When you get a chance, check out another video by House2House.com on How to Lead a Workshop. It hits at something that is characteristic of the simple church movement.
I am confident that in just a short time, our best stories will be about God transforming lives of people who are becoming devoted to Jesus and growing in community as they share Christ with others around them! For now, the best stories are of how God is opening doors, choosing which people and when we begin those relationships. This one’s about a guy I’ll call Memo (I’ve changed his name).
After I broke my ankle, I was really depressed. A big part of that was wondering why God had allowed a huge STOP sign to enter into the stream of relationship-building that I had been involved in with ferocity. Not only did it stop me from going out every day and visiting or doing things with other moms in the neighborhood, but it prevented Phil from having the time to commit to the people he had been getting to know because he had to be home much of the time to care for me and the boys. We felt frustrated because we couldn’t be working to form and build relationships like we wanted. No “street-work” was getting done…or so we thought!
One evening (about 11:00 at night) I was lying in bed feeling useless. Phil was working in the other room on some long overdue emails and administrative work. All of a sudden we heard gunshots ring out on the street outside, with a car screeching away down our block right afterward. Then I heard Phil’s feet pounding down the stairs and the door slam behind him as he ran out to investigate.
Here is an excellent video by House2House.com on the value of simple churches.
To me, the statements in this video make sense if we’re talking about more than just another church model. It’s not so much about meeting in homes, parks or coffee houses. A group of well-meaning Jesus-followers can still do ’spectator’ church in a living room. It’s less about asking where we meet or ‘how we do church’ and it’s more about asking ‘how can we be Christ in our communities’.
Something that especially connected with me is Neil Cole’s phrase: “Let’s lower the bar for how we do church and raise the bar for what it means to be a disciple.”
All this talk about ordinary Jesus-followers starting new churches sounds absurd at first. I can’t reproduce church as I knew it growing up (as wonderful as it was - it required a team of professionals to pull it off). But simple churches can be started by you and me… in our homes and around the world (like in the New Testament)!
What are your reactions to this “shift in the church landscape of America”?
We’ve been getting to know a lovely Laotian-Thai family who are as-of-yet-uncommitted to Christ. We met through our kids, who like to play together after school. Initially, the husband appeared reserved (closed?) toward friendship with us, that is, until he learned from Meredith the story of how I left a career as a public school teacher to be a full-time missionary. Strangely, it was then that he stood up and decidedly told my wife, “Our families should have a picnic.”The international picnic that followed led me into the worlds of boxing and Buddhism, and marked the beginnings of life-transforming spiritual friendship!
“What has been the biggest surprise so far in church planting?”
This was the second question my friend Gena asked me and three other female church planters to answer at the Pepperdine Bible Lectures, during a panel on Church Planting for Women. I wish I could remember word for word the responses of the other three women. They were amazing. Here is my response (as of today):
Aside from God cleaning up my mess (see my last entry), one of the biggest surprises has been the duality of spiritual forces battling it out in our lives and in the lives of our neighbors.
When people ask me to tell them about our mission in East Hollywood, they usually want to hear stories of what God is doing (through us and despite us) in the lives of other people. I love sharing those stories. But recently my friend Gena Granberg asked me to share (in a panel format at the Pepperdine Bible Lectures) my response to an equally important question, “What is God doing in you through this church planting experience?” For those of you who are interested in church planting as a woman, here was the essence of my reply:
In East Hollywood we will (by God’s grace) start a simple church movement among those who are as-of-yet uncommitted to Christ. Our vision is that this regional church movement will give birth to more church movements in regions throughout the city of Los Angeles and beyond.
Simple church movements are a growing but still misunderstood phenomenon in our country. In addition to “simple church” I also like to use the term “organic church.”Some people call them “house churches” but not all of them meet in homes. The way I see it, simple expressions of church are just one of several types God is utilizing to bring the loving, liberating reign of Christ into the world.
For a brief and balanced orientation to simple church movements check out the Wikipedia definition. I think you’ll find this article gives you a good introduction.You’ll see where my team gets some of our language to describe the bare essentials of “church” (e.g., the “DNA” of Christ’s body). The article describes common critiques of simple church movements, and provides several references for readers who want to become more acquainted simple church movements and what’s driving them.
