Almost 90% of Americans now believe there are legitimate alternatives to being part of a local church including worship at home, participating in a house church, watching a religious TV program, listening to religious radio, or engaging in community service. In the wake of Barna’s research, the church finds herself at, a moment of truth.

Christians must come to grips with the reality that much of what they do, even in terms of church and worship, is owing to tradition and not the Scriptures. Some of those dynamics may fall into the realm of Christian liberty while others fall into the categories of worldliness, legalism, ritualism, and the like.

While house churches or free worship styles in Christian community regulated by Scripture are legitimate, no other alternative mentioned by Barna has biblical warrant. Among others, the glaring issues have to do with community and authority. One cannot escape the “one anothering” or the “assembling together” principles in the New Testament. Neither can one escape the accountability that is inherent in the faith community nor the accountability to elders as under-shepherds of God. Further, it is the church that puts God’s wisdom on display as all kinds of people come together in one body.

The contemporary trend to “do what feels right for me” is reflective of our larger individualistic culture. God puts believers in union with Christ and with one another. The expressions of that reality are local assemblies across the world, not individuals dialed into their computers. The Scriptures declare to us that forsaking the assembling of ourselves together is the first step on the road to apostasy, not the road to a closer relationship with God.

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