Simple Church Journal

We have a sad, sad tendency. All of us. We like to know who the experts are. We want to know who knows what we want to know so that we can learn from them and then we will know it. We want to identify the gurus and the superstars… even in the house church “movement.”

Let me just say it as clearly as I can… As soon as we even begin thinking this way… we have lost it.

The whole point is that nobody really knows what God is up to… but God. Our only approach can be one of total and utter dependency on Him (become like little children). He builds His church… period. He orchestrates His church… period. He directs His church… period. He is the head of His church… period. If we no longer stand before Him in utter and complete naked dependency, then we have begun substituting human ingenuity for divine revelation. How tempting this is.

Does that mean that we don’t learn from one another? Of course not. The whole point of this blog is to create a place where we can brainstorm, share ideas, and learn from each other. But let’s watch that we don’t start identifying the latest craze, the coolest fad, the way that “they” do it, or what so-and-so has to say about it. Let’s make sure we remain utterly, fearlessly, passionately, devoted to a dependency on the One We Follow. He leads. Otherwise, don’t follow!

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I’m concerned that we are trying to re-structure church instead of re-learning what it is to live the Christian life.

House churches, simple churches, organic churches can easily become just the “new way” to do church, the next-wave model of churchianity. It’s easy for us, if we have been doing church for years, to want to simply come up with a “better way to do church.” But that really misses the whole point.

Instead, we need to be talking about the way to live our Christian life. We are privileged to have been given a whole new life: a lifestyle. We have the privilege of living passionately for God. We have the privilege and calling of living Kingdom lives: we journey with God, walk with Him, experience Him, know Him and express Him wherever we go. We have the joy of having a purpose and mission that comes out of the heart of the eternal Father. We get to live in His love, surrounded by His love, empowered by His love, and motivated by His love. Our life lived with a wondrous God is awesome!

This is vital because the Christian life becomes somehow confused with the concepts of “going to church” and “being involved in church.” While those may be very wonderful things to do, they are not, in and of themselves, the equivalent of living life in Christ. Yes, when we live the Christian life full on, we do gather with others. But that’s a result, an outcome of living all out for God. The “gathering with Christians” is not “the life”– it’s just a part of it. It’s one piece of what we do while we are living all out for God.

Let me suggest an analogy.

I love to ski. I am passionate about skiing. I enjoy skiing anywhere there is a slope and some snow. I may be involved in a ski club, I may go to a ski school, I may have skied at many different places. But none of this replaces what it’s all about: just skiing. If I tell people that I ski here or there, or that I’m part of this or that club, it’s not because I’m enamored with the club, the school, or even the ski resort. These are all peripherals to the real experience that I love, what it’s all about: skiing.

In the same way, none of our churches, nor “how we do church”, should be equated to living the Christian life. They are peripherals to the Christian life. Church gatherings support us in living the Christian life. But they are not “the life” itself. It’s great to gather and be part of, but let’s get skiing! It’s living for and with God that we are excited about, that we are talking to others about, that grips us with passion and excitement, that we are focused on. Just living full on for God. Just doing it. Going after it. Faithing it. Loving it. Losing ourselves in it and Him.

Aren’t churches and gatherings important? Yes, but let me be repetitive, they are peripherals to the Christian life. The church will always gather in a variety of ways. But imagine when the church gatherings are made up of a group of Christians whose primary focus is living full on for God. Imagine what church is like, whether we gather in a home or in a stadium, when all the full-on-passionate-alive-people-for-God gather together. Yeah, that’s church!

I admit, I like to gather in a house. I like it simple. I like it participatory. I like house church. It helps me remember that life with God is life with God and not an institution or event. But that’s just me. Where we gather is really very, very secondary. The central issue is, let’s live the Christian life… full on… with all that we have. Then when we gather… it will be good!

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Went to two house churches this weekend and came away realizing that I am still very much in transition from institutional-thinking to just plain caring about the people around me. I still find myself wanting our worship time to be a certain way. I still fight with the idea that “I know how to do it” (that old “leadership” mentality) and that it’s my job to help others “do it” better.

The fact is, this is one hundred percent not true! I don’t know anything about how others are meant to worship the awesome, creative, infinite God. Each person’s expression of worship, no matter how quiet, different, or out of the ordinary, is incredible and beautiful to God. It’s His job to orchestrate the hearts and expressions of His people.

But I have been trained well by a system in which a few people define what is “powerful” worship for the rest of the worshipping masses. I have learned to look for certain “evidences” of worship movement that are about my background and training. I begin to feel like I’m the “expert” (old tapes): the one who can “lead” others into a richer worship experience. In doing this, I am setting myself above others, seeking to take control away from God, and failing to love the unique worshippers as well as honor their unique worship expressions. This is control, not love.

Love is something completely different. It starts with realizing that I am just one of the gang and that each person has more to offer me than I could ever give to them. Love means to honor what the Holy Spirit is doing in each, appreciate what He is doing, bless what He is doing, and enjoy the way every heart expresses worship. Love is wanting others to be who they are. Love is enjoying how God created each of His children, and how much delight He gets from every expression of their heart toward Him.

It’s amazing what happens as I, and those around me, are grasping this. People are beginning to find their own worship voice rather than try to imitate someone else’s. Worship is becoming a wonderful, diverse mosaic of the hearts of God’s people reaching for Him in an infinite variety of expressions. Not something I would orchestrate. No, I would never come up with what I saw happen this weekend. It didn’t fit into my old pre-conceptions of “powerful worship.” But it was, in fact, something far more incredible. It was something God was orchestrating!!!! Something more than “powerful.” Something awesome. Something… of God.

I love the way Andrew Jones describes the feeling of what he calls “real church”:

“This morning i walked through the Walthamstow market and saw famers selling the organic produce they have been growing themselves. There is something freeing and simple, even rebellious, in buying produce directly from the people who grew it. I feel good buying it. He feels good selling it. Our transaction bypasses quite a few levels of marketing people and middlemen, and it is quite deconstructive in displacing those heirarchies. But it is also empowering to us, and it just feels good.
I get the same feeling when i experience church – real church –
i have also felt it in homeschooling, unschooling, downloading info from the web, the immediate self-publishing of blogging, punk music, shopping at Home Depot to fix my own house.
It feels empowering, never complex, bare and naked, totally human, focused, and God’s pleasure is one of those feelings mixed into it.”

How does “real” church feel to you????

This is a forum for, among other things, getting practical. Sharing real ideas from real people, all over the world, who are seeking to be the church and live out simple church expressions. I want to be able to talk about some of the down and dirty, real-life stuff. I want to talk about how to do a gathering, how does leadership actually function, how is spiritual transformation taking place, how is the church taking the Good News out into the world. I want to be able to brainstorm together.

Now, before I go any further, I know that this is dangerous. If we start talking about the “how-tos” of this stuff, we could lose the organic, the spontaneous, the unique things that God is doing through each church and gathering. And I acknowledge that this is a risk. We have a disturbing tendency to want to mimic what others are doing rather than seek God and let Him mold our unique expressions. Just consider the way that churches across the country copy the patterns of Hybel, Warren, and others. This human weakness keeps us from discovering our creative design in God. But, there is also a risk if we do not exchange practical ideas with one another and continually brainstorm together. We may miss out on the type of interdependency and learning-from-one-another that will strengthen what we are seeking to do.

The fact is, in the end, we have to take what God is doing inside of us and work it out in real, in-your-face life. Even though “gatherings” are not what church is, still, at some point, we do gather. So what does this look like for you; what does it look like for me? What do I want it to look like? Leadership functions, at some level, any time two or more or gathered. It’s inevitable and human. It may be formal or informal, controlling or serving. But it’s there. So let’s not run from leadership, rather let’s talk about it in practical ways. How can we do it so it truly reflects Christ? Structures do develop and structures are necessary. We need them to be simple, transformable, able to die when necessary. But they exist. How can we structure better? Tell me about the ways that our churches are incarnating God’s love into the world and how is it going? How can we do it better? Let’s discuss the problem areas and the problem people… if only to remind ourselves that we can’t control it all. Let’s acknowledge that nobody really knows what they are doing, and that’s the glory and mystery of God; but let’s also acknowledge that, together, we may be able to shed some light on each other’s paths.

I want an exchange of real ideas about house church, simple church, organic church, and wherever God is taking His church today. I don’t want to develop any “how to” templates for all churches everywhere. But I do want to be enriched by the exhange of all of the infinite possibilities. I want a place where we can ask questions, hard questions, real questions, and talk about what is really not working. I want a place where people who are new to house church concepts can come in and find an open forum for learning.
Mostly, I just want a place that will facilitate the Spirit speaking to each of us!

So much being written on the “emerging church,” “new wineskins,” “simple church,” “house church.”

I just want to weigh in with this statement:

For something truly “of God” to emerge within His community, it must come out of a deeply transformational happening within the people of His community.

Before I say more about this, let me share my own story.

I came into a desire for something new out of my own crash and burn. Fourteen years of traditional church ministry left me more than depleted: I was empty, used up, unable to go on, hurt, filled with pain, angry, and fully immobilized emotionally and spiritually. It was a dark place, indeed!

The ensuing months of of introspection, growing awareness, and coping with my dark hole was a season of hell on earth.

I began to unravel the previous years of “doing church” that, far from being life-giving, had starved the very life out of me. I had to come face-to-face with the reality that it wasn’t God nor was it His people that had put me in that hole. It was the way I had done church (the normal, expected, accepted way that one does church and ministry). It was the way I participated in a type of church where a few think they must carry the responsibility for the spiritual life of many. It was the way I was made to feel self-important, as a pastor, almost indispensable, and the weight I put on myself as a result. It was the way I worked so hard to “put church on” as though it was an event rather than an experience of God’s people with God in the midst. It was the way that others seemed locked into patterns of spiritual dependency and infancy because of the way we did church together, and the way I took on the impossible role to “grow them up.” It was the way in which I gave up myself in order to be what I thought I had to be and do what I thought I had to do… in the name of God. It was the way in which I buried the hurt and pain (thinking, in a martyr kind of way, that it was my cross to bear), instead of listening to my soul that was crying out to me: “This isn’t working! Pay attention!” Thus the pain, hurt, and anger built, and built, and finally blew.

Yet none of these awarenesses nor experiences will lead to a transformed church. Seeing the pain and dysfunction of the way we have done church may shake us out of our old and worn patterns. We may say, “I’ll never do church that way again.” Or we may nurse our hurts, wounds, and anger for years and use that as a basis for doing church differently. Or we may analyze, dissect, and re-invent church until we are blue in the face. But none of this will produce anything truly “emergent.”

No.

For something truly “of God” to emerge within His community, it must come out of a deeply transformational happening within the people of His community. All that I went through may have prepared me to leave some patterns that were not working, but entering into the truly new is something else altogether. Something new has to emerge within me before I can be part of an emerging, life-giving community.

I don’t know what all this is. But some of what God wants to do in me includes:
1. A deeper humility– nothing will come out of me, what I can do, or what I can think up. It’s all about Him– His plans and His power.
2. Becoming willing to live in the context of being broken– I must always be a work in process– it’s who I am– to try to be more than that is to set myself above others.
3. Letting go of control– my way of feeling safe and secure.
4. Finding safety and security in His arms alone– so I can let go of control.
5. Embracing mystery and learning a deeper trust– so I can walk forward not knowing where this emerging thing is taking me.
6. Making room for my creativity and uniqueness– realizing that the Holy Spirit desires to work through who I really am– not what others want me to be.
7. Pursuing ongoing healing of hurts and anger– so that I can make room in my heart for all of this that God wants to do in me.

Whew… sounds like a lot. Thank God I started with number one as number one because only God can even begin working any of this in me or in any of us.

So, this is my lengthy, seminal statement on the emerging church and simple church expressions. I’m excited about what God is doing, and wary lest I, once again, take hold of the little that I know and attempt to build, on my own, that which won’t be of God.

Wales: Bread, fish, beer – life in a pub church

Bar None is a church in a pub in Cardiff, Wales. Chris Coffey, one of the
founders, says “The employees like working in the cellar which we rent every
week. They enjoy the atmosphere, take part in the discussions, and sometimes
ask for prayer. I think that is an indication: when the employees who have to
work during a Christian event don’t stand around, tensely waiting for the end,
hating every minute, that’s a good sign…” Bar None began with three friends
who met at a Christian festival and discussed ideas of how to be church in a
unchurchlike manner. They came up with the idea of a pub church. A group of
Cardiff Christians decided to check out the city’s pubs, to find out if any
were open for the idea of being a pub church on Sunday. They expected
rejection, but were astonished that most were excited by the idea. They finally
settled on ‘The Oz Bar’ in the city centre.

Newspapers and Bibles
In the first meetings, they laid Bibles and newspapers on some of the tables,
held discussions and sometimes a 10-minute talk, a songwriter presented a song,
and discussed the meaning. “The best evenings were often the ones which we did
not plan,” says Chris. “Someone would ask ‘Why do you lot believe what you
believe?’ and things would go from there. To start with, we had around 100
people each evening, including many curious Christians from local churches. We
now have thirty to forty regular visitors, many of whom do not attend a
‘normal’ church because they think they would not fit in. Bar None is one of
four fellowships belonging to the Glenwood Church. It is important for people
to recognise that they are not in a waiting line for a ‘real church’, but that
this is ‘real church’! And one of the most important things that we have
learned is that we do not need to have an answer to every question, and do not
need to justify everything that we do,” he says.