Simply Church: A House Church Perspective

Power in an unlikely package

March 30, 2012 in Uncategorized with 7 Comments

Here's an outstanding Youtube video from the TV show, "Britain's Got Talent."

What makes this video so remarkable is the power of an extraordinary voice coming from a very ordinary-looking teenager who is shy and awkward and appears totally out of place on the big stage.

It reminds me that God's power can be demonstrated through any of us–no matter how ordinary we are. My observation is that God frequently uses people, especially on the mission field, who within their own context are socially somewhat eccentric. He delights to pour out his power through anyone who is yielded to him.

We may feel very ordinary and inadequate, but it's not about us; it's about Jesus. Will we let God pour out his Spirit through us? Are we surrendered to him?

What if there was An Army of Ordinary People lives submitted to the King, personal ambition laid down for the cause of His Kingdom? What could God do with such a people?

Being a disciple

March 28, 2012 in Kingdom of God with 5 Comments

We in the church sometimes live as though Jesus died to give us meetings, and meetings more abundantly.

Jesus died to give us life. Being a disciple of Jesus is not measured by how many meetings we go to–however informal they may be. It's measured by obedience to Jesus and his commands. It's demonstrated by what goes on in our everyday lives. It's lived out in what we pass on to others.

It's also about living for his Kingdom rather than for our own particular denomination, brand or structure of church.

When it doesn’t matter who gets the credit: a story

March 26, 2012 in Church planting, Kingdom of God with 8 Comments

While I was in the UK two weeks ago, a not-yet-Christian came to the church that meets in our home. She is friends with some of the students who attend regularly. Apparently it was a very ordinary time. But at the end she was asked, "Would you like to give your life to Jesus?"

"Yes," was her reply.

She very simply surrendered her life to Jesus, and was overcome with the peace and joy that only the Lord can give. Tony suggested that the students baptize her in their group that meets at the university.

Yesterday I heard the other half of the story.

I was at a Greenhouse, and met the student minister from one of the local churches. He shared that one of the students from his group had spent much of that day sharing about the Lord with this girl before she gave her heart to Jesus. Not only that, two of her friends had subsequently become Christians within his student ministry.

We rejoiced together at what the Lord is doing. We especially rejoiced at the fact that God's Kingdom is more important than either of our groups–that God is the one to get all the glory.

There are actually four groups involved in what went on.

Student CPX, who trained some of the students who come to the church that meets in our home. These students have started
a simple/organic church that is multiplying at a local university
The local cell church with a student ministry
The church that meets in our home

It reminds me of a passage in 1 Corinthians:

I planted the seed in your hearts, and Apollos watered it, but it was God who made it grow. It’s not important who does the planting, or who does the watering. What’s important is that God makes the seed grow. The one who plants and the one who waters work together with the same purpose. And both will be rewarded for their own hard work. For we are both God’s workers. And you are God’s field. You are God’s building. (I Corinthians 3:6-9)

What might happen if we build the Lord's house (the Kingdom) in preference to our own luxurious homes (our own churches) (Haggai 1)? What might happen in our cities if nobody minds who gets the credit? What might happen if a nameless, faceless generation allows God to get all the glory?

Maybe, just maybe, we would see the move of God we all long for.

A lesson from my days as a physician: What are we building?

March 23, 2012 in Kingdom of God with 5 Comments

Are we building our own luxurious houses or are we building God's Kingdom? (Haggai 1)

Are we more interested in holding a correct theological and ecclesiological position, or is our concern for the unity of the body of Christ? Do we believe that our way of being church is the right way and that everyone else is a little misguided?

Back in my days as a physician, one of the highlights of my career was performing an EKG on a very well-known persecuted Christian from the underground church. As I placed my hands on the deep (at least 1 inch deep and a foot or so long) scars on his chest and back, I was in awe at the example of this joy-filled and gracious man! One of the things I best remember him saying was that in a situation where believers suffer severe persecution, denominations and theological divisions do not matter. What counts is the heart and the relationship with Jesus. In prison he had deep fellowship with some who, under normal situations, people would say were part of a cult, or certainly very unsound theologically.

I pray it will not take that kind of persecution to bring the body of Christ to unity.

Jesus is in the process of breaking down the barriers that we have erected between us. He is coming back for a pure bride, without spot or wrinkle. As life accelerates towards his coming again, I believe we will see Christians walking together without regard to which church they attend, or what theology they hold. Even so come, Lord Jesus!

What can we do as churches together that we cannot do on our own? Let's build his Kingdom rather concentration on living in luxury and comfort in our own houses.

How our standard poodle was witness to my failure

March 21, 2012 in Church planting, House church, Kingdom of God, Kingdom skills, Organic church, Simple Church with 6 Comments

Winston H. Churchill is the full name of our standard poodle. (Winston Churchill obviously stems from our British heritage. The middle initial, "H," stands for Houdini which we added after he twice escaped from a wire kennel, leaving the door bolted behind him. No, don't ask!)

Winston: before grooming

One of the advantages of a standard poodle is that they do not shed. The disadvantage is that they need grooming. Let me explain what Winston and his dreadlocks have to do with God's Kingdom and church planting.

Six months ago I would have struggled to find the books of Haggai and Zechariah; now my Bible falls open to those pages. God has been speaking clearly and specifically to Tony and me from these books about many of the things we are involved in: our personal lives, the direction our business should take, what is going on with the simple/organic/house church movement.

To understand these books, it helps to know a little of the history. The first waves of the Children of Israel have returned from 70 years of captivity in Babylon. Led by Zerubbabel the Governor, and Jeshua the High Priest, they lay the foundations of the Temple in an attempt to rebuild Solomon's Temple, destroyed when Nebuchadnezzar invaded. But the local people (not Israelites, but others who have been relocated to their land) conspire to stop the work. For almost 20 years, the rebuilding of the Temple is abandoned. In the meantime, the Israelites settle back into their various towns and villages to rebuild their own houses.

Enter the prophets Haggai and Zechariah. They prophecy to the leaders and to the people telling them that many of the challenges they face, from financial difficulties to crop failures to drought, stem from the fact that they have neglected to rebuild God's temple. When Haggai and Zechariah prophecy the promise of God's presence and blessing (I am with you, says the Lord (Haggai 1:13)), it is enough to galvanize Zerubbabel and Jeshua and the Israelites back into action. Within four short years the Temple is completed.

The church in our nation is in rapid, overall decline. Christianity is fast becoming outdated and outmoded. It's time for us to rebuild the Temple. I'm not referring to physical bricks and mortar here, but to the Kingdom, God's spiritual temple built with spiritual stones. These spiritual stones are people, followers of Jesus (1Peter 2:5).

The Lord has been convicting me over recent days through the book of Haggai and through T4T teaching that I need to be more vocal about my faith. How will we ever see a move of God here if no seed of the Kingdom is sown? If I preach the importance of speaking about our faith, then I must live it too.

As I looked at my day early yesterday morning, the one occasion I was likely to get to chat with a non-believer was when I took Winston for his end-of-winter hair cut. I determined I was going to find an opportunity to share my spiritual story with the lady who grooms him.

I failed. Completely. Someone else was in the store and I chickened out! (Yes, I know. It's all about listening to the Lord and speaking to those he tells us to talk to.)

God help me!

Winston: after grooming

Fast multiplication: principles behind an abundant harvest

March 19, 2012 in Church planting, Kingdom skills, Luke 10, Organic church, Simple Church with 5 Comments

No farmer would expect to reap a harvest of wheat in a field where he had not sown seed.

Photo credit: CIMMYT (Creative Commons)

Why do we believers expect to reap a harvest of souls where we haven't sown spiritual seed?

There are similar principles of multiplication behind both physical and spiritual reaping and sowing. If we expect to see people become followers of Jesus without sowing the seed of the Kingdom, we are deluding ourselves.

What does this look like? According to Luke 8:11, the seed of the Kingdom is the word of God. In Matthew 13:38, the good seed represents the people of the Kingdom.

While at the Verge conference, I had the opportunity to attend some T4T training with Ying Kai. The T4Tmovement has seen more than 1.7 million baptisms and 150,000 new churches start since 2001.

What is the difference between what they see there compared to what we see in the West? They sow seed. Not just the occasional seed here or there. They sow abundantly.

The foundation behind their training is that each new believer is trained to share the good news of Jesus in simple ways right from the day they become a disciple. And not just once or twice. Each person is encouraged to share their personal story as a bridge to the Gospel, five times per week.

Is it surprising that they reap a big harvest?

Slow multiplication or fast multiplication? Your choice.

March 16, 2012 in Church planting, House church, Organic church, Simple Church with 1 Comment

When it comes to multiplying simple/organic churches, your pattern of multiplication will determine whether you multiply quickly or slowly.

Photo credit: archer10 (Dennis) Busy (Creative Commons)

Many people assume that the way to multiply a simple/organic church is to add new people to the church that meets in your home until it has outgrown your living room. Those who become believers, or Christians who want to join you, are assimilated into your existing fellowship. At the point at which the group becomes too large, you split it into two.

This is the slow way to multiply.

If you prefer to multiply more quickly, then start new groups around new followers of Jesus or new people who want to join you. Some of these will become churches.

Someone becomes a disciple? Ask them to bring together a few of their friends to explore spirituality. Help them to share their story with others. Teach them how to share the good news. Work with them and their oikos. You will soon find yourself with a group of new believers. An existing Christian finds your church? Let them know you'd like to help them work with their friends and family in their neighborhood, not yours. This is the quick way to multiply.

The faster multiplication pattern is likely to be more messy and more time consuming. It will involve people in more than just attending weekly gatherings. But it is far more effective in terms of Kingdom growth.

If you want to see your existing group excited about this and on board with what you are doing, it is important to cast vision, otherwise people will resent the disruption of a family/place where they are comfortable. The Lord did this for our group by giving us a clear picture of an orchard of apple trees. Now, whenever a new group starts, we are all excited to see the fulfillment of what the Lord has already shown us.

What might it look like when big and small work together?

March 14, 2012 in Church planting, House church, Kingdom of God, Organic church, Simple Church with 0 Comments

Photo credit: brendan.wood (Creative Commons)

The rabbit and the elephant have very different strengths. Different sized churches do too.

Rabbit sized churches:

Can penetrate into every nook and cranny of society reaching people who would never darken the door of a church building
Have the potential to multiply rapidly along relationship lines
Foster community and every member participation

Elephant sized churches:

Are highly visible
Can produce larger-scale events
Have many resources of both people and finance

Many larger churches are adopting simple/organic principles when it comes to reaching out into their communities with the good news of the Gospel. They actively encourage their members who are more entrepreneurial in terms of church planting to start new groups outside the four walls of the building. These"second tracks" (often called missional communities) are effectively simple churches with a missional emphasis. Often there is no expectation that these groups will feed new disciples into the main church.

It seems that God is working these principles right across the denominational lines. What can we do to support and involve with each other? Are there ways in which those of us who have been involved in simple/organic practices for many years, can stand together with the churches who are beginning to explore these areas?

What might happen in our cities if no one is seeking to get the credit?

Listening–a key skill for the body of Christ

March 12, 2012 in Gathering to Listen, Simple/organic church with 3 Comments

I just attended Verge 2012, a conference put on by Austin Stone, a mega-church here in Austin. It was an high-energy gathering with caliber, big-name speakers, sold out several days before it started and with something like 500 groups watching online. I had the privilege of running a workshop there.

But you know what impressed me the most?

In every main session, Stew (Michael Stewart) who organizes Verge, stopped and asked us to spend time listening to the Lord to answer two questions:

What is God saying to you?
What are you going to do about it?

Sound familiar?

Within simple/organic church we like to say there is one main skill we need to learn. How to listen to God and then respond to what he says. Seems as though Jesus is saying the same thing to many different parts of his body.

The Rabbit and the Elephant

March 10, 2012 in Kingdom of God with 6 Comments

There are two types of churches that seem to be growing more rapidly in the United States–the very large and the very small. A few years ago, Tony, my husband, felt very strongly that we should try and get some dialog between the two, and so we arranged a meeting for about 20 leaders from both styles of gathering to come together for two days of conversation. Northland: A Church Distributed, in Orlando hosted the time together. Northland is a multi-site church that has consistently found ways to bless the house church movement.

The most poignant moment occurred some time into the conference when Dan Lacich, one of the leaders at Northland shared. He effectively said, "Can you not trust me to have heard from the Lord that he is leading me to stay within the traditional church structure?"

When we feel very strongly about a topic, it's easy to assume that others just haven't seen the light yet. If only they would seek God more, he would show them what he's shown us.

Not so.

For a long time, since we first realized that God was going to do something major with the simple/organic church movement, we have been praying that God would overturn church history. Usually when a new move of God occurs, its primary detractors are from the move that came before it. So we began praying that God would cause traditional churches to bless the simple/organic/house churches, and that we in turn would only speak well of and bless the churches we have come from. It's for this reason that we like the term "legacy" churches (originally coined by our friend Kent Smith).

A few years ago, Tony and I wrote a book with George Barna entitled, "The Rabbit and the Elephant." (This book has since been republished in paperback under the title, "Small is Big.") The obvious analogy is for small and large churches, and refers to the ability of the small to multiply quickly. Because of where the Lord has led us, the book is primarily about the principles of how to make disciples and gather them in simple/organic churches.

God is far more interested in our hearts than he is in our structures or correct doctrine. Rabbits and elephants are not renowned for cooperating together in the wild, but can we, as large and small churches and everything in between, find ways of cooperating together synergistically for the sake of the Kingdom of God?

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