Link to Doofus article

Don't stop your great discussion on the other post. I just wanted you all to have the live link to the article Big Doofus recommended. It is required reading for anyone in the intellectual, cutural, or teaching leadership in Christ's church. I'm not kidding, it's that good and it's that important. Thanks Rog!

The Gospel in All its Forms
by Tim Keller

Building Christian Communities

Today's post will be generated almost entirely using quotes from a book I recently finished reading.

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We are actually facing the need, not simply to reorganize the institution of the church... but the need to create something that is not there now -- a community; that is, an environment that has a real unity to is, an organism. Organisms are not legislated. They grow naturally. In other words, an organic process of change is needed to form basic Christian communities... Leaders in the Church today need to understand community dynamics and not just organization dynamics.

Today's church is primarily a service institution, providing worship services and sacraments for all who come to them.

Churches instinctively look for a specific solution to the specific problem (a structural solution to a structural problem, a financial solution to a financial problem, etc.). They can accept the fact that spiritual renewal is important, but they cannot see how it has direct application to the specific problems which are clamoring for attention. And so they naturally try to deal with the pressuring problems first and do not get around to turning their attention to the problem of spiritual renewal.

This approach has to begin by the recognition that the church needs subcommunities and that these should be considered an integral part of the church life. It should involve forming the communities in an organic way -- that is, not be assigning people to form a community, but by fostering the beginnings of community among a group of people -- and encouraging and guiding their growth into a basic Christian community... Eventually, as there were a number of these communities that were successful, everyone in the church might find a place in such a community, and the church building would be a service unit at which a number of communities might gather and it could also provide some services that basic communities might find difficult to provide out of their own resources.

Although there are many factors which go into making a community vital, the most direct source of vitality is purpose and the commitment of the members to that purpose. If a community has a purpose that is clear and compelling, one that seems to be of real importance, and if its members are committed to that purpose and therefore put as many of their resources as possible into fostering that purpose, the community will be a vital community. If the community has no purpose, it will not last, no matter how well-structured it is.

...it might be possible to think that what the Church most needed was sociologists or community organizers. But this is not at all true. What the Church needs most is men of God, men who can and will function as pastors, evangelists, spiritual directors... Communities are not formed primarily by sociologists and community directors. They are formed by leaders of men who are dedicated to something.

A functional approach is work-oriented. It is oriented to getting a job done. An environmental approach is interaction-oriented or value-oriented. It is oriented to getting a group of people together who share certain values or concerns. It focuses on the growth of the relationship among people and on how people are being changed for the better... Some business executives are effective at getting production but poor in their ability to draw people together.

...From this point of view, much of what happens in the Church today is not very effective. There are many activities and many organizations. They do things which are good. But they do not build up a community of people committed to Christ and so they are ineffective in meeting the main pastoral needs of the Church today... [Even if] the Church were primarily an institution which was supposed to provide certain services (educational services, worship services, and social change services), it lacks... But if the Church is primarily supposed to be a community of people committed to Christ, there is an even more serious problem -- the lack of any community being built up through these activities.

A good term for the type of leadership that is natural to a community is "elder." An elder has a position. He is one of the recognized heads, and he has an openly accepted responsibility for the order of community life. But he is chose because he really is one of the elders, and not only in name. He is chose because he has a natural positions of respect and leadership in that community. His opinions and decisions "count" more than most people's... This would be true even if he did not have the position. In a properly functioning community, the position reflects the reality.

Watching for leaders as they emerge does not mean making the mistake of picking the people who are already in Church organizations, because they are usually there because they volunteered and are frequently ineffective in forming Christian communities. Nor does it mean electing people, because there is not enough community in the Church today where an election would be a good indication of how the community accepts a person as a leader... It means observing where real Christian communities are being formed effectively and picking the people who are responsible for that process.

The solution to the problem of climate and of coordination can be provided only by those who have positions of pastoral leadership in the Church. For instance, acceptance and understanding on the part of Church leadership is of great importance to those who belong to a movement. It can make all the difference in their loyalty to the Church and their willingness to work for it. The lack of it can lead to alienation among those who could be the strongest supports of the Church.

The process has to begin by putting the emphasis on community formation, not on programs or activities. If what is needed is forming communities which make it possible for a person to live a Christian life, the beginning is to actually have such a community. A person cannot begin by forming structures and programs and expect communities to come out of the hopper on the other end. Communities grow, they are not produced. If a process of renewal does not begin with an environmental approach, it will probably never get to one.

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The book is Building Christian Communities: Strategy for Renewing the Church, by Stephen B. Clark. The fascinating thing about this book is that it isn't some brand-new, 2008 book from Willow Creek Press. This book was published in 1972, by Ave Maria Press. Not only is it 36 years old, it was geared specifically to the Catholic church. I took the liberty of substituting the word "church" for the word "parish" in most of the quotes above.

This is a fairly short, simple book, but I've heard that it was used as a stepping stone for a number of intentional communities that were formed in the 1970s. Much of the book is geared towards Catholicism, and there are a number of issues that are specific to issues and movements of the late-60s and early-70s, but as you can tell by the quotes above, it's still quite relevant for churches today.

Many of us have been talking about this type of thing for quite some time, so while this "organic approach" is fascinating, it's not exactly a huge revelation. The book isn't exactly a step-by-step instruction manual for how to create Christian communities -- it's not intended to be. But it is intriguing to see some of these relational/holistic ideals being suggested, and then put into practice, before I was even born.

How cool that those crazy Christian hippies were so emergent!

The question remains, how do you foster this kind of attitude? How does Big Huge Megachurch encourage the formation of these Christian communities? Even if it begins as a movement within a church -- can it happen at all in a large church? Can it happen if leadership doesn't have a passion for it? And would a large enough percentage of the attendees be able to understand what it means to throw your life in with a group of people, rather than just showing up at a building for a weekly ritual?

The Slow Death of Pews, Sermons, and "Ministries"

The "functional" aspect of the American church continues to distress me.

The hallmark of the early Church was "see how they love one another." Not "see how efficiently they work together" or "see what a fantastic show they put on." Yet we still have SUCH a hard time picturing a shift in focus from ministries, functions, and Sunday mornings towards a community of "love-relationships" -- building each other up and helping each other live a better life for Christ.

In a late-night conversation many of us briefly had on a recent Saturday night, we were discussing how statistics show 20-30 year olds very interested in Jesus, yet running from the church like the plague. Why is that, we wonder. How do we get those people into our local churches?

Some might suggest trendier services on Sunday mornings. Being more seeker-sensitive. Louder music, some hipper clothes on the preacher. A fancier website.

I say all that is like polishing the brass on the Titanic. It looks nice, but it's all going down.

Societal changes in the past 30-40 years have been vast. Society has changed a lot in a short time, in a way that it didn't for hundreds and hundreds of years previously. We went from a "Christian" society (not that everyone was a Christian, but it was the expected thing to be, and there was an environment of Christianity surrounding people) to whatever you want to call it now. Post-modern. Post-Christian. Post-Church. Biblical Christianity is NOT normal now. Most people are NOT surrounded by a Christian environment.

And even more so, people are NOT interested in "the church." We've presented the church to them as a place to go on Sunday mornings, rather than a community of Jesus-followers that love each other. To society, a big Protestant church looks like a huge fancy building with a bunch of paid staff. And it does the following: A) produces a nice show to watch on Sunday mornings, B) has a bunch of "ministries" you can "serve in" to keep the gears turning, depending upon your demographic, and C) exists pretty much to get other people to attend on Sunday mornings. To add more people serving in ministries, plus of course more money in the offering to pay the bills.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I just don't see the church keeping up with society in the 21st century. That doesn't mean it needs to change its Biblical understanding or water down the message of Jesus (not that the church has necessarily done a stellar job of teaching the message of Jesus in the first place). But I do think we need to open up our minds to radical changes that are bigger than just changing up a Sunday morning service or adding additional "ministries" to the mix. I think it needs to, somehow, completely back off from the Sunday morning-centric focus, and begin putting time, people, and resources into forming a COMMUNITY of love. I think people are drawn to love, and people are drawn to community. Even the 20-something crowd.

That probably doesn't mean one big community of 1000 or 5000 people. It's nearly impossible to have a true love-community that big. You'd have to have a number of smaller communities. They've got to commit to one another.

We're a nation that is ruled by functionality. We think of ourselves in terms of our jobs, our careers, and the tasks that we do. And Christians, nay, church-goers, think of themselves by the ministry-tasks that they do. They'll say, I run sound at church. I play some guitar with the praise band. I help out in the nursery. I'm a greeter at the front door. I'm an usher and I pass the communion trays.

There is nothing wrong with any of those tasks. But we need to radically rethink our focus. The "church" is dying.

Is Christ actually the "head of the body"? Or is that really a metaphor about authority delegated to apostles, elders, and ministers?

There is a minor discussion going on among some church leaders regarding what is a "biblical" leadership scheme.

Some seem to feel the bible teaches a basically top-down heirarchical organization, wherein a key principle is Heb 13:17 "Yield to your leaders and submit to them. They keep watch over you as men who must give account (jrb)." It is based on benevolent but binding authority, and leaders are the mediators of God's will for the church.

Others seem to feel that the New Testament teaches a bottom-up organism. A key here would be Eph 4:16, "From (Christ) the whole body, fit and held together by every bond, from the proper working of every part, grows and builds itself by love (jrb)."

The world has plenty of examples of organizations based on power relationships. The whole world is, right? Well, is it possible to have organizations based on just submitted LOVE RELATIONSHIPS, under the direct authority of Christ Jesus?

But Should They Get Stock Options?

Things have slowed down on the ol' Java Jesus blog, which could be attributed to three things:

1) spring weather;
2) busy jobs, busy families, and busy life;
or
3) complete and utter burnout on church-talk.

From the weary looks on your faces, I'm thinking #3 is probably the correct answer.

Too bad. The Internet masses are clamoring for a new topic.

Something that's been discussed briefly in these circles before is the notion of paid ministry staff. One could find Biblical backing for either argument -- to pay or not to pay. Old Testament Levitical priests were provided for. The New Testament apostles were, I assume, housed and fed as they went from city to city. Yet many of the people that were "teaching" still had a job (tentmaker, fisherman, that sort of thing) as a source of income.

The answer that I'm looking for here isn't so much "what's the Bible say to do?" I'm looking at this on a different level. I realize that in this day and age, it makes perfect sense to have full-time salaried "employees" who run the church, coordinate and administer the stuff, and teach or preach to the members. Yet at the same time, I wonder if all of that feeds our current "Sunday-morning-centric," top-down church ideology.

If the church was truly run by people that held day-to-day jobs, just like everyone else, would the average churchgoer feel like he or she had more of a vested interest in the happenings of the church? Would we feel more like part of the leadership? Would it help to dissolve that chasm between "minister" and "laymen"?

Or does appropriate 21st-century-pastoring truly require a 50-60 hour workweek?

Women! Teaching in Your Church! Call the Authorities!

When I was 17, and not very smart, I dated a girl from a Methodist church for awhile.

The "not very smart" thing had nothing to do with the girl I was dating. I just wasn't very smart. Most 17 year-old guys aren't. I'll get to that in a minute.

Anyway, some Methodist churches had women as pastors. Growing up, I had always learned that this was a big no-no in churches. So some debate ensued between this girl and I. Pretty soon I even brought her pastor into the discussion, as well as some others in my church.

Yeah, like I said. I wasn't very smart. These are not necessarily the type of discussions that go over well in a teenage romance. Nothing was resolved, and obviously it did nothing to enhance my relationship with the girl.

Fast-forward 15 years to present day. I'm still in a church that frowns upon the notion of women being in teaching positions over men. It's not talked about, of course, because Big Churches don't like to put those kinds of topics front and center, for fear of offending the masses. But the leadership of the church will have to bring it up on occasion -- for instance, if a woman wants to teach a mixed-gender Sunday School class, or lead a small group, or maybe, I don't know, lead worship on a Sunday morning.

Yes, it's fifteen years later, and I'm so much more grown up. I'm an adult. Fifteen years of additional Biblical wisdom, teaching, and counsel. Obviously I should be an expert on the issue by now.

And I have no idea where I stand. The older I get, the less sure I become of the things that I once thought I knew.

I Timothy 2:11-15:

A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. But women will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.

This is nothing if not straightforward. There doesn't seem to be a lot of wiggle room, and that's why so many mainstream churches -- such as mine -- adhere to it. But, as I said, they don't want to OFFEND anyone. It's not like most churches have a "We are men, and all women must be silent and barefoot and in the kitchen!" mentality. It's just... No one seems to be sure what else to do about it.

So we push it to the side and hope that too many people won't rock the boat.

Churches -- and when I say "churches," my knowledge is limited to the three or four I've attended in the last fifteen years -- apply the "women teaching" passages a number or ways. The mentality seems to be thus:

• Women can't "teach" adult men in a group setting.
• Women can teach boys, generally up until those boys are somewhere around junior high age.
• Women can be on paid staff of churches on certain terms, as long as, again, they aren't teaching adult men. And for some odd reason, many churches (read: mine) don't like to give out titles like "Minister" or "Pastor" to the women on paid staff.

Leading worship is another topic altogether, because some mainstream churches will allow women to do this, and some won't. In my current church, I'm fairly certain that they'd never hire a woman to be the "Music Minister."

So how do people debate this whole "women-teaching" topic?

Here is one side you might find interesting. Starting on page 179, check out the chapter entitled "What Does It Mean Not To Teach or Have Authority Over Men?" This logical and well-researched argument holds that the restrictions from I Timothy 2 are permanent and authoritative for the church, in all times and places and circumstances.

And a seemingly opposing view, which is also well-written and well-researched, is here. The discussion on the I Timothy passage begins about halfway down the page.

A number of counterarguments have been made, from the culture of the first century church, to the original audience and how the Greek was used and translated. Logical, understandable arguments, that have me shaking my head and saying, "Yeah, I can see that course of reasoning." But in the back of my mind, I'm thinking, "We're still having to try awfully hard to disprove something that is written out in black and white."

Here's what I wonder: Why does Paul make these statements? Why does he, in one instance, say that in Christ there is no male nor female, yet here he gives such huge restrictions upon women? What about the different spiritual gifts that Paul talks about elsewhere? Can't women have those gifts? And what's with the "women will be saved through childbearing" in verse 15? Doesn't that contradict numerous other passages about how we will be "saved"?

Much has been written about this topic (and I'll admit I only skimmed the articles I linked above). I still don't know where I stand on the issue. The I Timothy passage seems straightforward to me -- even regrettably so -- and I'm not sure I could come up with a good, Biblical argument that perfectly refutes those verses.

Yet in the larger context of things, it just doesn't always make SENSE in my mind. In the vast majority of scripture, we tend to equate the words of the author with the words of God. But this is one of those passages where it seems to come from a very HUMAN vantage point. Granted, my understanding of God is very small, and very finite. But I still have a hard time grasping why God would tell us that.

Of course, this is the reason that Teh Interwebs was invented: So that we could debate and argue about it here.

Seeking a New Approach To Church

Ever wonder if our 21st-century approach to church is entirely wrong?

I have conversations with many people that are rather disgruntled at the state of "the church." And they don't always know if the problem lies with the leadership, or the congregants. After all, a good portion of many church-goers are once-a-week attendees that really have no community with the church body. They come, they enjoy a nice show, they are spoon-fed some sermon points, and they go home and go on with their lives. They have nothing invested whatsoever.

It's a cycle, really. The more that people expect to be Sunday morning consumers, the more the church provides it on a Sunday morning. The more they provide it, the more consumers show up. And to an extent, if we're talking about numbers, it's a great way to grow a church. A church can grow into a megachurch 10 miles wide. And two inches deep.

We talk about what the root cause might be, and whether it's theological, or a problem with vision, or leadership, or just 21st-century consumer culture. But I have another suggestion.

Perhaps the seeker-sensitive church approach is entirely backwards.

Let me explain. All of my life, I've heard from other churchgoers about how they need to invite non-Christians to church. After all, if they come to church on a Sunday morning, they'll listen to some nice songs, and they'll hear about Jesus! Then they'll become a Christian! It happens all the time!

Technically, that might be true. It does happen occasionally. People go to a Sunday-morning service, hear about God, and they become Christians. And then they come back the next Sunday morning, and the next, and they are spoon-fed every week. In fact, they'll continue to hear about Jesus for years without ever needing to DO anything.

Instead, try this: Don't invite people to church. Build a relationship with them and tell them about Jesus. Tell them about Jesus' life, death on the cross, and resurrection. Tell them about how you are a new creation, and how God has worked in your life.

If the spirit tugs on that person, and that person understands, you know what?

He or she may very well become part of the church. Right there. Then, it might be a good opportunity to tell them about a group of Christians that gets together in your house on Monday nights for small group. Or Wednesday nights for a meal. Or Sunday mornings for a celebration service. Invite them to come along.

A church that caters almost exclusively to non-Christians, or even nominal Christians, might be nice for evangelism. But it's not really The Church. The Church is made up of Christian brothers and sisters, and they are living, working, learning, and serving together. If you try to make everything about the church "sensitive to the non-believer," what's going to happen?

The people that ARE new converts are never going to grow past that two-inch thickness. The possibility will always exist that they'll remain Sunday-morning consumers for years. They were spoon-fed a show, and that's what inspired them to come forward and accept Jesus in the first place... So isn't THAT what Christianity is? A Sunday-morning show?

Well, we say, the Sunday morning service can be seeker-sensitive, because if people want to grow deeper, they need to get involved in Sunday School classes and other areas.

Seriously? Why would they need to get involved anywhere else? We've shown them that all they need to do to be saved is to come to a Sunday morning service and hear about God.

Relational evangelism is SO important, and it's so much more than inviting someone to church. I'm starting to seriously question a "seeker-sensitive" approach to church. Are WE, the people of God, to be "seeker-sensitive" when building relationships? Of course we are. But are church services supposed to always be "seeker-sensitive"?

I'm starting to think that's a bad idea.


What say you, random blog readers?

In This One Body to Reconcile Them Both to God

"For he himself is our peace who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations."

This post is not for "Theologs", but for everyone.

Here is a glimpse into my spooky side, what really is going on in Joe B all the time. I just try to express it in theological terms, not knowing what else to do with it. The stuff below was written to an old campus ministry comrade, one of the many now on the front line of foreign missions while I fight "The Battle of AT&T." I confessed:

"I just feel the heavens swirling around me again like in some days past. Something big is building in heaven and in the hearts of men, and I cannot articulate it but somehow I understand it. The huge post-christianity world-view shift of this generation sees dawning a new vision of God, and I just see the temple courts (you know, just outside the sanctuary?) filling up with unwashed nations of tax-collectors and prostitutes, entering with joyful force. And I see the priesthood of the sanctuary divided: whether to exclude them to keep it holy, or whether to risk defilement by passing thru the torn veil, by breaking the bread and pouring the wine of the Eucharist. Will we recognize the day of our visitation?"

"If that paragraph were spoken it would have had that spooky "prophesying" sound to it. This thing has been swelling for seven years as God has kept me peering into some mystery of Eph 2:11-22, especially v14-15. These last two years God has stirred me to pray that the "church" will remain whole, and not a branch broken off as a new shoot is grafted in. I see well-meaning Dividers on the Inside and on the Outside, MacArthur v. McLaren, and I cry and say "must it be so?" (I'm much better at crying than praying.)"

"It sounds so foolish to be swept up in cosmic things when my life is such a speck."

I know this is personal, but it is profoundly ecclesiological too. And all of you are a part of it. What is the Spirit saying to the Church?

Subculture or Counterculture: Is Church Relevant?

...This raises the missional question as to whether the church exists simply as a subculture or a counterculture or whether it can become truly cross-cultural in the sense of crossing into the broader culture through proclaiming the good news within that cultural context. [From Emerging Churches: Creating Christian Community in Postmodern Cultures, by Eddie Gibbs and Ryan K Bolger.]

We KNOW that the gospel is relevant. Jesus is still relevant. But are most modern churches relevant to society?

Sometimes we get the two confused. We think Obviously, all our churches are relevant. Because Jesus is still relevant!

Jesus immersed himself in first century Jewish society. He took on the culture and practices -- he became accessible, he became one of us. Yet sometimes we believe that our churches should stand totally apart from the culture. Should they? Should churches really be countercultural?

I haven't read much of the book that I quoted above, honestly. But some of the parts I've skimmed have made me think. Missionaries immerse themselves in the societies in which they live. Yet sometimes we criticize local churches that become too much "like the world." We like our traditions. We think that just because the world is in a constant state of change, the church doesn't necessarily need to change the way it functions.

This book mentions that the church occupied a central position within Western societies for more than 1600 years. But that has recently changed. Within the last 100 years, cultural shifts have created a post-Christian society. "The church as an institution has lost its privileged position and increasingly occupies a place on the margins of society alongside other recreational and non-profit organizations."

Most people don't go to church anymore.

And, though this is a big assumption, I believe that the vast majority of the minority that DOES go to church, does just that. They go to church. They don't go to WORSHIP. They don't consider themselves to really be the church. It's a building to go to on Sunday mornings.

The message of Jesus doesn't need to change. Our need for God doesn't change. But that doesn't mean that what church IS, and how church is done, can't change.

So how should it change?

We use the word community a lot to talk about what we think the church needs to be. Most of us truly believe that people long for relationships -- they long for an intimate community. The thing is, on the surface, that's not always true. People isolate themselves in their suburban homes because they want to. They avoid seeking out those relationships because, sometimes, it can be uncomfortable.

I talked to someone the other day who said she hated when people talked to her that she didn't know. Friendly people bothered her. She just wanted to be left alone, because she thought that any stranger that talked to her was going to be full of fake, insincere bullsh**.

So that takes us to the next set of words we like to use. Honesty. Vulnerability. Transparency. The church needs to rid itself of the faux smiles we automatically put on when we walk in the door. It needs to get real.

Are these things true? I don't know. Probably. An intimate community of honest people is nice. But that's not the gospel. That's not the message of Jesus. That's a self-help group, which is exactly what we're trying to avoid.

Obviously we need to show the love of Jesus. We need to be more outwardly-focused, yet at the same time developing true relationships within. Maybe the church DOES need to be countercultural. Surely, it needs to be different. Yet it still needs to understand our society, and be willing to change.

Once again, I have more questions than answers.

Should the church cross into the broader culture? How? Does the church need to change its "business model"?

More on Christian Community

When you stay up talking outside of Starbucks until 2:30 AM on a Monday night, it really sucks away your ability to be awake enough to write anything compelling on a blog the rest of the week.

I'll give it a go anyway.

Many of us are aware that "church" is not just a building or a worship service, but it's a group of people. Christians. Followers of Jesus.

At least that's what we *SAY*. However, a lifetime of preconceived notions about "church" are quite difficult to transform. Regardless of how much I talk about the "community of believers," it is still amazingly hard to back out of my "church" paradigm.

For instance, I think of my small group as just that -- a "small group." It's a subset of my "church." The group of guys that stay up talking late into the night at Starbucks is still, often in my mind, a subset of my "church."

We identify our churches by name. Even if we avoid the term "church" and ask someone, "Where do you go to worship?", we are still wanting to know which specific church they attend -- it's nothing more than semantics.

By putting a name with a church, we generally know a denomination, or at least something about that church's belief structure. I could look up an address, a phone number, a web page. Maybe even find a mission statement or a vision.

The problem with this paradigm is that, while it's handy and efficient when I want to classify and categorize things, it often does very little to foster and create a real Christian community.

You know what? My small group is a church. We're a group of people that care about one another, and we often get together at predetermined times to meet, to eat, to pray, to laugh, to talk, or to study scriptures. At least in our case, there's no real bureaucracy in which we must report our activities up to "the church."

House churches are a fascinating topic. I think it's easy for many of us (me included) to write off some house churches as fringe groups, meeting in somebody's living room, led by some crazy guy who has little to no understanding of the Bible. We look at many of the big churches -- the Church Growth Model megachurches, the House of Hybels and Warren -- and we think, Well, they must be doing something right. Look how many people go there each week!

Many of the megachurches are preaching the gospel, I'm sure. But we cannot look at Sunday morning attendance as a metric of "church success." If 3000 people show up for a Sunday morning service, how many of them are truly experiencing Christian community the rest of the week?

For that matter, how many of them are even experiencing Christian community on Sunday morning?

The idea of some form of communal living continues to intrigue me. Not just for economical and efficiency reasons, but because I believe that in the right context it would be something more. Many of us are looking for something more. Something deeper. Something above and beyond Sunday-morning-centric Christianity.

A way to grow and commune with friends.

A way to grow and know God more deeply.

A way to befriend and reach other people that don't know Jesus.

I look at so many modern churches, and I think, Is this really what God had in mind? I see good things, yes, but I also see so much... fluff. So much stuff. Random ministries that are sucking the life out of volunteers that got pulled into something they had no heart for in the first place. Worship services that require a cast of literally hundreds to produce the show. And then hundreds that attend to watch the show, before leaving with a heart that hasn't been changed in the least.

In the meantime, the Christians that are looking to be fed, the Christians looking for a sense of community, wander about like a boat with no anchor.

They feel at times purposeless and powerless.

Perhaps only within smaller groups, smaller "churches," can we feel that community. That sense of purpose.

Maybe it's just something that you can't foist upon people. Maybe people just have to find it themselves.

Can large churches have true "community"? If so, how do they do it?

The Wittenburg Church Door

Okay, so we've had many discussions on what church should be, and what church seems to be lacking.

We know we want action. In fact, I *feel* a call to action. A call to do something concrete, rather than just the bitching and moaning we've been doing for the past many weeks months years.

Wait, can I say "bitching" on a family-friendly blog?

Too late.

So I think it's time for some specifics. If something is wrong, what is wrong? And if something needs fixed, how can we fix it? What do I *desire* to see out of a church?

I THINK IT'S TIME FOR A LIST.

Bloggers love lists. Martin Luther loved lists. Have you seen High Fidelity? John Cusack. Good flick. His character loved lists.

Let's begin, shall we? This list will be fluid, as these are all up for discussion, debate, and editing. I doubt I'll come up with 95, but it's a start. Please feel free to add your own or argue some of these.

1. Church is a community of believers, and much of the focus of "church" should be on that community.
2. Obviously, the focus of a worship "service" should be on God.
3. The purpose of "church" should NOT be to get people to sit in a pew on a Sunday morning. A church that is too "Sunday morning-centric" is not healthy for the church as a whole or Christians individually, as it fosters institutional thinking within the church and a "once-a-week" mentality within Christians.
4. A worship service should be careful not to fall into a routine. If it lacks creativity or any discernable change on a week-by-week basis, it becomes problematic (we may need to explore the "why" here some more).
5. A worship service should be careful not to be performance-based. When it becomes a production, when it becomes all about excellence, then it becomes less about God and the Holy Spirit.
6. The Gospel of Christ, of love, of His kingdom... All those things should be preached. There is nothing wrong with "seeker-sensitive" worship services, but psychological self-help, chicken-soup-for-the-soul type of sermons are a problem.
7. The church is smart enough to follow a sermon without needing blanks to fill in.
8. Giving the Holy Spirit room to maneuver during a worship service means that occasionally, things may not go as planned. We should allow this.
9. God doesn't care if there is feedback, or if a screen flickers, or if a microphone doesn't work.
10. Along the lines of #4 and #8, worship services could be drastically different from week to week. That could mean a week of all singing and scripture reading. That could mean a week of drama and prayer. That could mean people coming forward to give testimonies.
11. Other teachers could be raised up to preach on occasion. These don't even have to be paid staff or elders or someone with a PhD.
12. A church needs a common vision, something to work towards and bring people together, moreso than just a generic mission statement. (This one is up for debate, as one could argue that the New Testament church did not have a specific "vision" beyond Jesus' call to make disciples of all nations.)
13. Honesty and vulnerability is tantamount in a church. If the church is in a major financial bind, the congregation needs to be aware of that. If Sunday morning worship services are the main meeting time for the congregation, it is obvious that during a Sunday morning worship service, honest talk of finances is vital.
14. The "success" of a church is not measured by its weekly worship service attendance in numbers, or by its "growth" in numbers from year to year. If numbers must be used to measure real "growth," then small groups, Sunday School classes, and other specific ministries are probably the best way to quantify.
15. Along with #13, vulnerability and openness within a church needs to be fostered from the ministry staff. REAL vulnerability and openness, including sin and repentance.

That's only 15, but I don't want to hog all of these. Any thoughts on these 15, or additional ideas?