we outside?� Is Christ being preached?

If He's not, whether you're inside or outside, God is not being honored and He's not being worshiped the way He needs to be worshiped. I think that has to be the priority, and we need to be patient with each other. Look, instead of putting pressure on one another as churches, let's pray for each other and try to help one another think wisely about what's best for each individual congregation in their context. So really appreciate your question, and that's how I would approach this issue. Good counsel. Richard, thanks so much for your question. Thanks for listening to Core Christianity. Here's the number. If you have a call for Pastor Adriel, it's 1-833-843-2673.

If you want to spell it out, it's 833-THE-CORE. Let's go to Kirsten, who is calling from Mineola, New York. Hi, Kirsten.

Welcome to Core Christianity. Hi. I believe he answered one of my questions last week and actually really helped a lot. Oh, awesome. I came across... Sorry.

No, I'm just glad to hear that, Kirsten. What's your question today? I was reading 1 John 4, and I saw that John exhorts us to test every spirit to see whether they're from God or not.

I've heard a lot of people using this phrase all the time, but I'm just a bit confused as to what this actually looks like. Yeah, really, really great question and important for us to parse this out. 1 John 4, John said, Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God. For many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God.

Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. First, what does John mean by test? He uses a Greek word here.

The word is dokimadzo, and it means to prove the genuineness of something. It's a sort of thorough examination. He gives us the test right there in the following verses. By this you know the Spirit of God.

In other words, here's the test. Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God. I think what John is highlighting for us here is that the spirit of the antichrist in the world today, you know what he wants to do more than anything else, is minimize the person and the work of Jesus Christ, his person.

First, who he is. That is, he is the eternal Son of God who came to earth for us and for our salvation. Those groups that minimize the person of Jesus, his deity, his true humanity. You think of the Jehovah's Witnesses, you think of the Mormons, you think of many who minimize the identity, the true identity of Jesus Christ by saying he's something other than what the New Testament tells us that he is, what the Bible reveals to us.

He's the God-man. But also his work, those who minimize what he came to do. Even that language there, again, by this you know the Spirit of God, every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh. Now, why did Jesus come?

Well, it was to do something, to live a perfect life in obedience to God's law as the second Adam so that we might have eternal life through his work and his atoning sacrifice for our sins. And so, people who deny the person of Jesus and the work of Jesus, that is the gospel, what he's accomplished for us, salvation by grace through faith. That's the spirit of the Antichrist.

He's minimizing those things. And the fact of the matter is, like John says here, he was at work then and he's at work today. That spirit, that sinister spirit is at work in the world today. And so we, brothers and sisters, each and every one of us needs to do what John says here, test the spirits and know who Jesus is and what he's come to do. Kirsten, thank you so much for your question.

May the Lord bless you. You're listening to CORE Christianity. And by the way, if you have a question for us and can't call during the program, you can always leave a voicemail message or go to our website and record a message right there.

Now, the program airs at eleven thirty a.m. Pacific time, twelve thirty Mountain, one thirty Central and two thirty Eastern Time. If you want to call in live again, the number is eight three three the core. Let's go to Michael calling from St. Louis, Missouri. Michael, welcome to CORE Christianity. Hello, sir.

I have a question. I am a born again believer. I love Jesus. But I have a passage of scripture that I'm struggling with in Second Samuel.

I think it's chapter eleven, I believe, but talks about David and Bathsheba. And I wonder how in the world this scripture say that he was a man after God's own heart when he was an adulterer and he was a murderer. And, you know, he did all these things. You know, I understand the scriptures, but I don't I can't correlate how that, you know, you know, the Bible says that he's a man after God's own heart, but he killed he killed a man after he.

Yeah. How do we how do we reconcile this, Michael? I mean, that's that that's that's what your question is. You know, last year, family Bible reading with my children, we were reading through First and Second Samuel and the kids were just you know, they were riveted as we're talking about the story of Saul and going through this whole thing. And then David and David was really this this hero, you know, the kids are cheering David on because as you said, David was a man after God's own heart. We read that in First Samuel chapter thirteen. And so David is is he's coming and he's going to be faithful to the Lord in the areas where Saul was unfaithful. He's going to pursue the Lord with all of his heart that kind of a thing. But then you get to Second Samuel chapter eleven.

And what happens here? You have this man who's described after as a man after God's own heart, committing adultery and murder. And when I read this story for my kids, they were shocked.

I mean, you should have seen the look on their faces because it's just like, how can this be? And one of the things that I love about the Bible, Michael, is it doesn't minimize the sinful humanity of people. The fact that everyone, every single quote unquote hero in the Old Testament failed miserably on many occasions. You think of Moses, you think of David, you think even in the New Testament, men like Peter who denied the Lord Jesus when Jesus was being crucified. But then even later in his life, you know, Paul talks about how he had to rebuke Peter in the book of Galatians.

And so all of these people, what we what we realize is, you know, what these people are, they're sinners. God, Michael, uses sinners. And even though David was a terrible sinner, he was still someone who repented, who turned to the Lord. Now, he needed a little bit of prodding, and that's why the prophet Nathan had to come to him. But you can read about David's repentance in Psalm 51. It really is this beautiful Psalm of repentance, where David basically outlines everything that was going on in his life. And then him calling to the Lord, Psalm 51, David, when Nathan the prophet went to him after he had gone into Bathsheba, verse one, Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love and according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions. You see, to be a man after God's own heart does not mean that you're perfect.

None of us is. Only Jesus was perfect. To be a man or a woman after God's own heart means we turn from our sins. We know we're sinners, and we go to the Lord and we cry out to him and we say, Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love, blot out my transgressions. And I think that's why the scripture can faithfully speak to David as a man after God's own heart. Now again, one of the things I think that we see here, brother, is that all of these heroes in the Old Testament are people that we're not ultimately called to put our trust in, just like we're not called to put our trust in pastors and church leaders today. We're called to put our trust in the only perfect person to ever live, Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

And so that's where our focus is. And all of these people, David, Moses, the other quote unquote heroes of the Old Testament, you think of Samson, they point us forward to Jesus, to the need, you think of David in particular, the need of a perfectly righteous king who was going to come and care for his sheep, protect them, guard them, and live in perfect purity. David was not that perfect king, but Jesus Christ is. And so we worship him and we draw near to him.

And I really appreciate your question, brother, because I know that there is this great tension, you know, we read about these heroes and we think, you know, how can this be? But the reality is they were sinners, and so are we. And so we cry out to the Lord and say, as David did in Psalm 51, wash me thoroughly from my iniquities and cleanse me from my sin. We do that every day, and that's what it means to pursue the Lord.

Michael, thanks so much for your question. And boy, Adriel, the key is repentance, isn't it? I mean, if we make a mistake, even a terrible mistake, even a terrible sin, like David did, the fact is that he in his heart was repentant and fell on his face before God. And that's what we need to do when we blow it.

Yeah, that's right. Not to minimize our actions or to pretend like we are perfect. You know, I think that's another thing that we see here with all of these stories in the Old Testament bill is that God uses sinners. Now, that doesn't justify their sin. That doesn't make it okay.

We don't minimize it. We identify it, we call it what it is, and then we repent of it. We return from it. And so there is something that really here gives us, I think, each of us hope, knowing that the Lord can use us despite the fact that we fail. And throughout the Scriptures, you see that over and over again. You're listening to Core Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez, and today we have something very special to offer you, especially if you are a new listener to Core Christianity. It's called our Core Kit. Yeah, the Core Kit is basically a kit of introductory material that will help you understand what it is that we're doing here at Core Christianity, and it will really bless you. It will edify you. It will build you up in your faith.

We have articles that we want to put in your hands. The most popular questions that we get on a day-by-day basis answer to those questions, and also a DVD teaching series by Dr. Michael Horton and Nancy Guthrie, Bible teacher, that really focuses on our purpose here on earth. If you're someone who struggles searching for meaning in life, you know, why am I here?

What does God have for me? This resource will be really good for you, especially this teaching series on this CD, because it's all about the story of God and how we fit into that story, how we're brought into that story through Jesus. And so get a hold of this resource, the Core Kit. We'd love to send that to you, and all you have to do is go to our website at corechristianity.com forward slash kit. Again, corechristianity.com forward slash kit to sign up. And you can also call us for that resource or any one of our resources at 833-843-2673.

That's 833-The Core. Let's go to Joshua from Orlando, Florida. Joshua, welcome to Core Christianity. Good afternoon, pastors. Thank you.

Thank you for taking my call. I just want to say I'm a little nervous to ask this question. I don't want this to come off the wrong way. I'm not trying to be condescending.

This isn't a ha gotcha question. I'm just I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. I believe that Jesus is Lord, and I just want to have a better understanding of the scriptures to help me with my walk with God. And my question is a it's a contextual question that I have here in the book of Matthew. So in the beginning of Matthew, it traces the ancestry from Abraham all the way down through the line of Judah through King David, until we all get down to Joseph, who ends up being the father, or the husband of the Virgin Mary.

And I actually have my Bible here in front of me. From from the top, this is the record of the ancestor of Jesus, the Messiah, descendant of David and of Abraham. Now I understand from the Old Testament, the prophets had prophesied that the Messiah would come through a specific genealogy through God's people. And we get here to a believe it is verse 18. This is how Jesus the Messiah was born, his mother Mary was engaged to be married to Joseph. But before the marriage took place, while she was still a virgin, she became pregnant through the power of the Holy Spirit. Joseph to whom she was engaged was a righteous man and did not want to disgrace her publicly.

So we decided to break the engagement quietly. And then So if your question, how can Jesus be from the line of David if Joseph wasn't his biological father? Yes. Okay.

Yeah. Now I really appreciate your question. And honestly, just the way you asked that question, and I want to be able to encourage you and just say, man, I love that you are digging into the word and that you want answers to these very specific questions. I think that's what we have to do as we're studying the scripture and there's something that confuses us. The typical approach I think that's been given by scholars with that question in particular and theologians is simply that legally he was the son of Joseph and therefore as the son of Joseph still heir to the Davidic throne. And of course, in the Old Testament, we were talking about David earlier, the man after God's own heart who sinned grievously, but you had this promise given to David, essentially the Davidic covenant in 2 Samuel 7 where God promised to put an heir on his throne forever, this king who was going to rule essentially the whole world. And you see this expanded in places like Psalm chapter two where God talks about the king that he's established on his holy hill who's going to rule over the whole world. And so the reason that Matthew is focusing here in particular on that part of the genealogy is because he's showing us that Jesus is that divine king who has come in the lineage of David. Yes, he was not David's biological offspring because Mary was a virgin. We're told in Luke chapter one that the Holy Spirit overshadowed her and she was found with child by the Holy Ghost. I think it's Luke chapter one verse 35, but he was still legally the son of Joseph and as the legal son of Joseph, he was the rightful heir to the Davidic throne.

Now what does that mean? It means that Jesus is the great king who rules over the whole world. He's ascended into heaven at the right hand of the father.

We see this in Acts chapter two in particular. And right now, Joshua, he rules over the church. He subdues us to himself by his word and spirit. He defends us by his gospel, by his grace. He is the great king that was prophesied about way back in second Samuel chapter seven and in Psalm chapter two. It really is, I think, just this beautiful picture. But again, the key there is he's Joseph's legal son, even though he's not Joseph's biological son, he's Joseph's legal son and therefore the heir to the Davidic throne. I love the fact that Joshua really dug into God's word there and that's a great question I think a lot of people have.

Yeah, it really is a great question. And frankly, that's what we want right now more than anything, isn't it? A king, a just ruler who's going to care for us. And we have that in Jesus Christ, a king who laid down his life for the forgiveness of all of our sins. Thanks for listening to CORE Christianity. To request your copy of today's special offer visit us at corechristianity.com and click on offers in the menu bar or call us at 1-833-843-2673. That's 833-THE-CORE. When you contact us, please let us know how you've been encouraged by this program and be sure to join us next time as we explore the truth of God's word together.