How Precious Are Christian Meetings to You?

IT WAS midwinter and the temperature was below zero. But that did not prevent a Christian mother living in Wisconsin from starting out on foot on an eight-mile walk to town with four of her children. Happily for her, after they had trudged for three miles, a neighbor in an auto happened to come along and gave them a lift, driving them the remaining five miles to their destination.

Why would a mother want to start out on a hike like that? Because she wanted to associate with fellow Christians for worship and for study of God’s Word. That is how precious those meetings were to her. Especially did she want to attend the meetings that Sunday, as a traveling representative of the Watch Tower Society was to speak. There being no buses and her husband refusing to let her use the family car, she had no alternative but to go on foot. Are Christian meetings that precious to you? Do you have a like awareness of your spiritual need?​—Matt. 5:3.

Jesus encourages Christians to meet together, for he promised: “Where there are two or three gathered together in my name, there I am in their midst.” (Matt. 18:20) And the apostle Paul wrote: “We ought to see how each of us may best arouse others to love and active goodness, not staying away from our meetings, as some do, but rather encouraging one another, all the more because you see the Day drawing near.”​—Heb. 10:24, 25, The New English Bible.

How precious Christian meetings are to you, you show by the price you are willing to pay to attend them.

In Cuba three Christians were put into prison after their homes were raided by officials on April 29 and 30, 1969. In each case all their Bible literature was taken, as well as other possessions. But why? They were charged with having illegal meetings, meetings for study of the Bible.

In a town in Thessaly, Greece, thirteen Christians were imprisoned because they had gathered for a Bible study. Their meetings were so precious to them that they were willing to risk prison to attend them.

Lesser obstacles can also reveal how precious Christian meetings are to a person.

POOR HEALTH AND PHYSICAL INFIRMITY

It takes a measure of health and strength to be able to attend Christian meetings. But, with effort, problems can often be overcome. A newly interested woman in Ceylon keeps attending meetings at the Kingdom Hall although she is semiparalyzed. And in spite of this condition she has enrolled in the congregation’s Theocratic Ministry School and has begun witnessing to others.

In Nicaragua the traveling circuit minister noticed an attender having tears stream down over her face for about the first fifteen minutes of each meeting. Why? He learned that this was due to her high blood pressure and rheumatism in her legs. It took fifteen minutes or so after getting to the Kingdom Hall for the pain to subside enough for her to be able to stand it without weeping. Still, unless she is confined to her bed, she is a regular attender of the congregation meetings.

If you are missing meetings because of such an obstacle you might well ask yourself, in view of such examples, Does it present a challenge that I can overcome or one that I must yield to? Do not deprive yourself of spiritual blessings needlessly!

THE TRANSPORTATION PROBLEM

For others, it is the problem of transportation that keeps them from attending meetings regularly. If it is lacking, how far or how long would you be willing to walk to attend Christian meetings? In the Congo (Brazzaville), a youth of seventeen walks nine miles to attend meetings. In Nicaragua in one congregation twelve Witnesses walk two hours each way to get to the meetings, and they seldom miss.

In Sierra Leone a Witness past eighty-six years of age comes twice each week to the Kingdom Hall in all kinds of weather. He never fails. Yet to do so he must walk more than five miles up and down a steep mountain. A group of new Witnesses in Honduras each Sunday walk three hours to get to the meetings and three hours to get back home. And in the Philippine Republic a sixty-eight-year-old Witness living in a mountainous territory walks twenty-four miles over a stretch where there are no roads. Because of a previous leg fracture he must walk very slowly, so he leaves home a day early in order to get to the meetings on time​—and he always is on time!

But what would you do if it just was not safe to travel to the meetings? A newly interested woman living in the Caribbean island of Anguilla, at the opposite end of town from where the meetings were held, was distressed because she could not attend the midweek meetings, as they were held in the evening and it was not safe for her to go out alone at night. So what did she do? She overcame this obstacle by moving to a house near the Kingdom Hall!

Is your problem similar to any of these? Can you overcome it?

FAMILY OPPOSITION

Jesus Christ warned his followers that they could expect opposition from their own families: “Indeed, a man’s enemies will be persons of his own household,” he said.​—Matt. 10:34-36.

Opposition by members of one’s own family to one’s attending Christian meetings has also furnished opportunities for God’s servants to show how precious those meetings are to them. In Okinawa an unbelieving husband would lock out his wife on meeting nights. So she used an old blanket and slept out in the garden under a corrugated metal sheet. This she has done week after week even though faced with the danger of being bitten by poisonous habu snakes and suffering from many mosquito bites. When asked about it, she said that it was nothing when compared to what Christians had been experiencing elsewhere.

In Surinam a Christian wife had a similar experience. To discourage her, her husband not only took away her literature ​—to burn it, he said—​but every time she went to the meetings and she came home she found the door locked, and so she had to sleep in the chicken coop. She did not give up. Finally one day her husband said to her: “Okay, you win. This is beating the wind. Keep your books. Study with Jehovah’s witnesses. . . . I can’t fight the tide anymore.”

Could it be that you have a like obstacle to attending Christian meetings regularly? If so, take encouragement from what these women were willing to put up with for the sake of meeting with their fellow Christians. Be like the psalmist who said: “A day in your courtyards is better than a thousand elsewhere.”​—Ps. 84:10.

DO HOURS OF EMPLOYMENT INTERFERE?

Could it be that you have not been attending Christian meetings regularly because of the hours of your secular employment? If so, it seems that there is a conflict between your obligation to associate with your fellow Christians and that of providing for yourself and your family. (1 Tim. 5:8; Heb. 10:24, 25) Could you solve this conflict in favor of attending meetings regularly? Many have.

In Belgium a Witness explained to his Works Manager that he would like to have a change in his hours, as they were interfering with his attending congregation meetings. What response did he get? He was fired, given five days’ severance pay and a dole ticket. He at once set out looking for another job. But four days later the Works Manager called at his door, offering him a better job with hours that would enable him to attend all the meetings.

A student in Andorra who was studying the Bible with Jehovah’s witnesses had such working hours that he could not attend any of the meetings. He quit his job and finally took employment as a bricklayer’s helper. Although not accustomed to working outside in cold weather, he prefers doing that because it gives him time, not only to attend Christian meetings, but also for personal study and the field ministry.

In Ethiopia a Witness found that he was forty-five minutes late to the congregation meetings every other week due to shift changes. So he arranged with a fellow worker to come forty-five minutes early on those days and relieve him. In return the Witness agreed to work a complete seven-hour shift, either the day before or the day after. Now the Witness is never late for meetings and he is happy and willing to exchange fourteen hours of work a month for just ninety minutes of meetings, so great is his appreciation for Jehovah’s spiritual table!

Are you engaged in secular employment that interferes with your attending Christian meetings? What you can do about it, of course, depends upon your circumstances, but do not forget God’s promise: “I will by no means leave you nor by any means forsake you.”​—Heb. 13:5.

All Christians who would keep their integrity toward Jehovah God must be conscious of their spiritual need. That means studying God’s Word and associating with one’s fellow Christians at the congregation meetings to the extent that one is able to do so. If these meetings are truly precious to you, you will not be easily turned aside or prevented from attending them. Rather, you will do all you possibly can to overcome any obstacles. Doing so can result in great happiness and many blessings both now and in the coming system of things.