Should churches provide recreation?

Welcome to Midway Church of Christ

What’s Your Question? for May 21

It is good for individuals to work to earn money (Eph. 4:28), engage in recreation (1 Tim. 4:8) and do many other good things, but churches are not authorized to provide such. N.B. Hardeman (in a sermon in 1942) said: "It is not the work of the church to furnish entertainment for members. And yet many churches have drifted into such an effort. They enlarge their basements, put in all kinds of gymnastic apparatus, and make every sort of an appeal to the young people of the congregation. I have never read anything in the Bible that indicated to me that such was a part of the work of the church. I am wholly ignorant of any Scripture that even points in that direction" (Tabernacle Sermons, Vol. 5, p. 50). The Bible has not changed since 1942!