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So where does this leave us? I can't speak for anyone else, but it leaves me here: The "zipper-position" which takes away a woman's right to speak in a church meeting reflects a very brittle approach to the New Testament. It's an unwarranted assumption that's based on a common, but obvious, culturally generated misinterpretation of Paul.

We have created a chart that lists differences from the New Testament Church and today's more Traditional Church.

Though I don't expect to see a perfect expression of the body of Christ on the planet before Jesus returns, that doesn't keep me from beholding her glory nonetheless. I have witnessed again and again all over the world the miracle of people sharing the life of Jesus together in growing compassion, wisdom, care and freedom. I've watched God connect people who had a profound impact on each other's lives and had great joy in doing so.

Here is a simple approach to begin a new organic church. This simple approach is not 'easy' but if you follow these steps, a church will emerge. If you apply these principles, please write us and let us know about your experience. You can e-mail me(edwaken@cox.net) with your experiences.

The following steps are NOT meant to be followed in a prescribed order. These are principles that will more often be layered on top of another. The key is that all of these principles need to be practiced with various people all the time.

In 2008 we will regularly have gatherings of those involved in planting and leading simple churches. These will be times of encouragement, discussion, and training. Some of these events will be 1 day, and at other times there will be 2 day events.

The first event of this year will be on Saturday, January 19th from 9:30-5:30. The gathering will take place at 4 Svitoshinskaya, Apt. 85 (18th floor) not far from Svitoshin Metro Station in Kiev. Please let us know of your plans to attend on or before January 16th, so that we can make plans for food. If you would like to register or need more info, please contact Maxim Nikolaev at m.nikolaeff@gmail.com or (093) 571-99-44. This will be a great time to learn from and encourage one another, so we hope many of you can be with us.

Note: This is Part 2 of a two part article. You may not have seen the first part, because we have had problems with the site in the past month. We apologize for the problems with the site. We hope the problems are corrected and that the site will now work normally again. To fully understand the thoughts in this article, we encourage you to read Part 1 of the article first. Thanks for visiting and participating in our site.

We are a Kingdom of Priests

I have heard about the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers for most of my life. It is something that most Christians say they believe, but my conviction is that the practices of many churches hinder people from really living in the reality of their priesthood.

Have you heard recently these common phrases after church: "Have a great week!" or "See you next Sunday..."?

Nothing imaginable makes me cringe more than hearing these statements over and over again, like "going to church" is something akin to next weekend's "golf outing". Until the church - be that simple, house, or regular - sees Christianity as more than a meeting, we will have little to offer the unsaved masses around us.

Picture yourself this fine day at the hospital and you have just come in from the waiting room to the doctor's office. What's the first question the doctor has for you?: "Tell me where it hurts?" You answer, "Oh, Doc, I had some bad food last night and my stomach hurts terribly." Now imagine that your "condition" has no obvious symptoms and that you have had this condition from birth.

Also imagine that it has been passed on to you from your father, who got it from his father, etc. If your doctor were to ask you where it hurts, you couldn't give him any answer, even though he could clearly see the problem on your X-ray. In some ways, I think this small scenario accurately describes the Church today, 2000 years after its inception. We aren't aware of any major "hurts" (i.e. symptoms) and, therefore, can't get an accurate diagnosis of our condition.

The premise of this e-letter is to explore with you the idea that New Testament Christianity died in the year 313 A.D., the year Constantine the Great issued the Edict of Milan and made Christianity a legal religion. The tragedy is that so many of us are completely unaware of the global impact this event had on the church of Jesus Christ for the last 1,700 years.

Recently, a group of believers involved in simple churches in Kiev met together for encouragement and instruction.

A desire was expressed to meet together as simple churches at least every 6 weeks, and to also have special training times together.

We have already planned 4 such opportunities for the next couple of months. The first opportunity is a baptism for new believers from our simple churches. This will happen on Saturday, February 9th. If you are interested in your simple church taking part in the Baptism, or any of our other upcoming events. Please write Maxim Nikolaev at m.nikolaeff@gmail.com for more information.

UPD. Baptism. Photoreport

There are many definitions for simple church, our preferred term for what is sometimes called house church. One of the best comes from the Dawn North America Web site (it is also found on the House2House Web site). Rather then reinvent the wheel, I list their definition below.

• By "simple church," we mean a way of doing and being church that is so simple that any believer would respond by saying, "I could do that!"
• By "simple church," we mean the kind of church that is described in the New Testament. Not constrained by structure but by the needs of the extended family (oikos) and a desire to extend the kingdom of God.
• By "simple church," we mean a church that listens to God, follows His leading and obeys His commands.
• By "simple church," we mean spiritual parents raising spiritual sons and daughters to establish their own families (oikos).