tomorrow's church

Met yesterday with Michael Moynagh, author of:



Some of the research we are doing overlaps and we hope to be able to combine forces in a small way to go further, faster.

We had an inspiring conversation and I was very encouraged to find how far outside the box Michael actually was. He has an enormous breadth of experience and thinking, demonstrated through his work & writing via the Tomorrow project.

In terms of where we might be going church wise we were both wrestling with some similar issues to do with what is actually needed if we are to see movement generated, issues related to leadership for the 'emerging' church, how is it going to be developed and where is it going to come from, how do we make a 'knowledge bank' for these leaders/pioneers available (or do we need that at all!), the lack of a foundational family structure in this country which makes it highly difficult to introduce 'household church' in a first century style (perhaps there are alternatives?); the importance of the relationship between the existing/big and the emerging/small; the possibility of reproductive training models rather than 'come to us' centralised systems.

Lots of helpful and challenging thoughts.

posted by alexander @ 8:34 AM    0 comments

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Will the Emerging Church Fully Emerge? Frank Viola

Some of you may already have read this "Invitation for Serious Reflection and Open Dialogue" sent out by Frank Viola who has been involved in 'emerging church' for over 20 years! When he says emerging church he means a return to the values and pattern of the 1st century church which met in homes, without a 'lead pastor' who did everything on behalf of the people.

Bearing in mind he is writing from a US angle, nevertheless he hits some nails right on the head. Here are a few snippets, having covered 8 areas of positives about the present EC movement he then cuts to the chase with some concerns;

The emerging church phenomenon has wonderfully articulated some of the major flaws of the modern church, yet like all of its predecessors, it has failed to identify and take dead aim at one of the chief roots of most of its ills.

I firmly believe that the taproot of most of the problems that plague the church in modernity is the clergy system. To put a finer point on it, Protestant Christians are addicted to the modern pastoral office. The pastor is the all-purpose religious professional in the modern Protestant church, both evangelical and mainline.

...In Century One, some of the churches had elders who played a shepherding role. But they did not dominate the ministry of the church, nor was the direction of the church exclusively placed into their hands (as is the case with many elder-led churches today like Presbyterians and the Plymouth Brethren). I believe that we are in desperate need to return to these first principles.

...Question: Is it possible that in our efforts to bring renewal and change to the traditional church, we have never seriously taken a biblical, historical, and practical look at the legitimacy of the modern pastoral office? Can we at least experiment with another alternative . . . the ministry paradigm that we find in our New Testaments?

...Let me enlarge this observation into a principle. The clergy-led institutional church is like a rubber band. No matter what it experiences in the way of renewal or reform, it will always bounce back to the same structure. It lives on fads and gimmicks. But when the smoke clears, it will always return to a pastor who preaches sermons to a passive congregation, a prescribed order of worship where God’s people are not free to function unhindered in the gatherings, and a building whose structural arrangement encourages people to be muted spectators.

...Question: Is it possible that the emerging church phenomenon has neglected to look at the way churches were planted in the first century, and instead, has opted to follow the path of modern missionary movements and traditional pastoral systems?

...The emerging church phenomenon shares a common trait with most of Christendom in that it is largely built on theory with little practice. For instance, there is a great deal of high-talk about Body functioning, community life, and equipping the saints for ministry, yet I have seen little to no fleshing out of these spiritual realities in any form among those who carry on loudly about them.

...The emerging church phenomenon, like all preceding reform/renewal movements, has emphasized a bundle of Christian “its” and “things,” instead of the Person of Jesus Christ.

...Challenge and Invitation

In the mid-20th century, Swiss watchmakers had the corner on the world market share of watches. But that changed when one of their own countrymen came out with a revolutionary new idea: The quartz watch. He presented this idea to the Swiss manufacturers and they laughed at him. They con­cluded it could never work, so they refused to patent the idea. Seiko, on the other hand, took one look at the quartz watch and the rest is history.

The power of a paradigm had so influenced the Swiss watch manufacturers that they could not understand the new concept of the quartz watch. Because the quartz watch had no gears, no mainspring, and no bearings, they rejected it. Their present paradigm did not allow for the new innovation. The net effect was that they lost the leading edge on watch making and they were forced to lay off thousands of workers. It was all because the quartz watch did not fit into their world view. It did not fit within their paradigm. They did not appreciate the new way because they were blinded by the old way.

It is my strong conviction that a similar paradigm shift concerning the structure and practice of the church as well as church planting is absolutely crucial if the Body of Christ will reflect the dream in God’s heart and have any significant cultural impact. Or to put it another way, a serious rethinking of the modern pastoral role, the way that churches are planted, the centrality of Jesus Christ, the taproot of Christ’s earthly conduct, the narrative of the first-century story, and the eternal purpose of God are all necessary if the emerging church has any hope of fully emerging.

It appears to me that Viola has observed one part of the emerging church, the part that is quite visible due to blogging and conferences etc, but I think there is a whole other emerging church which is largely off the radar and unseen. Occuring at grass-roots level, instigated by ordinary christians who just want to get on with being church where they are without all the hassle of 'church' as they knew it. These people don't write theological articles, or publish books or go to conferences, they are too busy getting on with Life. There is no clergy system, leadership is fluid and corporate. All are involved with discipling, teaching and shepherding. There is some theory knocked about but most of what happens derives from real life experience. There is a high commitment to working out a real spirituality in the midst of shared everyday life. This is a completely different paradigm from the one we have previously known.

posted by alexander @ 10:20 AM    2 comments

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Amen! I agree and I see it...an authentic, grass-roots movement where God's people are free to love God and each other, and BE, in an atmosphere of liberty. my home church has been trying this, falteringly but surely, for over 15 years now, and most of the folks in my church couldn't even spell postmodern! So while I do enjoy what shows up on the 'net, I realize that much is happening in the hidden places...and that's how our Lord seems to like it.

By  Mike Morrell, at 3:11 AM  

Hi Mike good to hear from you again. we met a couple of years back @ Greenbelt round a camp fire.
hey you need to include this site on your mega listing!

By  alexander, at 9:37 AM  

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Back at last
Returned after a couple of weeks on the road. Met some interesting people along the way. Including folks from Germany, France, Spain, Belgium, Austria, Switzerland, Croatia, Scotland, Wales, England, Ireland, Italy, Norway, Sweden, South Africa, Romania and Cambodia to name but a few!

On my return, last Monday I was with Claire from Oz, who is doing some similar research on behalf of Forge looking at how to provide continued support and resourcing for those who have been through their church planting program. Then on to see Paul Thaxter at CMS to talk through the UK version of that research: into what is currently out there for emerging church/missional leaders and/or what is actually needed. Then onto see Peter Brierley from Christian Research. Fascinating to hear about all his facts and figures. Interesting side comment that the only 2 groups who isolated themselves from the Challenge 2000 project in the 90's are the only 2 groups who have subsequently continued to steadily plant new churches, Vineyard & NFI.

They too (Christian Research) are attempting to measure the emerging side of things in their current church census. But finding it's organic nature rather difficult to track!! In a way my hope is that if this genuinely is a movement it remains unmeasureable, not only becasue of it's diversity and obstinacy but simply because it is out of control. We don't need something that is controllabe and measureable. We need something which, under the Holy Spirit, is out of our grasp and control; a movement which has a life of it's own. The spontaneous expansion of the church.

posted by alexander @ 11:01 AM    0 comments

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a revolutionary ministry
So over in the States researcher, George Barna has been taking his organisation through a massive re-envisioning this past year. I'll leave you to read the whole article here, but what interested me was a side comment he threw in about Emerging Church, here it is;

these branded books will reveal what is happening in the emerging Church – not the postmodern, candles/coffee/couches types of anti-modern ministries, but the Revolutionary ministry that is percolating to the surface of American society through new forms of ministry such as the cyberchurch, house churches, marketplace ministries, and tribal faith experiences.

It seems as if he figures that there is something beyond the 'anti-modern' reactionary expressions which is wholly different and potentially revolutionary. Does that hold for the UK? My observation of things in the States is that in the area of organic/home/simple church they are around 2 years further down the road than us. I know things are culturally very different, so I have my doubts here, but could this pattern emerge here too - that this 'revolutionary ministry' will percolate to the surface? What do you think?

posted by alexander @ 7:28 AM    0 comments

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