Article by Adriel Sanchez, pastor of North Park Presbyterian Church, a congregation in the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). In addition to his pastoral responsibilities, he also serves the broader church as a contributor on the White Horse Inn radio program. He and his wife Ysabel live in San Diego with their three children.(original source here)

It has been in vogue for the past few years to talk about “gospel-centrality.” I don’t know about you, but I appreciate the language. Having experienced churches that had a very truncated view of the gospel (i.e., the gospel is something that only relates to your conversion, but not to the rest of your Christian life), I’m refreshed by the fact that churches have been emphasizing the sanctifying power of the work of Jesus.

A gospel-centered church is a church which focuses primarily on Christ’s work. It recognizes that Jesus’ priestly ministry doesn’t just relate to our justification (the act of our being made right in God’s sight), but to every aspect of our salvation. In gospel-centered churches, we’re continually reminded of God’s initiative and action toward us, what some theologians have called, “redemption accomplished.” It’s this good news that creates and sustains the church.

Here are three fruits of a gospel-centered community:

1. Gospel-Centered churches produce humility.
Throughout the Bible, God condemns pride. The arrogant person makes himself God’s enemy (Js. 4:6). Sadly, pride is a weed that can grow in our own hearts if we aren’t careful to cut it down. Moralistic churches often water our pride because they focus on human achievement. When we think we’re living up to God’s standards, we start looking down on others whom we deem less obedient than ourselves (Lk. 18:11). Ironically, we can even grow arrogant in our theological learning (1 Cor. 8:1). The gospel is like God’s heavenly weed whacker, shredding our pride to pieces as it reveals to us how desperately we fall short of God’s standard. We need more than just a little bit of assistance here and there; we need God to come to earth and fix the job we have botched.

Gospel-centered churches ought to produce radically humble disciples because the focus is always on our need and God’s great grace. Since the solution lies outside of us, we have no reason to be proud in ourselves. This is precisely what Paul was getting at when, after discussing God’s free justification of sinners, he wrote, “Then what becomes of our boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? By a law of works? No, but by the law of faith” (Rom 3:27).

2. Gospel-Centered churches produce diversity.
Sadly, this fruit of the gospel is much rarer than it should be in our churches. Oftentimes today we walk into a church and find an affinity group rather than a gospel-built community. Here’s what I mean: in many of our churches, what brings us together isn’t primarily Jesus and his gospel, but shared interests. This is what Mark Dever and Jamie Dunlop call “gospel-plus community” in their helpful book The Compelling Community. We’re here because of Jesus—plus the fact that we’re all white-collar professionals, or lower-income Hispanics, or millennials who listen to Head and the Heart. We have to understand that our churches will always become affinity groups by default unless we talk about the implications of the gospel for forming diverse communities. The gospel doesn’t speak to one demographic; it speaks to sinners. Sin doesn’t discriminate and neither does Jesus.

When the gospel is central to the life of the church, it should attract people from all walks of life and all cultural backgrounds. This is a fruit we should strive to see in our local churches because it’s such a powerful depiction of what the good news of Jesus is capable of. No one is surprised when a bunch of friends sit down for a meal; everyone is surprised when two people with nothing in common—indeed, people who had even harbored hostility toward each other—sit down to break bread. Among Jesus’ first disciples you had one guy who wanted to terrorize the government (Simon the Zealot) along with a corrupt official who had been colluding with the government (Levi the tax collector). Mortal enemies by the world’s standards, they were brought into Jesus’ church to serve side-by-side. When the world tastes this sweet fruit of the gospel, they’ll have a hard time denying its power.

3. Gospel-Centered churches are welcoming toward sinners.
Gospel-less churches don’t know what to do with sinners. So many of us have experienced this type of church that we’re curious about whether it’s safe to be ourselves around other Christians.

A pastor in Germany named Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote, “The pious fellowship permits no one to be a sinner. So everybody must conceal his sin from himself and from the fellowship. We dare not be sinners. Many Christians are unthinkably horrified when a real sinner is suddenly discovered among the righteous. So we remain alone with our sin, living in lies and hypocrisy” (Life Together, p. 110).

We live in a merit-based world where people can’t be honest about their failures. This culture sometimes seeps into the church, and we can have a “pious” fellowship that’s ultimately built on pretending. The gospel breaks through this fake piety and allows us to be honest with each other about our failures. It allows us to bring our sins into the light because Christ’s blood can cleanse us and remove our shame. When we stop pretending we’re perfect, we become a people who welcomes sinners instead of looking on them with an “us vs. them” mentality. We are them, who have been mercifully washed by Jesus. Building a culture of transparency and dependence on the gospel helps other sinners see that there’s a God who isn’t afraid of them.

Article by David Mathis (original source here)

The final frontier of biological research is still the enigmatic human brain. And at the cutting edge of recent study has been this phenomenon we call “habits.” One important finding has been what researchers and popularizers call “keystone habits” — simple, but catalytic new routines that inspire other fresh patterns of behavior.

Take, for example, the habit of drinking more water daily. A little intentionality here might lead to making better food choices, and may even help inspire exercise. For some, quitting smoking is a keystone habit that starts a domino effect of good lifestyle changes. For others, simply forming the habit of putting on running shoes in the morning leads to walking for exercise, then light jogging, and eventually to becoming a full-fledged regular runner.

Find the right keystone, and you could unleash a string of good habits in your life.

Keystone for Christians?
While I cannot commend one keystone habit that will make the difference for every believer, I do want to speak up on behalf of one weekly habit that is utterly essential to any healthy, life-giving, joy-producing Christian walk: corporate worship. And it is all too often neglected, or taken very lightly, in our day of disembodiment and in our proclivity for being noncommittal. In fact, I do not think it is too strong to call corporate worship the single most important habit of the Christian life.

We may think it’s a new temptation today to play fast and loose with corporate worship, but the book of Hebrews gives another impression. Actually, speaking of habits, Hebrews 10:24–25 is the only use of the word “habit” in our English translations of the New Testament.

Let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near. (Hebrews 10:24–25)

By clearly delineating a bad habit that we must not develop — “neglecting to meet together” — Hebrews is also making clear what good habit we should cultivate, and feed: meeting together. Today’s temptation to underestimate the importance of the weekly assembly is as old as the church itself. And yet, the great irony is that the habit of meeting together with Christ’s people to worship him is utterly crucial for the Christian life.

But why? What is it about corporate worship that would lead us to think so highly of this as a habit to make — and to suspect for some that this may indeed be the keystone habit they desperately need for life-change?

Why Corporate Worship Is Critical
The reason corporate worship may be the single most important Christian habit, and our greatest weapon in the fight for joy, is because like no other single habit, corporate worship combines all three essential principles of God’s ongoing supply of grace for the Christian life: hearing his voice (in his word), having his ear (in prayer), and belonging to his body (in the fellowship of the church).

In corporate worship, we hear from God, in the pastor’s call to worship, in the reading of Scripture, in the faithful preaching of the gospel, in the words of institution at the Table, in the commission to be lights in the world. In corporate worship, we respond to God in prayer, in confession, in singing, in thanksgiving, in recitation, in petitions, in taking the elements in faith. And in corporate worship, we do it all together.

“God didn’t make us to live as solitary individuals. Neglecting corporate worship sows seeds of unbelief in our soul.”

God didn’t make us to live and worship as solitary individuals. Personal Bible meditation and prayer are glorious gifts and essential, not to be neglected or taken for granted. And they are appointed by God as rhythms for personal communion with him that thrive only in the context of regular communal communion with him.

Make It a Habit
Settle it now. Make it a habit. Corporate worship is too important to revisit each weekend and wrestle, Will I go this weekend, or sit this one out? If you leave it open-ended, as so many do, excuse after excuse will keep you from the storehouses of grace God loves to open in corporate worship. Over time your soul will become dry and shallow because of it. Neglecting to meet together will soon sow and nourish seeds of unbelief in your soul.

Decide now, and begin putting it as a pattern into your life, not to revisit the decision each weekend, and not to bow out on community group (or whatever other regular corporate gatherings are vital in the structure of your local church) because of lame, myopic excuses. Of course, unusual circumstances will arise, when you’re out of town, or at the hospital with a new baby, or something else manifestly restricting. But the sad truth is we are far too prone to give ourselves a pass on meeting together, when we really should have made it a habit ahead of time, entertaining only the rarest of exceptions.

Make it a habit. Corporate worship is too important to revisit each weekend and wrestle, “Will I go this Sunday?”

And just to be sure, the reason to make corporate worship a habit is not to check the box on perfect attendance, and not because corporate worship alone is enough to fully power the Christian life, and not because mere attendance in worship will save your soul. This is not a call for legalistic going-through-the-motions. The hope is not just to show up and be a shell.

Rather, this is a summons to harness the power of habit to rescue our souls from empty excuses that keep us from spiritual riches and increasing joy. Negligence and chronic minimizing of the importance of corporate worship reveal something unhealthy and scary in our souls. Let’s resist it with fresh resolve.

For our deep and enduring joy, there is simply no replacement for corporate worship.

Just in the last hour, the sermon that affected me more than any other I have ever heard was posted online. I was privileged to be in attendance when it was preached by Dr. Steve Lawson at the Shepherds Conference two weeks ago today. Perhaps it is just where I was at when I heard it and the Lord was dealing with me in a deep way – and perhaps others will not find it to be as equally impacting as I did – but this to me was so powerful that quite frankly, I wept through much of the sermon.

I believe your heart will soar in hearing this proclamation of the Lord Jesus in His full authority, power and glory. After the sermon, I just took time by myself to walk around outside, just thankful to have heard such a God honoring message… As I say, no sermon has affected me more than this one. What a Savior He is!

If (very soon) you can carve out 55 minutes of uninterrupted time to hear this, I believe it will do your soul MUCH good. The sermon is entitled “Christ – the Head of the Church.” You will find it both on audio and video at this link.

General Session 10 – Steven Lawson – Shepherds’ Conference 2018 from Grace Community Church on Vimeo.