This guest blog post draws directly from the sermon “Showcase - 9AM Worship Service” so you can keep engaging with the message all week. Read, reflect, and share it with your small group or friends.

"Let's Have Church": The Difference Between Going Through the Motions and Actually Encountering God

Meta Description: Pastor Grant McCrae challenged us to stop doing church and start having church — a message about remembrance, worship, and coming back home to God. URL Slug: lets-have-church-pastor-grant-mccrae Featured Image: A wide-angle shot of a packed church sanctuary with hands raised in worship — ideally capturing multiple levels of seating to reflect the "third floor praise" illustration from the sermon.

There's a difference between going to church and having church. And this Sunday, Pastor Grant McCrae made sure we understood exactly what that difference looks like — and why it matters more than we might realize.

Drawing from Joel 2 and a handful of beloved Psalms, Pastor McCrae delivered a message that was equal parts challenge and invitation. It wasn't a sermon designed to make anyone feel guilty. It was a sermon designed to pull back the veil — on the polished, comfortable, "I've got it all together" version of ourselves that so many of us bring through the church doors on Sunday morning.

When Comfort Changes Our Praise

Pastor McCrae opened with a striking observation about the sanctuary itself. People sit in different sections — different levels, different seats, different views — and yet they're all in the same building, worshiping the same God. He used that image to raise a question that lingered throughout the entire message:

Does where we're sitting influence our perspective — and does our perspective impact our praise?

He wasn't just talking about physical seats. He was talking about the spiritual seats we've settled into as God has blessed us. Because somewhere between Lord, if you make a way and Lord, look what you blessed me with — something can quietly change in us.

"Don't let what God gave you forget who gave it to you," Pastor McCrae said, and the room responded like he had touched something real.

He was careful not to diminish the blessings. He wasn't saying God didn't bless us — he was saying that sometimes we get so comfortable in the blessing that we forget how desperate we used to be for the presence of the One who gave it.

"Rend Your Heart, Not Your Garment"

The sermon's anchor text came from Joel 2:12-13, where the prophet calls God's people to genuine repentance:

"Now, therefore, says the Lord, turn to me with all of your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning. So rend your heart, and not your garments."

Pastor McCrae unpacked this passage with clarity and conviction. Rending garments was a public, visible act of mourning in ancient culture — the kind of thing that could easily become performance. But God, through Joel, was asking for something far more costly: a rend of the heart.

Stop performing. Stop hiding. Stop trying to look like you have it all together. God already knows — and he still woke you up this morning.

"Why do we spend so much time trying to impress the One who already knows?" he asked. It's a question worth sitting with long after Sunday.

The Power of a "Third Floor Praise"

One of the most memorable moments of the morning came when Pastor McCrae pointed to the upper level of the sanctuary and coined a phrase that will likely stick with this congregation for a long time: the third floor praise.

The people up there, he noted, aren't worried about who they're sitting next to. They can't see everything perfectly. They didn't get the best seats. But they showed up anyway — because after everything they've been through, they're just glad to be in the room.

That, he said, is the kind of praise God is after. Not a praise that requires perfect conditions, but a praise rooted in remembrance.

He took us to Psalm 124:1, where David writes:

"If it had not been for the Lord who was on my side..."

David didn't start with what he had. He started with what God did. And Pastor McCrae challenged us to do the same — to ask ourselves the honest question: Where would I be if God hadn't stepped in?

Because sometimes you don't appreciate where you are until you remember where you could have been.

Don't Forget the Struggle

The second major thread of the message came from Psalm 103:2, where David talks to himself:

"Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits."

Pastor McCrae pointed out that David was literally preaching to himself — reminding his own soul not to forget. And he named the things that make us forget: a new house, a better job, a full refrigerator, a good doctor's report. None of those things are bad. But they can quietly crowd out the memory of the God who brought us through the hard seasons that preceded them.

"I don't want you to go back to the struggle," he said. "I just don't want you to forget what God brought you through."

The distinction matters. Remembering the struggle isn't about living in the past — it's about staying connected to the God who walked through it with you. Remembrance, he reminded us, produces worship.

Come Back Home

The sermon's final movement was perhaps its most tender. Pastor McCrae made clear that God isn't calling us back to nostalgia — he's calling us back to himself. And those are two very different things.

He grounded this in Hebrews 10, which tells us that because of Jesus, the veil that once separated us from God's presence has been torn — not from top to bottom, but from bottom to top. Which means everyone is welcome in.

"Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiness by the blood of Jesus." (Hebrews 10)

And he brought it home with Romans 12:1:

"Present your bodies, a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service."

Worship, he said, isn't what happens when the music starts. Worship is what happens when your life belongs to God. You can worship in the sanctuary and in your kitchen. In the quiet of the morning and in the noise of a hard day. Because worship isn't just a sound — it's a surrender.

Maybe God isn't asking us to get louder. Maybe he's asking us to go deeper.

This Sunday's message left us with three simple invitations that are worth carrying into the week:

Come with a spirit that says, "I'm just glad I made it."
Don't forget the struggle — or the God who walked through it with you.
Come back home — not to how church used to be done, but to the God who is waiting for you.

If you missed this message or want to revisit it, we encourage you to watch the full sermon on our YouTube channel. And if something stirred in you while reading this — don't wait. Come home.

Social Media Excerpt (Facebook/Instagram): There's a difference between doing church and having church. This Sunday, Pastor Grant McCrae reminded us that our praise should be connected to our remembrance — and that God isn't calling us back to nostalgia, he's calling us back to himself. Don't miss this one. 🙌 [Link in bio / comments]