Even among Christians who are convinced that the saints’ weekly gathering is “essential,” many remain suspicious of the church’s true necessity. This suspicion is likely due to the fact that many Christians fail to understand precisely how the church is “unique.” In our day, there appears to be an alarming amount of Christians who are simply unaware of what actually occurs in the gathered assembly of the saints on the Lord’s Day. They fail to see how what takes place at church is categorically distinct from what individual Christians do all week long in their private practices of piety (scripture reading, prayer, fasting, catechizing their children, etc).