Shut In

by Matthew W. Bassford

Last Sunday morning was the last time I will ever attempt to assemble with the saints. I say “attempt” because I did not succeed in assembling. It was a debacle. About midway through the debacle, I resolved that I wasn't going to put myself or my wife through such misery anymore. Then, it got worse. I’m simply not capable of going anywhere, even to worship.

This is bitter. If there is anything on earth that I love, it is the assembly. All of the things that we trivialize with the label “the five acts of worship” fill me with profound joy. I also love the opportunity to connect with my brethren before and after worship. Even when I am visiting an unfamiliar congregation, you might as well give me a key, because when the time comes to lock up, I'll still be around!

These times have become even more precious to me since my diagnosis. I knew that the time would come when I couldn't make it out anymore, so I strove to make my remaining opportunities to assemble as meaningful as I could. I worked to sink myself into each hymn and prayer. After services, I shunned small talk in an effort to speak to the hearts of my Christian family. Even when I wasn't talking to somebody, I would look around the auditorium and pray for each member I saw.

No more. Now, I am left with the livestream, which is as much like the actual assembly as a photograph of a loved one is like the loved one. You would rather have the photo if you can't have the loved one, but it's not the same.

After I returned home in defeat last Sunday, I turned on the livestream. One of the hymns led that morning was “Each Step I Take”. In my ever-so-humble opinion, the verses of the hymn aren’t much, but the chorus makes a powerful point. It reads:

Each step I take, I know that He will guide me;
To higher ground He ever leads me on;
Until one day the last step will be taken,
Each step I take just leads me closer home.

In other words, even if, like Abraham, I don't know where I'm going, I still know where I'm going. The steps of the faithful are always bringing them closer to God. In the words of Romans 13:11, salvation is nearer to us than when we first believed.

This is true even for shut-ins. I've spent hundreds of hours visiting shut-ins, but during that time, it never crossed my mind that one day I would be a shut-in myself. However, I suspect that most Christians must endure a season of being unable to assemble.

In this season, I must remember the wise counsel of “Each Step I Take”. I may feel further away from God and His people than ever before, but paradoxically, I am closer.

It is not any earthly assembly to which I am drawing near but to the great assembly around the throne of God in heaven. Rather than fixing my mind upon a God I cannot see, I will fix my eyes upon the great King in His beauty. I will gather not with a few hundred believers, but with myriads of angels, the souls of the righteous made perfect, and with beings I cannot now comprehend. Neither I nor anybody else will need a key to lock up because the glory and the joy will never end.

There have been times in my life when I traveled some distance to join a particular assembly, whether it be to gather with my home congregation over the holidays or join in the singing on the first night of Florida College Lectures. The journeys themselves were tedious and unremarkable, but the delight at the end was worth it.

I am on another journey now, a journey that everyone undergoes. I anticipate that mine will take months, though it may be shorter. It will be tedious; it may be considerably worse. However, I am convinced that the assembly at the end will be worth it too.

Each step I take just leads me closer home.