Home Church

I really don't need another night out, but I couldn't really turn down an invitation to join a small group (how I hate that term - so programmatic), or should I say home church. I don't believe in small groups as a program, but I do think that a lot of what the church has to do can't happen on a Sunday morning. It has to happen in a more intimate setting. My small group experience has been bad - really bad - in the past. I'm a terrible small group leader. It's a completely different skill set than is required from the Sunday morning pastor type. Still, as Rob Bell asked last week, "Are you smoking what you're selling?" I talk about the value of sitting in circles rather than rows. I couldn't really turn down the invitation to join this home church. I arrived, and soon recognized I was in a one-another experience. I was not the expert or the Bible answer man (thank God). I did not have to participate in any discussions on directional issues or strategic shifts. I sat beside my wife and was just who I am, hungry for community, hungry for something more with one another than we've made church out to be. No offerings. No budgets. No strategy. No hierarchy. Just each other. And it was great.