By Pastor Stephen Hess –
At the end of 2020, the Gallup organization released a stunning report on the state of Americans’ mental health. For nearly twenty years Gallup has surveyed the mental well-being of Americans and one of the key findings of last year’s survey was that mental health in 2020 was lower than at any other point in the last two decades. According to Gallup, seventy-six percent of U.S. adults rate their mental health positively. While this number might seem high, it represents a nine-point decline from 2019.
A deeper look at the data shows that declines in mental health were experienced in every single demographic subgroup expect for one. The most stunning piece of the report was that only one subgroup in the whole country that reported an increase in mental health from 2019. What was this subgroup? It was those who attended religious services every week. Individuals who attended church services occasionally reported mental health declines comparable to the other demographic subgroups, but those who attended church weekly reported a four percent increase in their mental health!
This data echoes a reality that has been clear in Scripture from the beginning: Human beings were created for community, and when we try to exist without community we do not flourish as God intended. The first pages of Genesis show us that after God created Adam he immediately declared, “It is not good that the man should be alone” (Gen. 2:18). Obviously, this statement points to the creation and blessing of marriage, but it also points more broadly to the importance of community. God created human beings in such a way that we flourish when we are in fellowship with one another.
The Gallup data also should remind us of what the New Testament teaches about the church. The church is not a building but is an assembly of people whom God has called out of the world. In this way the church is fundamentally a community, and to be a Christian is to be part of that community. The Apostle Paul describes it this way in Ephesians: “So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit” (Eph. 2:19-22). In these verses, Paul describes the church as a spiritual temple with the apostles as its foundation, the people as its structure, and Christ as its cornerstone. But notice that this structure cannot grow into a holy temple unless it is joined together. From this we understand that we cannot mature as Christians unless we are connected to the body of Christ.
Over the past year the coronavirus pandemic has temporarily upended many of our normal patterns of worship and fellowship. For many of us, 2020 will probably be remembered as the year we were introduced to “livestreaming” worship rather than gathering in person. Even now as we begin a new year, livestreaming and Zoom meetings continue to be the options of choice for many people as we wait out the pandemic. I am incredibly thankful that God has provided us with these technologies because they have been wonderful tools to help us stay connected during a season when many cannot attend events in person.
However, as I have said before, we should understand these technologies as temporary tools and not permanent ways of being the church. Technology always comes with blessings and dangers. One of the dangers of our current technologies is that some Christians might begin to think they no longer need the genuine, in-person community of the church. The Gallup data shows that this thinking is dangerous to our mental health and Scripture shows that this thinking is dangerous to our spiritual health. The pandemic will not last forever, and as we move to the other side of this strange season we must not forget that in-person community is an essential part of what it means to be the body of Christ.
Throughout every season of life, the words of Hebrews are an important reminder: “Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near” (Heb. 10:23-25).