lifeasmission

Turning the Titanic While We Tidy Up the Rooms

February 8, 2006

   
Most people I talk to at Fuller are fairly well agreed that the truest and most helpful expression of the church happens on the level of people who authentically share their lives together as they seek to know Christ and make him known to other through both verbal and lived witness.  Most of these same friends seem fairly content with seeking to facilitate this kind of expereince of the level of small groups within larger congregations.  I think that’s great.  There are many people who have deep and transformative experiences by virture of being part of a small group.  They find ways to live in authentic community, serve together, study and worship together, pray together, and all the other stuff Christian communities ought be embodying as they seek to honor God.  But I have 2 reservations.

1) In my expereince, this is not the norm for small groups.  On the whole small groups serve as little more than a church program one is expected to be a part of as a point of discipleship and rarely develop beyond weekly times of prayer and study (which may actually end up doing more harm than good if no one in the group actually knows what they are talking about) and perhaps monthly outings or service projects.

2) Even if the majority of small groups were really attaining the status of powerful expressions of God’s Kingdom and reign, this doesn’t save us from the huge responsibility of addressing larger issues facing the church in Western culture as a whole.

There are still issues of pastors functioning as CEO’s, the church’s adoption of Western culture’s bend toward consumerism, individualism, and materialism, the lack of diversity, the pervasiveness of age based segregation, the idea of large scale corporate witness, lack of inherent church based theological education, global issues, the distribution of funds toward salaries, building programs, and budgets.  On top of all those practical issues, there’s even more to discuss in terms of theology and doctrine.

I suppose my point is simply that I find it dangerous when we overly content ourselves with making progress on a micro level when we leave the macro level unaddressed.  These two levels are not mutually exclusive, the inform one another.  In writing this I am reminded that macro level change does not necessarily guarantee micro level results.  The two need addressed simultaneously. 

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Posted in: church, Fuller Seminary, missional, theology