[290 words]
A man who had not attended one service of the church in four years told me he had never thought of quitting the church. I reminded him that he had: (1) Withdrawn his presence from the service; (2) Refused to give his moral support to the activities of the congregation; (3) Withdrawn his financial support, for he had not given one dime to help carry on the Lord’s work.
Then I asked “What else would you have to do in order to ‘quit’ the church? As the truth stared to dawn upon him, his expression reflected sober thoughts. He replied, “Why, Bro. Nichols, I’ve already quit, haven’t I? Well, I surely didn’t mean to! And I don’t know when I did it. I’m coming back.” He did too. At the next service, he was restored and three years later, he was still faithful.
Dear reader, how about you? Have you quit the Lord and His church without resolving to do so? Perhaps no one deliberately decides to quit, but many carelessly drift into backsliding. If you quit attending services, quit boosting the program of activities planned by the elders and quit giving as God has prospered you to enable the congregation to meet its budget, you need to be restored.
People rarely plan to leave the Lord. Instead of it being a conscious decision, it usually happens through inattention to Bible study, to prayer. to worship, to working in the Lord’s church, etc. You may have already quit the church and you didn’t even realize it. It was with this possibility in mind that the writer of Hebrews wrote, “Therefore, we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it” (Hebrews 2:1).
Gus Nichols (1892-1975)
via San Augustine Church of Christ
San Augustine, TX