“There will be a Youth, Men and Women’s Fellowship meetings
on Monday evening at 7.30pm. The Singing Band and Choir will meet on Tuesday
and Thursday at 6pm and Saturday at 5.30pm. There will be the usual mid week
service on Wednesday at 6.30pm. On Friday there will be an all night service
from 10pm. On the same Friday, we will have our morning prayers from 8am. From
Monday to Friday there will be the usual morning devotions from 5am each day.’
Now what is amusing, or rather confusing about such an
innocent church announcement, aptly delivered by the Steward? The times spent
at the Church by virtue of such meetings had never hit me until this Sunday
when, in fact, the preaching had centered on how family units should endeavor to
spend time together, how parents should spend time with their children despite
the heavy work schedules now and how bad it will be for parents to chase all
the money in the world and still lose the discipline of their children.
Imagine a family of five. The man is in the Men’s
Fellowship. The wife is in the Women’s Fellowship. One child is in the Youth
Fellowship, two are in the Choir and the other is in the Singing Band.
Seriously, parents in these times have a lot of job with
little time. They have to ensure they work hard and make money to be able to
educate their children and take care of their livelihood. They work from
morning to late, generally and the few times they get to spend with the
children are mainly an hour or two in the evenings, between when they get home
and when the children go to sleep. Now a lot of these meetings are spread to
cover almost every available time within the week. And this is where my issue
begins.
We all know times are hard. We need to work. We need to pay
bills. You cannot go to church and have peace from not being asked to give
money, if not for a building project then for something else and this is
different from the usual offertory. Paying tithes is a must as well.
My humble point, for which I have typed all these words is
this- can the churches put all these meetings together and hold them on one
day, one evening? Cant all these meetings be held on a Wednesday evening and
crowned with the mid week service to last less than an hour? We all are aware
of the difficulties we are faced with in these times. A parent staying at home
to care for their children is gradually becoming alien. I am not saying the
church is the main course for some of these issues of parents not spending much
time with the children. Am saying that the church should try and centralize and
synchronize all activities so that aside Sundays and Saturdays, parents and
children will spend just about another day or two at church. At the end of the
day, prayers and salvation are seriously an individual affair. Right or wrong?
And do not forget, when it is time for harvests and project appeals, you dare
not say you lost your job or that you do not have money. It will be squeezed
from you!
hhhmmm swt u do hve a point there inasmuch as i agree with u to some extent, sometimes i understand why it is like that. thinking about it from a spiritual perspective there are lots of dangerous grounds built in our world by the enemy nd christians must always be armed. I don't think if christians had a community to themselves where they have easy access to each other to share and fellowship,the church would have been callin us back to its premises all through the week. But we are so apart and the devil is taking dat as an advantage to destroy the church.This world we live in is temporary and the things we do to get ourselves busy will fade away. The families we have our temporary the real family is our fellow christan. The church will prefer to have its members in its premises doing things that will enhance their lives and talents for God than be left idle for the devil to play tricks on. Humanly thinking, yes, it is sometimes too much but because God himself knows the devil to be smarter than us, he prefers we strive to always be together to learn and strengthen each other so we dnt fall prey to the plans of the devil.If we try to also develop ourselves and become strong spiritually to stand against the pressures of this world, then I think the God himself will give us some days off for oursleves and family but since that doesn't look like its gonna happen soon, we should jus take the opportunity and rather than goin alone, we all go together as a family or also schedule a time for ourselves to have fun, devotion, pray and do something together. Hope i said something sensible...lol
ReplyDeleteHi. I do agree with you to an extent. but then again it is your opinion. :-)
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