Insufficient

Like so many others, our church is closed for Sunday services these days. Like so many others, we have an online service to watch. So, last week and this week, people gather at our house -- less than the maximum allowed -- to join with us to worship ... online.

Is this the next big thing? Are we looking at a church revolution or evolution? Will the church become a remote location? I don't think so.

Virtual Church is not a thing. The concept of "church" is a "one another" thing, an assembling together for fellowship (Heb 10:25) for those "one another" things like encouraging one another (Heb 10:25) and stimulating one another to love and good deeds (Heb 10:24) and such. Lots of that. In Acts, they met "house to house" (Acts 2:46) which expanded to "church to church" today, but it has always been understood that "gathered" never meant "virtually." (I mean, come on, how do we "Greet one another with a holy kiss" (Rom 16:16; 1 Cor 16:20; 2 Cor 13:12; 1 Thess 5:26; 1 Peter 5:14) online?) VR -- virtual reality -- is not reality; it is "almost like reality." In the same sense, virtual church is not church; it can only be a temporary and incomplete approximation.

This last week CNN did a story about an 11-year-old who lost his grandfather on March 2, came home from the funeral to find his school had closed, and faced a birthday on March 22 without a birthday party. So a local woman organized a caravan of well-wishers to drive by with signs and songs and such to cheer the boy and ease his hard times. Very nice story. Very thoughtful. Lots of good things. But what it was not was a birthday party. It's the same today. We have to make allowances for crises and temporarily find other means to virtually gather, but let's not confuse virtual with actual. Like husbands in Afghanistan keeping in touch with their wives at home via remote video, it's an approximation, but when the distance ends, they won't keep that up. This cannot become the norm because virtual church is insufficient for God's intention for the gathering of believers. This, too, shall pass.