Wednesday, March 08, 2006

House Churches revisited

ok so let talk about house churches. in an effort to make today seem worth while I surfed over to the Time website to read this article that has gotten alot of talk lately. several ppl pointed the article out to me, and I was interested, but didn't have the time.
so my thoughts on house churches a year later...
I still think they are deffinatly doable. it is a great concept. I think it does take alot of passion, & support. Last year there where 5 or 6 (I could go look it up but I don't feel like it) house church that came out of RTPC. I was excited., but it all came crashing down. there were too many ppl that thought they were in charge (or wanted to be) and no one wanted to care about the other ppl. it all became a power struggle.
we left the house churches for a couple of reasons. 1. it felt too exclusive. it was worse than a big church that felt like a country club. there was no way for an outsider to break into these groups. 2. I could take feeling inferior, whether or not it was intended to be that way, that is how it felt
3. the pain was way too much. even before the split to house churches happened there was alot of pain and house churches seemed to make that pain explode.
all in all I am now 100% sure that it was time to leave. we are now in a good place (not a perfect place)
Do I think house churches are bad. well no way. I have some friends who are very involved in the house church movement and amazingly great things are being done through their churches. But I don't think it is for everyone. I think that if you go into expecting to escape form the horrors of the institutional church, then it isn't going to work. I think that if you love ppl that have been beaten and abused by church to the point they refuse to go near a church building, then you may have something with house churches. I think it takes alot of dedication and suffering to see the fruit of house churches.

1 comment:

'neice said...

Glad to see you blogging! I missed seeing more stuff! :)