A pious man who had reached the age of 105 suddenly stopped going to synagogue. Alarmed by the old fellow's absence after so many years of faithful attendance the Rabbi went to see him. He found him in excellent health, so the Rabbi asked, "How come after all these years we don't see you at services anymore?"
The old man looked around and lowered his voice. "I'll tell you, Rabbi," he whispered. "When I got to be 90, I expected God to take me any day. But then I got to be 95, then 100, then 105. So I figured that God is very busy and must have forgotten about me, and I don't want to remind Him!"
Two thoughts come to mind: (1) We don't need to worry about (or hope for) God getting busy and forgetting about us. That will never happen! "For He Himself has said, 'I will never leave you nor forsake you.'" (Hebrews 13:5).
(2) We don't go worship so that God won't forget about us; we go so that we won't forget about God! We need the constant reminder that comes from the encouragement we give one another in our assembly.
In Psalm 73, the psalmist Asaph expressed the struggle that he had with his faith. He expected that good things would happen to those who are good and that bad things would happen to those who are evil, but when he looked around, that's not what he saw. He saw evil people prospering and righteous people suffering. It seemed that God had forgotten him. "It was too painful for me -- until I went to the sanctuary of God...It is good for me to draw near to God" (Psalm 73:16-17,28).
If you think that missing worship will help you to "hide" from God, don't be fooled. But if you're having trouble seeing God in your life, worship may be the place you need to be to find Him once again!
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