The Weakly

How did Jesus get His message to the people? The reason I ask is that we don’t tend to think about how Jesus did things. When I was in Bible College I took a lot of “deep” courses in theology but I never studied something as superficial as Jesus’ methodology. We never asked the “how” question. Seriously, what would He know about methods?

The greatest sermon ever spoken on this earth is the “Sermon on the Mount.” (Matthew 5-7) It takes about 10 minutes to say. It is the longest recorded sermon by Jesus. It isn’t really a sermon about listening, it is a sermon about “doing/being.” I get the distinct impression that Jesus expected the people to leave and figure out how to “do/be” these things. When they had this stuff lived out in their lives, they could come back for more. It wasn’t about getting their weakly “pep” talk. Interestingly enough, Jesus doesn’t indicate the requirement of attending the weakly sermon.

Why then do we have the “weakly”? I believe that the “idol” of the sermon has even replaced the higher value of love for one another. You can miss the former and be forgiven for the latter. But don’t continue to miss…

Did I say “idol”? Try being part of a traditional church and not be part of the weakly “pep” talk. You will only be a fringe observer at best. People will be sad for you that you have fallen from “grace”. They will sincerely desire that you come back into the fold. Some have even told me that I hate the church because I speak this way of “precious”. Even when I was studying 30-40 hours a week at Bible College, I would have been thrown out if I didn't show up.

It seems that the core mechanism of determining your true love for Jesus is that you “show” up for the “show”. I dare you to stop attending the Sunday “sermon” for six months (1 month would likely be sufficient) and see if you are considered a card carrying member of any traditional church. Can you be a “key” leader without attending? Could you live guilt free without it?

We would counsel recovering alcholics not to be around booze. How would you counsel a "weakly" addict? I know, only attend "bi-weakly."

You could do all of these things:
develop great friendships
have dynamic prayer times,
have in depth discussions centered on the Bible,
give all your money to the poor,
love your family with every fiber of your being.

But if you miss the weakly, without a note from mummy, people would think that you have missed out on serving Jesus.

Some have figured out how to do this. See my post, “Top 10 Ways to Not Sit Through the Sermon”. Nevertheless, I would say you could never be honest and declare that your allegiance is not to the “sermon.”

Could the weakly be an idol?

p.s. "weakly" is not spelled wrong