Danny,
I think your message is in the wrong thread. This thread is not about
meeting in homes. It is about the style of meeting the New Testament
commands us to have. Would you agree with me that many (or most) RM
chruches do not obey the instructions Paul gave for having church
meetings, adn instead follow Protestant tradition in this regard?
I've read that it is a myth that Christians were consistently and
universally persecuted throughout the Roman Empire for 300 years.
Persecution came sporadically and in different areas. Christians
might have been able to build church buildings in some areas.
What if I went to a church that used beer instead of wine/grape juice
for Holy Communion, I might ask someone 'Why do you use beer instead
of grape juice instead of grape juice or wine? The apostles used the
fruit of the vine.'
Suppose someone there answers 'The apostles used wine because beer was
not widely available in Israel in the first century.' What is wrong
with that answer? Well, for one thing, the Bible doesn't hint that
the reason the apostles used wine was because beer wasn't widely
available. The people at this church, for some reason, might think
that beer is superior to wine for use in Holy Communion, but that is
only because they value beer more than wine for this person. The
Bible gives us no reason to assume that wine was a substitute for
beer.
A friend of mine said it irritated him to hear people say that the
reason Jews in the first century drank wine was because they didn't
have a way to preserve fresh grape juice. He says they drank wine
because they liked wine. Some modern American Christians who have an
anti-wine prejudice might read their own ideas into history about the
reason people drank wine.
But what about this argument that the reason the early Christians
didn't build church buildings was because there was persecution, etc.
Well, I don't see in the Bible any indication that the churches were
looking forward to a day when they could put up church buildings. I
don't see the church building as a norm in scripture. The concept
doesn't even show up.
Like I said, I don't think is a sin to meet in a church building, but
I do see some problems with the 'ediface complex:'
1) Many churches ignore Christ's teaching and the early church example
of caring for the poor. A lot of money gets spent on building
buildings, even borrowing money to do so. 'The borrower is servant to
the lender.'
2) Congregations that meet in a house are often ignored or considered
to be weird or a cult. 'Why don't they meet in a building like a real
church?" some people may ask. Ironically, the apostles held meetings
in houses.
3) Artificiality from speakers. It is easy for a minister to stand up
behind a pulpit and give an uninterrupted speech in front of a
congregation in a church building, and come off as perfect. Put him
in his own living room, and let him talk in a natural environment.
See how he acts around his kids.
4) Sunday-only Christianity. The church building reinforces the idea
that the 'main event' for Christians is going to join in a very formal
program. Relationships, bearing one another's burdens, loving one
another, often gets replaced down to brief handshakes as people hurry
out to beat the Baptists to Western Sizzler.
5) Theological error. Buildings are not responsible for teaching
error, people are, I realize. But buildings help people play into the
erroneous thinking that a church building is hallow ground. Think of
how many preachers misuse verses that apply to the OT temple or to the
church to refer to church buildings. We are God's house in this day
and age, not a building of brick and mortar. Plenty of preachers say
'Isn't it good to be in God's house this morning.' How many kids get
told to behave when they are in 'God's house?'
6) Houses are much better suited for a Biblical style celebration of
the Lord's Supper which could allow fellowship during a meal eaten
together. Pews and nice carpet are not a good environment for this.
You might get food on the carpet. The formal atmosphere of the church
building is not as suitable for fellowship as a home. Also, the pews
are set up in a way to make fellowship difficult. I don't think any
real scholar that studies communion in the first century disagrees
with the idea that the early Christians ate a meal for the Lord's
Supper.
7) Unscriptural church meeting. most church buildings the way they
are constructed, are designed for the type of church meeting received
from the Reformation, but are not designed for the type of church
meetings scripture instructs us to have. They are not designed for
meetings in which 'every one of you' talks, sharing doctrines, songs,
revelations, etc. I Corinthians 14 contains instructions for church
meetings. (See Heb 10:25 also- mutual exhortation.)
One person who works with church planting here in Indonesia says that
when people go out to start a church plant, there is a lot of
evangelism at first, but about he time the congregation puts together
a proposal to get a building, the evangelism stops.
I can imagine why? this is a predominantly Muslim country. There are
also Buddhist neighborhoods, but let's imagine this in a Muslim
context. A couple of evangelistically gifted brothers go into a
neighborhood and find opportunities to share the Gospel with people.
Getting a church started become a matter of reaching people. Ministry
is people-focused.
Eventually, they might get 20 or 30 people coming to meetings in a
home. Well, the traditional mind-set takes over. The church planters
follow what the think is the natural course of action- get a building
and one of them becomes 'the pastor.' So, the way they do that in
Indonesia is they put together a budget proposal on apiece of paper
and start going around to churches asking for donations. Then they
rent an office storefront (or 'ruko' which is similar), usually, since
it is difficult to get building permits to build a church building.
Then what happens? The church goes from being people-oriented to
program oriented. The pastor is concerned with keeping the machine
running- having people come to meetings.
He may do some evangelism. The clergy-laity gulf is established. The
laity begin to think of evangelizing, etc. as the special job of the
salaried minister.
What is another alternatives? If the brothers are gifted at starting
churches, they could teach the new believers to read the scriptures in
meetings, edify one another with spiritual gifts, and exhort one
another not to sin. The congregation doesn't need a professional
'pastor' to lead a liturgy. Like the apostles of old, the church
planters can move on and do other work and come back later after the
Lord has matured some of the saints enough for them to be elders of
the church and take responsibility for the oversight of the flock.
What are the priorities in financing church growth? Where does money
get spent? Well, proposals here may include money for the pastors
salary, the rent for the church building for a certain period of time,
maybe a year, etc. I talked to one Bible college student who had a
group of people meeting in one little neighborhood. He might have had
20 people or less meeting, and he started talking about some of the
things he needed to set up a church later. One thing he needed was a
sound system. Is a sound system necessary? I think not.
I think an evangelism strategy of winning people to Christ and have
them all meet in one or more houses nearby in groups of 20 or 30 for
their weekly meeting is a pretty good idea. Money for sound systems,
rent for church buildings, etc. is unnecessary. Money can be given to
those doing real evangelism, elders working hard, widows, and the poor
within the congregation. Wouldn't it be better to spend money
collected on paying a brother or sister's rent who is having a hard
time than paying rent on a church building? Would it be better to
spend money on the church than on a steeple house? If we want to
spend on Jesus lavishly, like Mary of Bethany who poured ointment on
his feet, what should we do? Jesus said in another passage that
whatever you do to the least of these My brethren you do it unto me?
Who are our brethren? Church buildings or those saints who obey the
Father?
Actually-built church buildings here tend to be quite flammable. I
don't get it. Stuff here is built out of brick or concrete. Several
church buildings were bombed late Christmas Eve before midnight.
In the US, house churches are also a good idea for church growth.
There may be less church burning there, but it would still work.
Meeting in houses is the way the church in the Bible did it, so why
would we expect that something else (building steeple houses) is the
'norm.' The early saints met in public areas or existing structures
at times (the temple, perhaps Tyrranus' lecture hall) but we have no
pattern for using church funds to build a building to meet in.
It is interesting to me that 'Restoration Movements,' Reformations,
etc. often get stuck. They discover a few truths, make those the
focal point of their movement, but generations later, when that first
generation of leaders who are open to change in order to be consistent
with the scriptures die away, later generations get stuck in the same
mold as the first generation of the movement.
Usually, later generations think their movement has found it. They
have a lot of pride invested in their movement. Think about
Lutherans. Luther showed people that the Roman Church was in error
about some things. But some staunch Lutherans, like Luther, are very
much opposed to the idea that there is something wrong with infant
baptism. After all, they reason, their movement is the right one.
They don't push forward all the way into various other aspects of
Biblical Christianity.
There are people in the RM that are the same way. They focus a lot
on certain things the founders of the movement taught, pointing to
scriptures to support their views, but when you point out an area
where the RM has not returned to Biblical Christianity, they are
resistant to the idea or just apathetic. One example of this is when
we deal with the issue of how the church met. Another is spiritual
gifts. Afterall, a CoC or CC attender may reason, if there were
spiritual gifts today, wouldn't they manifest in my church. If there
is a Biblical way of meeting that does not center around hearing one
man preach a sermon, then wouldn't -my church be doing it? This type
of person is resistent to pressing forward into obeying what the
scriptures teach. Of course, all denominations have plenty of people
with types of thinking. Some consider this to be 'denominational
thinking.' Since CC's and CoC's are considered 'undenomination' I
suppose we could say RM people who think like this have
'undenominational thinking.'
Of course, not all RM people are like this. 'Mutual edification
Churches of Christ' may have caught hold of some of these concepts.
Nelta's webpage has links to a newsletter in which some RM ministers
express some similar views on the New Testament principles for
meetings to those expressed in the message I posted of Rusty Entrekin
comments on I Corinthains 14. Some people who used to go to Sign Out
Front CoC's are now involved in house churches. I ran across someone
who attends a house church who used to go to a SOF COC on the
TruthQuest mailing list. The American CoC tentmaker I came over here
to work with originally was interested in these same NT principles of
meeting before I began to see them in the scriptures. He was visiting
a Local Church Movement meeting which had open meetings, plural
elders, etc. (their church name also translates 'Church of Christ'
from Indonesian into English.) That is the movement Watchman Nee was
a part of, though it seems to have taken a different direction
doctrinally in some areas since then.
The idea that the average CC or CoC church meets and operates just
like the church in the Bible just doesn't stand up in the light of
scripture. The meetings are too different.
Let us please move this to the thread about meeting in homes compared
to baptism. That way we can focus on how the New Testament instructs
us to meet in this thread. Lord willing, I would like to crosspost
the bulk of this message over there to move this conversation to that
thread.
-- Anonymous, February 06, 2001