Sunday, July 24, 2005

3C's Of Churches / 3 Journeys

In their book "The Shaping Of Things To Come", Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch talk about one of the tragedies of Christianity - the separation between missioning and the worshiping communities within the church. Based on Acts 2, three broad commitments are suggested in this book, which is very similar to LivingRoom's three journeys.

The three broad commitments include Communion, Community and Commission.

Communion (in Relationship with Christ) - Inner Journey
  • God's word
  • Worship

Community (in Relationship with One Another) - Together Journey

  • Learning
  • Fellowship/friendship

Commission (in Relationshi with the World) - Outer Journey

  • Serving/giving
  • Gospel telling/sharing

I think that as long as these three Cs / journeys are present, any group of Christians can legitimately be considered a church in any place. Well what do you all think?

Mike and Alan ask some interesting questions which are worth pondering:

To be a church,

Do you need to meet in a church building?

Do you need to meet weekly?

Do you need ministers?

Do you need to sing?

Does someone have to bring a sermon?

Hope to hear your answers to these questions.

1 comment:

Susan Barnes said...

I read somewhere (can't remember where) that in Old Testament times if there were nine Israelite families in a community each would live on 9/10th of their income and the tithe would provide the income for a priest (? or Levite). So ten families would make up the equivalent of what we would call a church family. I don't know if this is relevant but I thought it was interesting.