Another positive thing about being in simple/organic expressions of church life was the giving. Why? Well simple, we didn’t give to the “church”. You may say “whats good about that” or “well you guys weren’t giving” which are necessary questions.

Yes we gave. But we gave to people or to specific organizations that the Lord had burdened our heart for. We didn’t collect money as a church and make decisions that we feel that they should have the obligation to make. We didn’t want to take the responsibility of giving away from them and so we didn’t collect money and house it. Whats good about that? Well simply put, God directs your giving and holds you responsible to the command of being a giver. Not only that, you should be interacting with people, listening, being compassionate and from there show forth God’s love by meeting real, urgent, pertinent and specific needs.

Where I struggle with traditional churches is in the area of money. They often teach those who are members to give to them and from their they make get to make the decisions on who is qualified to get a need met and who isn’t. Often times overhead is the area where a good portion of the money goes. Some even teach that you have tithing which is 10% of your income that should always go to them and then any giving above that is offering which may or may not be given to them that can be used for other things.

That leads to this question. When I read the New Testament, it seems that every penny that was collected was for the sole purpose of being given away not to save up for a rainy day or to extend the building or to upgrade the audio systems or…… Now I am not nitpicking or trying to cause a fight. However, to make a youth wing, or expansion of a building that will 99% of the time only be used by the church for its own purposes, doesn’t seem to qualify as a real need. When I read Acts, Philippians, Corinthians and a few other places it seems to me that money was collected and it went to meet an immediate need and there were always immediate needs.

Today there is a host of red tape that one must go through to receive help from a local church, there were even a few times where I heard “they are not members here so we can’t help them” or “they are not in good giving standing so we can’t help them”. Wow! The church of the scripture (as far as I can read) didn’t seem to have this philosophy.

Now I know things are different. Today we own land, elaborate buildings, state of the art equipment, great HVAC systems and so forth. I know today we have multiple people on paid staff, from the youth pastor to the teaching pastor to the business manager and so forth. However, I argue that does things are not only unnecessary, they actually have no foundation in scripture whatsoever. They are man made modern “positions” created to institutionalize and incorporate the body of Christ.

Think about this. Do you know what percentage of your money goes where? Not only that. If the church is setting money back, couldn’t you or even shouldn’t you sit that money back yourself until a real need comes up? What if they have plans to expand but you see a neighbor going to be foreclosed on? Can you decide to not give to them and to given to the needy neighbor? Can you ask for the money you gave back so that you may give to that neighbor? See where I am going. I personally believe that a Christian right has been taken away and cloaked in theological jargon that has no real basis in scripture. Especially if I see how money was raised in Acts, Philippians and Corinthians. Think about pledge cards and all of that stuff and what they are for. They are never to help people but always to help the organization and the growth of said organization.

Your giving is your responsiblity. To sit by passively and allow someone else to make that decision with your money (as I often here I gave it the church and what they do with it is their problem). God has called you to make disciples just as well as the church. James is calling individuals to provide for the widow and the orphan not organizations called churches, though the church can collectively do this. Before you right your next check or click that paypal button, think about immediate needs you have heard about and do what Christ has called you to do.

1. Rented Facility: Instead of owning a parcel of land, we rent a recreation center or do an annual sublease through a church that does own land. We could meet in this rented location for a year. Our small groups would meet in homes. We would equip them to make disciples in their own neighborhoods but we meet collectively every Sunday in a place where we could have a few talented musicians volunteer or receive voluntary donations for their work for the Lord. The renting would provide us some flexibility to move around different neighborhoods as we grow and the Lord directs our path.

2. Participatory Sermons: This wouldn’t have to happen every time as there are times and maybe even series that demand a monologue. However, most of the messages would be participatory. Where others can testify of God’s goodness, ask questions and even apply personal application as this is the purpose of teaching anyway. Not to just inform but mostly to transform. So messages where others are invited to share not only encourages the church it also allows other a voice when the church meets.

3. Collections As Needed: Here is what I am thinking here. We have people who join help commit to the overhead cost of renting the facility and then any other collections would be made on an as need basis. If people would like to do their regular giving at the church because they just can’t find one needy person, then we would have our tax exemption to provide others with that type of freedom.

4. Unpaid Leadership/Staff: Now this is the tough one, but one I think is important. I look at Paul’s words in Acts 20 to the elders before he is headed off and he informs them to work with their own hands and to be a blessing to others. This would mean those who are in leadership are balancing work, ministry and family just like every other Christian in the congregation and they can be Godly examples for God’s sheep.

If you are intrested in a church like that, let me know. I know it can be done and I think such a church could spark a movement of more church plants similar to it. We are currently looking for a church home and would love one with such a model. I probably know someone else who would so there is at least two families interested.

I don’t know how I forgot this and how you guys allowed me to without eating my lunch. However, World Missions has to be a foundational core value. Actually over and beyond anything else on the my list.

Here my friends is where I find my greatest problem with African American Urban Churches. I absolutely refuse tosubmit to leadership that has no global vision for the Gospel. For me that means the Great Commssion is as they say the Great Recommendation. No! Any church with a membership base more than 25 people should be supporting missionaries. Now this could be an indiividual thing but none the less a focus on global missions is a non-negoitable. I have a post coming about blacks and world missions and it won’t be pretty.

Well since I have decided to go a new direction and pursue a more traditional church setting, I now have the very difficult task of searching for a church home (a group of believers to live life with larger than the current folks who are the greatest).

The biggest problem is I have specific convictions that are important to me. These convictions would prevent me from fellowshipping with a group of people on a personal level, but they would prevent me from attending the “church service” on a weekly basis. Time is very important and I don’t want to waste it sitting in pew listening to something I don’t agree, submitting to people I disagree with fundamentally and/or having a problem with how we function.

So I have thought about a few distincitives that are important to me as a parishoner.  So below are the whats and the whys behind them.

1. Sound Exegetical Preaching. I don’t want to hear a five part series on how to be a better employee, I have Stephen Covey for that. I don’t want to hear 10 ways to be more healthy. I have 24 hour fitness for that. I don’t want to hear a 3 part series on how to have a successful marriage, or a 5 part series on having better sex, or any other such issues. I want to hear sound verse by verse exposition. I can stay home and listen to Olsteen or some other nice fella/woman on these issues. If I am going to wake up, wrestle with the kids, jump in my car, spend my gas money and sit for 1.5 hours I want to hear sound theological praise music and sound theological exegesis of God’s text. This is non-negotiable for me. I am sorry but I don’t respect men/women who play around with the holy text. People have risked their lives protecting it and somebody best risk their lives proclaiming. So that is point one.

2. Plural Church Governance – This is also extremely important to me. The church doesn’t have to have this in place today, but it best be a fiber of the church. A plurality of elders seems to be a biblical position. I see no such monster as a senior pastor who makes all the decisions while helpless sheep eat whats given. There is strength in a council and a council of Godly men is the only thing I will tolerate. I don’t mind a senior of the elders I can make that argument though I disagree but there best be a plurality or no dice for me.

3.  Community Groups/Small Groups – The heartbeat of a local church should be its community. Sound preaching is important, plural church polity is important, but the community is the church. The face of a congregation, the folks that get things going and how people feel loved is all based on its community and how they interact. Again I am not going to try to take the pulse of such a group but having them there and having them understand the importance of personal fellowship is critical for me. This actually should be number one.

4. Christ/Grace Centered – Okay this one may seem like nit picking but it isn’t. If you have ever experienced Christ/Grace Centered ethics you know what I mean. The “do better or go to hell” preaching is about as dangerous to Christianity as Mormonism. I would actually say that there is no biblical basis for it. Christ said “if I be lifted up”. Not Satan, not hell but the Savior then “I will draw all men to myself”. This is a promise from the Son of God. If we lift up Christ then and only then can man find peace with God. Legalism is too dangerous for me to sit under for more than 2 minutes (arbitrary number). To be even more frank, a Christ Centered hermeneutic is important. I don’t want to hear a good story about 3 smooth stones. I want to see how that story culminates and ultimately points to Christ the savior of the world.

So those are my criteria. I have some other stuff (notice I didn’t mention Sovereign Grace, but that is important to me but not as important as those) but this is probably the nonnegotiable list. What do you think?

Over the last two plus years, I have been on a quest to find the perfect church. I had these strict demands and I wasn’t going to quit until these demands were met. I had an ideal vision of what church should look like and I wanted that ideal to become a reality. And I did this at all cost. No matter who I alienated, no matter who I offended, no matter what bridges were burned I wanted the perfect church. It is was like I was on the quest for the holy grail. A mission from God!

My journey has lead me to a spiritual dryland. I would verbalize that form wasn’t “that important” but it consumed me. I then used catchy phrases such as “form drives function” and though this is true it can be a bit misleading. Form does drive function, but the next question is… is function as important to God as it is to me? In other words, what is the heartbeat of God as I see in the scripture? If Paul’s passion is driven by the Spirit, it seems to me that it is quite simple. God’s heartbeat is to reconcile the world to Himself. He desires to reestablish His reign on earth through us. The future Kingdom is being put forth today in the world through those He has reconciled to Himself through faith. Everything else, is an extension of that. And I do mean everything else.

So I have come to this one conclusion. The perfect church is not a group of people who do things the right way. The perfect church is not the church that says the right things. The perfect church isn’t the church with the “biblical” church polity. It isn’t the church with best outreach program. It isn’t the church that serves the best. It isn’t the church that has strong biblical preaching, correct church discipline, a great worship band, not the “spirit-filled” church (in the charismatic use of the word), not the church that grows the fastest.

The perfect church is the one that acknowledeges they are imperfect, yet are at the mercy of a Perfect Savior and desires to see Him glorified throughout the entire world. A church which humbly calls upon the Lord for strength, direction, guidance and power is the perfect church. This may mean that some convictions or theological positions they have are different from other churches that are seeking the same thing. And what is important is that these seperate fellowships (churches) should openly receive one another because both parties know that they are imperfect in and of themselves.

The picture above is how I have felt over the last two years. I felt to be on a never ending staircase, as soon as you make it to the top there is a stair leading you down. So the question on those who read this blog mind is how does this effect me today? Well it is simple. I am headed back to a more traditional framework. Why? That is just as simple. I desire the fellowship of many and for the last 2000 years God has used the “traditional church” to accomplish His will mightily. From missions, to food pantries, to orphanages, to the abolition of slavery, to women rights, to civil rights, to public policy, to church planting and most of all to the making and shaping disciples of Christ the traditional church has been where God is making moves.

Now I know I am going to get in trouble for this. But what follows is about as honest as one can be. In the last two years I have yet to see one nonbeliever come to Christ through house church networks. I am not saying it does not happen, but 100% of the people who has come into the organic/simple church has been believers who were somehow frustrated with traditional churches and the fact that they had little freedom to express their gifts in the setting. But to be honest not one person has come to Christ in any setting I have been involved with or even flirted with.

The traditional church has more resources, more gifts, and can handle things better logistically. It would be very difficult for a church of say 6 to start a food pantry, or to rebuild someones house, or to buy a house for a family that lost theirs. It would be nearly impossible for a church of say 10-12 to build an orphanage or even fund a full-time missionary and help rebuild or fund a small village. Truth be told the disconnectedness in house churches/simple churches is just as bad as traditional churches. It is a small band of isolated disciples with similar convictions. It is no different than the denominationalism that plagues the traditional church. Sectarianism has not been escaped outside of the traditional church.

Now I know questions on leadership are going to come up and an entire host of questions. I am prepared to answer them with post or comments. I have stepped off of the never ending staircase and have ended my quest. I am now comfortable enough to say that the the faults I found in organic fellowship are really no more or less than in the traditional churches. The biggest thing is the making of disciples, resources and logistics. I look forward to your comments.

If you have followed my writing long enough, you will find that I occasionally… okay…. frequently change my mind. Always remember I never have bad intentions. So I will be going in a different direction or acutally an old direction for those who followed Black and Reformed or Better Covenant or many of the other names. This is one of the reasons I have not been writing. I have been in prayer and meditation. I am moving back towards a more traditional reformed view (New Covenant, Monergistic, Baptist, Traditonal Ecclesiology). If you read this congratulations, you are the first to know. I have changed some of the feeds back to some of the men I listened to for years. Thanks again for following God bless and Happy New Year.

Christian Leadership should be an oxymoron to the world. Here is why. If we look at our prime example. If we look at the foundation of our faith. If we look at our Chief Shepherd, if we look at the originator of our faith, the sustainer of the our faith, the Alpha and the Omega, if we look at the Firstborn over all of creation and evaluate and define His leadership it looks like this:

5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Now, lets look at the architect of our faith. God wrapped in human flesh. What is His leadership disposition? Is it the best parking spot? Is it an elaborate salary? Is it people (armor bearers) waiting on Him hand and foot (we will talk about hand and foot in a second)? Is it designer suits and custom shirts? Is it a nice benefits package? Is it having people at their beckoning call? How about Pastor Anniversaries? No? What about the best seat in the house? No? His name on the marquee? No? What about a special office? A personal secretary? (they did have a treasurer right)? How about a special title He wanted to be addressed by and if not He looked at you funny (He called us friends)? No? None of these? Well….

Why is it today that so many leaders want to be recognized and served? Why is it today you have to compensate them so well? Why is it today they get a special place to park? A special committee to serve them? Special days where they get bonuses and gifts laid at their feet? They want you to address them as Pastor or Bishop or Apostle or Reverend. Why is that these so called leaders (and I ain’t just talking Olsteen or Jakes) demand so much service while the Master did so much serving? You tell me, is that “biblical” leadership? And I should submit to such people? A person who demands their rights, while our Master displayed such divesting of Himself, such servanthood such humility!

Honestly I am sick of such foolishness. These leaders use scripture such as:

9 For it is written in the Law of Moses, “You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain.” Is it for oxen that God is concerned? 10 Does he not speak entirely for our sake? It was written for our sake, because the plowman should plow in hope and the thresher thresh in hope of sharing in the crop. 11 If we have sown spiritual things among you, is it too much if we reap material things from you? 12 If others share this rightful claim on you, do not we even more?

But forget about scripture such as:

23 Are they servants of Christ? I am a better one—I am talking like a madman—with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless beatings, and often near death. 24 Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. 25 Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; 26 on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; 27 in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure

Listen to me. You want to know if your leader is a biblical shepherd? Reconcile his life with that of Philippians 2:1-13. See if he would do his job for not only free, but would use his hard earned money to serve others (Acts 20:32-34). See if he demands that you submit, that someone serves him, that he is given the highest and most important place in the congregation, see if he would wash your feet (John 13:12).

Outside of that, you may be a leader. I don’t doubt that, you have followers; however, you are not a Christian leader. You may lead Christians in a building called a church, you may read and preach the bible, you may use biblical words in your title, you may even go to a “Christian Leadership” Conference even worse host one. However, if you leadership doesn’t push you downward and lead others downward you are not like Jesus at all in your leadership. We have the blueprint my friend and you look nothing like the specs.

The Glory of Plodding

by Kevin DeYoung

“GIVING CHRIST PRE-EMINENCE IN THE CHURCH”

Presentations by Jon Zens on re-thinking what “church” is at every level.

When: August 27-28, 2010

Where: LeRoy Community Center, Main Street, LeRoy, MN 55951

Contacts: Dale Martin, 507-657-2590; Jon Zens, 715-338-2796

Gatherings (each session will be followed by a time for audience response and Q & A):

**Friday, August 27, 7:00pm – Christ is the Fullness of God in a Body / The Church is the Body of Christ on Earth (Colossians 1)

**Saturday, August 28

10am – Christ is Present on Earth Through the Church (Matt.18:20, 1 Cor.12)

**2pm – Obstacles to Christ’s Pre-eminence: The Traditions of Men (Mark 7)

**7pm – Restoring Christ’s Pre-eminence in the Church (1 Cor.1,5,6,14)

**At the end of each session retirees Dick & Shirley Scherz from Rice Lake WI will be giving brief testimony to what these perspectives have meant in their lives since 1992**

(A table with literature will be provided)

About LeRoy 
LeRoy is a viable community of just under 1,000 population located north of the Minnesota-Iowa border 40 miles south of Rochester and 30 miles southeast of Austin. State Route 56 goes through downtown LeRoy and the other Prairie Visions towns of Taopi, Adams, and Rose Creek to Interstate 90 northwest 26 miles. It is seven miles west to U.S. 63, a widely-traveled route connecting northeast Iowa with southeast Minnesota.   Http://www.visitleroy.com/newresidents.HTML

Hotel LeRoy

128 West Main St, LeRoy MN 55951

507-324-9546

Spring Valley Inns & Suites

745 N. Broadway Ave.

Spring Valley MN 55975

888-254-6835

Shady Rest Motel

710 N. Broadway Ave.

Spring Valley MN 55975

507-346-2625

Parkview Motel

1401 South Section Ave

Spring Valley MN 55975

507-346-2861 

For those who have RV’s or wish to camp:

Lake Louise State Park

Lake Louise State Park: Minnesota DNR

Lake Louise State Park is staffed on a seasonal basis. Camping at the park opens April 30 and remains available through Labor Day. …
www.dnr.state.mn.us › Destinations › State parks - Cached

Jon Zens has a wide-ranging theological background. He holds a B.A. In Biblical studies from Covenant College, a M.Div. (church history) from Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, and a D.Min. (Ethics) from the California Graduate School of Theology. Jon’s groundbreaking articles in the late 1970s, “Is There a ‘Covenant of Grace’?” and “Crucial Thoughts on ‘Law’ in the New Covenant,” were highly instrumental in developing what came to be called “New Covenant Theology.” Jon’s doctoral thesis was published in an edited form in 1997 as “‘This is My Beloved Son, Hear Him’: The Foundation for New Covenant Ethics and Ecclesiology.” He is also the author of the new book A Church Building Every 1/2 Mile: What Makes American Christianity Tick?, which appeared in 2008. His What’s With Paul & Women: Unlocking the Cultural Background to 1 Timothy 2 was published in 2010.

For the past thirty-two years, Jon has been the editor of a magazine entitled Searching Together. He has done considerable research concerning the NT and church history. Jon also served as a pastor for two years, but moved on after concluding that full reformation within the existing institutional church system was unworkable.

Since 1975 Jon & Dotty have been in and working with informal fellowships, focusing on living under grace and learning to extend grace to others.  They have traveled all over America and ministered in the Philippines, England, Romania, Canada, New Zealand, and Ireland.

From 1970-1975 and 1985 – 2000, Jon worked in three manufacturing companies in aerospace production planning, inside sales, inventory control, engineering support, human resources, purchasing and shipping/receiving.  Jon and Dotty have three lovely children and six wonderful grandchildren.