Articles

Announcing a New Resource:

Please look in our resource section to find an excellent new article titled People of Purpose. This is a resource that Ed Waken shared with us at the conference in November. Whether you attended the conference or not, you will find this to be helpful information.

Also, if you are new to our site, please look under the resource page to find the books we have available in Russian.

Wednesday March 5th- 10:30-17:30 General Encouragement and Vision for Simple Churches. Rich Correll will be in town to share and discuss principles of simple, reproducing churches with those who are doing it and those who are interested in it. This event is open to all interested people. It will take place at 4 Svitoshinskaya, Apartment 85 near Svitoshin Metro. Call Timmy 8 097 926-0675 for specific directions.

Please let us know if you will attend the event on March 5th by sending a simple response to Timmy Powers at this address- timmy.powers@gcmweb.org or to Maxim Nikolaev at m.nikolaeff@gmail.com.

THE KINGDOM OF GOD

 

"In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes."  Judges 21:25

You may have heard this scripture read as descriptive of a problem to be solved by establishing a king and often the person reading it is presenting themselves as the king that you need to submit to in order to solve the problem!    In reality it is simply two statements placed side by side.  It was true that there was no king in Israel.  It was  true that everyone was doing whatever he pleased.

Is structure a bad word in organic church? Can systems be organic or are they only institutional? How do you organize a decentralized, rapidly expanding, spontaneous multiplication movement without killing it in the process?

Perhaps the real question is this: can we be out of control and still have order? I believe the answer is yes. We can have order in chaos and structure without control, but it must come in a different pattern than what we are accustomed to and emerge from a very different foundation.

The Kingdom of God is the rule of God. And it rests upon the Lordship of Jesus Christ. The Kingdom of God produces the church . . . the community of the King.  The church, in turn, submits to the sway or rule of the Kingdom. As it does, the church expresses, represents, and advances God's Kingdom on the earth.

Properly conceived, the church is the community of believers who possess Divine life. This community joyfully enthrones Jesus Christ, expresses His sovereign rule in the world, and as a result, enjoys the blessings of the future age here-and-now (Rom. 14:17; Heb. 6:5).

I was asked to write an answer to this question because of some thoughts I’ve developed over the years but have never written down. Quite frankly, I am hesitant to write them down now. I am confident that my words will hit a sore spot in the church today. I am writing nonetheless, and, actually, for that very reason. Not to ignite division, but to challenge us to see something about ourselves that may not be healthy. This is a very critical question for the church to ask today. In order to approach this subject with cooler heads and calmer hearts, may I suggest we commit ourselves to addressing this from the New Testament rather than from our traditions, practical challenges and emotional bias. Can we read the New Testament as if we never read it before?

 

Every day new visitors are coming to our site. In order to expose them to some of our best articles, and to create fresh discussion among those of us who have been active on the site a long time, we will from time to time repost an past article like this one. This article has been a favorite of many people. We invite you to read it for the first time or read it again. Take a moment to add your thoughts and commentary and let's learn together how we can honor and magnify Jesus and join Him in building His kingdom. He was a religious leader who sought Jesus out in the dark of night. He knew Jesus’ miracles were proof that God was with him and he wanted to be part of his kingdom. But he had no idea what it would demand from him.

Perhaps Nicodemus wanted some instructions to follow, new rules that would let him in on the life Jesus lived. But Jesus didn’t offer any. He simply told him that he needed to be born all over again. The idea sent Nicodemus’ head spinning as he tried to conceive how he, an old man, could be born a second time. Jesus must have smiled at the thought.

Participatory gatherings: wonderful, biblical, necessary. Do we really know how to do them?

One of my greatest joys in house church is the participatory nature of the gatherings.

My own transition to participatory church came after many years as a pulpit pastor. I echo the words of Scott William who said:

It seems easy on Saturday night to prepare three points on how to fix your marriage or how to quit sinning. On Sunday I have delivered the message, felt good about it, been complimented for it… but did it really change anything? Really?...

 

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.

Editors Note:
Every day new visitors are coming to our site. In order to expose them to some of our best articles, and to create fresh discussion among those of us who have been active on the site a long time, we will from time to time repost an past article like this one. This article has been a favorite of many people. We invite you to read it for the first time or read it again. Take a moment to add your thoughts and commentary and let's learn together how we can honor and magnify Jesus and join Him in building His kingdom.

As I travel among the body of Christ one of the questions I am asked the most is, what do I see Jesus doing in his church today? Am I excited or discouraged by what I see?

Before I answer that here, let me admit at the outset that my vantage point is in some ways incredibly blessed and in other ways severely limited. While better traveled than most, perhaps, there is much I don’t see and certainly my teachings, writings and web postings put me in touch believers who have a specific kind of passion. But I do get to sit down fairly often with some of the most incredible followers of Christ on the planet—those who are experiencing a depth of relationship with him that is transforming how they live in the world. Many of those had been in ‘positions of ministry’ at some point, but found themselves unable to fit into the religious landscape that proved insufficient for their hungers even though few others could validate their passion or obedience.