Let's talk about a piece of church history you've
probably never questioned. Pews. For most of
us, when we picture church, we picture rows.
Maybe they're old, heavy wooden pews with hymn
book racks on the back. Maybe they're padded
chairs clipped together so tightly that moving
one requires a two -thirds majority vote from
the deacon board. Or maybe they're those metal
folding chairs that announce every small adjustment.
with a screech loud enough to completely derail
any sermon. Whatever your church uses, the layout
probably feels completely natural. The pastor
stands at the front. The congregation sits in
rows. Everybody faces forward. And because that
arrangement is all many of us have ever known,
it can begin to feel almost biblical. As though
somewhere in the New Testament, Paul wrote, When
the saints assemble, let them sit in straight
rows. facing the front with one center aisle
for weddings, invitations, and people arriving
12 minutes late. That verse, it ain't in there.
The early church gathered in homes, courtyards,
and whatever space was available. Even after
Christians began using dedicated buildings, permanent
seating for the entire congregation developed
gradually. Over time, benches and pews became
increasingly common. And honestly, if someone's
going to preach for an hour, letting people sit
down is a profound act of pastoral mercy. I love
chairs. At this stage in my life, solid back
support is one of the richest expressions of
common grace. But here's the point. Pews became
common because they were useful. They were not
handed down on Mount Sinai. Rows of chairs are
just a practical decision about how to arrange
people inside a room. But when we sit in the
same arrangement every week for decades, the
layout starts preaching a quiet sermon of its
own. The people at the front speak. The people
in the rows consume. Now, rows are not simple,
and circles are not automatically spiritual.
Moving the chairs will not create New Testament
community by itself. You can sit in a circle
and still avoid knowing anyone. The issue is
not the furniture. It is how easily a practical
choice becomes... and unquestioned expectation.
Then another church arranges the room differently,
and something inside us immediately says, that
does not really feel like church. That reaction
is worth examining, because sometimes what we
call biblical conviction is really just a habit
we've watched on repeat for so long that we forgot
it was ever a choice, and pews are only the beginning.
Welcome to an extra shot of Grace in the Grind,
the part of the podcast where the mic probably
should have been turned off, but we kept talking
anyways. This is the bonus space for deeper theology,
honest questions, fewer filters, and a level
of caffeinated commentary I should probably apologize
for in advance. So grab your coffee, find a pew,
a chair, a couch, or whatever seating arrangement
your conscience allows, and let's get into this.
In the main episode, we asked whether our definition
of church matches what Jesus actually established.
Today, we need to push that question one step
further. How do practical decisions eventually
start feeling like biblical requirements? It
happens with music styles, dress expectations,
service times, building designs. Someone makes
a practical choice because it works in a particular
time and place. That choice gets repeated. The
next generation inherits it. Eventually, everybody
forgets why it started. They only know that this
is the way faithful churches do things. Changing
the custom suddenly feels like changing the faith.
Christian theology has often used a category
called anaphora. That word refers to matters
scripture neither directly commands nor forbids.
These are areas where believers and churches
must use Christian liberty, biblical wisdom,
and love for one another. But Christian liberty
does not mean carelessness. And it definitely
does not mean every choice is equally wise. To
think clearly about these things, we need four
categories. Commanded, modeled, permitted, and
familiar. Commanded deals with divine authority.
Modeled asks what apostolic patterns should shape
us. Permitted deals with Christian liberty and
wisdom. Familiar asks whether we are acting from
biblical conviction or inherited habit. When
we blur those lines, our preference becomes convictions.
Our customs become doctrines, and ordinary differences
become reasons to divide. What is commanded?
These are non -negotiables. Believers are called
to gather. The word is to be read, taught, and
preached. The church is to pray, sing, baptize,
and practice the Lord's Supper. We are to exercise
discipline, use spiritual gifts, encourage one
another, and bear one another's burdens. These
belong to the church because Christ, through
his apostles, instructed the church to practice
them. A congregation may carry out those commands
differently depending on its size, language,
culture, and circumstances, but it does not have
the authority to dismiss what Christ has required.
This is where our convictions must be strong.
If scripture commands something, we cannot set
it aside because it's inconvenient. We cannot
replace it. because something else is more popular.
We cannot ignore it because culture finds it
uncomfortable. At that point, the question is
not, what do we prefer? The question is, are
we obeying Christ? What is modeled? Other practices
are modeled throughout the New Testament. We
see believers meeting in homes. We see churches
sharing meals. We see local congregations led
by plurality of elders. We see public teaching,
prayer, generosity, testimony, discussion, and
meaningful participation from the body. Those
examples matter. A biblical model is not automatically
a universal command in precisely the same form.
But repeated New Testament patterns should make
us slow down before dismissing them as merely
cultural. We should ask what theological principle
the pattern reveals. But we should also ask whether
the repeated form itself may be part of how that
principle is meant to be practiced. For example,
the early church often met in homes. That does
not necessarily mean every faithful congregation
must sell its building and divide into house
churches by next Tuesday. Please do not list
your church building online because of one podcast
episode. But the repeated pattern should challenge
the assumption that the church depends on owning
property. It should make us take hospitality,
close relationships, shared meals, and life together
seriously. The same is true of plurality in leadership.
The principle is not simply, leaders are helpful.
The repeated pattern of multiple qualified elders
serving a local body should carry real weight.
A biblical model may leave room in its exact
cultural expression while still carrying theological
significance in both its principle and its form.
That means we should not flatten every description
into a command. But we should not wave repeated
apostolic patterns away simply because they disrupt
what feels normal. What's permitted? This is
the realm of Christian liberty. A church may
own a building. They may rent a school. They
may meet in a home or a storefront. It may use
microphones, screens, hymnals, live streams,
or printed bulletins. There's no list of inspired,
acceptable microphone brands, no apostolic instruction
concerning projector brightness, and no verse
requiring the worship leader to own at least
one pair of suspiciously tight jeans. But permitted
does not mean mindless. Tools must still be governed
by biblical wisdom and the edification of the
body. A live stream can help the homebound, but
it can also unintentionally encourage healthy
people. to treat embodied fellowship as permanently
optional. A building can support ministry. It
can also consume resources, attention, and energy
that might be needed elsewhere. Technology can
help people hear and participate. It can also
become a distraction or performance -driven.
So Christian liberty still asks, is this wise?
Is this loving? Does it build up the body? Does
it serve the purpose Christ gave the church?
What is simply familiar? This is the category
that often is hardest to recognize. A practice
may not be commanded. It may not be clearly modeled.
It may simply be what we have always done. That
does not make it wrong. Familiar traditions can
carry beautiful meaning. There is real power
in singing a hymn your grandparents sang. Rhythm
can give a local body stability. Customs can
preserve memory and connect generations. The
danger begins when we stop calling those practices
traditions and start treating them like tests
of orthodoxy. Things like faithful pastors must
preach for this amount of time. Faithful churches
must sing this kind of music. Faithful congregations
must follow this exact sequence. And faithful
Christians must dress this way. At that point,
familiarity is governing our judgment. And sometimes
we defend a familiar practice with more passion.
then we obey an actual command. We will fight
over music while ignoring patients. We'll divide
over furniture while neglecting hospitality.
We will become outraged over service order while
gossip, bitterness, pride, and unforgiveness
sit comfortably in the same pew every Sunday.
If disrupting a custom bothers us more than disobeying
a clear command to love one another, Our authority
structure is broken. Let's apply this to something
nearly every congregation has, whether it's printed
or not, an order of service. Most services follow
some kind of predictable sequence. Two songs,
a welcome. Two more songs, a prayer. Announcements,
which depending on the church, can continue until
morale improves. The sermon, an invitation, a
closing prayer. 1 Corinthians 14 says the gathering
should be conducted decently and in order. So
planning a service is wise, but scripture does
not prescribe one universal liturgy. It does
not give us one mandatory sequence for every
congregation in every place and time. What scripture
does give us are governing priorities. The gathering
should be intelligible. It should build up the
body. It should be orderly. The word should be
central. The saints should pray. Believers should
sing. The ordinances should be practiced. Spiritual
gifts should serve the body. Everything should
be done in truth, love, holiness, and mutual
edification. So not every order is equally wise.
But no single order is universally prescribed.
The order of service can be incredibly thoughtful.
without being sacred. Yet the moment you change
the routine, move the sermon earlier, or adjust
the frequency of communion, the room gets tense.
Usually, that discomfort is not a holy response
to biblical violation. It's a human reaction
to disrupted familiarity. And those are not the
same thing. Every format shapes us. If a service
leaves no room for the body to participate, pray,
or exercise gifts, it can quietly train people
to remain passive. Now, participation does not
mean every person must speak publicly every Sunday.
Opening the floor for completely spontaneous
testimonies can occasionally lead to 20 minutes
of highly regrettable oversharing. Participation
can include singing, praying, listening attentively,
giving, taking communion, encouraging others,
and using our gifts throughout the life of the
church. The gathering should equip and express
the life of a body. It should not reduce most
believers to religious spectators. But the answer
is not to burn down every structure. There are
two ditches here. The traditionalist ditch assumes
that because a structure helped form your faith,
every faithful Christian must practice it exactly
the same way forever. The innovator ditch assumes
that because a structure is old, it must be dead,
and that a new or informal idea is automatically
a spiritual upgrade. No format protects us from
sin. A house church can become an insulated,
legalistic echo chamber. A large congregation
can be deeply faithful and relational. Liturgy
can become empty repetition. But a contemporary
production can easily become a performance where
Excellence quietly replaces edification. We are
trying to bring every practice underneath the
authority of Scripture. The traditional believer
must admit, my preference is not necessarily
a command. The innovative believer must admit,
my new idea is not necessarily an improvement.
So this week, choose one or two parts of your
church's normal routine. The music style, the
room layout, the order of service, the frequency
of communion, the role of the pastor. The role
of the congregation. Run each practice through
four words. Commanded, modeled, permitted, familiar.
Do not use this exercise to build a case against
your leadership. Start with your own heart. Ask
yourself, where have I confused personal comfort
with biblical faithfulness? Where have I judged
another believer for doing something scripture
leaves open? Where have I defended a preference
more passionately? then I have obeyed a command.
Where have I resisted something biblical because
it did not feel familiar? Discomfort is not always
a threat. Sometimes it is the exact tool God
uses to expose an assumption that was never rooted
in his word. Quick reminder, if you want to support
Grace on the Grind, grab a bag of coffee from
Arrow and Roots Coffee Company. You get good
coffee. We get real support. That's it. Link
is in the show notes. So pews are not the problem,
by the way. And chairs are not salvation. Changing
the sequence of Sunday morning will not instantly
manufacture a healthy church. Keeping it the
same does not make a congregation unfaithful.
The goal is not constant chaotic change. The
goal is clarity. Scripture commands what Christ
requires. It models patterns we must take seriously.
It permits a wide variety of faithful applications
within the bounds of wisdom, and it exposes the
customs we have treated as authoritative simply
because they are familiar. Humility refuses to
turn preference into laws. Love refuses to divide
over what Christ has left open. And true faithfulness
keeps examining whether our practices are actually
serving the people Jesus is building. The next
time you take your seat, Look around. The format
may be wise. The tradition may be beautiful.
But none of those things is the foundation. Christ
is. And his word, not our familiarity, holds
the final authority. Thank you for joining me
for this extra shot of Grace on the Grind. If
this conversation has helped you think more clearly
about the difference between scripture and familiarity,
share it with someone who would wrestle with
that question honestly and graciously. Like the
episode, subscribe or follow the podcast, and
leave a review wherever you listen. Before you
criticize your church's furniture, order of service,
or traditions, begin with the harder question.
What has scripture actually said, and what have
I simply assumed? Until next time, keep the coffee
strong and your faith stronger.