As We Prepare for In-Person Regathering
Beginning on 21 March, Reality Church London will begin holding in-person worship services again at Central Foundation Boys’ School. These in-person services will adhere to all guidelines for COVID secureness. Even as we begin regathering in person, we will still continue to offer a virtual Sunday worship gathering via Zoom.
As the 21st approaches, I want to share a few thoughts to prepare us as we head into this next phase of life in and after COVID.
What the Church Is
For nearly all of the past year Reality Church London has met virtually, not only for Sunday worship but also for community groups, prayer meetings, classes, and more. Whilst there certainly have been challenges we’ve faced, we’ve also seen grace and growth through this season. As I reflect on the grace that we’ve walked in this past year, one important truth that has shined brightly among us is this: the church is not a building; the church is a people. Of course, in theory most of us knew that before the pandemic. But over the past year we’ve lived it. Every Sunday we don’t go to church; every Sunday we gather as the church.
Even a cursory survey of the teaching of the New Testament makes this point emphatically:
● Prior to his conversion, Paul was a persecutor of Christians. He wrote of his former life, ‘For you have heard of my previous way of life… how intensely I persecuted the church of God and tried to destroy it’ (Galatians 1:13). Paul wasn’t persecuting buildings; he was persecuting people.
● Later, as an apostle and leader of Christians, Paul exhorted a group of pastors, ‘Be shepherds of the church of God which he bought with his own blood’ (Acts 20:28). Christ didn’t buy buildings with his own blood; he bought a people.
● And the Lord Jesus is building his church: ‘I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it’ (Matthew 16:18). The church Christ is building is not made of brick and mortar, but persons from ‘every tribe and language and people and nation’ (Revelation 5:9).
As we journey towards a post-pandemic world, let’s remain rooted in this foundational truth that we’ve had no choice but to live in for the past year: we are the church, scattered throughout this city, and gathering together every Sunday for worship, whether online or in person.
Why We’ll Keep Offering an Online Option
For the foreseeable future Reality Church London will offer an online Sunday worship option, happening via Zoom at the same time as our in-person service. I’ve been asked, ‘Since we’re able to meet in person, why have an online option?’ There are a few biblical and practical reasons that offering a virtual worship service right now is actually part of our mission.
Throughout the pandemic the north star guiding our decision making has been to ask, ‘How can we best love our neighbours at this moment?’ Till now, loving our neighbours has taken the shape of not meeting in person, thereby doing our part to protect the most vulnerable by relieving strain on the infrastructure that sustains our city, including the NHS. Now, even as we prepare to regather, we know that for many in our church and throughout our city, the way that they can most directly fulfil Christ’s command to love their neighbour is to continue worshipping virtually.
Some in our congregation are vulnerable and at risk. If, for any reason, vaccination has not been possible for you, or if there are extenuating concerns even after receiving your vaccination, we want you to still be able to gather with your church every Sunday. For others, you serve in a carer role and, out of love for those you care for, you need to continue to limit travel and exposure.
Beyond the immediate health concerns, there are real practical challenges that some of us are facing. For example, government guidance does not permit us to have creche or kids’ ministry right now. Some families will still opt to gather in-person, whilst others would rather continue meeting online until our kids can join together safely for their programming.
Here’s another practical concern. The regular rhythms of most people’s lives have been dramatically impacted by COVID. One trend we’ve observed is people who are part of our church, for all kinds of reasons, have temporarily moved out of London. They certainly plan to come back to London, and Reality Church London is their church — but they just aren’t coming back to London yet. We recognise that COVID has created pressures and burdens for people that were wholly unexpected, and in the midst of those burdens we want them to be able to stay connected to their church family with a real experience of community, even as they look to return to the city.
Why Gather In Person
All that said, we couldn’t be more excited to begin regathering in person. Gathering together every Sunday is central for our church’s life and mission: everything we believe comes together in Sunday worship, and everything we aim to be and do as a church flows out of Sunday worship. Long term we look forward to everyone in our community being able to safely be together in person, but, until then, we are very excited about taking this small step towards regathering, even in limited ways.
The reason for our excitement is theological: God has made us as embodied beings. What we do with our bodies matters, and being physically around other bodies matters. There’s a paragraph from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s great little book on Christian community about the importance of being physically around other Christians. I suspect this was a paragraph that most people who read this book didn’t fully appreciate until last year:
The physical presence of other Christians is a source of incomparable joy and strength to the believer… The believer feels no shame, as though he were still living too much in the flesh, when he yearns for the physical presence of other Christians. Man was created a body, the Son of God appeared on earth in the body, he was raised in the body, in the sacrament the believer receives the Lord Christ in the body, and the resurrection of the dead will bring about the perfected fellowship of God’s spiritual-physical creatures. The believer therefore lauds the Creator, the Redeemer, God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, for the bodily presence of a brother. The prisoner, the sick person, the Christian in exile sees in the companionship of a fellow Christian a physical sign of the gracious presence of the triune God.
Even though our in-person services will be initially limited as we adhere to COVID secure guidelines, the physical presence of other Christians is a source of incomparable joy and strength. We are regathering not only because it will be a joy to do so, but for a much deeper reason: as we learn new and creative ways to move towards a post-pandemic world, we will begin to practise anew the ministry of physical presence in the fullness of our embodied beings.
See you Sunday
When 21 March gets here, we’ll gather together as a church. Some will attend in person, and others via Zoom. But we are the church, gathering around the good news of Jesus, our Lord, friend, and King.
