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A spell of Coronavirus can give you a fresh appreciation for the church.  We now know what the psalmist meant when he said, “My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the Lord!” (Ps 84).  In church-loving Zambia, “No church!” was a most unwelcome antiviral prescription.  And as the churches have gradually re-opened, you may hear the sound of celebration in the air: “Takwaba Uwalingana Na Yesu!”

For me it’s just the ingrained habit — one of those embedded lifelong traditions we accrue — of getting up on the Lord Day, finding some appropriate garb, and going off to the House of God to meet with your fellow-believers and friends, to “worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness,” as the psalmist says. There is something about that shared event that one just hates to lose — online church notwithstanding!

“I miss sacred space,” said one man, when answering a recent questionnaire about churches in lockdown. Ah, sacred space.  Very special territory. 

“I miss the silent time before anything begins,” said another, who was used to entering his cool cathedral a half hour before the invocation.  So much for programming!  “The cool scented air, the quiet, the colours streaming in from the windows and the smiles of friends…It is a few minutes of changing from ‘world time’ to ‘God time,’ of feeling my muscles relax, my breath slow down, and my mind open to Jesus.”

“I miss the singing,” said another…“that wonderful sound of shared spiritual life you find nowhere else.”

“I miss the hands of my Christian family,” said another.  “The hands and the hugs.”  Karl Vaters writes in Christianity Today, “Yes, it’s true that we are the church. That’s what matters most. But it’s becoming ever more clear that the going part is a very close second. … I miss the gathering. What a celebration it will be when we’re gathered again” (April 6).

Times like these remind us that we have often taken the church for granted.  Now we have opportunity to appreciate it afresh and even truly long to be there. How blessed we are, when you think of it. What a blessing to have freedom of worship week by week!  In this troubled world full of underground believers, many with only the faintest hope of ever being “the church gathered?”  We should cherish these things till death do us part. 

Mind you, not everybody is missing the church.  “I don’t miss church,” says one woman who was “pretty lonely in church … I’ve never felt that loneliness with online church.” Though she was busy and interactive in “real church,” she felt that most programs and activities were not really designed for her, and that her relationships were largely superficial (Spectrum, April, 2020).

  Another speaks of the all-consuming programming of church life.  “When did church became so busy?,” she asks.  “Is this highly orchestrated approach yielding better results?”  She laments that it took a pandemic for her to discover “how lavishly restful” the Day of Rest can be.  “But now that it has a slower pace and a delightful quietness, I don’t want to surrender them so easily!  Why can’t our worship,” she asks, “be conducive to rest?”

Brett McCracken of The Gospel Coalition calls on the church to “hit the pause button” during these Coronavirus days and revisit our raison d’etre.  What are the essentials? In his article, “Coronavirus is the Death of Consumer Christianity” (Christian Living, April 7), he says, “Coronavirus has rapidly taken away the excesses of church, all the bells and whistles, all the ‘nice-to-haves’ we’ve come to see as ‘must-haves.’ What remains are bare essentials: Jesus, the Word, community, prayer, singing. What remains is the reality that the church can never be vanquished.”

What a timely call!  Focus on the essentials!  It seems this is what the Coronavirus days are enabling us to do. Jesus, the Word, community, prayer, singing.  We might add, “the Holy Spirit at work.” These great essentials are why we miss church.  They make up the ballast that keeps life from going hollow. 

And so, when Alvin Slaughter raises the question in his great song, “Are You One of the Worshipers?” I’m quick to answer, “By all means! Let the worshipers be gathered again!”

“The Father is seeking for those who come with a pure heart

He’s seeking for those who will come and gladly take part

He’s looking for those unashamed to fall down on their face

He’s looking for those who will bow down and ask for mercy and grace

Are you one?

Are you one of the worshipers?”