God’s Church Is the Lifeline We Need in Times of Trouble
Andrew stood at our front door and handed over a blue ice cream container of pesto pasta and a bottle of beer. “Sounds like you might need these,” he said.
When my husband and I moved to a new city in 2018, we were full of optimism and hope. The promise of new jobs in an area known for great food and coffee was exciting. We rented a small truck and drove all our possessions up the coast and onto the ferry. When we arrived at our new flat, I unpacked everything and enthusiastically set about decorating it with photos and our favorite Bible verses. We attended the newcomers’ lunch at our local church and headed along to Bible Study.
However, within weeks of our arrival, I began to experience significant mood swings which left me feeling as though someone had dumped a bucket of cold water over me. These worsened into panic attacks, and I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety. My diagnosis started a journey to find a medication that would help, and it would take over a year before I began to feel any improvement. Some of the side effects of the medications were crippling. 2018 turned out to be the darkest year of my life.
Instead of branching out on an adventure, we felt stranded. We were far away from our families, our friends, and the church we’d attended for five years. Here, we knew almost no one. But in God’s good providence he’d brought us exactly where we needed to be—back to his church. Although we were in a different part of the country with people we barely knew at all, we were still surrounded by God’s family.
As I’ve reflected on that time, I’ve come to have a much deeper understanding and appreciation for God’s church—the family to which he calls all believers. I’ve seen biblical truths lived out in the context of the local church, and I’ve been greatly blessed as a result. Two things I’ve come to learn about the church are that the church is a place to serve and it is a place to belong.
The Church Is Equipped to Serve Each Other
In his first letter to the Corinthians, the Apostle Paul is writing to the church in Corinth about what life together should look like. Chapter twelve is a passage full of great encouragement, showing the beauty of God’s design for the church.
Paul first explains that there are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit who distributes them—and these gifts are to be used to serve each other (1 Cor. 12:4–11). In verse seven he says, “To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.”
Paul goes on to give some examples of these different gifts or “manifestations of the Spirit.” He lists messages of wisdom, knowledge, faith, healing, miraculous powers, prophecy. Some of the gifts he lists may even sound a little weird and wonderful (anyone got the gift of “distinguishing between spirits” from verse ten?), but the point is clear: each of these gifts is intended to serve those in the church and are intended for the common good. We are blessed with wisdom, knowledge, faith, and a multitude of other gifts to care for each other.
When the church heard how things were going for my husband and I, they sprang into action. Those with the gift of prayer committed to praying for us. Those with the gift of encouragement checked in on us both to see how we were doing. Those with the gift of freezer meals brought those! Andrew and his family were one of many who provided us with meals. We felt edified and uplifted as those in the church used the gifts they had been given for our common good.
In church life we can feel a little out of sorts when we aren’t perceived to have the gift of leading at the front or the gift of sitting on the church governance group—or even when we don’t feel we have the gift of delivering leftovers. Paul, however, encourages us that “There are different kinds of working, but in all of them and in everyone it is the same God at work” (1 Cor. 12:6 NIV).
We read in verse seven that to each one gifts have been given. This means that we all have something to offer, and we are all called to offer it for the good of those around us. Rather than sitting around and waiting to be asked to do something brilliant or exciting, we are to do what we can—no matter how small—to bless those in our church family.
Even as I struggled through life, I was still called to use my gifts to serve others as I could. God convicted me of my self-centeredness and of making every conversation about myself. His Spirit led me to ask others how they were doing. When I took some time off work, I ended up in the home of a young mother, where I cooked her some really terrible rice and folded her laundry. God has set out good works for us to do each day (Eph. 2:10), and we are to be faithful to use even the very small gifts we feel we have to offer.
All Believers Are Essential in Church
Before our move, I was very involved in my previous church. I led children’s ministry, I wrote Bible studies, I welcomed newcomers. I was there early and late. But while I was sick, God challenged my perception of what it meant to belong to a church. The Sunday morning service was too loud, there were too many people, and having to stay still for so long played havoc with my ruminating brain. Bible study was too intense, involved more thinking than I could handle, and again required me to sit still. Instead of being in the middle of everything, I could barely cope with hanging out in the margins.
With the encouragement of friends, my husband did everything he could to keep me meeting with my fellow believers. His only goal was for us to get in the car and drive to church—we didn’t have to get out of the car or go inside; we just had to get there. Some days we went in; other days we didn’t. Sometimes we just went for the sermon and avoided all the singing. On better days, I was able to sit through the service by taking pens and paper to color in.
I felt useless, like I had nothing to contribute, but in 1 Corinthians 12:21–22 Paul explains that the church is like a body, with everyone playing a different part: “The eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I have no need of you,’ nor again the head to the feet, ‘I have no need of you.’ On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable.” Ultimately, we are all essential.
Sure, maybe I didn’t feel like a vital organ that kept the church on its feet, but in my weakness, I was still indispensable. This is all possible because God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. He has done this in such a way that “If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together” (1 Cor. 12:26).
God’s church is knitted together in such an intimate way as to be like a body, and when one part feels pain the whole body feels it too. It’s too easy for us to stay on the fringes of church life, feeling like no one wants or needs us. Especially in seasons of suffering or neediness, it’s easy to wonder what the point of belonging is. If this is you, dear friend, let me remind you the whole body suffers when you do, and the whole body suffers when you are not there. God himself has placed you into the context of a particular body of believers, and they need you.
A Lifeline in Times of Trouble
The care of that particular local church kept my husband and I going—physically and spiritually. We had a family where we had none. We had a place to belong in a strange land. We praise the Lord for the blessing of his church.
The dual blessings of serving and being served by the church help us to see that church is more than just a club for happy people or a place to organize meal trains when we’re sick. It’s a precious body of believers, one that we are called to be part of, called to belong to. When troubles come and we’re weak and feeble, we need the church—and the church needs us.
Grace Strijbis lives in Christchurch, New Zealand with her family. She enjoys worshipping and serving at St. Stephen’s Anglican Church, where she co-leads a women’s Bible study. Grace loves reading, writing, cycling, and coffee with friends. You can follow her on Instagram.