SimpleChurch Journal aka House Church Blog

Re-Thinking Leadership

There have been a lot of comments on previous posts regarding leadership, so I thought I would initiate a couple of new posts on the subject.  I did a workshop at the Denver house church conference called "Re-Thinking Leadership: From Leading an Organization to Serving a Movement."  I suppose, since I facilitated this workshop, that makes me "the expert."  Haha.  Just kidding.  In fact, you might notice the title is "re-thinking" as in current-tense-still-in-the-process.  I think we are all in this process of re-envisioning what leadership of an organic movement looks like and, therefore, there are no experts.  This is what makes this such a dynamic conversation for today!

The workshop I did was set up to be participatory.  However, I did set the stage with some pre-suppositions which I will share here as a starting point for this discussion on leadership.

Presupposition #1: Church is a living entity.  Church is an explosion of God's life through people.  It is, by definition, an organic life-force process that God directs.  It is the life and power of God flowing under his sovereignty through people who are submitted to his authority.

We have so over-used and mis-understood the term "church" that we often lose the divine nature of it.  Church is people, yes, but it is all about God's divinity--in all of his fullness and life--flowing in and through people.  We might want to say that word "church "and envision fire around it and rivers flowing through it just to see clearly the divine-life nature of it.  "Church" is inherently God's own life being transmitted to and through people.  In this sense it is organic, a living entity, in the most full-of-life sense imaginable.

Perhaps a good visualization, then, of this "divine explosion of life through people" that we call "church" would be a living river that has intelligence--God's intelligence--behind it.  The importance of this is that first of all, it is-- like a river--filled with life and power.  Secondly, it is a river that is fully under God's direction (and God alone).  Thirdly, it is neither sensible nor controllable.  It sometimes flows calmly and gently, and then, in a moment, it rushes over a cliff and becomes a wild onslaught of rushing water that overflows banks and cannot be contained.  Just because God is at work in and through people, we must not lose sight of the fact that "church" is people who are infused with an overflow of heavenly life that comes from the throne.  We are alive to God because he has filled us with his organic, power-filled life. It is a life-force that is transmitted under his direction and command.  It is truly alive and it is a beyond-this-world entity!

As a side note to this description of "church" I would say that, at the very least, it helps us to approach the topic of "leadership" (facilitating this divine flow of life) with great humility.  After all, the most we can hope to do is to develop a deep intimacy with the one who commands this explosion of life, respond to HIS leading, and in that way take part in facilitating the furtherance of this life-force.

Presupposition #2: Organizational leadership, as a model for facilitating church (as a living life-force entity), is inadequate at best and detrimental at worst.  Our business/organizational/leadership models are simply not up to the task for facilitating a living, God-directed process.

By definition, our organizational leadership models are about human control: set understandable goals, develop mechanized strategies to reach those goals, implement, evaluate.  If you look at this clearly, you can see that we are in trouble right from the start.  How can one set understandable goals for something as beyond-this-world as the living church?  I am not suggesting that a believer must never set goals.  We do live in a world that requires a certain amount of control and order.  I am simply saying that using these tools as a primary way to bring leadership to God's church is wholly unsatisfactory.

Presupposition #3: God's way of leadership is foreign to us and therefore difficult to understand and implement.  Most of us have been schooled and trained in the type of scientific thinking that makes it relatively easy to embrace organizational/business-type leadership.  It simply makes sense to us.  So much so, that it is difficult to get our minds around what leadership looks like without that basic paradigm.

The fact is, what we call "servant leadership" is not just a "biblical way" to go about doing organizational leadership.  It is a completely different paradigm and basic definition of what leadership is.  It simply does not fit into business/organizational leadership models nor does it fit comfortably into the way we think of leadership at all.  It is a different way-to-think-about leadership altogether that is both discomforting and challenging because it does not allow us to "do leadership" within the context of the roles we are familiar with.

Henri Nouwen says this about biblical servant-leadership: "The servant-leader is the leader who is being led to unknown, undesirable, and painful places.  The way of the Christian leader is not the way of upward mobility in which our world has invested so much, but the way of downward mobility ending on the cross."

I would like to suggest that the reason we struggle with understanding the reality of this type of leadership is because we have not really walked out the discomfort of its calling!

Nouwen goes on to say, "the world in which we live--a world of efficiency and control--has no models to offer to those who want to be shepherds in the way Jesus was a shepherd..."

I think this shows the difficulty of this conversation on leadership.  We cannot really put our finger on "the model" because it is so foreign to us and so little seen.

Presupposition #4: Leadership, in the way it is meant to be expressed in the church today, is in fact vital.  All of this to say that re-envisioning, re-defining, and re-thinking leadership is not just an intellectual exercise.  We need today, more than ever, to see the church led by those who "get it"-- by those who model rather than preach, who impart it by lifestyle not by platitudes, whose laid-down life is the offering that influences others, and who do not require recognition because their reward is to see the divine-explosion of live, kingdom life, increased on the earth.

More to come... (I think)...  This is meant to be just a starting point!

Frank Viola Answers Questions

I have not heard Frank Viola before so I was intrigued to attend one of his workshops at the Denver House Church Conference.  He has an intense personality (not unlike his books) and certainly brings to the table many, many years of simple church / house church experience.

He used this workshop to answer questions that he has been most frequently asked over the years.  My personal note is that I am serving as more of a reporter here and will reserve my own comments for another time.

1.  What are the reasons that people leave institutional churches?  Frank suggested that the best reason for leaving the institutional church is because of a deep revelation of Jesus Christ and his purposes that is powerfully compelling and that causes the person to realize that these purposes can only be fulfilled outside of the institution of church.  He acknowledges that most people leave the institutional church for other reasons: they are born rebels, they have been hurt deeply, they are not getting enough of their needs met, they want to be scriptural, etc, etc.  But Viola's hope is that these people would ultimately come to the place of seeking a deeper grasp of Jesus Christ as their core motivation.

2.  Who can start a house church?  Viola admits that he is controversial on this issue.  He asserts that spontaneous expressions of church start up all the time by all kinds of people and in all types of settings.  He believes, however, that most of these expressions of church will be short-lived.  He believes that there is an apostolic calling to plant churches, that those with apostolic callings are needed to bring revelation of Christ to the church, to center the church properly, and to nourish it.  He believes that church expressions that spring up spontaneously would do well to bring in outside apostolic guidance and input.

3.  I feel called to plant churches; what do I do?  Frank recommends three books to those who feel called to plant churches.  Two books are by Watchman Nee: "Normal Christian Church Life," and "Release of the Spirit."  The third is by Viola himself: "So You Want to Start a House Church."

4.  What can we expect in the first year or two in house church?  Frank suggest that you can expect to walk through four distinct seasons.  If you make it all the way through the four seasons, then you can expect these seasons to re-cycle:

1. Honeymoon-- everything is wonderful and beautiful.
2. Crisis--conflicts, disagreements, or problems with difficult people.  This can cause the church to self-destruct unless they are able to move on to the next season.
3. The cross--people in the group are able and willing to take their life and issues to the cross and die to self in the area that is being challenged.
4. Tested Body life--real community is experienced (at least for a while).

5.  What is the average life span of a house church?  Frank says that most churches survive from 6 months to two years.  He points back to the seasons just mentioned.  Unless churches can navigate through the inevitable conflics and crises, they will self-destruct at a fairly early stage.  He again asserts that they might do well to bring in outside help to navigate through the difficulties.

6.  What is your view on elders in a house church?  Viola asserts that a house church should never start with elders.  He points to scriptural examples of this precedent (Paul in the book of Acts).  He suggests that those who fulfill the role of elder should emerge naturally and organically as part of the body life growth.

7.  What advice can you give us about children?  Frank did not have specific advice on this issue.  He was concerned about children being cared for.  He was also equally concerned about the difficulties of being in community with parents whose commitment to their children supercedes their commitment to the church community.  In other words, children need to be neither neglected nor worshipped.

Frank Viola's materials can be found here.

I'm off to more of the workshop.

Barna's Revised Statistics

I am at the Denver House Church Conference and just heard Barna share some of his latest statistics on "alternative models of faith communities" in the U.S.  Some of you will appreciate this since several of you wondered out loud (i.e. in comments) at the large number of people he stated were attending house churches.

In fact, his previous statistic (20 million Christians involved in house church) changed a bit when he asked the question about house church involvement with a bit more clarification by adding the phrase "and consider this home-gathering to be a complete church on its own."  This phrase dropped the number of people attending house churches to about 5 million people.  Furthermore, at least 6 out of 10 people who are involved in a house church by this definition continue to attend a conventional church and consider the conventional church to be their primary church.

Okay... now the statistics start to match experience.  Many people are, in fact, exploring alternative faith communities and the numbers are growing.  However we are still dealing with a movement that is in infancy stage... which I see as a good thing as God continues to mold and shape it and we don't yet see the handprints of man's programs all over it.

Nevertheless, he still considers the movement a revolution that will continue to change the church landscape over the next few years.

Some additional interesting facts about those involved in house church:

• It is more prevalent among young people (which is one reason Barna expects the movement to grow--it fits their longing for authenticity and belonging)
• It is more prevalent in the south
• It is more prevalent among home-schoolers

He also reports that there is a high level of satisfaction with spiritual depth and connectedness among those involved in house church (higher than those attending conventional churches).

Barna himself is involved in house church because of his awareness that the calling of God upon the church is to see transformed lives.  He believes that this can only take place one person at a time in a relational context.  He sees house church/ simple church as an ideal setting for transformation that leads to biblical revolution and impact-the-culture living.

Perhaps Barna's most profound challenge to the house church movement (and any church expression willing to listen) is that we are still not emphasizing sufficiently the importance of children.  "The war is often won or lost by the age of 13."  An important point... perhaps something to ponder more on a future post.

I will try to share on other conference sessions over the weekend as soon as possible.