In House Church, Pt. 8, I shared about a popular blogging pastor who made some comments to me about house church. I withheld his name at that time, and didn't link to the conversation. But now I feel that the example is important enough to share.

Back in December, Tony Morgan posted in response to some stuff George Barna had said. He asked this question in Does More Church Activity Equal Life Transformation?:

In our desire to help people become fully-devoted followers of Christ, we tend to think we need to encourage people to experience a ministry program, retreat or class at the church, and yet research is showing those activities don't lead to transformation. Barna is focusing his attention more on home church/group experiences. Again, in my mind, this suggests that relational connection must be the key ingredient. The problem, of course, is that encouraging people to step into those types of relationships is much harder than just inviting people to show up for an event at the church.

Is anyone else frustrated by realities like this?

And here was my initial reply:

ME:
It's not a challenge when your church *is* a "home church/group experience". I've grown more in the last six months having participated exclusively in a house church, than I have in the last six years leading worship at a conventional church.

Perry Noble, the pastor of NewSpring Church in Anderson, SC, then entered the conversation.

PERRY NOBLE:
The house church model has ONE problem--they neglect the great commission. If Jesus would have wanted us to sit around and suck thumbs...He would have commanded it.

BUT...what was HIS first calling on the disciples? Follow me and we will do deep Bible study? Nope! Follow me and we will figure out predestination? Nope! Follow me and I will make you fishers of me...in other words--we will reach people!!!

I am not saying the house church is totally evil--there has to be an element of community in the church for it to be truly successful...but without an event to stir the heart (remember the Day of Pentecost) then I think many will be missed.

ME:
Wow. If that's your mental model of a house church, then you need to meet some people who attend one.

Granted, some house churches are formed out of pure bitterness and isolation, and house churches are just as prone to sitting on their thumbs as any conventional church is.

But the reality is this - if Jesus had intended for us to launch groups of thousands, with a single "pastor" at the top - he would have started the first one himself.

Yes, he preached to thousands, on occasion, at least. Yet the gospels speak of how he would do his best to escape those crowds. How he chose twelve specific people to pour his heart into them, and then told them (via the great commission) to do the same.

If the very Son of God chose "quality" over "quantity," who am I to second guess him?

If Jesus had millions of dollars, he wouldn't be building church buildings (large or small). If Jesus had thousands of followers, he'd be picking twelve of them and concentrating on those. If Jesus had to choose how to spend his time, he'd be spending it with people instead of preparing all week long for a large weekly event. At least, that's what I'm finding in the Bible I've been reading.

PERRY NOBLE:
Glad we are on the same team...and we will have to agree to disagree on this one. Let's keep loving God and loving others with everything we've got...and following His ways the best we know how...and if one of us OR both of us are wrong...then I believe He will weigh the motives of our heart and understand that we were really trying our best to follow Him the best way we knew how.

I appreciate that Perry showed a little bit of humility at the end... but in reality, after all of the Biblical examples I gave of Jesus choosing small, open, and relational instead of large, closed, and presentational, Perry disagreed with me without any explanation. Yes, we are trying to follow "His ways the best we know how." But that is not an excuse for any of us to be ignorant of the examples of church gatherings found in the Bible. The modern church places far more emphasis on following a traditional model of church than it does on the original examples described in the New Testament.

Perry made two specific points that are important to address.

One, that house churches neglect the great commission. This is amazing for him to say, because house churches were the method of fulfillment of the great commission for the early church. Acts describes some explosive growth for the early church, yet you never see the mention of utilizing a regular event, building a building, or relying on a charismatic pastor to build the church. They met in houses, daily. For large gatherings, they met publicly in public places. It was organic, unrestrained growth, not organizational.

The second point Perry makes is that the "event" is required to reach the most people. Even if this is true, this is still no justification for a church to pour HUGE resources into a grand, weekly production. Church members get so burned out on putting together a grand production that they don't have time for any of the "one another" commandments. The "event" can be much less regular, giving time and room for the church to be relational rather than focusing continually on being presentational.

I believe that Jesus' sole attractional philosophy for His church was for "love one another" to be what attracted people to the church. Not events with a high production value.

The other point to take away is this - I always see more negative response from those within traditional churches towards those in house churches than the other way around. Barna talked about this in Revolution. I've heard how other megachurch pastors now dismiss Barna outright. I've known several others involved in house church who have shared the same experience. (As far as Barna's standing with the modern church, wait until Barna's next book comes out, Pagan Christianity: Exploring the Roots of Our Church Practices. Co-written with Frank Viola.)

I've been in traditional church. I understand the lure of the presentational format, and the desire as a presenter to see the value in it. While I've never been a pastor of a church the size of NewSpring (or a pastor at all, for that matter), it's accurate to say that I know much better where Perry's coming from than he knows where I'm coming from. That's why those in house churches will discuss the failings of the modern church, but the goal there is to help others see what they themselves have already discovered. But those entrenched in the modern church are simply defending the only thing they've ever known, and typically do that by making mischaracterizations of house churches, and ignoring countless scriptures that clearly describe the reliance of the early church on them.

The final thing I'd like to say is this: I believe that many of the megachurch pastors have missed their calling. I believe that they have truly apostolic gifts. That is why they focus on numbers and size. They focus on church planing. This is an important role in the body of Christ, but it is a role that is absent in the modern church. Therefore, people such as Perry Noble feel a call to ministry, and the modern notion of "pastor" is really the only thing available to them. If the body of Christ functioned as described in the New Testament, people with apostolic gifts would be unhindered by the administration of the local church corporation. They would be able to follow the Spirit's leading in planting hundreds of churches rather than just one. They would be mentoring many more apostles. And their impact would be far bigger than their buildings can now allow.

But at the moment, it is primarily the prophets who are trying to call the modern church out of its religious trappings and free it to be the body of Christ as described in scripture. But prophets are rarely appreciated. One day, I pray that God will open all of our eyes to His truth as revealed in scripture.

Labels: church, house church, open formats