It’s a quiet Sunday morning. More quiet than usual. It’s almost 8. Usually I’m in full-on rush mode by now, trying to get dressed, stop by and say hi to my mom, then make it to church to get communion ready or prepare for the praise team or have a quick prayer time with a friend or pick up dead cockroaches in the hallway or… well, you get it.

Now there’s social distancing. Semi-quarantine. No service at our church building. Our assembling will be online. I’ll stop by the building around our normal assembly time (I live 5 blocks away), in case some didn’t get the message. Otherwise, I won’t have much contact with anyone outside of family.

I’ve been an elder for almost two years. Things that I’ve known in theory have become more real to me. Especially at times like yesterday morning when we were trying to decide what to do about our assembly. As we talked, I was reminded of a an important reality: we were called to shepherd the University Church of Christ in Abilene, Texas. Our responsibility is to look out for the welfare of our flock. Spiritual welfare. Physical welfare. Emotional welfare.

We aren’t the shepherds of every congregation in Abilene. As we met, other godly men were meeting to wrestle with similar decisions concerning their flock. They would decide based on what was best for their people.

We certainly aren’t doctrine-setters for other Christians. Not even official doctrine discerners for others.

On this issue, we made the best decision we could keeping in mind our flock. We quite literally thought of each one by name, as we later went over our membership lists to divide them up for communication purposes. We thought not only about this Sunday morning but the coming weeks. This was a decision for our time, our people, our context.

Other Christians are doing the same. God bless each of you as you discern what is best for your people in your moment in your context.

May we recognize the necessity of this occurring for all decisions, not just those related to coronavirus. Let’s not worry about what others will think, others will say, or what meme on Facebook will criticize our choices. And let’s not sit on judgment on the servant of another (Romans 12:4).

Happy Sunday. He is Risen! And His church lives.