SimpleChurch Journal aka House Church Blog

Love 'Em and Bless 'Em

One of the unintended consequences of conventional churches and their focus to grow is the subtle, and sometimes not-so-subtle, message that unreached people are targets that need to be “reached” and “brought in.”

I heard the atheist, Matt Caspar (Jim and Caspar Go to Church), speak at a conference and describe how he asked his new Christian friend, “Am I your friend or your project?”  His question reflects the way Christians have gone about relating to the world around them and the perception that unChristians have as a result.

On the one hand, there is the reality that the Father’s heart is broken for children who are separated from Him.  This is central to a Biblical worldview in which Jesus, who came to seek and save the lost, invites us to join Him in the missional adventure of taking His good news and compassion to a broken, truly-lost world.  God is not simply a God on a mission, He is a missional God at His very loving core.

However, when this message is coupled with an organized church’s “vision to grow”, it is so easy for our passion to love and bless people to take on a religious, weighty sense of performance that comes more out of “earning points” by counting conversions, baptisms, and pew sitters than simply desiring to see people (from a place of love) truly blessed and transformed.

I realize this may seem like splitting hairs, but I think the implications are enormous.  The fact is, Christians do want to love and bless people… genuinely.  There is something in all of us that enjoys the prospect of simply being people who care, love, give, help, bless, assist, and really make a difference in the lives of people around us.  We do not relish the idea of helping people for the sake of manipulating them or trying to get them to do something so that we can feel good about ourselves religiously.  We really do want to love and bless people!

I share this because, for me, moving out of an institutional mindset into more of an organic one has freed me to fully enjoy the missional adventure of loving people.  I am not feeling the pressure of “results” or feeling that institutional “shadow” lurking within me asking about specific, tangible outcomes.  I am finding great joy in seeking and discovering ways to just encourage and love people—no strings attached.

One might ask if that means I have lost my missional intentionality.  I would have to say, that insofar as mission is about truly loving someone and wanting what is best for them, then the answer is “no.”  I might even suggest that, by moving into the realm of real relationships (love, care, a desire to bless) I might even be more “effective” if one is looking at some kind of external indicator.   But that, again, misses the point.  More significant is the joy of being set free to naturally care about people and allowing God to work within that relationship super-naturally as He wills.

The bottom line is that one of the most significant aspects of simple/house church is a generation of believers who can step outside the walls and into the world with the mission of love on their hearts 24/7.

A Lifestyle of Spirit-Led Leadership

The following is from Kent Smith (emailed to me some time back by Mike Steele) on "A Lifestyle of Spirit-Led Leadership."  Kent is a missions professor at Abilene Christian University and has been involved in training leaders of simple churches:

The great soccer player Pele was quoted saying, "I have just three moves . . . but I do them very, very well."
 
That brought to mind one of my favorite quotes from Peter Drucker: "Effective people focus on a few areas where outstanding performance will produce outstanding results."
 
We want to be an expert at:
                        1) Loving, hearing and obeying Jesus.
                        2) Leading others to love, hear and obey Jesus.
                        3) Leading the leaders of others to love hear and obey Jesus.
 
If we do these things well, we believe we will fulfill the Lord's purpose for our relational family and the peoples and cities God calls us to bless and encourage around the world.
 
In light of this . . .
 
We don't assume that the challenge and task we face is first and foremost church planting. We assume rather that the focus must be to find those who are open to God's life and to train them to center their lives in Jesus.
 
We believe that both of these points of ministry will produce something that may be called a church—but only the second will produce a vibrant family of Jesus, that is to say, a healthy community where Jesus is actually embodied in a particular setting.
 
We further assume that mature apostles/missionaries will understand that their work will only be healthy and enduring if it:

1. is centered and built upon the foundation that is Jesus Christ. At a practical level this means the people involved are listening to Jesus and doing what he says.
2. embraces and calls forth the full spectrum of healthy functioning in the body, not merely, for example, the reproductive function. For a body to be healthy and mature all the parts must be free to do their work, including those with other equipping gifts.

The work of mature apostles/missionaries therefore is first and foremost a work of "eduction", of calling forth the latent grace of God in each person and community God calls them to serve.
 
This is a work of profound humility that steadily discovers and submits to the new thing Christ is doing in each person and place as he builds his Church.
 

The Tangible Kingdom: Creating Incarnational Community

Hugh Halter and Matt Smay have written an interesting book on "Creating Incarnational Community."  It's a good read.  Following is not a book review, rather just some notes (and quotes) that I wrote after reading it:

Author Hugh Halter tells this story:

As I’m sitting at a Starbucks in the final week of editing this book, I just took a break to talk to a guy named Don.  Don grew up in a non-practicing Catholic home, watched his father convert to a Seventh-Day Adventist tradition, but only remembers the types of meat he couldn’t eat.  His wife hates the idea of God, and Don’s already expressed his disdain for organized church.  Since he seemed open to talk, I lobbed up this question: "If Christianity was only about finding a group of people to live life with, who shared openly their search for God and allowed anyone, regardless of behavior, to seek too, and who collectively lived by faith to make the world a little more like Heaven, would you be interested?”

“Hell yes!” was his reply.  He continued, “Are there churches like that?”

On belonging to those we are reaching:

In order for us to change the incorrect assumptions that people have about God and his followers… we’ve got to get to the point where they consider us one of them.

On becoming an advocate for people:

When your posture is correct, you’ll be perceived to be an advocate, a person who supports and speaks in favor of or pleads for another…  Instead of drawing a line in the sand and imploring them to ‘get right with God or get left behind,’ we step across from our religious side into their all-too real world and ask how we can help…  To be an advocate means that when people are in need, they know that we’ll be on their team, and that we’ll be there whenever they need us, for just about everything.

On inviting people to join you on your spiritual journey:

Share food… Share life… Listen to them… Share Scripture…

On intentionality around creating incarnational communities:

We put much emphasis on helping people create and participate in incarnational communities.  It’s not just an attempt to start a bunch of small groups all over the city.  We believe that unless people experience [this lifestyle]… and fight for this tangible Kingdom, they won’t grow as disciples of Christ, and Sojourners [the lost] won’t be moving toward God.