Interviews Concerning Simple Church
The video below contains interviews with authors, pioneers and long time leaders of simple church. It is the “Special Feature” from the new When You Come Together DVD available from House2House.
Set aside 10 minutes with a hot cup of coffee or your favorite beverage and watch the video. Jot down some notes so when you finish watching you can leave a comment about some insights you have.
Here are 7 quotes that I gleaned from the interviews. Which part of the interviews captured your attention? Leave your comments or questions below.
“So much in legacy Christianity is basically a holy meeting – on a holy day – in a holy building – at a holy hour – with holy people – dressed in holy clothes – listening to holy priests.” Wolfgang Simson; Author: Houses that Change the Word – (1:02)
“Because most people when they think of the word church, they think of a building with a steeple on it – and that’s not what church is. Church is God’s people involved in doing God’s business.” David Watson; City Team Ministries – (1:35)
“But if we are going to really effect the nations of the world and multiply at the pace God wants us to multiply it has to be done much simpler.” Tony Fitzgerald, Church of the Nations – (2:08)
“If we are going to see many of the pockets of people in North America who are truly unreached people – people without church in their background – come to know Christ, it was going to happen through very different kinds of understandings of what it means to follow Jesus in terms of their relationships and organization” Kent Smith; Abilene Christian University – (2:29)
“It is absolutely essential that laypeople start churches.” David Watson; City Team Ministries – (5:54)
“The reality of simple church is the idea of living out the life of Christ in the midst of the people on a regular basis.” Mike Steele; Dawn Ministries – (6:21)
“I believe that because it’s been brewing under the surface for a long time it’s now to a point where you can’t go back – it’s unstoppable.” Neil Cole; Church Multiplication Associates – (8:47)
Grace and Peace,
Terry
Tagged with: Coffee Break • House Church • Organic Church • Simple Church • Video
Filed under: Simple/Organic Church Practices
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As I’ve been trying to understand Simple Church this is one of the videos I watched and talked to my Dad about.
While watching the video the one thing that kept coming to my mind is that we shouldn’t paint all traditional churches with such a broad brush. The church we went to in Amarillo ate as a congregation after every morning service, at the church here in Garland we eat constantly with one another at each others houses. At both of these churches there is a definite feel of family. We share our joys and rejoice with one another, we share our burdens and feel sorrow for one another. Finally, we believe that the worship service isn’t a spectator sport but that we do participate in it. Maybe my experiances are unusual in a traditional church but most of what is described in the video is going on where I’ve been a member.
I mean the positive stuff described in the video, not the negative typical traditional stuff.
Miller, I have experienced many of the things you mentioned in “traditional” churches in which I pastored or attended. I grew up in a farming community and our church was organic in so many simple ways. This is where my roots are. It was here that I was found by Jesus. In the past I was so busy maintaining the machinery that I did not have time to build true relationships with anyone. So much of what we did was for us but those needing Christ seemed to get lost in our celebrating. My hope for simple church is that it will get us back to the mission of making disciples.
One of the motivating factors for me to move to simple church is what Kent Smith said, “If we are going to see many of the pockets of people in North America who are truly unreached people – people without church in their background – come to know Christ, it was going to happen through very different kinds of understandings of what it means to follow Jesus in terms of their relationships and organization.”