Third Stream Church

When a House Church Becomes Too Large

2012-01-31T02:44:00.000-08:00

I've recently enjoyed interacting with Eric Carpenter at his blog A Pilgrim's Progress on the subject of How Big is Too Big? when asked of a church that meets in the home and places a high value on all-member participation in the meetings. Eric was a full-time salaried pastor who left this employment in pursuit of a "simpler form of church life."

In the comments section, I suggested a number of possible next steps that such a church could take when it starts to "feel too large." My option four was to "split the group into two or more smaller groups and try to replicate what you have experienced so far." Option five was to "intentionally start to dream, pray and prepare, for a long-term process of multiple future church planting."

Alan Knox then asked the following question: "I'd love to hear some examples of the outcome of #5 and how it differs from #4."

Rather than presume on Eric's bandwith, I thought might make a few notes here in response to that good question.

Many groups respond to numerical growth by splitting, dividing or multiplying (option 4). Biological cell concepts are often employed to explain or in some cases justify this course of action.

In my experience, such an action can be a mixed blessing, with long-term relationships sometimes severed or at least placed under strain as a group that may have taken months or years to bond together finds itself torn in two.

Option 5 takes a more intentional, long-term view, rather than just responding to the immediate lack of space in a home. As such, it allows the possibility that some of the more difficult aspects of "splitting" a group can be avoided, or at least mitigated.

In essence, I would distinguish option 5 from option 4 by comparing the ways that a cell divides from the way that a family grows and reproduces. In the latter scenario (option 5), we are not looking to divide a group but to start a new household - specifically a household of faith.

In my own limited experience, pursuing this latter option involves looking for and recognising those individuals who have the capacity, character and inclination to become spiritual parents. They should be supported, empowered, trained and encouraged to intentionally begin the process of opening their homes with the aim of forming a new community. This should happen while the existing church is still quite young and while it is itself forming and developing. The intention to plant out is therefore sown into fabric of the church from early on in its life. As I have said, however, this process becomes part of the ethos of the church, but is not done in such a way that "splits" the existing church in two.

Again, in my limited experience, I have seen this process undertaken resulting in the formation of six new churches that I have had a part in helping to plant in the west of England, during the period 1997 to 2004. At least one of these, becasue of the gift mix of the couple hosting it, started as an Apha course and was composed overwhelmingly of new converts. All of them began as home-based churches. Because of where I was with my ecclesiology at that time, most of these churches went on to become somewhat larger mono-congregations rather than remain small and reproduce smaller household-style churches. Having said that, because of their theological values, these churches do tend to have a higher level of member participation in the meetings than might be experienced in a more traditional "church service" model.

Driscoll, Marriage and Sex

2012-01-10T16:10:00.000-08:00

Mark Driscoll's new book, Real Marriage: The Truth About Sex, Friendship and Life Together, co-authored with his wife Grace, is rapidly contributing to reviews, comments and articles across the blogosphere. I haven't read the book (funny how many articles begin by saying that) but here are a selection of articles inspired by the book and the themes it addresses.

Methodist Morgan Guyton on Red Letter Christians confesses that he can make no sense of what he calls the "gender heirarchy" outlined in the Driscoll's book.

Rachel Held Evans summarises the book as the good, the bad and the ugly and in the process raises concerns about the assumption that evangelical pastors should be regared as competent to advise on such intimate issues as sex. :

Evangelicals expect too much of their pastors. In addition to demanding they serve as nearly flawless leaders and teachers, many of us demand that our pastors serve as professional counselors and advisors, experts on everything from politics to science to sex to health to money to marriage to relationships.

Evans' appeal to look at the Biblical context as well as the Biblical content of the key marriage passages is also interesting.

Since David Moore of Fuller Theological Seminary states early on in his article that, "This book is an astoundingly unbelievable work of disrespect for women", there is no surprise that his review is largly critical.

Here in the UK, Christianity Magazine has released part of an interview with Mark Driscoll. The latter has subsequently described the hour-long interview as "adverserial." Driscoll has published a response to the article here.

Researcher Ed Stetzer meanwhile notes that the topic of sex is being discussed by the world every day and asks the question of Christian leaders, How Should we Talk About Sex? His five points are that Christians need to:

move beyond discomfort on the subject.
answer the critical questions people are asking.
hype does not help
teaching on sex, or at least the same levels of teaching on sex, is not for everyone.
talk more, not less, about sex

Lecturer and theologian John Armstrong expresses dispair at what he sees as the growing sensationalism of mega-churches on the subject of sex as he notes that:

Ed and Lisa Young, founders of Texas-based Fellowship Church, will spend 24 hours in bed on the church roof next week and stream themselves live on the Internet to encourage married couples to see firsthand the power of a healthy sex life as prescribed in their new book, Sexperiment.

As Armstrong says,

And some people actually wonder why young evangelical adults, who deeply love Jesus Christ, are now leaving evangelical churches in increasing numbers to go to more ancient churches.

Ed Stetzer - Lottie Moon and House Churches

2012-01-07T02:16:00.000-08:00

Image via Wikipedia

Ed Stetzer - Lottie Moon and House Churches:

When the gospel is allowed to grow naturally in China, without forcing processes of development, the "church in the house" is usually its first form of organization. God grant us faith and courage to keep "hands off" and allow this new garden of the Lord's planting to ripen in the rays of the Divine Love, free from human interference!

- Lottie Moon, Pingtu, September 10, 1890

Was Lottie Moon right than for China?

Was she right now for Europe? America?

I've been increasingly struck in recent years at the way Paul preached the gospel and "allowed" it to take root in its natural, culturally appropriate context. In the case of the first century Greco-Roman world, this natural context was the extended household.

Is the same true in twenty-first century Britain?

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The Emerging Church

2011-11-23T15:58:00.000-08:00

The Emerging Church

A helpful and interesting introduction to the issues and personalities sometimes grouped together under the label of the "emerging church."

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welldigger: Revival Alliance Meetings in Westminster September 2011

2011-09-12T14:02:00.000-07:00

welldigger: Revival Alliance Meetings in Westminster September 2011

Fascinating and encouraging report from David Pike (Cardiff) about the recent Revival Alliance meeings held in central London.

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Why we might not be as Reformed as we think we are | Papers | Theology Matters | Newfrontiers UK

2011-09-09T14:51:00.000-07:00

Why we might not be as Reformed as we think we are | Papers | Theology Matters | Newfrontiers UK

Fine post from Matt Hosier on the Theology Matters blog.

Big themes to think about for evangelical charismatics everywhere!

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Senator Mark Hatfield: RIP

2011-08-24T16:34:00.000-07:00

Image via WikipediaJohn H Armstrong : Senator Mark Hatfield: RIP

Virtually unknown in the UK, Senator Mark Hatfield, who died this month, was a leading American Christian politician, from an age before the enmeshing of those two terms became so toxic.

John H Armstrong writes about his life and legacy:

For nearly four decades, [he was] perhaps American evangelicals' most prominent and admired politician . . . a man associated with liberal politics, one of the country's leading voices against the Vietnam War and military spending, and a critic of the nascent religious right.

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Riots and the Early Church

2011-08-09T14:42:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

The simple idea that "things were better" in the past is one that may appeal to many. Historians, however, tend not to believe it.

This on the place of riots in first-century Greco-Roman cities from French historian Jerome Carcopino:

"Night fell over the city like the shadow of a great danger, diffused, sinister and menacing. Everyone fled to his home, shut himself in and barricaded the entrance....Juvenal sighs that to go out to supper without having made your will was to expose yourself to reproach of carelessness....Criminals abounded in the city."

And this from Professor Rodney Stark from the University of Washngton:

"The social integration of Greco-Roman cities was severely disrupted .... exposing residents to a variety of harmful consequences, including high rates of devience and disorder. Indeed, this is a major reason why Greco-Roman cities were so prone to riots."

On Antioch in particular, location of Christianity's first genuinely multi-racial church, Professor Stark notes:

"the six major periods of rioting that racked the city [during the Roman era]. By a major riot, I mean one resulting in substantial damage and death, as distinct from the city's frequent riots in which only a few were killed."

,
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Food and the Culture of Hobbits: Tolkein on Fellowship and Warfare

2011-08-04T15:15:00.000-07:00

“Bread, Surpassing the Savour of a Fair White Loaf to One Who Is Starving”: Food and the Culture of Hobbits : The Other Journal

You have got to read this article on the place of eating in Tolkein's writing.

It's the heart of fellowship.

Love it.

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Seminary president: Baptists have been 'homophobic' (OneNewsNow.com)

2011-06-18T05:48:00.000-07:00

Seminary president: Baptists have been 'homophobic' (OneNewsNow.com)

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The Changing Nature of Church Membership

2011-05-19T12:55:00.000-07:00

Loose connections | The Christian Century

Interesting article from The Christian Century on the changing nature of church membership in America.

Many articles on this theme tend to be of the "isn't-it-terrible-how-consumerist-we've-all-become-and-why-can't you-be-more-committed" type.

The above article avoids that easy narrative and looks instead at some historical and sociological models that question whether the emphasis on local churches as "belonging institutions" is the only valid model.

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The Evangelical Universalist: a Short Response

2011-05-07T10:46:00.000-07:00

The Evangelical Universalist by Gregory MacDonald

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The title alone suggests that this would be a controversial book in evangelical circles. Originally written under a pseudonym, the author has since revealed his identity as Dr Robin Parry, publishing editor of Paternoster Press and a member of City Church Worcester, part of the Salt and Light network of churches.

My initial response to the book is that I hope its central thesis is true - that in the end, all will be saved through faith in Christ, even those who enter hell. By that, I mean that the doctrine of endless punishment has, up to now, been a difficult doctrine for me to live with as I have stood at the gravesides of a growing number of my non-Christian extended family.

Such an emotional response does not of course mean that the doctrine of universal reconciliation is true. I do, however, intend to study the book more closely and try and come to a view on its message. Certainly, if nothing else, the book demands that all Bible-believing Christians think carefully about the “universalist” texts in Isaiah, Psalms, Paul’s letters and Revelation, which as MacDonald shows, are routinely read by evangelicals through the filter of the “hell texts” of the synoptic gospels. The author argues that we need to read the texts the other way round (filtering the hell texts through the universalist texts) in order to come to a view that does justice to the character and eternal purpose of God.

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An Encouraging Easter

2011-04-24T16:31:00.000-07:00

It may just be my personal slice of the web, but overall I've been pleasantly surprised at the rather positive profile that the Christian message seems to have had here in the UK over this Easter week.

A few anecdotal highlights:

Brighton's Passion performed on Brighton seafront - Brighton's first ever Passion Play - with the aim of it being turned into a feature film later in the year.

Public baptisms of around thirty people in the open air outside York Minster on Easter Sunday.

Several overt Christian references from public figures on Twitter and elsewhere.

The Port Talbot Passion Play involved around 1,000 local actors, and was performed over three days to crowds of up to 5,000. Extensive coverage on the BBC

Reports of spontaneous baptisms in the Channel Islands. This from Jonathan Letoq : "Great celebrations as Steph, unplanned, responds to the Gospel & is immediately baptised."

Finally, and because I like Americans as well, this from John Lanferman in St Louis via his Twitter feed: "Many spontaneous baptisms, that just keep coming. Thrilling... More and more keep coming to be baptized spontaneously. What a great day."

Publishing Projects Update

2011-03-15T15:33:00.000-07:00

The second in my series of essys under the working title Understanding the Times: Essays in Christian Engagement has been published today.

Alliteration has taken over for this second essay, titled Prayerfully Pursuing Peaceful Societies in a Post-Democratic Age.

Comments welcome, as always.

Of course, you'll need to read it first!

The front cover features Benjamin West's Treaty of Penn with the Indians, from 1772.

Christians in Politics: Reflections on the Woodlands Day-Conference

2011-02-20T09:40:00.000-08:00

Attended most (not all) of a day-conference yesterday in my home city of Bristol on the theme of Christians in Politics, hosted by Woodlands Church.

Described as being "for followers of Jesus passionate about the kingdom of God & longing for justice", the day consisted of workshops, presentations and question-and-answer sessions, followed by a worship celebration in the evening which I did not attend.

For my American Christian readers used to a more conservative paradigm for thinking about politics and Christianity, yesterday's event may have been something of a surprise, with presentations from Andy Flannagan of the Christian Socialist Movement, a representative from the Green Party (only caught his first name, Rob) and the former Parliamentary candidate for Bristol West from the Liberal Democrats, Paul Harrod. There were also representatives from NGOs, including lobbying and campaign groups. If there was a representative from the Conservative Party taking part, I wasn't aware of their presence, though there was literature from the Conservative Christian Fellowship available.

Of the smaller workshops, I opted for "Westminster or Bust?", subtitled "finding your political vocation". Chaired by Gareth Davis of CARE, who struck me as bearing a striking similarity visually and stylistically to New Frontiers leader David Stroud, the workshop was a whistle-stop tour of practical ways to get involved in politics. Preceded by a helpful and succinct "why get involved" presentation, Gareth's ten ways of engaging ranged from meeting your MP/local councilor, to joining a political party, from becoming a school governor to working for a think tank or as a civil servant.

As an aside, Gareth Davis's presentation was based on the Prezi software, the ability to move in and out of images on-screen proving a welcome change to PowerPoint.

In the main presentation that proceeded the breakout sessions, we were introduced to a range of political activists. One of them, Les I think his name was, took the opportunity to critique the Woodlands Church motto, "Reproducing the Life of Jesus" as meaningless, arguing that Jesus' life was unique and unreproducible. Les further informed us that he "didn't know what he believed" about faith and politics. Perhaps predictably, Les was to chair the workshop on "Throw Over the Tables and Whip Them", the Christian case for direct action. All very post-church/Greenbelt, I smugly thought to myself.

A couple of final thoughts that left me something to reflect on as a result of the day.

1) There appeared to be a genuine respect across the party divides for believers who were seeking to engage politically, despite their differences of approach and a recognition that such differences are usually of strategy rather than objective.

2) Affecting meaningful political change is a very long-term project. Those most involved in the nitty-gritty of campaigning and lobbying spoke several times about how it takes decades in order to have an effect on public policy. Today's mainstream policies (third world debt reduction, for instance) arose from campaigns launched in the 1980s.

2) Another aspect to this long term approach is to not despise idealism in politics. Andy Flanagan commented: "Today's idealism is what everyone agrees with in ten years time."

Of the organisations, and other individuals represented at the day (attended by about 80-100 adults) I noted SUSA, whose website seems to contain a lot of non-partisan useful resources, including a "What kind of political animal are you?" questionnaire.

Overall, an interesting day. More practical than theoretical, but none the worse for that approach, in my opinion.

My own introduction to the topic of Christians in politics is found here.

Publishing Projects

2011-01-17T10:47:00.000-08:00

I have started 2011 with the intention of creating a number of self-published written works, to supplement this blog and others that I maintain.

My two main publishing projects for this year are:

1. A series of essays under the working title of Understanding the Times: Essays in Christian Engagement

2. A book examining the radical Christian history of Bristol, my home town.

The essays will be published once a month on the You Publish site and will be available to download as PDF documents.

In fact, the first essay, setting the scene and introducing the theme, has been uploaded already and can be read here.

Comments welcome, as always.

The image is Ship of Fools by Hieronymus Bosch, and forms the front cover of the first essay.

A Pilgrim's Progress: A Few Thoughts on Sunday's Gathering

2010-12-23T15:13:00.000-08:00

A Pilgrim's Progress: A Few Thoughts on Sunday's Gathering

Anyone want to do some of this?

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Governments: A Lightening Survey of the New Testament Perspective

2010-12-14T17:40:00.000-08:00

Image via WikipediaI noted, in a previous post, that the texts usually cited as teaching Christians to obey and respect the state governments (Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2) needed to read in the context of a broader New Testament perspective on governments, which is overwhelmingly negative.

A quick overview of this "negative" material, by way of a follow on, seemed appropriate. No doubt many more examples could be cited than these:

Herod is portrayed in the gospels as brutal, power-hungry and murderous - most notoriously in the slaying of the innocents
A later Herod is sexually immoral and has John the Baptist executed at a whim
Pilate is a schemer, responsible for the execution of the Son of God
The Sanhedrin are blind guides, oppressors of widows and inwardly corrupt
Roman provincial authorities imprison the apostles repeatedly and collaborate in the execution of the apostle James
Roman and Jewish authorities conspire to imprison the apostle Paul and hold him without trial for over two years
Paul and Barnabas are arrested and imprisoned in Phillipi on trumped up charges
John's Revelation portrays the Roman Empire as a lustful, bloody monster, guilty of the slaying of multitudes of saints

Christians and Wikileaks

2010-12-11T00:21:00.000-08:00

Reaction to the Wikileaks phenomenon among Christians has been mixed, but in my observation this week, it has gravitated towards being concerned or annoyed, with a minority being outraged. A short piece by Julie Clawson on the Sojourner's website has been the only article I have read so far from a Christian perspective that sees the publishing of the leaks as a qualified good.

In reflecting on the more general view among Christians whose comments I have read this week, which express concern or hostility, I have noted a number of theological and political assumptions which are influencing interpretations of the Wikileaks project. In addition, as we shall see, there are more personal concerns being raised about the nature of security and privacy in the Internet age.

A high view of government. The "key texts" of Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2 appear to represent a grid through which a deferential perspective on the role of political rulers is formed and expressed.
A concern about process. I have heard some say that while they see it as helpful for the public to know the facts about how its government has been operating, they are nervous about the manner in which Wikileaks have gone about disclosing the inner workings of the state.
A concern about lawlessness. The commencement of Denial of Service attacks against businesses which have withdrawn support from Wikileaks (including Amazon, Mastercard, Visa and PayPal) has, in my reading, raised the hackles of those who might otherwise be more sympathetic to the Wikileaks agenda. One church leader in the United States, for instance, has questioned whether these DOD attacks represent a "spirit of lawlessness" as described in 2 Thessalonians 2.
A concern for privacy - both at the institutional and individual level. It has been interesting to hear some express concern that the leaking of the State Department's internal memos could be a step in the direction of everyone's private thoughts and correspondence being broadcast online. Interestingly, I have not come across this particular Orwellian concern being expressed by anyone other than Christian writers in the last week.

What can we deduce from the above points, and are there alternative or complementary considerations that are worth taking into account when assessing the Wikileaks phenomenon? A few broad themes present themselves:

Romans 12 and 1 Peter 2 could be read against the backdrop of a New Testament that paints a rather more negative view of government than might be suggested if those two passages are taken in isolation. We see in the writing of the apostles rulers portrayed as routinely corrupt, immoral and bloodthirsty (think Herod), described as enemies of the gospel (emperors and their subordinates) and as members of an immoral world system that is under God's judgment, represented variously as a drunken prostitute and a many-headed monster.
We ought to think carefully about "why" it is that many believers appear to be more troubled by the process of the leaks than they are by some of the facts they reveal. In particular, the large (and previously unreported) number of civilians who have lost their lives as a direct result of the American and British invasion of Iraq ought, surely, to be of greater concern than any loss of prestige caused to the governments that have contributed to these loses. If this is not the case, we must ask ourselves some fundamental questions about our faith and the moral priorities that arise from it.
We should be careful not to equate lawlessness with disturbing the status quo. Blind obedience to rulers is not a virtue, Christian or otherwise, and all moral people will have some actions which they will not commit, even if required to do so by the State. Furthermore, we should be careful to not miss the fact that the leaks reveal spectacular acts of lawlessness on the part of those in government. Illegal phone tapping of citizens, and orders to obtain biometric data from UN diplomats, are revealed as just two of the most obvious examples of lawless activity that elected leaders stand accused of by their own official documents.
We should be careful to be historically consistent when analyzing such a phenomenon as Wikileaks. It is ironic, to say the least, to hear residents of a nation birthed in an act of armed rebellion (the United Sates) denying the right of citizens to take modest action to assert their freedoms and challenge the perceived injustices of militarized and increasingly dominant governments.
Concerns about individual privacy are important and valid concerns. However, the reality is that the greatest threats to our right to a private life come not from reporters such as Julian Assange, but from corporations and governments who have the power and the motive to pry, spy and intrude in ways unimaginable a generation ago. Against such a backdrop, the need for a free press (defined as one that says things some people don't want to have said) remains of paramount importance as a restraint against tyranny.

Theology Serves the Church

2010-11-04T02:01:00.001-07:00

Interviews in Politics and Theology: Oliver O’Donovan

2010-10-29T15:51:00.000-07:00

Best article on political theology I have read in ages.

In-depth interview with Oliver O’Donovan.

Very quotable:

"The “average American in the pew” seems not uncommonly to be told (or so it appears to us as we listen in across the Atlantic Ocean) that she or he has much larger political responsibilities than this: to make the Gospel heard in public life, to bring in the Kingdom of God and to make a better world, and so on. Some of these tasks are indeed tasks of the Church, which all Christians share, but not distinctively political. Some are political, but not tasks of the Church so much as promises of the work of the Spirit of God, for which we must pray and wait – while fulfilling our mission and doing the work that comes to our hand – humbly and without pompous pretensions. We cannot be too alert to the fact that the realm of politics is inhabited by principalities and powers that would command our worship in place of Christ."

"The path of political action is always a narrow one, always liable in a moment to be cut off by human stupidity and cruelty, always to be received afresh, and on new terms, from God."

“The notion that political deliberation is basically about the rival claims of competing parties is one which the church must do everything it can to challenge”

“To serve at all one must be able to assess how one may be of service; one must know the difference between true service and mere acquiescence.”

2010-10-29T13:00:00.001-07:00

OK, let's see how we get on using Ping to update a few of my sites.

John H Armstrong : How Does a Postmodern Understanding of Faith Relate to a Premodern Understanding?

2010-10-21T18:21:00.000-07:00

Image by Rachel Ford James via Flickr

John H Armstrong : How Does a Postmodern Understanding of Faith Relate to a Premodern Understanding?

Amazing quote from Augustine on John Armstrong's site:

Although I hear people say “Moses meant this” or “Moses meant that,” I think it more truly religious to say “Why should he not have both meanings in mind, if both are true? And if others see in the same words a third, or a fourth, or any number of true meanings ,why should we not believe that Moses saw them all? There is only one God, who caused Moses to write the Holy Scripture in the way best suited to the minds of great numbers of men who would all see truths in them, though not the same truths in the each case.”

For my part I declare resolutely and with all my heart that if I were called upon to write a book which was to be vested with the highest authority, I should prefer to write it in such a way that a reader could find re-echoed in my words whatever truths he was able to apprehend. I would rather write in this way than impose a single true meaning so explicitly that it would exclude all others (The Confessions of St. Augustine, trans. Edward B. Pusey, 1962, 308).

Makes Augustine sound like a post-modern emergent!

The reason for Augustine's view, and how this fitted into the pre-modern church's understanding of the nature of Scripture, are further explored in Armstrong's thought-provoking article.

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John H Armstrong : How the New Ecumenism Differs from the Old

2010-10-10T12:22:00.000-07:00

John H Armstrong : How the New Ecumenism Differs from the Old

Alan Hirsch on the Forgotten Ways

2010-10-10T09:08:00.000-07:00

I love what Alan is saying here about the characteristics of spontaneous mission movements.

My only concern is that, as with so much of this type of material, its starting point is the situation in the United States (despite Alan's Australian background.)

If the mainstream model of church is only capable (culturally) of reaching 40% of the American population (in which 90% of the population claim to believe in God), then those of us called to serve in the UK, with its more entrenched secularism and lower religious worldview are surely in need of thinking especially carefully about Alan's diagnosis as we seek to be the church of God in our cultural context.

Some Notes on Hunter

2010-10-05T17:12:00.000-07:00

James Davison Hunter's recent book To Change the World - which I have yet to read - has been helpfully reviewed by Matthew Hosier here.

In addition, there is an excellent, must read interview with Hunter here. Be warned - the interview is lengthy, but fascinating.

The theme of Hunter's book is the nature and extent of the church's engagement with its surrounding culture, in which the author argues for a model of neither triumphalism nor withdrawal but for a idea of the church as a "faithful presence" within culture.

One tangential thought: there appears to be little of this kind of material written primarily from a British perspective. It is a shame that British Christians have to de-contextualise such a work before being able to think through its implications for their own cultural and nation.

Inspired by Ignatius

2010-07-23T12:00:00.000-07:00

I'm in the process of discovering Ignatius of Antioch, and what a wonderful discovery he has been.

The letters from the early-second century bishop of Antioch (not to be confused with the C16 founder of the Jesuits with the same first name) are a treasure of inspiration and insight.

The elderly bishop-martyr certainly had a way with words - think Spurgeon with a toga. The fact that his letters were largely penned on the road in AD 107 during his final journey as a prisoner to be executed in Rome, adds a powerful quality to both his content and style.

A few highlights so far, all taken from the letter of Ignatius to the Ephesians:

"It is true that I am a prisoner for the Name's sake, but I am by no means perfect in Jesus Christ as yet; I am only a beginner in discipleship."

Ignatius is often cited as giving evidence of a proto-episcopalianism in his writings, and thus providing a theological rationale for the gradual emergence of the monarchical bishops who ruled the churches by the fourth century.

In fact, there is a strong case to be made that the emphasis Ignatius places on the role of the bishops in the churches is not because he is fixated on an episcopalian model as such. Rather, his focus is doctrinal. In the absence of a closed canon of Scripture, much less any universally agreed creeds or confessions by the church, the body of gospel truth handed down by Christ and the twelve was (dynamically and intellectually) resident in the lives and teachings of the overseers and shepherds of the church, some of whom had been appointed by the original apostles and prophets, or by their delegates, during the preceding half century.

His comments on the role of the bishops should, in my view be read, in this context.

"Your justly respected clergy, who are a credit to God, are attuned to their bishop like the strings of a harp, and the result is a hymn of praise to Jesus Christ from minds that are in unison and affections that are in harmony. Pray, then, come and join this choir, every one of you; let there be a whole symphony of minds in concert; take the tone all together from God, and sing aloud to the Father with one voice through Jesus Christ, so that he may hear you and know by your good works that you are indeed members of his Son's body."

Commending the church in Ephesus for its recent refusal to entertain false teachers who had visited them, Ignatius notes:

"You stopped your ears against the seed they were sowing. Deaf as stones you were: yes, stones trimmed ready for God to build with, hoisted up by the derrick of Jesus Christ (the Cross) with the Holy Spirit for a cable; your faith being the winch that draws you to God, up the ramp of love."

Perhaps the most intense (and deservedly famous) quote of Ignatius from these letters is a comment on his impending martyrdom, in which the bishop exalts:

"I am God's wheat, ground fine by the lion's teeth to become purest bread for Christ."

It's heady stuff.

I'm discovering Ignatius through reading the Penguin edition of Early Christian Writings, translated by Maxwell Staniforth.

The Lord's Supper

2010-07-01T14:49:00.000-07:00

Here's what looks like an interesting new blog.

Grace at the Table combines the author's "two great passions: the grace of God and the Lord’s Supper."

A blog about the meaning and application of the Lord's Supper - a theme I have written briefly about here.

Widows: They Haven't Gone Away

2010-06-24T00:02:00.000-07:00

For Christians living in the economically developed world, the Biblical emphasis on caring for "widows" is one that we tend to rapidly contextualise away from its traditional and literal meaning.

Our line of reasoning goes something like this:

there aren't that many widows around today and those that exist tend to be elderly
the state (shaped in part, we claim, by centuries of Christian influence in the west) is now the main provider of care to widows
the equivalent person in our culture to the widow of biblical times is a) the single mother or b) the victim of sex trafficking.

No doubt such contextualisation has its place, but recent research reveals that, internationally, the plight of widows remains significant.

The Loomba Foundation, of which Cherie Blair is a patron, has this week launched a new report showing that 115 million widows around the world live in extreme poverty. Prejudice, mistreatment and exploitation are common among this section of the global population.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the countries with the largest number of widows broadly reflect those with large general populations - China (43 million widows), India (42 million) and the United States (13 million). Indonesia, Russia and Japan have a total of 24 million between them and there are around 245 million widows worldwide.

Widows in Afghanistan (2 million) and Iraq (3/4 of a million) are, according to the report, among those in the most difficult circumstances. The irony of this fact cannot be missed, both countries having been invaded by the orders of the British government while Mrs Blair's husband was prime minister.

The report also highlights the suffering of over 500 million dependent and adult children of widows, many of whom are severely affected by homelessness, poor health, economic and sexual exploitation and violence.

It is notable that both the old and new testaments place the care of widows at the heart of the responsibility of God's people. The church in Jerusalem, the first church to come into existence, ran a daily food distribution service to widows within its community, supported by the generous giving of its members. Deuteronomy 10 is typical of this Biblical emphasis:

For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the alien, giving him food and clothing.

Whereas many Christians in the west will continue to try and apply the Biblical commands to their specific cultural circumstances, it is worth remembering that "real" widows remain a significant part of the global population and, as in Biblical times, are at the sharp end of economic need.

The DNA of the Church

2010-06-21T14:03:00.000-07:00

What I do believe, however, is that the New Testament contains a revelation of Jesus Christ and His church. As we say repeatedly ... the church of the first-century was organic. And that organism we call the church has the same DNA today as it did in Century One.

What are some of those features which are native to her DNA? Features like the headship of Jesus Christ (He alone is the Head of the Body), face-to-face authentic community, the every-member functioning of the Body, mutual submission, the family nature of the church, the priesthood of all believers, etc. ... I sometimes call this "the organic expression of the church," "gathering in NT fashion," "meeting first-century style," or "NT-style church."
Frank Viola

Urban Church Planting

2010-05-15T17:45:00.000-07:00

Thoughtful piece by David Broodryk on David Watson's blog on the dynamics of urban church planting - especially looking at the important question of what "is" a church.

The concluding definition Broodryk offers, after considering the dynamic of smaller homogeneous groups which might be considered too small and unstable to be described as churches in their own right, is as follows:

“Church is the collection of baptized believers in the Lord Jesus Christ in a given locality (city or network), who gather regularly (in one group or several) for the purposes of worship, discipleship and nurture, and who depart those gatherings with the intention of obeying all the commands of Christ, in order to transform their families, communities and cities.”

There are omissions in this definition, of course. One addition I would want to make straight away is to add the phrase "who have received the Holy Spirit" after the phrase "Lord Jesus Christ" and before the phrase "in a given locality." I would also make the intention of the believers' obedience more explicitly focused on the glory of God, with any attendant cultural impact as secondary.

I appreciate, having said this, that Broodryk is not writing a theological treatise but a summary that addresses the specific and limited question of whether a church has to meet all-together in order to truly be a church.

Very interesting article, in my opinion.

Max McLean Acts Mark's Gospel

2010-05-08T16:45:00.000-07:00

Not sure how I have manged to miss this series by American actor Max Mclean.

Amazing!

Francis Chan Steps Out in Faith

2010-04-30T02:17:00.000-07:00

Francis Chan is stepping out in faith... from Catalyst on Vimeo.

Why Good News to the Poor is Not Enough

2010-04-27T01:35:00.000-07:00

Many churches and Christian organisations have, over recent years, rediscovered their God-given mandate to serve and bring good news to the economically disadvantaged, both in their locality and further field.

Thankfully, the idea that such acts are a distraction from the gospel is now rarely heard in Christian circles, as local churches support night shelters, drug rehabilitation projects, food programmes, education support and a myriad of other good works which seek to demonstrate the presence of the Kingdom of God through words and actions.

Welcome though these developments are, they are insufficient to either address the needs of those who are disadvantaged or to fully express the nature of the rule of God in the earth.

The same Lord who was anointed with the Spirit to "preach good news to the poor" was also mandated to bring a rather different message to the rich.

The materially wealthy, according to the gospel accounts, will find it "hard" to enter the kingdom of God, are sent away empty by God, and are to be overlooked by Jesus' disciples when they organise social events.

If that were not bad enough, the Son of God explicitly pronounces judgment upon the wealthy: not only does he pronounce the poor as "blessed", but, in Luke's account of the Sermon on the Mount, he proclaims "woe" to the rich - this term being drawn directly from the writings of the Prophets when they announced God's judgment on individuals, groups or nations.

A church pastor recently shared his concern in discovering that two adjacent neighbourhoods in his city, both of which contain church members, had significantly differing rates of average life expectancy. Those living in the poorer area were likely to die nine years earlier than those in the wealthy neighbourhood next door.

It is questionable how far this gap can be addressed by only meeting the needs and empowering those at the bottom of the economic scale, without also addressing the income and consumption levels of those at the top.

The gospel, it seems to me, calls us to focus on both.

Church Planting Statistics

2010-04-23T17:51:00.000-07:00

Of 1,000 American Protestant church pastors recently surveyed,

"only 3 percent of their churches served as the primary sponsor of a church plant in the past year"

Commenting on this, Ed Stetzer says:

"In a practical sense this amounts to a neglect of the Apostolic model of multiplication and winds up diminishing the local church's Kingdom impact in the world."

Source.

On the Westminster Declaration

2010-04-22T18:44:00.001-07:00

The Westminster Declaration has generated some discussion among Christians engaged with the political process in the run up to the General Election, drawing both praise and criticism from both inside and outside the Christian community

The Evangelical Alliance in Wales, meanwhile, has released its own set of priorities for voters to consider in the coming election.

"Firstly that the new government will ensure that the UK's poorest people will not lose out as it seeks to resolve the nation's colossal debt.

Secondly that the new government will commit itself to social justice. Wealth creation and entrepreneurship is to be encouraged so that the whole of society may benefit and not a privileged few.

Thirdly that the new government will ensure that Christians and other people of faith are allowed to express their views and organise themselves without the intrusive intervention of the state."

The difference of emphasis in the two statements says something about where different Christians assume the emphasis should be placed when seeking to apply their faith to their voting choices.

Is Arsenal FC Like the Local Church?

2010-04-02T09:59:00.001-07:00

Watching Arsenal's impressive second half come-back against Barcelona in the quarter final of the UEFA Champions League earlier in the week, I got thinking about the nature of the local church (as you do).

The link was formed in my mind as I thought back to former Arsenal successes, both domestic and European, and considered what we mean when we say things like, "Arsenal won the Premier League in 2003-04". Stay with me, this will all tie up with our understanding of the local church in due course, I promise.

Very few of the players who battled Barcelona this week took part in Arsenal's unbeaten Premiership campaign in 03-04. The stars of that season were such luminaries as Patrick Vieira, Robert Pires and Theirry Henry, now all playing for other clubs. Despite this discontinuity within the team, the club's success that year are widely regarded as forming part of the success of "Arsenal" today, even though few if any of today's players took part in it.

This means that when we talk about Arsenal's footballing record, we are actually talking about the record of the club as an institution, rather than of the specific 27 players who make up the first team squad this season.

When we talk about a local church, especially when we talk about its history, we also tend to be be describing that church as an institution rather than as a current collective or congregation.

When we say "This church has a history of sending out missionaries around the world", for instance, or, "This church has been a centre of strong preaching for generations", we are clearly talking about the institution of that church rather than the 180 adults who make up the current membership. This is despite the fact that missionaries may still be going out from it or that preaching continues to be strong.

My question is, is such a concept valid when thinking about the nature of a local church? Can a local church be conceived of as an institution that transcends the lifetime of its current members? Or, by definition, is a specific church only capable of existing in the present? What do we mean when we say, "This church has been here for 100 years?"

We can answer this question in several contrasting ways:

We can assert the historical continuity of a specific local church. Christ Church in the City of Boston, for instance, is a example of a local church that describes itself as having existed continuously since at least 1723.
We can assert the continuity of a specific local church if it was founded during the lifetime of any of its current members.
We can assert the continuity of a local church as long as it has had the same leadership/constitution/building/name or denominational affiliation.
We can assert the continuity of a congregation for a generation but describe each successive generation as representing essentially a new church (even though it may call itself by the same name).
More radically, we can conceive of the local church as existing only when it meets; by this definition, each new gathering is essentially a "new church".

I have noted elsewhere on this blog that the late John Wimber offered the opinion that a specific local church should only see itself existing for "about twenty years or "a generation".

Was Wimber correct? And if so, does this "new church" create itself naturally through the passage of time or does it need to be "re-planted"?

The fact that many of the local churches we meet in the New Testament are quite new makes it quite challenging to answer these questions conclusively from the example of these churches.

But, as we shall see in a future post, there are at least some hints in the NT of how we are to approach this subject - which is not ultimately about history and semantics but about the essential nature of the church, the body of Christ on the earth.

Single Leaders

2010-03-02T16:17:00.000-08:00

"Losing the specific and original trait of the primitive community, the church by and large became again subject to the usual anthropologically universal pattern of the single, sacramentally qualified religionist. By and large . . . this pattern has continued to our day in churches of every polity and theology."

John Howard Yoder

Tradition and Scripture

2010-03-02T15:52:00.000-08:00

"Christians today who want to see the church be faithful to the gospel of the kingdom should ask themselves: Which of our current traditions are consistent with Scripture and help us to be faithful communities of the kingdom? And which really nullify God’s Word? If churches confront that question prayerfully while seriously examining Scripture, many things may change."

Howard Snyder

Happy Birthday Terry Virgo!

2010-02-20T01:31:00.000-08:00

The Leaders Poole: Happy Birthday Terry Virgo!

Matthew Hosier expresses appreciation for Terry Virgo. I agree wholeheartedly with everything Matthew has written.

I would add one other quality that commands my respect.

Terry is very generous. Especially with his own money. He is, to quote something I have heard him say several times, "seriously committed to hilarious giving."

Happy birthday Terry.

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John H Armstrong : Why Do Muslims Become Jesus Followers?

2010-01-25T16:33:00.000-08:00

John H Armstrong : Why Do Muslims Become Jesus Followers?

Some interesting and well-researched work into the issue of muslim conversion.

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Starting Gospel Planting Movements on Campus: Make Disciples

2009-11-18T17:57:00.000-08:00

Starting Gospel Planting Movements on Campus: Make Disciples:

"A mindset that focuses on the expansion of any religious system will force you to ignore and reject opportunities and partnerships to reach people that will not join the system."

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Why is church so dull? A psychotherapist diagnoses the Sunday ritual. - By Stephen W. Simpson - Patrol Magazine

2009-11-13T01:16:00.000-08:00

Why is church so dull? A psychotherapist diagnoses the Sunday ritual. - By Stephen W. Simpson - Patrol Magazine

Painful honesty with a glimmer of hope for the future.

"As much as postmodern evangelicals bandy about the word “community,” our gatherings have changed very little. Stylistic alterations might add some hipster flair, but the focal point of the liturgical week remains theater. A dozen or so people perform for a few hundred that sit, stand, kneel, pray, and sing on command. We squeeze real community into the gaps, between events with a hierarchical structure."

"In the first century there was still teaching, prayer, and worship, but the early church was about community. Paul’s letters paint a picture of people living together and collectively figuring out what it meant to follow Christ. The authority of the leaders and teachers wasn’t a forgone conclusion. They were in dialogue with their congregations. Paul himself often had to defend his position of authority and many of his letters are part of an ongoing doctrinal debate. You get the sense, however, that even theological issues were somewhat secondary. The focus was a meal, not a class or a worship service. Some early Christians enjoyed the community meal so much that Paul had to tell them to tone it down because they were partying a little too hard."

"How can we expect our leaders to be authentic when theater is the center of our religious week? No one is drawn to such a job unless they enjoy power and attention."

"In my fifteen years as a psychotherapist, I have encountered few human systems so consistently dysfunctional as church staffs....When we rely on the talents and titillating vision of one man instead of the slow, silent life of community, it’s easy for people to get hurt."

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God Breaks Those He Wants To Make Great

2009-10-18T12:55:00.000-07:00

adrianwarnock.com: God Breaks Those He Wants To Make Great

Great quote from Spurgeon over on Adrian Warnock's site just now.

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Emil Brunner on the Nature of the Church

2009-08-11T13:20:00.000-07:00

“In the last 50 or 100 years New Testament research has unremittingly and successfully addressed itself to the task of elucidating for us what was known as the „Ecclesia‟ in primitive Christianity—so very different from what is to-day called the church both in Roman and Protestant camps. . . . This insight—which an unprejudiced study of the New Testament and the crying need of the church have helped us to reach—may be expressed as follows: the New Testament „Ecclesia,‟ the fellowship of Jesus Christ, is a pure communion of persons and has nothing to do with the character of an institution about it; it is therefore misleading to identify any single one of the historically developed churches, which are all marked by an institutional character, with the true Christian communion.”

Emil Brunner

Doing Church Differently

2009-08-02T16:58:00.000-07:00

In my opinion the time has come to do church differently. I am convinced that we must shift our focus from highly programmed ministry to developing Missional/Transformational Communities that are formed as a seamless organic whole. These types of communities are rare and difficult to visualize because we have moved so forcefully to programmatic ministry in the last half of the previous century.

Alan Andrews, recently retired President of the Navigators, U.S.

source

Ten Reasons Why Men Should Not Be Ordained for Ministry

2009-07-27T14:13:00.000-07:00

Apologies if you've read it already. It was new to me and made me chuckle.

I found it on Eugene Cho's blog here and traced it back to the original author on the Serving Bread site here.

Ten Reasons Why Men Should Not Be Ordained for Ministry

10. A man’s place is in the army.

9. The pastoral duties of men who have children might distract them from the responsibility of being a parent.

8. The physique of men indicates that they are more suited to such tasks as chopping down trees and wrestling mountain lions. It would be “unnatural” for them to do ministerial tasks.

7. Man was created before woman, obviously as a prototype. Thus, they represent an experiment rather than the crowning achievement of creation.

6. Men are too emotional to be priests or pastors. Their conduct at football and basketball games demonstrates this.

5. Some men are handsome, and this will distract women worshipers.

4. Pastors need to nurture their congregations. But this is not a traditional male role. Throughout history, women have been recognized as not only more skilled than men at nurturing, but also more fervently attracted to it. This makes them the obvious choice for ordination.

3. Men are prone to violence. No really masculine man wants to settle disputes except by fighting about them. Thus they would be poor role models as well as dangerously unstable in positions of leadership.

2. The New Testament tells us that Jesus was betrayed by a man. His lack of faith and ensuing punishment remind us of the subordinated position that all men should take.

1. Men can still be involved in church activities, even without being ordained. They can sweep sidewalks, repair the church roof, and perhaps even lead the song service on Father’s Day. By confining themselves to such traditional male roles, they can still be vitally important in the life of the church.

Boom, boom.

What Divides Us?

2009-07-26T10:25:00.000-07:00

Came across this quote from S. Michael Craven from the Center for Christ and Culture. The quote is from his recent blog post Love Believes All Things. I agree with the content and the tone of the piece and made some similar comments on a previous post myself.

"How many times have you heard the phrase “doctrine divides?” In response, I would say it isn’t doctrine that divides us but rather epistemology. In other words, it’s what we think we know with certainty that divides us. Such certitude is presumptuous and arrogant, the height of hubris when measured against the humility of Paul, who in the same chapter on love conceded the presence of mystery when he wrote, “Now I know in part” (1 Corinthians 13:12). If the apostle Paul did not know the truth completely, then neither do you or I. The consequence of this fact should be a more humble epistemology that is more inclined to listen, to process and ponder, rather than critique and attack."

You can read the rest of Michael's blog post here.

Transition Culture, Community and the Local Church

2009-06-25T23:59:00.000-07:00

This article should be read by everyone concerned with communicating the gospel and planting churches in Britain.

Although written to explain the phenomenon of the Transition Movement (the grass roots environmental network that seeks to explore ways of enabling local communities to adapt to a post-oil environment) , author Jay Griffiths also provides an insightful description of urban life in C21 Britain - the culture many of us are called to minister into.

The article provides insight into one of the crucial "felt needs" (not to mention actual needs!) of modern society: the need for community.

Whatever else we think of the nature and practice of the local church, I'm sure that most of us would feel that fellowship ought to be one of its key components. My own view is that fellowship is also at the heart of how we communicate the good news: the medium becomes the message. We model what we speak - of God's redeeming love and the creation of a new humanity in Christ.

Invaluable reading as a discussion starter for those committed to seeing the local church engage effectively with the un-churched majority around it.

Among the many quotable insights from jay Griffith's article:

Many people feel that individual action [on climate change] is too trivial to be effective but that they are unable to influence anything at a national, governmental level. They find themselves paralyzed between the apparent futility of the small-scale and impotence in the large-scale.
At a government level, I find I’ve shrunk, smaller than the X on my ballot paper.
We speak of economies of scale, and I would suggest that there are also moralities of scale.
Community morality involves a sense of fellow-feeling, is attuned to the common good, far steadier than individual morality, far kinder than the State.
The fact that they were trying out an idea without being able to predict the results has a vitality to it, an intellectually energetic quality, a profound liveliness.
William Morris spoke of the gentle social-ism that he called fellowship: “Fellowship is life, and lack of fellowship is death.”
Many people today experience a strange hollow in the psyche, a hole the size of a village.
In this extreme isolation, we don’t interact except with the television and the computer. We’ve lost something, and we don’t know what it is, and we try to fill it with food and alcohol and shopping but it’s never filled—what we’ve lost is our connection to our community, our place, and nature.
The colonial powers practiced the policy of “divide and rule” ... but in contemporary society there is a more insidious policy of “atomize and rule.” The world of mass media fragments real societies into solitary individuals, passive recipients of information.
Although the French Revolution announced that it stood for three things, only two of these (Liberty and Equality) have survived in political parlance while the third, Fraternity, has been made to sound both quaint and unnecessary.
We are ineluctably and gloriously social animals. We want fellowship.
Celebrity culture is an opposite of community, informing us that these few nonsense-heads matter but that the rest of us do not. Insidiously, the television tells me I am no one. If I was Someone, I’d be on telly.
Celebrity culture is both a cause and a consequence of the low self-esteem that mars so many people’s lives. So, the unacknowledged individual is manipulated into a jealousy of acknowledgment, which is why it is so telling that huge numbers of young people insist that when they grow up they want to be a celebrity.
We all need acknowledgment (but not fame). We all need recognition (but not to be “spotted” out shopping). We all need to be known, we need our selves confirmed by others, fluidly, naturally. A sense of community has always provided these familiar, unshowy acts of ordinary recognition.

Comments, please.

How Long Should a Local Church Last?

2009-06-22T12:56:00.000-07:00

I've only heard it stated publicly twice.

The first time was by the late John Wimber when he said (on his church planting tapes, if I remember rightly) that, in his view, a local church should probably see itself lasting about 20 years before it either closes or undergoes such substantial and fundamental change that it, in effect, becomes a new church.

The second time I heard it was today when Steve Timmis, leader of the Porterbook Network and Western Europe director (or something equally impressive) of the Acts 29 Network, made the following statement on his twitter profile:

"Every church is 'designed' for a specific culture & generation. It has a 'sell-by' date which, if ignored, leads into institutionalism."

I must confess, I have not thought a great deal about this issue so I will throw it out to the blogosphere in the hope that someone has done some Biblical thinking on it and can provide some guidance on where to begin in responding to this concept of the alleged time-sensitive nature of a specific local church.

Meanwhile, I'll try and get some further clarification from Steve Timmis about why he believes this.

Should We Use Twitter in Church? A Response to Josh Harris

2009-05-29T14:37:00.000-07:00

Although not really the main focus of this blog, I was stimulated by Josh Harris's post on the use of Twitter in church.

His conclusion is to leave the tweeting out during the church meetings and his reasons are as follows:

1. Doing so will be likely to distract me from the word of God (as I am likely to be tempted to check emails, etc.)

2. Tweeting, even in response to the sermon, is time spent not actively listening to the sermon.

3. Tweeting focuses on me broadcasting rather than listening and, thus, is a different activity to that needed to benefit from the word.

4. We may set the wrong example to other people - they may think we're merely checking our emails and this may lead them to do likewise.

5. Popularity in the culture does not make an activity appropriate in the church.

6. Nothing will be lost by tweeting after the Sunday meeting.

Judging by the number of comments on Josh's blog, this seems a pretty live issue, with John Piper even entering the debate. So here goes with a response, point by point:

1. If it is true that tweeting distracts you from the word of God, then it is certainly an activity to be avoided.

My difficulty with Josh's first point, however, is that, having been honest about his own struggles in this area and sharing the effect that tweeting during the sermon has on him ( I assume he has tried it), he moves from that to a general claim that the action must have the same effect on every human being.

A superficial consideration of this premise, or a familiarity with the varieties of human experiences, will reveal it to be unsustainable. Everyone is different and one man's meat is another man's poison. The Lord Jesus only required us to cut off our hands if they were causing us to sin. If they were not, we are permitted to keep them attached to our arms.

2. Tweeting is not time spent listening. This is surely being righteous over-much. The act of listening (to God's word) is far more multi-faceted than the mere act of sitting still and hearing. It involves, for instance, thinking about what is heard, engaging our will and emotions in response to it; applying it to our lives as we hear; praying while we listen, etc. Actively listening to the word of God may also involve us weeping or trembling at it (a response that God says he "esteems") .

Any or all of these excellent actions may involve us, temporarily, "not listening" in the narrow sense that Josh suggests. But, surely, they are all very much at the heart of how a godly congregation should listen. If an individual finds that they can use a tool of some kind to focus their response and enrich their capacity to engage with the message, that is surely a valid act for them, subject to it being done unto the Lord and with due regard to the needs of the weaker brother. I note that, annecdotally, several of those commenting on Josh's post do in fact state this to be the reason they use twitter during the sermon.

Furthermore, Josh's assumption that the act of tweeting cannot be done while actively listening is, presumably, a statement which he himself has found to be the case in his experience. To make a rule based on this experience, however, appears unwise and a possible case of imposing one' s own freedom (or lack of it) on another.

I would disagree with those who compare tweeting with note taking. I compare it more with saying "amen" to a particular point in the sermon. I don't know if he still does it, but CJ Mahaney was one of the first Christian leaders I observed giving verbal feedback during Bible teaching - often of a vigorous kind. Are we to prohibit this activity because it is "not time spent listening"? Please see my concluding comments for more on this point.

3. I agree that tweeting is broadcasting, but this action does not have to be seen as incompatible with listening. My definition (above) of what is involved in active listening is, I think, relevant to this point as well as to the previous one. I am not qualified to comment on listening from a neurological or educational perspective, but there may be more to discover from those fields of knowledge and common grace about what it is exactly that is involved in effective listening.

A subsidiary point could be made here that, by sharing the individual's response to the sermon, the effect of it is being spread in real time and in a natural, relational way.

4. Example. Oh! The great argument that has stifled innovation in God's church for centuries! Exactly the same argument has been used repeatedly in connection with a hundred and one developments in church that are now uncontroversial, including (in no particular order):

using TV monitors in the meetings (people will think they've come to a cinema, etc)
using guitars (people will think that it's OK to listen to rock music)
wearing suits (people will think they've come to a business convention)
not wearing suits (people will think they've come to a hippy festival, etc)

This argument is really a dead end for two reasons. Firstly, because it focuses so much on externals at the expense of heart attitude that it is difficult to see how such an argument will tend towards producing anything other than ....... well, externalism!

Secondly, it suggests that Christian adults who are often handling major responsibility in the world of work all week, are incapable of dealing emotionally or intellectually with another individual who is accessing a palmtop or other device during a public meeting. Do such people actually exist in our churches? If so, I would want to ask the question, "Where did they learn to be so uptight?" My concern is that they might have learned such unseemly traits in church itself.

5. Josh's analysis of the relationship between church life and the surrounding culture is, to my mind, the weakest element in his article. To say that we do not need to incorporate a thing into church life just because it is popular is at one level, a mere truism.

At another level, however, it reads a little bit like the age-old line, "We don't want change just for the sake of change" to which I reply, "Why not? We're quite happy with predictability for the sake of predictability."

Anyone who argues that we should "start doing something" in church because "they do it in the world" is clearly a sad person who needs befriending and taking out more. The fact is, people are using twitter increasingly in public conferences and other presentational settings and it is a trend that is naturally finding expression in some churches. The issue, therefore, is a pastoral one - should leaders encourage or discourage this practice for the good of the body - not one based on making the meetings more culturally relevant to the outsider.

6. Several things will be lost by tweeting after the Sunday meeting instead of during it. Most significantly, I would suggest, is the sense of immediacy. Preaching, if I have understood correctly, is meant to cause a response now. Of course, such a response cannot only be expressed through tweeting! But, if the point of preaching is that it is meant to have an effect in the moment, we should be careful that we do not confuse this aim with the ability to form a considered evaluation of a sermon at a later point.

Some final thoughts:

Listening (to paraphrase Jonathan Edwards in his Dissertation Concerning the End for Which God Created the World) is a subordinate end not an ultimate end when we gather to hear God's word. The ultimate end of listening to preaching is, of course, to glorify God, but between the subordinate end of listening and the ultimate end of God being glorified, other subordinate ends exist. In particular, we should expect the preaching of the word to effect change in us, conforming us in greater measure to the will of God and the character of Jesus Christ.

If this is happening, we should rejoice whether or not tweeting is happening. If it is not, tweeting or sitting still is a non-issue.

The Next Evangelicalism?

2009-05-20T17:06:00.000-07:00

Interview: Soong Chan Rah from Eugene Cho on Vimeo.

Seeker Friendly, New Testament Style (Part 1)

2009-05-02T10:34:00.000-07:00

Debates about the extent to which church meetings are or should be accessible to the uncommitted or casual visitor have occupied a great deal of attention in Christian circles in recent years.

It is interesting to note within the context of this debate how little space has been given over to analysing how the new testament church actually understood the issue. Instead, an assumption is often made that a desire to be accessible to the un-churched outsider is an entirely new preoccupation, unknown to the early church. The reality however is quite different.

Paul's Corinthian correspondence, while focusing on the life of the church itself, also has an eye on those outside, as we shall see in a series of forthcoming posts on the subject.

Seeker Friendly, New Testament Style (Part 2)

2009-04-30T00:25:00.000-07:00

A common assertion made in debates about church meetings being seeker-friendly is that the use of charismatic gifts is off-putting to outsiders.

If that is the case, perhaps it is because we do not really see many expressions of charismatic gifts being exercised in local church life in the way the apostle Paul envisaged. That is, involving the active participation of all members in the use of the gifts they have been given for the common good. Instead, we may see at best a platform-dominated use of prophecy or healing and the occasional use of tongues sung or spoken corporately.

Perhaps it is this latter use of spiritual gifts that is reportedly off-putting to the outsider rather than the usage that Paul envisaged when he wrote to the believers in Corinth about the administration of spiritual gifts.

Paul's guidance for regulating the use of spiritual gifts in church meetings is twofold: their use should be both intelligible and edifying. The manifestations of the Spirit must be understood by those present so that they can be built up by them. For this reason, Paul gives some practical guidance in 1 Corinthians 14 on how the gifts should to be exercised in an intelligible and edifying way:

tongues should be interpreted (13-17) and spoken one after another (27)
prophecy should be delivered one after another rather than blurted out at the same time (29-31)
prophecy should be weighed (29)
women should not disrupt the meeting by chatting out of turn (34)

It is in this context that Paul applies the same principle of intelligibility to the needs of the non-believer who might be present in the meeting:

The key passage - and one that often proves difficult to understand - is 1 Corinthians 14: 20-25:

Brothers, stop thinking like children. In regard to evil be infants, but in your thinking be adults. In the Law it is written: "Through men of strange tongues and through the lips of foreigners I will speak to this people, but even then they will not listen to me," says the Lord.
Tongues, then, are a sign, not for believers but for unbelievers; prophecy, however, is for believers, not for unbelievers. So if the whole church comes together and everyone speaks in tongues, and some who do not understand or some unbelievers come in, will they not say that you are out of your mind? But if an unbeliever or someone who does not understand comes in while everybody is prophesying, he will be convinced by all that he is a sinner and will be judged by all, and the secrets of his heart will be laid bare. So he will fall down and worship God, exclaiming, "God is really among you!"

At first glance, the passage appears to contradict itself in several places. In v. 22, firstly, Paul says that tongues are a sign for unbelievers but in v 23 he says that when unbelievers hear the gift of tongues in the meeting, they will think the church is mad. Hardly a convincing sign, we might think.

In v. 22 and 24, Paul appears to make another contradiction. On the one hand, he asserts that prophecy is for believers but in 24, its use appears to be instrumental in convincing unbelievers of God's presence and their own guilt.

How do we resolve these apparent contradictions?

What is a Sign?

Firstly, we should understand what Paul means by "sign" in this passage. It is often assumed that the apostle is asserting that the gift of tongues is an evidence of the truth of the gospel that will lead unbelievers to faith in Christ.

Actually, the context of the passage requires us to see the use of the word sign in quite a different way. The quotation from the Old Testament is taken from the book of Isaiah. In that passage (Isaiah 28: 11-12) the prophet is predicting the impending invasion of the Assyrian army as a judgment on Judah and Jerusalem, an event which subsequently took place c. 700 BC. The "strange tongues" described by Isaiah are therefore the voices of Assyrian soldiers as they lay siege to Jerusalem and their presence indicates God's judgment on the nation.

The "sign" that Paul is referring to, therefore, in 1 Corinthians 14 is not a sign that confirms the truth of the gospel to the unbeliever, but is rather a sign of judgment upon him. When a non-believer hears the gift of tongues used without interpretation in a church meeting, that event signifies God's judgment on him. He is, to use another Pauline term, an "unspiritual man". The gift of tongues without interpretation highlights this fact and results in the seeker drawing an incorrect conclusion about the phenomenon he is observing.

Paul does not say that the presence of this sign is a good thing! Rather, Paul's point is that it serves no value to the outsider beyond confirming him in his ignorance of spiritual things. Therefore, implies Paul, tongues without interpretation is definitely NOT seeker-friendly!

Who is Prophecy For?

The second apparent contradiction can be resolved in a similar way. Paul does not say that prophecy is a "sign" for believers. Rather, he simply states that it "for believers." In other words, believers (rather than seekers) are the intended recipients of the gift of prophecy.

This being the case, the use of prophecy, unlike the use of uninterpreted tongues, is intelligible to both believers and outsiders. To the former, it serves to build them up. To the latter, its revelatory element serves to highlight their own guilt before God because they can understand it. A message in tongues may well be full of revelation (Paul earlier describes it as "uttering mysteries with your spirit") but, because it is not intelligible, the believers are not edified and the outsiders think you're all mad.

Prophecy, by contrast, which is also full of revelation, is intelligible to both saint and sinner. Its effect, therefore, is to edify the former and convict the latter.

Paul's conclusion should not come as a surprise in verse 39:

Therefore, my brothers, be eager to prophesy, and do not forbid speaking in tongues. But everything should be done in a fitting and orderly way.

Paul saw the use of spiritual gifts as a positive thing in the life of the local church, both for the sake of the believers and for the benefit of the outsider. The key was that they should be exercised in ways that are understandable to both.

Thomas Aquinas on the Credit Crunch

2009-03-05T14:15:00.000-08:00

To take usury for money lent is unjust in itself, because this is to sell what does not exist, and this evidently leads to inequality, which is contrary to justice.

Thomas Aquinas,
Dominican friar and theologian (1225-1274).

source

Struck by Isaiah

2009-03-03T23:56:00.000-08:00

Prophets tend to be fairly direct in their style and delivery. Isaiah, I'm reminded as I reread his message, is no exception.

The opening five chapters of the book that bears his name is a stinging indictment against a society that owes its existence to God's gracious calling of them and which now has abandoned God for the pursuit of false gods and material wealth.

Without pulling any punches, the prophet laments the nation of Israel's slide into unfaithfulness and injustice:

"See how the faithful city has become a harlot!"

Particular evils highlighted in these opening chapters include:

bloodshed (1:15)
corruption (1:23)
injustice towards the economically vulnerable (1:23)
occult practices and pagan religion (2:6)
the accumulation of wealth (2:7)
the worship of created things (2:8)
arrogance (2:17)
conspicuous displays of wealth (3:16f)
economic speculation (5:8)
alcohol abuse (5:11)

In the midst of these opening pages, which for a book written over 2,700 years ago reads with alarming contemporary relevance, the prophet announces a ray of hope.

Firstly, God promises cleansing from sin (4:4). Secondly, he announces a mountain that draws the nations (2:2f), the latter containing imagery resonant with the emergence of the Christian church.

I think I'm going to enjoy becoming reacquainted with "the evangelist of the old testament."

Responding to Adrian Warnock on Measures of Leadership

2009-02-27T00:32:00.000-08:00

Adrian Warnock has posted this week on the subject of measures of gifting and knowing your role as a leader. Since the views expressed in the post are widely held among Christians - the passage is a particular favourite of cell churches, for instance - it seemed appropriate to respond to it and invite readers to consider another perspective on the passage and its application for today.

The passage in question is Exodus 18.

Adrian's arguement, if I have understood it correctly, is that the Exodus passage refers to different measures of leadership capacity that different people possess ("leaders of 10's , leaders of 50's, " etc ) and that church leaders today should be aware of their measure of leadership gifting and seek to operate faithfully within that specific sphere or measure.

My problems with this interpretation are several:

1. The men in Exodus 18 were essentially judges not pastors or elders. The words used to describe them in the NIV are "officials" (21) and "judges" (22). They are called "leaders" in verse 25, but this term is immediately qualified in the same verse by again referring to their role as "officials" and "judges". Moses is here setting up a system of law enforcement - more a police force than a church leadership team.

2. The view that the different roles these judges occupied were based on their "differing capacity for leadership" is stated but not proven from the text. The passage itself does not actually tell us what basis was used by Moses for selecting some to be officials over 10 and others to be officials over 1000. It is an assumption that the different roles were based on "capacity" but not a conclusion that arises naturally from the text, which merely states that men were appointed to these roles.

3. It is entirely possible that Moses made these appointments based not on measures of gifting but on age or on family or clan ties. Anyone reasonably familiar with middle eastern cultures in the past or present would not find that sentence as shocking as those of us raised in a modern, urban and western environment. Of course, I am not claiming that this was the basis for Moses' decisions - I am merely illustrating that "gifting" is not a necessary way of understanding the passage as it is not referred to at all within it.

4. Adrian assumes the validity of the "number one" leader model for local churches and basis his application of the passage on that assumption. His application includes the following : "Sadly we fail to realise that not every godly Christian leader should aspire to be the so-called "number one" leader of a church." I would respond that it is surely preferable that no godly Christian aspires to such an un-biblical role.

The phrase "number one" is virtually always placed in inverted commas when used in a Christian context, as I have done in this sentence. Such usage highlights the inherent problem with the term. We feel it to be an inappropriate phrase because we claim to believe in servant leadership rather than hierarchy in church life; at the same time, our use of the term reveals that, in fact, we do believe in hierarchy in the local church. Hence the inverted commas, as a way of trying to have our leadership cake and eat it.

Who was the number one among Jesus' apostles after the ascension? The vision caster? The most gifted public speaker? Actually, it was the the one who had always been the greatest - namely, the least of all.

Adrian does, of course, make a valid point, which I agree is implicit indirectly in the passage, that leaders should not assume more of themselves than is realistic. Perhaps Paul had something similar in mind when he exhorts us to "not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you." The context of this passage in Romans 12:3 does have to do with gifting in a broader sense - not whether I am a "leader of 50" or not but whether my gifts include teaching, being a mercy-giver, prophesying or leadership, all of which are to be used to serve the body of Christ and build others up.

Don't Forget Mystery

2009-02-05T17:45:00.000-08:00

In the church of my dreams, the Bible is central and speaks with "final authority on all matters of faith and practice" (to quote a document from the Baptist church of my youth). Such a valuing of the Scriptures will inevitably lead to teaching from the Bible that is doctrinal in nature. So far so good.

From this can arise the desire for a "systematic" theology that covers all aspects of Biblical revelation and attempts to draw together the different strands of Bible truth into a comprehensive whole. Affirming that Scripture is not internally contradictory and assuming that all strands of Biblical truth can be harmonised, we can then develop a system of belief that attempts to explain all - a kind of Biblical equivalent of the scientist's search for a Grand Theory of Everything.

This desire is, of course, understandable and at one level is to be welcomed. It does, however, have its risks. One problem that can emerge in a church or movement committed to expounding Biblical truth is that its understanding of doctrine can become overly formulaic and can fail to recognise that in the end, all doctrine ends in mystery.

When we say that "God is love", for example, we are saying something that at one level appears reasonably clear and able to be understood (to the mind made alive by the Spirit). But at the same time, we are also staring wide mouthed into the most profound mystery of the universe, a mystery that makes the unraveling of the human genome appear child's play.

Although the words of Scripture are sufficient, they are not exhaustive. They do not tell us all that can be known, only that which we need to know for our salvation and for living a godly life.

Perhaps Paul had something similar in mind when he confessed that "we know in part" and when he portrayed this present life as "looking into a dark mirror" or (as other versions put it) "seeing only dimly". Because so much attention has been spent in recent decades explaining that these verses in 1 Corinthians do not refer to the cessation of spiritual gifts with the closing of the canon of Scripture, we have perhaps not been as careful to explain what they actually do mean.

In context, Paul is saying that all of our current knowledge about the things of God is limited - not incorrect, just limited. It is like the knowledge that a child has about the world around him - simplistic, basic, lacking depth or rigor. "Now", says Paul, "we know in part."

What is Paul's response to the reality of our current childish knowledge compared to our future adult knowledge of spiritual things? Does he abandon doctrine? Not at all. Rather, he emphasises love: And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

In the church of my dreams, doctrinal teaching is important. But it is to be set forth with a healthy dose of humility and a recognition that at present we're just kids talking about big stuff that we don't really get. This being the case, we adopt humility in our dealings with each other, and we make great efforts to think, speak and act lovingly towards all those who belong to Jesus Christ, even with those who don't agree with our view of the Millenium.

Colin Crouch, Post Democracy and Grass Roots Church Movements

2008-11-23T15:19:00.000-08:00

My guess is that when Colin Crouch, Chair of the Department of Social and Political Sciences at the European University Institute in Florence, penned his short but absorbing book Post-democracy he was not anticipating that it would, in part, inspire thought about the nature of the Christian church.

When reading, however, I was struck by one paragraph that seemed to have a direct application to the idea of the church as a movement rather than an organisation.

Against the backdrop of the numerical decline in the manual working classes in Western societies and, as Crouch sees it, the related decline in mass concerted political action emanating from those social groups, he notes one movement that has bucked the trend of growing political passivity in recent years: namely, the rise of the feminist movement. Alongside the green movement, it has, says the author, "constituted the most important new instance of democratic politics at work" in recent decades.

The paragraph that struck me as having something to say (indirectly) about the church was as follows:

"Starting with small groups of intellectuals and extremists, it [feminism] spread to express itself in complex, rich and uncontrollable ways, but all rooted in the fundamental requirement of a great movement: the discovery of an unexpressed identity, leading to the definition of interests and the formation of formal and informal groups to give expression to these. As with all great movements, it took the existing political system by surprise and could not be easily manipulated. ... It is characteristic of a true major social movement that it takes a confusing and sometimes contradictory multiplicity of forms."

Those of us who have a longing to see a mass movement of Christian life which significantly effects the social and cultural landscape of our communities and nations, may wish to reflect on these ideas:

1. Mass Christian movements often start at the fringes and are easily dismissed or ridiculed in their early stages. While we look back with awe at, say, the Wesleyan movement of the C18, we do well to remember that in origin it was quirky and led by a small band of prayerful extremists.

2. A great movement requires the "discovery of an unexpressed identity". While we can rejoice wholeheartedly in the recovery across the Christian church in recent years of an appreciation of the grace of God in regard to the believer's righteous standing in Christ, his freedom from condemnation and law and the power of the new birth to deliver from slavery to sin, there is perhaps yet "more light" to be shed on the implications of this truth for our corporate life together. The discovery that, since I am in Christ, I am one with you if you are in Christ and that, when we meet together, Christ himself is present with us, no matter how few in number we are, is a truth whose power is, perhaps, waiting to be fully realised.

3. This discovery, that we the church have a shared identity and shared life waiting to be fully expressed beyond our current experience of church meetings and organised events could, according to Crouch's model, lead to the "defining of interests." Our interests as Christian believers include encouraging one another to grow in God's grace, caring deeply for one another and sharing our lives together in fellowship. Our interests include living holy lives for the glory of God.and seeking Christ's Kingdom in our lives, our families and in wider society . Our interests include a detachment from worldly priorities and a longing for the "appearing" of Christ at the end of the age when we shall be united with him forever. Our interests also include a desire to make Christ known to others by word and deed and to seek the advance of his kingdom throughout the nations.

4. The discovery of these interests could lead, in turn, to the formation of groups that give expression to them. Groups of believers who meet to pray, to feed on Christ through his word and through the sacrament of the Lord's supper, to share our lives together and to care for, teach and encourage one another. Groups where we learn from God's word and where true discipleship takes place which shapes everything about us. Groups which non-believers attend and in which they witness supernatural occurrences as the Spirit of Christ distributes gifts and manifestations to build up the members. Such groups might vary in size, in time and frequency of gathering and in numerous other secondary matters. I know what you're thinking - it sounds bit like the church we read of in Acts.

5. Such a movement could take existing systems by surprise. A system that has for so long been leader-centric could find that anyone and everyone is hosting and starting groups without asking for permission. We could find that, just as unnamed believers fleeing persecution first took the gospel to Antioch and into the Gentile world (see Acts 11), we could today see ordinary believers who have regular full-time jobs in offices, schools or factories breaking into new people groups with the good news in our multi-cultural cities and that new churches are appearing who sing the praise of Jesus Christ in Somali, Arabic and Polish. Although we may think we would rejoice in these untidy developments, we may in reality find ourselves nervous about these uncontrolled events, in similar ways to the reaction of European Catholicism 500 years ago when the reformers promised to translate the Bible into the common languages and place it in the hands of ploughmen and weavers to read and obey as their conscience taught them.

6. The fact that such a movement cannot be manipulated indicates how different it is from other structures that may exist within a society. In particular, such a mass movement is in nature quite different from a corporation or a firm, particularly as they increasingly exist in the Anglo-American economies. Such firms, which tragically (to my mind) some churches have sought to imitate, have a product or products, streamlined delivery and marketing systems, multiple layers of managers and highly powerful senior executives, the CEO being at the top of the organisation. All of which can make them efficient but also controlling.

Let me speak plainly.

I see a growing movement of believers developing outside of traditional church structures - and even outside of "new church" structures. Some of these believers are discouraged. Others are weak. And some, frankly, have significant gaps in their theology and practice. Most of them love the Lord Jesus but have fallen out of love with their previous experience of doing church. Many are longing for a way of being the church together that is highly relational, flexible and "in life".

I also think that those with gifts of leadership, teaching, pastoral care and apostleship would do well to serve these scattered believers with the word of God and with their gifts.

I'm reminded of the advice that Dr Martyn Lloyd Jones gave to the late Henry Tyler, a founding elder of what is now Church of Christ the King in Brighton. After finishing Bible college, Henry, who I knew personally, was considering taking on the pastorate of a Baptist church. Lloyd Jones urged Henry to "stay among the house churches" that were emerging in the 1970s and to teach them the word of God.

A similar phenomenon is emerging today. I hope that those outside this emerging movement who are leaders have the wisdom of Lloyd Jones as they look on and consider their response.

I have written a review of professor Crouch's book here.

The Gospel, the Church, the Culture and the Mission

2008-08-08T15:20:00.000-07:00

As fools yearn to play Hamlet (paraphrasing Packer's introduction to Knowing God), so I have longed to write a post about the gospel and culture.

This, however, is not it.

As a fleeting dip of the toe into the water, however, may I refer readers to a recent post by Brother Maynard over at Subversive Influence. His topic is the "men in church" thing, which, if I have time, I hope to write about as well. The theme, however, provides the writer with the opportunity to explore the issues of "contextualisation" of the gospel compared with "incarnation" of the gospel.

It's a bit late in the day and I don't really get it all. But I think he raises some good questions about the dangers of seeing the gospel as a product and the world as our target market. I don't know many people who use that language as such, but I observe quite a lot of actions that show that this kind of thinking is quite influential.

Which, of course, does not mean it is right.

Catholic Wisdom

2008-07-04T16:42:00.000-07:00

Don't worry, I'm not about to set up a shrine to Our Lady of North Bristol.

It's just that from time to time I find the odd snippet from the Catholic wing that strikes a chord and which I think is worth repeating.

Third stream Christian groups - which I have written about elsewhere - have historically been happy to learn from the best of the Catholic mystic tradition while retaining a solid adherence to the authority of Scripture and an evangelical understanding of salvation/justification.

It is in that spirit that I offer the following quote from Scott Schaeffer-Duffy who with his wife Claire started the St. Francis and Theresa Worker House in 1986 (inspired by the example of Catholic civil rights activist Dorothy Day) in Worcester, Massachusetts:

"We confess to being fools and wish that we were more so.... We seek an irrational and personalist way of doing things that trusts in the miraculous power of God.... Without government aid, salaries, grants or institutional help from the Church, and often without many volunteers, we feed and house people, deliver aid in war zones, confront local and national injustices, and still manage to have happy personal and family lives. That's pretty miraculous to me."

Although I may not choose to use the word "irrational" and although I would see "help from the church" as a good thing, nonetheless, I share with the writer the desire for a church that is weak, as far as human might is concerned. Such a church consciously rejects the mechanisms of power and influence that govern much human activity in the political, economic and military spheres. This same church is powerful in its adherence to the gospel, its seeking of another Kingdom, its commitment to prayer and its experience and expectation of God's active and supernatural involvement.

I think Paul had something similar in mind when he said: when I am weak,then I am strong.

The Church and Money - a Historical Perspective

2008-06-29T07:13:00.000-07:00

Following an occasional series on the issue of money in the church portrayed in the new testament writings, I now take a slight historical detour to look at "Christian attitudes to finance in the first four centuries" - the title of an article by Frances Young of Birmingham University. I am grateful to Early Church for the heads up on this article.

Frances Young highlights three key themes in her essay:

1. The Ban on Lending Money with Interest

Young outlines the growth and consolidation of this teaching from its roots in the Old Testament commands (Exod 22.25; Deut 23.19; Ps 15.5; and Ezek 18.8) to its application to, first church leaders, then all Christians by the ninth century.

Although not opposed to banking as such, the early church did protest against the growing consolidation of wealth in the hands of a powerful few and the use of their economic power to lend money with interest.

2. The Use of Money to Care for the Poor

Young also provides some fascinating statistical data to illustrate the nature of the church's concern for the poor during this period. In the third century, for instance, the church in Rome is recorded as supporting 1,500 widows and other poor persons at an annual cost of between 1/2 and 1 million sesterces.

Just after 400 AD, the church in Antioch was supporting 3,000 virgins and widows, and the Church in Constantinople financed the care of 50,000 poor people.

It was during this period that some of the more well known quotations by outsiders commenting on the church's practice were noted and written down. The pagan satirist Lucian, for instance, notes of the Christians that "their original law-giver taught them that they were all brothers."

Tertullian, meanwhile, describes the varied use of the church common fund:

feeding poor Christians
providing for orphans both inside and outside of the church
paying for the funeral costs of poor Christians
supporting Christians in prison and those sent to the mines as punishment for their faith

Against this backdrop, Tertullian quotes outsiders as saying of the Christians, "Only look how they love one another!"

At a later date, the Emperor Justin expresses frustration in his attempts to revive the fortunes of the pagan cults. Forming imperial charitable institutions to rival those of the Christians, Justin writes, "It is disgraceful that all men should see our people lack aid from us, when no Jew has ever had to beg and the impious Galileans [i.e. Christians] support not only their own poor but ours as well."

3. The Support of Church Leaders

The church in Rome in the third century is reported as having 150 paid "clergy" exercising a variety of serving/leadership functions.

Many of the church's salaried workers during this period were, in fact, appointed to administer the church's communal charity funds - a development anticipated in the narrative in Acts 6 concerning the appointment of the "seven" to care for the daily distribution of food to widows in the Jerusalem church.

Conspicuous for its absence until the 4th century is any reference to the use of money to buy or maintain buildings. By the fifth century, however, as Christianity became the official religion of the empire and started to receive government allowances, the proportion of the church's finances directed towards the poor dropped to about one-fifth, the rest being spent on the clergy and the upkeep of buildings (pictured).

The Gospels and the Gospel

2008-06-29T01:12:00.001-07:00

Not being in the forefront of current Christian thought and discussion, I have only now got round to reading Dr NT Wright's response to the controversy that ran through British evangelicalism last year concerning the evangelical understanding of the nature of the atonement - a controversy fueled in part by Steve Chalke's book The Lost Message of Jesus and reported on in depth at my friend Adrian Warnock's site over the months.

In reading Dr Wright's response to the issue (a 13,000 word treatise which he modestly describes as being "only a tip-of-the-iceberg treatment written in haste") I was struck by several aspects of the article.

In particular, I was heartened by the way he demands that evangelicals must give more attention in their theological reflection on the nature of the atonement to the canonical gospel texts and not only to Paul's writings. The following is typical of his concern:

I am forced to conclude that there is a substantial swathe of contemporary evangelicalism which actually doesn't know what the gospels themselves are there for, and would rather elevate 'Paul' ... and treat Matthew, Mark, Luke and John as mere repositories of Jesus' stories from which certain doctrinal and theological nuggets may be collected.

As a third generation unbeliever, I was converted to the faith of Christ through reading and preaching that centered on Matthew and John. It was only later in my Christian life that I was introduced in any meaningful way to the Pauline corpus (through the preaching of Terry Virgo), a development for which I remain continually thankful.

Partly because of my own journey to faith, no doubt, I have always had a high view of the gospels and have at times wondered whether the focus on Paul's letters in so much of the preaching of the churches I have been part of has lead to an imbalanced theology in some respects. Shocking sentence, I know.

Although I have my own views on the controversy outlined at the start of this post, I am not going to share them here (not yet, anyway). Nor am I suggesting (as some have done) that the gospels and Paul are in any way in tension with each other.

Instead, I would rather state that in the church of my dreams, the gospel narratives are treated with the same reverence and respect afforded to the apostolic letters and Acts and that their theology of Christ - his life, his teaching, his kingdom works, his humanity, his divinity, his place in the history of God's saving purpose, his death and his resurrection - is taught, received and put into practice with the same vigor and commitment that we afford to the apostolic letters of Paul.

Unity and Diversity

2008-04-22T14:44:00.000-07:00

Have enjoyed reading Mark Heath's post over at Word and Spirit on Bruce Milne's dream of unity and diversity within the local church.

Here are Milne's closing thoughts as expressed in his book Dynamic Diversity:

I have a dream – a dream of a congregation where people of all colours and from every ethnic identity find welcome, warmth, dignity and a sense of belonging; I have a dream of a church where men and women worship the triune God, and serve together as equally valuable in the sight of God, and equal in their capacity to honour him. I have a dream of a Christian community where children, youth, middle-aged and seniors, boomers, busters, generation-Xers and millennials learn to respect and love and discover their profound need for each other; where people from all wealth and power indexes can live and relate and laugh together.

I have a dream of a family where singles and marrieds, and marrieds with families, and single parents and divorcees are all affirmed in their worth before God and his people; a family where poor and rich, sophisticated and unsophisticated, the physically and mentally strong and the physically and mentally challenged have learned to walk together in love, and to appreciate and affirm each other.

I have a dream of a people of God where differences of personality and huge diversities of spiritual stories and spiritual journeys, or the lack of them, are no barrier to acceptance.

I have a dream of all that many-splendoured, multi-textured humanity uniting under the conscious, blessed rule of the exalted Lord Jesus Christ through his living, liberating, energizing Word, joining in wondering communion in their worship, along with saints and angels – I have a dream.

And I have a dream of that same exuberant, multi-colour family, swept along by the Holy Spirit, streaming forth from the worship place into the community around them – to throw their arms around it, and hug it to their hearts; offering to all who have need the practical ministries of love – to the poor and the homeless, single parents and street kids, HIV / Aids sufferers and the addicted; and sharing too the joyous good news of Jesus and his great salvation – with the lost and lonely, the affluent and the power-brokers, the cynics and the seekers, the young and the aged, the followers of other faith traditions and the followers of none, local residents and those from every corner of the globe; lifting high the world’s only Saviour, and doing so in a way that his holy, all-embracing transforming love is reflected and authenticated in the dynamic diversity of their life together ... I have a dream.

I am encouraged by the centrality of love in Milne's dream - a priority that we cannot fail to see in the apostolic writings and one that can be lost if we only emphasise "purpose" and "vision".

What do you think?

Full of the Word - the Theory

2008-03-22T02:33:00.000-07:00

When Paul exhorted the believers in Colossae to "let the word of Christ dwell in you richly", they may have understood this command slightly differently from the way it is sometimes thought of by Christians today.

Whereas modern believers are likely to hear in it a challenge to go and read our Bibles more regularly and more deeply, it is probable that the Colossian believers would have heard in Paul's words an encouragement to teach each other more carefully and to sing to God more thankfully.

The key is in reading the whole verse:

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God. (Colossians 3:16)

Please note the phrases, "as you teach..." and "as you sing..." Paul wanted the word to dwell richly in the lives of these believers, firstly, as they taught each other. The focus here is not on private piety but on corporate practice. Paul apparently envisaged a way of being the church together in which members regularly and wisely taught and admonished each other - this activity producing a rich indwelling of Christ's word in members' lives.

The second way Paul envisaged the word of Christ dwelling richly was as these early Christians sang to God. The experience of each member teaching and exhorting each other was to be reinforced by the activity of corporate singing - which in context must imply that the songs of the early church were doctrinal in nature and reinforced gospel truth in the minds of those singing them.

Let's think about the key words in this verse:

Word of Christ - Most commentators agree that this phrase (which is used nowhere else in the new testament in this exact form) refers to the body of truth about Christ - who he is and what he has done, including Christ's own teaching and that of the apostles. This body of truth has been written down under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit in the writings which we now know as the Bible, both old and new testaments. Calvin rightly concludes: The Scriptures must be read with this intention, that in them we find Christ.

Admonish - while "teaching" describes positively imparting spiritual principles to one another, admonishing means doing this with a warning. An example might be "do not get drunk on wine which leads to debauchery."

Wisdom - a recurrent term in the letter, Paul is keen that the believers' teaching and exhorting is done wisely. This means knowing what to say when, how to say it, in what spirit and with what application.

Psalms, hymns and spiritual songs - although commentators love discussing these terms, the reality is that they are not really defined in the new testament. A possible distinction between the three terms may be that a) psalms refers to the contents of the biblical book by the same name b) hymns may describe Christian songs used regularly among the churches (examples may include Phil 2:6-11 and 1 Tim 3:16 and c) spiritual songs may describe spontaneous songs which are contributed during a specific gathering of the church but which are not written down and used regularly.

Maybe.

In conclusion, whereas Paul is not denying the role of elders in teaching the word, his interest here is primarily on every member teaching and every member giving thanks. This would have been more natural in the churches he served, which tended to meet in homes and be of a certain size which encouraged a high degree of interaction and one-anothering.

The church of my dreams? Believers, who have previously been taught the word of Christ and had a foundation laid in their lives together, meeting together and speaking the truth wisely and specifically into one other's lives, in the context of singing with gratitude to God.

We could call this edification and it seemed to have been the staple diet of the early church's life.

Full of the Word - the Practice

2008-03-22T02:19:00.000-07:00

A previous post looked at Paul's exhortation to the Colossians to "teach and admonish each other with all wisdom."

How does this work in practice?

Such a pattern of teaching will, I believe, tend to produce greater maturity than an intake of God's word which is only done individually or is received from a gifted teacher. Both these routes are important, of course, but one-another teaching and admonishing has several distinctive features that are unique in the economy of God:

It is relational. As children, we are shaped by our families and in church new believers are to be nurtured in the family of God with relationships that resemble - even go beyond - those of a human extended family.

It is holistic. Teaching and admonishing in this sense deals with our understanding of the gospel and its application to how we live. The same apostle who wrote Romans 1-8 also wrote Romans 9-16. Yet how often do you hear teaching in church about citizenship, gender, race, the ethics of food, how to live as a Christian at work, socializing and responding to economic inequality in the church and the world? I thought not. Yet all of these topics are addressed in Romans 9-16 and should be taught - both publicly and through one-another teaching and admonishing.

It is practical. Such teaching can be modeled as well as talked about. Although it is possible for a preacher to illustrate spiritual truth from his own life, the close one-another style of teaching increases this aspect exponentially. We can "see" and "get" what is being taught (assuming those teaching are living consistently with it) because we can see it being worked out.

It is flexible. A church meeting where members teach each other can adjust its content to the needs of the members - including those that arise in the context of the interactive discussion. Such teaching can also be done at any mutually convenient time. Shift workers are not excluded!

It is interactive. This approach to teaching allows lots of room for questions and two-way discussion. This is healthy and reinforces the learning value of the teaching.

It is universal. Everyone gets to teach and everyone receives teaching. This addresses the issue of passivity in church as well as allowing for much more dynamic growth personally and numerically as members (even new converts) develop the habit of sharing God's word with others. Essentially, anyone can do it. Elders and apostles are there to make sure things stay on track and of course have specific teaching gifts to discharge as well, but essentially a lot of the day-to-day work of the church is to be done by the rank and file members, equipped by those with leadership gifting.

Of course, all of this can be done around a meal and is most natural and effective in a smaller group, such as a household-style church.

Where Does the Money Go in Church - Part 2

2008-01-10T16:46:00.000-08:00

We've seen that one of the ways money was used in the New Testament church was to provide the necessities of life for oneself and one's family.

Beyond this, early on in Acts, we see money being used to help other believers in the local church. The key passages are well known and both describe life in the Jerusalem church:

All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. (Acts 2:44-45)

All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was upon them all. (Acts 4:32-33)

Both passages begin with a description of a state of mind and finish with a description of certain activities that arose from that state.

In chapter two we are told by Luke that this group of believers "devoted themselves" to four things:

1) the apostles' doctrine
2) the fellowship
3) the breaking of bread
4) prayer

This devotion then found expression in a way of life in which "all the believers had everything in common" and in which they "gave to anyone as he had need."

Evangelical commentators have sometimes got their proverbial knickers in a twist over this passage. Prompted, perhaps, in the mid-20th century by a fear of communism, many of that century's commentaries go to considerable lengths to argue that this "common life" was extraordinary, experimental and non-binding on believers in every age.

Presumably, these helpful commentators would not take such a view of being devoted to the apostles' doctrine, but would see that as an excellent example to be followed by Christians today.

Actually, devotion to the four things that the Jerusalem believers were devoted to will tend to produce similar ways of thinking in believers of all ages.

Apostolic doctrine

Apostolic doctrine was soteriological - focused on God's act of salvation in Christ - and tended to produce worship and thanksgiving.

Apostolic doctrine was also eschatological - focusing on the coming of the Kingdom of God and the passing away of this present evil age - and tended to loosen ties to the things of this world.

It was also communitarian - emphasizing God's plan to bring Jew and Gentile together into one new man in Christ - and tended to produce unity and equality

Finally, this doctrine was ethical - love being the fulfillment of the law and the greatest command - and highlighted one's moral responsibility to one's fellow man

The fellowship

In a similar, but perhaps more direct way, the church's devotion to "the fellowship" was an obvious way in which their mind set was shaped with regard to the sharing of possessions.

Fellowship, at its most basic level, means "sharing" or "common-ness" , the word (koinonea) being the root of our English words common, community and communism. These early believer were, according to Luke, "devoted" to this practical idea of sharing/participating together/being community.

Sharing their possessions was a natural outworking of this devotion.

The breaking of bread

There is not a consensus among scholars as to the precise meaning of this phrase and, in particular, the extent to which it refers to the "Lord's Supper" of bread and wine.

The phrase is used by Paul in his Corinthian correspondence with reference to the remembrance of the death of Christ through the act of eating bread and drinking wine. I have also argued elsewhere in this blog that the early church did in fact share the bread and wine in the context of an actual meal with real food present. This was certainly the case when the original meal was eaten by the Lord and the disciples the night before his arrest.

What is clear is that the phrase "the breaking of bread" does refer to eating food together and that it was a practice that the Jerusalem church was devoted to.

Prayer

So much has been written and said about prayer in the early church that I feel there is little I could add to the wealth of understanding on the subject.

Perhaps there is just one perspective that may be relevant. It is that the devotion to prayer enjoyed by these believers was present in the context of community life - in fact, perhaps the most extraordinary and beautiful community life recorded in Scripture.

Perhaps you're different, but personally I find it more natural to pray (even for long periods of time and into the night) when I am living in community with brothers and sisters who are devoted to the apostles' doctrine, devoted to the shared life and devoted to eating together often and remembering the Lord's death and resurrection.

I would go so far as to say that were you and I to be living in such a community, prayer would flood out of us. The healthy peer-pressure would be irresistible!

This began as a post about sharing possessions. It is still about that, but as an expression of devoted lives.

Christians sometimes get very nervous about sharing possessions with those in need. Sometimes it's because we don't see it as the overflow of a life devoted to sharing the truth of the gospel, sharing food, sharing the Lord's supper and sharing prayer.

Where Does the Money Go in Church?

2007-11-19T13:06:00.000-08:00

Have you ever stopped and thought about what the early believers did with their money?

We know that the Lord had some challenging things to say about money and possessions and that he practiced what he preached. We also know that the early church tried to put this teaching into practice to some extent. The question is, where did this money go? What was it used for? Who managed the process and who benefited from it? I offer the following posts as a reasonable summary of the way that money was used in the New Testament churches. Any thoughts, responses or disagreements, please leave a comment.

1. To provide the necessities of life

Obvious, I know, but not always highlighted. It's worth noting that in some churches, teaching on "money" often takes the form of teaching on "giving", which of course is only one aspect of the subject area.

The Old Testament background makes it clear that God provided materially for his people in order that they may be clothed, fed and sheltered from the elements. The New Testament writers insist on the duty of adult believers to provide for themselves and their extended families. Relevant verses include 1 Timothy 5:8 and Titus 3:14. Paul reminds the churches he planted of his own example of working to provide his needs and implies that those in the local church who live otherwise are not following sound doctrine (2 Thes 3:6-8). The neglect of such personal and family duty was severely criticized by the Lord Jesus when he rebuked the Pharisees for their super spirituality In Matthew chapter 15:

Jesus replied, "And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition? For God said, 'Honor your father and mother' and 'Anyone who curses his father or mother must be put to death.'But you say that if a man says to his father or mother, 'Whatever help you might otherwise have received from me is a gift devoted to God,' he is not to 'honor his father' with it. Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you: " 'These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.'"

Here's a question: when a church is holding a gift day (towards a building project, for instance), is it ethical to encourage members, explicitly or implicitly, to give away money that they have set aside for food? Or, what about money that they would otherwise have put into a saving fund for their children's education? Or a pension fund to cover the costs of their retirement? I know this happens. I also know that some believers later come to regret having acted in this way. The latter group do not always get the chance to publicly testify to God's provision in their lives. As a result, sometimes church members are only hearing some of the outcomes of acting in this way.

Is it right? And should not our teaching on money begin with these more mundane principles of provision for self and family before we start encouraging extravagant giving (a subject I will return to in a future post)?

The Vision Thing - Continued

2007-09-03T11:17:00.000-07:00

Vision in local churches is usually defined as the "big idea" that gives shape to the activities and emphases of the church.

In practice, it is often defined by a "senior" leader. In it's crudest form, the leader's vision effectively becomes the church's vision - or at least the church's stated vision. There are other ways that vision is defined and articulated, but most are leadership-centered to a greater or lesser degree.

This style of leadership bears similarities to the CEO-model of management in the majority of secular business corporations and organizations. In them, the CEO's role includes "vision casting" - defined as communicating to the organization the emphasis that the organization has for its future - either in the coming year or longer-term.

One of my concerns with this model is how difficult it is to find in the new testament. Nowhere in Paul's letters, for instance, do we find the apostle encouraging his readers to "stay focused on the vision that God has given them as a local church." In his farewell meeting with the Ephesian elders, there is not a mention of the concept of the church in Ephesus having a corporate vision. Paul's preoccupation rather is that these men "keep watch" over the flock and act as "shepherds" of the church of God.

Now that's a vision that I could be excited by.

The Vision Thing

2007-07-22T15:26:00.000-07:00

Every local church needs a vision - right?

It's a statement that is repeated so often that it has acquired its own authority and is rarely questioned. In my own experience, people who do question the premise are often criticised for "lacking vision"!

Future posts will consider this issue in more depth and the validity (or otherwise) of the "vision-driven" model of the local church. For now, just a few initial thoughts:

1. What is meant by vision? The word often lacks definition.

2. Why is the word so lacking from the pages of the new testament and what conclusions should we draw from this absence?

3. Why do the vast majority of sermons on the subject of vision focus on one half of one verse (Proverbs 29:18, Where there is no revelation, the people cast off restraint)? Would we base any other doctrine on such a limited range of texts?

4. Who's vision is it and what does the answer given reveal about one's view of the nature of the church?

Watch this space for further developments...

Elders and Eldership - What's the Difference?

2007-06-20T12:13:00.000-07:00

Churches with plural elders are far more common than they used to be.

Although this form of church leadership has existed within Presbyterianism since the Reformation (and was normative among the Plymouth Brethren in the C19), the new church movement of the 1970s-80s saw a major re-focus on the plurality of elders in local churches.

As these newer churches have developed, however, a subtle change appears to have taken place, expressed in a simple change in the language used. Whereas the New Testament primarily refers to "elders", it is increasingly common now to hear of "eldership." It's a subtle but important difference.

The word "elders" is simply the plural of "elder". If we know what an elder is, then it's reasonably straightforward to understand what is meant when the apostle Paul appointed "elders in each church" (Acts 14:23). It means he appointed several of them.

The term "eldership", however, is slightly more complicated. For a start, it's a collective noun - used when you want to talk about a group of people as one unit. In this sense, the word is similar to such terms as "team", "group", "board" or "management". The word "eldership" focuses our attention on the collective group in a way that the word "elders" does not.

Secondly, it's not a Bible word. The nearest we get to such a use is Paul's description of the time when "the body of elders" laid hands on Timothy, imparting a gift to him and prophesying over him (1 Tim 4:13-15). Apart from this one use, the New Testament prefers the more neutral term "elders".

Thirdly, "eldership" implies a particular model of local church life. As businesses have management boards, churches have eldership teams. The term suggests a corporate body who manage and make decisions. But as we have seen elsewhere in this blog, decision making was never the sole responsibility of a small leadership team in the early church. More importantly, the New Testament writers do not look to the business world for their model of local church.

The church of my dreams is lead by elders, but if you were to look for a model of how this works, I would suggest that the head of an extended family or clan is closer to the Biblical idea than the management board of a company.

More to follow......

The Joy of Service?

2007-06-09T03:37:00.000-07:00

What's in a word?

When I first came across a fully-fledged charismatic church - Clarendon Church (now Church of Christ the King) in Hove, its literature invited people to the "meetings" and to "come and praise the Living God." It's more common in charismatic churches now to be invited to a "service".

It's a small linguistic difference which perhaps reveals an important shift in thinking.

Meeting (I would prefer meating) is a functional word. It simply describes people coming together for a purpose.

Service, however, is a religious word, borrowed from the Roman Catholic mass. It's strange, therefore, to find it used so freely in evangelical and charismatic circles. Even in this latter context, it carries connotations of performance and ritual and of a special class of person officiating.

It's understandable why this shift has taken place. Few charismatic churches really practice every-member-participating meetings anymore. Many have settled for something less - quality worship music, Bible preaching and a "ministry time". In this context, the concept of a service is appropriate. It has a start and finish time, a running order and, like its Catholic counterpart, a certain predictability.

The Greek words most commonly translated "service" in English versions of the New Testament are diakonia, leitourgia and latreia. Diakonia comes from the world of household servants and is used of Martha's practical work in Luke 10:40. Paul employs the same term (in Romans 15: 31) to describe his task of bringing the financial gift he has gathered from the gentile churches to the poor among the believers in Jerusalem.

Leitourgia is used of the priestly service of Zechariah in Luke 1:23 and of the superior ministry Jesus has received as high priest (Heb 8:6). Paul describes the work of certain churches in the same way - the Corinthians' service of giving money to the poor (2 Cor 9:12) and the Philippians' help and service towards Paul himself (Phil 2:17, 30).

Latreia - from the word for a hired servant - is used in a variety of ways, including the reasonable act of giving ourselves to God (Rom 12:1) and the temple worship in the nation of Israel (Rom 9:4).

What is obviously missing from these uses of the service-group of Greek words is any use of them to describe a gathering of Christian believers as a local church.

It is certainly the case that as believers we serve God in the totality of our lives as we offer ourselves to him as living sacrifices, but there is no sense in the apostolic writings that we perform or attend a special religious service when we meet together. This usage, as I have suggested above, owes more to the Roman Catholic concept of the mass than the New Testament feel of believers gathering for a fellowship meal, to pray and to build each other up.

At least, that's how I see it.

The Council of Jerusalem - a Case Study in Decision Making

2007-04-22T10:53:00.000-07:00

The number one controversy in the early church was not women in leadership or spiritual gifts. The BIG ISSUE which threatened to tear the infant church apart in the first century was the place of the Gentiles in the new Christian community.

The Council in Jerusalem, recorded by Luke right in the middle of his account of the early church, was key to addressing this issue. Although the theological principles clarified in the Council were vital and the practical strategies articulated for implementing them are of interest, the Council of Jerusalem is also instructive as a case study in decision-making in the emerging church.

Space permits only the briefest summary of the way this meeting illustrates some of the principles for decision-making adopted by the early believers. The full account is in Acts 15:1-21.

1. The Council arose from a controversy in Antioch between Paul and Barnabas on the one hand and some unnamed men on the other, the latter group teaching that Gentile converts needed to be circumcised in order to be saved.

2. A decision was taken in response to this controversy to send Paul and Barnabas to Jerusalem to discuss the issue with the apostles and elders in that church. These two were accompanied by "some other believers" from Antioch.

3. The group that met to discuss the issue was a large one. Although Luke records explicitly that it was "the apostles and elders" who met to consider the Gentile question, this was apparently not a small gathering. The fact that "the whole assembly...listened to Barnabas and Saul" strongly suggests a large group.

4. The decision took time to be reached. This is implied by the phrase "much discussion" in verse 7. This is an important point, especially in the Western context where church culture often values quick decision making.

5. A consensus appears to emerge, facilitated in no short measure by James' ability to draw together the different threads of the debate and highlight the key theological principles.

6. The decision reached is embraced by "the whole church" in Jerusalem (v. 22) and it is this wider assembly of believers who are active in selecting the men (Judas and Silas) who would accompany Paul and Barnabas to Antioch to communicate the outcome of the Council.

When the oppressive Taleban government of Afghanistan was removed by NATO forces in 2001, the world's media looked on with bemusement at what happened next. Instead of an election, the world was introduced to a new term - a loya jirga. The transition to a new elected government was preceeded by a lengthy gathering of Afghan tribal heads. This loya jirga is a traditional way of resolving major issues in this decentralised, tribal society. Western observers, used to the faster pace and smaller numbers involved in leadership decsions in industrialized countries, were struggling for a way of understanding and explaining this slower mechanism.

It seems from the book of Acts, however, that the apostles and elders would not have had a problem with this approach to such a fundamental decision. Perhaps we can go so far as to say that they would have been surprised by our agenda-driven leadership meetings where small numbers make large decisions in limited amounts of time.

Decision Making in the Local Church - 2

2007-04-03T23:10:00.000-07:00

The ways in which decisions were taken in the local church were varied. A lightening overview of the subject in the book of Acts reveals the following dynamics:

the 120 prayed and cast lots to replace Judas (2:24)
the Twelve identified a need for spiritually-qualified men to serve the daily food distribution to widows (7:2-4)
the Jerusalem church acted corporately to select these men (7:5-6)
the founding of the church in Samaria was by Philip and other unnamed believers (8:4-8)
the gospel was taken to an Ethiopian official by Philip as a result of angelic direction (8:26)
Ananias, a previously unknown believer, welcomed Saul into the Christian community in Damascus following a divine revelation (9:10)
the church in Antioch took a group decision to send financial aid to the Judean believers in response to a prophecy (11:27-30)
"the brothers" in Ephesus encouraged Apollos in his ministry and commended him to the believers in Achaia (18:27)

Even with such a superficial overview, it is possible to see that the process of decision making in the early churches was varied and decentralised, with few apparent formal mechanisms. Instead, we see individuals, recognised leaders and whole churches contributing to the process. The model of elders meeting separately to the whole church and working through an agenda of business is conspicuously absent - though of course arguments from silence are notoriously unreliable as a means of establishing normative practice for today.

Perhaps the most significant example of a major decision taken by the church in Acts concerned the place of the Gentiles in the new Christian community and was hammered out at the Council of Jerusalem (in chapter 15.) Because of the attention Luke gives this matter, I will deal with it as an example of decision-making in a separate post.

Decision Making in the Local Church - 1

2007-04-03T23:01:00.000-07:00

In my own church tradition, local church-wide decisions are generally made by elders.

I understand why this happens. The historic context out of which the "new churches" emerged in the 1970s and 80s was often one where democracy prevailed and where men who were called to lead and shepherd God's people often found themselves held back by voting procedures, die-hard deacons and, occasionally, un-sanctified church "members" who would exert undue influence over key decisions in the life of the local congregation.

Against this backdrop, the renewed focus on leadership, spiritual authority and the role of elders that came through the churches in the 1980s was a welcome and necessary corrective.

My question now, 25 years on, is whether we are in danger of having thrown out the baby (the capacity of the congregation to discern the will of God together) with the bath water (carnal church politics).

Meeting or Meating?

2007-03-15T00:49:00.000-07:00

The idea of church services - where Christians gather to worship or hear the word - is so entrenched in people's minds that the idea that a church might meet to eat is difficult for the religious mind to embrace. This, however, was a common practice within the early church.

The Jerusalem church, for instance, "broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts" as well as gathering together in the temple area for prayer and teaching.

The church in Corinth, furthermore, seems to have had a meal together as often as they met. This is implied in Paul's admonition to them in his first letter to them (chapter 11). Interestingly, Paul does not criticise them for eating when they meet: he does, however, rebuke them for tolerating economic and social divisions when they gather:

"for as you eat, each of you goes ahead without waiting for anybody else. One remains hungry, another gets drunk.... Do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you for this? Certainly not!"

Anthropologists have discovered that people in all cultures tend to eat meals with those they regard as their social equals. If true, that provides a remarkable insight into the nature of the fellowship meal between Christians as well as Paul's concern that it should not be undermined through class division.

Evidently, it was as part of this meal - consisting of real food in a real house - that the Corinthian believers ate bread and drank wine to remember the Lord's death. This is consistent with the original Supper, when Jesus and his disciples ate a full meal together on the eve of his death during which the Lord told them to remember him through eating bread and drinking wine.

It is also instructive to see that the church in Corinth not only ate together, breaking bread and drinking wine in memory of Christ, they also taught one another, prophesied, prayed and spoke in tongues - all within the contest of a fellowship meal.

The church of my dreams? Meeting to eat, affirming and celebrating our fellowship in Christ, remembering the Lord's death, praying and building each other up through using the gifts the Spirit gives.

How does that sound?

A Multi-Gifted Body

2007-03-10T12:24:00.000-08:00

Paul's first letter to the church in Corinth gives us some unique insights into the reasons why the church met and the activities that took place when they did.

"When you come together...", writes the apostle, "everyone has a...." He then lists a sample of the different gifts and manifestations of the Holy Spirit's presence that members of the community might exercise.

Here is the starting point for answering the question, "Why meet?" The church in Corinth met in order to build itself up in God through (a) the sharing of its life together and (b) the exercise by its members of its God-given gifts as guided by the Holy Spirit for the benefit of all.

A shorter definition of this sentence might be to say that the reason the church gathered was for fellowship and edification.

A study of the word "worship" in the New Testament will reveal that it is never used as a word to describe the focus of the local church's meetings. (If you don't have a free online concordance, Bible Gateway is a good one to get you started.) That's not to say that the early church never sang praise or worship songs - far from it. But it appears that this was not the focus of their gatherings.

Perhaps more controversially, it's also difficult to argue that the primitive churches met in order to hear preaching. It's hard to write a sentence like that without appearing to endorse the anti-doctrinal elements that are rife in the "new church" or "emerging church" movements. For the record, I do not endorse this anti-doctrinal emphasis, believing it is dishonoring of God's word and that it also produces weak Christians. My point is simply that, while teaching played a prominent part in the meetings of the early churches, it is difficult to argue that this was the essential reason why they gathered.

Instead, Paul's letter paints a picture of a multi-membered body, each member filled with the Holy Spirit, coming together to share their common life in God and build up each other through using the gifts God had given them. In this sense, they were a charismatic church. In fact, the term is tautologous: there is no concept in the pages of the New Testament of any kind of church that did not function on the basis of the giftedness of its members.

Why Meet?

2007-03-08T06:12:00.000-08:00

Whatever else we understand about the local church, it is certainly a group of believers in Christ that meets together.

The emphasis in recent years on the church being "not only a meeting" ought not obscure the fact that the church certainly does need to meet to be true to its calling and identity. When the apostles used the word ekklesia to describe this new community that was emerging out of first century Judaism, their hearers would have associated the word with the idea of a public or group gathering. The "called out" were, etymologically at least, those who had been summoned from their houses by an imperial herald and gathered together to hear a proclamation.

The idea of gathering together was fundamental to the identity of the early church. The question is, why meet and what is the church meant to do when it actually comes together? Historically, several answers to this question have been put forward.

Traditionally, worship (usually defined as singing or listening to praise songs and/or reciting prayers) has been seen as central to the purpose for the church's gatherings. The Reformation placed the preaching of the word at the center of the church's meetings, reflected in the prominence given to the pulpit in Protestant church building designs.

More recently, many charismatic Christians would describe the purpose of meeting as being to "meet with God" - often defined as having a felt experience of God's presence, mediated either through the worship songs and prayers, the preaching of the Bible or the exercise of spiritual gifts - especially the more public and dramatic ones.

The question is, do these reasons do justice to the Biblical evidence for why local churches meet?

More next time...

Believers Together

2007-02-26T23:24:00.000-08:00

The church of the New Testament consisted of believers, though outsiders sometimes found their way into the meetings as well.

These believers had come to personal faith in Jesus Christ, the Son of God and had responded to the message that was preached by the apostles or their associates - that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah who had ushered in God's Kingdom in a decisive way, had suffered and died for the sins of others, had been raised to life on the third day and ascended into heaven. His death was the means of achieving salvation for people - defined as forgiveness of sins and a new righteous standing with God. He had sent his Holy Spirit to fill his followers and would return to the earth from heaven at the end of the age.

A church is a gathering in a particular place comprising people who have believed this message and experienced this salvation.

So far so good.

In the Beginning

2007-02-22T22:10:00.000-08:00

"Are you living now in the church of your dreams?"

That was the question put by a wise older man - senior in years and Christian experience - to a group of younger leaders meeting in a hotel in Bristol several years ago.

The question has always provoked me.

Over the years, niggling questions became major doubts and eventually new understandings and convictions.

Today, I'm still not living in the church of my dreams. But I'm a lot clearer about what that dream is and how to move towards it.

Welcome. I look forward to sharing together over the coming months and years.

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