Saturday
May172003
What (who) is the church?
Saturday, May 17, 2003 at 9:22PM
This is emerging as the question at Rachel's website. Here are some possible answers to this question: 1) The traditional or modern church - This seems to resemble an institution more than something living and organic. It's not doing well in most of the world, and many are checking out. When people talk about leaving the church, this is what they usually mean. There may be some life left in this type of church, but it doesn't look good overall. 2) New forms of churches - House churches, emerging churches, etc. This is looking a lot better right now, but it still doesn't cut it for others. 3) Informal groups of believers - Some seem to argue that if you're a believer, you don't need the institution (they're right), and sooner or later you'll end up meeting with other believers and that will be your church, whenever you just happen to get together. There's some truth to this, but it seems to involve a bit more intentionality in the Bible. I guess it can happen spontaneously, but it seems to have taken a lot of effort in apostolic times. 4) There is no church - The extreme view is that there is no it, there are only people. While the church ultimately is people, there still is something quite apart from individuals that forms when we get together - something organic and non-institutional, just like my wife and kids and I form something together and separate from what we could individually (a family). I really have no problem if people leave the institutional church (option 1), even though I'm not sure that's the solution. I'm excited about new forms of churches (option 2), but I'm a little wary of options 3 and 4. As I've participated in this discussion, though, I've been getting more excited. It seems like God is up to something. It's almost like we're living through the beginnings of another Reformation. Can't wait to see what God will do.
Reader Comments (7)
cool...nice descriptions Darryl
Hi Darryl, I just linked up to this post with the comment: I'm glad to have been a part of this discussion -- sometimes things degenerate really badly on blogs and it ends up being petty, argumentative, and no-one really wants to hear opinions other than their own -- I don't think this discussion has gone down that track. People are hungry, open and listening. At the heart of it all, we all long for the same thing: we all want to be in relationships with other christians who build us up and love us (and vice versa). .: peace Rachel
I have appreciated the tone of the discussion as well. I think that most of us are in a place where we know there needs to be change but we don't know how it should look like. If we are open and keep talking amazing things can and will happen.
Thanks Darryl - linking up to this. Great descriptions, although I can't help but think that the early local fellowships you refer to would have to be described as #3's!!
Good descriptions. I think I can understand your wariness toward #4, but why #3? Don't most #2s come from #3s?
I guess it's the impression I get from the pastoral epistles that these local fellowships, or whatever you want to call them, didn't just spring up - for instance, "I left you on the island of Crete so you could complete our work there and appoint elders in each town as I instructed you" (Titus 1:5). I'm open to being convinced, though.
Are the pastoral epistles the norm? Perhaps they were written to deal with churches in a certain context of crisis. The other epistles and the book of Acts seem to portray a church that is more fluid and less structured as Mike pointed out. Paul rarely refers to any kind of formal church structure. The church in Jerusalem had a tight core with the apostles and deacons, but the thousands meeting from house to house were probably pretty informal and loosely grouped. On Paul's first missionary journey, he seems to have simply shared the good news, gathered the believers together, taught them to various extents and left them as informal groups (#3s). On his second trip, he appointed elders (Acts 14:23) and the groups perhaps became #2s although there's little reference to elders in his epistles.