For us Confessional Lutherans we don't approach church (or as we call it divine) service as foremost what we do for God (meaning worship) but as foremost what God does for us. He gives us His objective word week in week out through the service that our sins are forgiven for Christ's sake when we confess our sins and believe Christ paid for our sins (absolution). We hear the Word proclaimed from the OT, the NT, and gospel. We are given the objective promises of forgiveness via sacrament.
For us, foremost, God gives us His grace not only to join us to Christ but to keep us in Him and His forgiveness won for us at the cross via Word and Sacrament given in the divine service.
And in response, we can worship God and give as well knowing we can't outdo God and out give God.
So for us, divine service is where foremost God is gloried in our salvation and in response we glorified and worshipped Him for what He has done for us. In Christ crucified and resurrected for us.
So the approach for us is different from many Protestants.
When people withhold themselves from the church in our view, they withhold themselves from the gifts God give them in Word and Sacrament to continue to keep them in the forgiveness Christ merited for them and strengthened them.
So for us a large part of why people don't go to church is wrong approach. We see it as heaven meets earth, rather than earth meets heaven. We see it as Christ comes to us in a real way to draw us to Himself and continues to do so over and over again to keep us in the one truth faith.
Here we stand.
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