Why Bother to Gather When Just Showing Up Is A Challenge?
By Mike Dohehey, Worship Leader Magazine, 2025
When Sundays feel chaotic, why gather for worship? Mike Donehey shares three reasons church still matters: relationship, encouragement, and incarnation.
This past Easter (2025) was… a disaster. It fell on April Fool’s Day, and honestly, that felt fitting. It was my first Sunday home after two months on tour. I had high hopes—dreams of pastel family outfits, angelic children, and a picture-perfect worship service. Instead? Chaos. Screaming kids, torn leggings, a 102-degree fever, poop in underwear, and even the dog vomiting. By the time my wife and I finished tag-teaming laundry, floors, and childcare, we collapsed in exhaustion. Happy Easter!
Which brings me to Hebrews 10:24–25:
“And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together… but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”
Beautiful verse. Hard to live. Because honestly—sometimes just getting out the door for church feels less like holy discipline and more like spiritual warfare.
So Why Do We Bother? With livestreams, podcasts, and devotionals at our fingertips, why not just stream a sermon in pajamas with a bowl of cereal at Bedside Baptist? Good question. And sometimes—if a kid’s sick or you’re bone-tired—the right choice is rest. God doesn’t hand out gold stars for perfect attendance. But here’s why I still believe showing up is worth it.
- God Is Relationship
If God is Father, Son, and Spirit—an eternal community of love—then relationship is at the core of reality. And we, made in His image, are wired for the same. That’s why Jesus said, “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” (John 13:35).
But true community isn’t just proximity. It’s not sitting in the same row or echoing the same opinions. Real community costs something. It asks us to joyfully inconvenience ourselves for others. Think about it: Who do you call to pick you up from the airport even though you could just Uber? That’s your friend. So maybe the simple act of dragging our kids, with all their noise and stains, into a pew says something to the stranger beside us: I will show up for you too, even when it’s hard.
(continued on pg. 4)