Why You Should Attend Sunday Evening Service (Part 1)

I want to begin by getting the disclaimers out of the way. Yes, I know that Sunday evening services are not required for entry into heaven. Yes, I know that attending Sunday evening services does not prevent people from being hypocrites. And, yes, I am fully aware that a 6 o’clock worship time is not explicitly mandated in the New Testament. I also know that these disclaimers are true about much, if not most, of what we do in our Christian lives. There are good and wise things to do as a Christian that don't make you a Christian. So the very good reasons (as I see them) for your attendance at our evening service this coming Lord’s Day still stand. Here are a few of them.

(1). Attend Sunday evening service because you need as much of the Word of God as possible.

If you haven't tried a 6 PM service at Fellowship, and you are wondering what Sunday evening is all about, I assure you there is biblical content to feed your soul. Pastor Tyler or another one of the pastors delivers a full exposition of God’s Word, explaining it and applying it to your life, with as much study in preparation and intentionality as any Sunday morning sermon. True, our congregation is not required to have this schedule, but we do. Our church for years has served up two expositional meals on the Lord’s Day, and neglecting half of your Sunday diet will not make your soul any better off, and it will not accelerate your understanding of the whole counsel of God. God’s Word should be our delight (Psalm 119:92) whether taught at in the late morning, or in the evening.

(2). Attend Sunday evening service because you need to be equipped for ministry.

We preach the Bible on Sunday evenings to equip the saints so you can do the work of the ministry (Ephesians 4:12). I love this verse because people often assume that pastors are always on the giving end of ministry, and “ordinary Christians” are always on the receiving end. This is not the case: elders equip the membership so they can serve alongside the elders. Biblical, Christ-centered preaching will help you serve your family, will help you evangelize, and will help you disciple others. Two sermons per Lord’s Day will do this better than only one. If you think the preaching from our pulpit is equipping you to serve Jesus, then may I suggest being here for the entire Lord’s Day, when your pastors regularly feed you the Scriptures, so you can be equipped even more.

(3). Attend Sunday evening service because it will help you train your children to reverence God.

A couple of my arguments for Sunday evening service are directed at parents of young children. That is in part because I know one of the major challenges to some is that we don’t offer kid’s classes during this time. I have heard the excuses: “My kids won’t sit still,” “They don’t understand what’s going on,” “They will be a distraction.” In conversations like this I like to remind young parents that I have three children of my own, and that two of them are in Sunday evening service, every week, and believe it or not, sometimes we have to deal with our kids in church. Yes, if you bring your kids to church, you may have to take them out periodically and be a parent. Yes, they may distract people. Yes, they may not sit perfectly still (at first, although they eventually will if you are faithful each week). But this hasn’t kept you from attending funerals, family events, games, and whatever else is really important to you. This is a wonderful opportunity to train them to see that the things of God are important. Will some things be over their head? Of course. But this is a bad excuse for saying no to Sunday evenings. As John Piper has said, our newborns don’t know English, but it would be a cruel remedy to keep them exclusively with other newborns 24/7 during infancy. You bring your babies to the family table, they are with you in your living room, when you eat dinner, in the car. Do they know everything that’s being said? No, but this is how they learn. You don't accommodate your babies' lack of English by keeping them from situations where people communicate fluently, you incorporate them into your life by immersing them in the language they will one day speak. The same holds true with the entire family being together in church.

(4). Attend Sunday evening service because it will help keep your kids in the faith.

If you want to have the best possible odds at transmitting the Christian faith to your children, there is nothing more important than shared spiritual experiences that involve the whole family. This is not only a clear biblical principle (Deuteronomy 6:4-7, Psalm 78:1-8) but it is backed up by research. This begins at home, and it includes shared participation in corporate worship: where you show up, and you experience it together as a unit. Children and youth ministry have been shown to supplement a child’s faith, and help them know the Bible better. I am thankful for the ministries to children that we have at FBC. They help the parents, and they help me and Hannah. But the research is clear that these ministries have minimal to zero effect in keeping children Christian if the parents of those children never have any shared spiritual experiences with them. You read that right. This is not a secret in religious sociology: this has been widely known for decades. Nominal Christians who miss much of what goes on in the church are shocked when their children turn eighteen and walk away from the faith - I am genuinely surprised when they stay. If you only attend church when you can give away your kids to other adults, it hurts the odds that your children will follow Christ when they themselves are adults. So take action. Cancel the sports commitments that you will regret later. Give up Sunday evening TV binging. Don't host people at your home during a scheduled time of corporate worship. Do what you have to do to show up with your family. If you have children, sit with them during the service, like a family. This doesn't guarantee they will say yes to Christ, but it is a key part of ensuring you are doing everything you can so they do, because Christians rarely pass along the faith to their young children if they don't experience it with them.

We will consider some additional reasons next week.