The nature of the new pt 2

2. Organic

What I understand and mean by organic is that this new shape of church is free to grow and develop naturally and relationally without too much interference or control by man. I do not mean that there is no structure at all. Quite clearly all organic growth has a basic structure. But there is something very important being conveyed by the use of this word organic. It is the issue of control, i.e. who is in reality in charge of and who is actually building the church, Jesus or us? One of the greatest battles we constantly face as believers is between the flesh and the spirit. Are we going to live the Christian life in our own strength and from our own initiative or God’s? Are we going to rely on our own abilities and knowledge or are we going to actually believe that Jesus does infact know more than us and is more capable than we are? Are we willing to trust Him sufficiently to allow Him to do what He said He would do in the first place, build the church?

Our human tendency once something is going is to grab hold of it and bring it under our control because in our pride we believe that we know best how to do this thing. I am not saying that God doesn’t invite us to work with Him and to use the gifts and abilities He has blessed us with, including our minds. Rather I am saying that we have to learn that ONLY God can do the work of God, our job at the end of the day is to trust Him; to believe that He IS God and does know more than us and is more than capable of building His church; Then making ourselves and our gifts available to Him.

Hands off

One of the most outstanding characteristics of the apostle Paul was his extraordinary trust in the Holy Spirit’s ability to take care of, watch over and build the church. He wasn’t afraid, having established a brand new church, to leave them after just a short time in the hands of the Spirit for several months before returning to appoint elders to care for the flock. His confidence was in Jesus to do what He said He would do. This is a critical lesson I believe that we must take note of.

Thus the whole ethos of the new paradigm is ‘hands off’. Allowing and trusting the Holy Spirit to develop and shape things in His way and time. So when I say natural and organic I don’t mean free-wheeling without control or structure, I mean free of mans control and under the control of the Spirit. Sometimes that requires patience and self control when the temptation is to plunge in and begin organising everything. Often He is more interested in hearts than programmes, much to the annoyance of our action-oriented natures!

This shift in the balance of control is again difficult to observe at first sight but it is fundamental to the emerging paradigm. This atmosphere of non-control is also critical to the potential for multiplication and movement. Why? Because for movement to occur there has to be an outward ‘releasing’ dynamic. To stop a virus from spreading it has to be isolated, kept in one place, bottled up. But if the church is going to be free to multiply it has to be liberated from as much control and ‘bottling up in one place’ as possible. Anything that restricts this free movement will limit its capacity to spread. I recognise that this immediately raises a number of common questions such as ‘how do you stop these churches falling into heresy?’ and ‘how do you stop strong individuals taking them over?’ These questions have been well addressed by others, for example try this link: Simple Church - FAQ (http://www.dawnministries.org/regions/nam/simplechurch/faq.html#leadership).

Fluid church

The Glory of God, we are promised, is one day going to cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. How will this glory come? Through the church. If the church, like water, is bottled up in its own banks it will never spread and cover the earth. The dams and banks of control have to be removed so that it can flow freely across the earth.

The church is fluid in that it flows where the people are. It doesn’t hide behind holy ‘walls’. It’s in the streets, in the homes, offices, schools, coffee shops, parks. It has, in the words of Martin Robinson and Dwight Smith, 'Invaded secular space' (http://www.cpo-online.org.uk/product.asp?cat=510&prod=AH67) rather than hiding away in holy huddles. It is uncontained, allowing it to spread freely like a virus. It is organic, it grows naturally and relationally. Its shape is not controlled rigorously. It flows ever outwards rather than piling up in one central body. I like to think of it as – free running church.

Go not come

Here’s an example of how this thinking works in practise; in terms of reaching out, growing and building the church the focus is not on building a bigger and bigger central body but rather on spreading ever further outwards. So for example say Chris, a member of “the church that meets at Dave’s house” leads Phil, who he works with, to the Lord. Phil is married, has a family and also has one or two neighbours who he knows would be interested in spiritual things. Instead of yanking Phil out of his circle of influence into the church at Dave’s house, they decide to leave him exactly where he is and send Chris and his wife Jenny to help Phil gather his family and friends in his own home. A new church is born and has an immediate circle of influence to draw on and reach out to in a real and natural way. This demonstrates a subtle but enormously important shift in thinking. Instead of constantly saying to people ‘come to us’ we are actually beginning to do what Jesus said, ‘Go’. We are taking the church to them, or rather Jesus, and where Jesus comes church follows. We are not holding on to anything, we are giving away, releasing. To do otherwise would be like forbidding our own children, once grown up, to leave home to start their own families. God’s mandate was that the man should leave his parents in order to cleave to his wife and thus be fruitful, multiply and fill the earth. Not to remain in his parents home so that it would grow bigger and bigger and more attractive and powerful.

This dynamic can only occur if there is a control-free mindset, one that is not geared to personal empire building, for whatever reason, but Kingdom extending.

This doesn’t mean that there should not be larger gatherings and in the example above it would be quite natural for the new church that meets in Phil’s house to occasionally gather together with Dave’s and others they may be connected to. The point is that this larger setting serves the smaller home churches in their mission rather than the other way round.

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