They Met at Their Peril
“When Christianity becomes churchless [they say], it is able to fly under the radar of hostile opposing religions and ideologies because it has become invisible. This offers the enormous boon of providing a way for people to be Christian and to avoid all the persecution that would otherwise come their way. They simply are unknown in their believing.
It is an ingenious proposal, but sadly it suffers from a defect: it violates the biblical norm. God’s people should not neglect ‘to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another’ (Heb. 10:25). Indeed, it is striking to note that in many cases in the New Testament, God’s blessing came, not simply in private moments, but when people were gathered together (E.g., Acts 2:1; 4:31; 10:44). They obviously met at their peril, but meet they did. And it was in their company that outsiders saw the reality of God’s redemption at work.”
[David Wells, The Courage to Be Protestant, 216]
