Saturday, May 23, 2009

Simple Church

Sometimes I think church life is far from simple. Evn if it is simple we manage to make it complicated and VERY busy.

Over the last couple of years we have tried to de-clutter a little at MKCC but it still seems to run a breakneck speed. And there is always a little pressure to start another ministry. Honestly, I think people generally confuse a heart and passion that God has given them to follow through for getting the "church" to start a ministry.

My answer now normally is. Yes start doing it. If God has spoken into your life to help or minister a certain group of people just start doing it. You don't need the church to organise, structure and promote something. Just start serving.

My friend and pastor Roger Blackmore put it like this:

"During my recent visits to the UK, a number of people were asking questions about our church - seems we’d be a bit of a novelty over there just as we are on Long Island.

One of the questions that came up fairly often was what programs and activities we have running mid-week and of course the answer was “not a lot”.

The second Sunday in our church’s brief history, I explained very clearly that we were not going to be another over-programmed church with stuff going on every evening that pulls people away from two important areas of life.

One of those is family. It amazes me how so many churches preach family and then do their best to separate them by making unbelievable time demands on family members that pull them out of the house way too often.

The other area of life that is neglected when churches have a whole mountain of mid-week activities is social interaction with the unchurched. God never intended us to isolate ourselves in countless services of one kind or another with fellow Christians, he rather expects us to be salt and light in this world. That means we need to have the time to be out there.

So what do we do mid-week?

Small groups. Three times a year in six to eight week segments.

Celebrate Recovery. For those who are dealing with hurts, habits and hangups.

That’s it - no men’s group, no ladies’ fellowship, no prayer meetings, no special Bible studies, nothing but the basics needed to enable our congregation to be as effective as possible in influencing others for Jesus.

And if you don’t think that’s enough, check out the research in the book Simple Church, which offers irrefutable evidence that the healthiest churches in America are those that have stopped pulling their folks in a hundred different directions."

Well said Rog!

0 comments:

Post a Comment