house churches oh noooooo ....

It's the new big discovery ... again. Yep, "house churches" are in the news. Once again people have figured out that attending some mass meeting once a week (or even three times if you are AG) just doesn't get it. And once again they think that some how by meeting in their home, they have figured out something new that eliminates all of the baggage attached to our "traditional churches" and gains all that Christ called us to be as His Bride ... hmmmm?

As I read through the article I'm happy that people are finding renewed relationships with each other and with God but I'm saddened at the deception around it. The article also confuses groups that are autonomous and those that are subsets of a "traditional church". The former I reject, the latter I embrace.

"They are part of the growing number of Americans ..."

I'm not the oldest guy around but that's what we Vineyard guys said about kinships in the '70s ... I'm sure someone else found it so well before we thought we discovered it.

"How do you form a community in a church of 4,000 people?" asks Scott, who used to attend a megachurch in St. Paul. "Sometimes it's hard to get really connected. What I've really been looking for is community."

Apparently Scott doesn't understand the various components of community. I commend to you that God created us to need and find relationships in public, social, personal, and intimate spaces. So yes, small groups are needed but that doesn't equal leaving the large group - and worse, leaving the some of the key elements of church life just because it is associated with traditional church life (throwing the baby out with the bath water).

Forgoing pastoral leadership ... house churches redefine what it means to be a church.

Yikes!!! Danger, Danger Will Robertson ...

... grown frustrated with the "spiritual lite" of traditional churches.

So fix that rather than run from it. I'm wondering how these small bands of men and women keep themselves from becoming spiritual lite house churches and why they think that doesn't fit in a larger group context?

"It's a lower barrier to entry," says Dale, who has started eight to 10 house churches over the past decade. "The discussion isn't around theology … but is focused on what's going on in each of our lives today. It's intensely personal and very real."

Oh oh, no theology? That can't be good? On the other hand, applying theology to our lives, that can be excellent. Wonder why they confuse this?

... keeping free of traditional churches on Sunday is fine. But could a house church morph into a traditional church if it grew too big? Scott says her group often worries about how to grow, but there is no plan to make their house church into a traditional one.

Any group can "morph" into the stuff these guys are fearing. A proper group will grow, multiply, and then want to bring the groups together on a weekly basis to follow the Biblical pattern.

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