Those with the Biblical commitment and personal humility needed to actually function together as part of a simple, participatory church in their home or other hospitable local gathering place …

Do.

Those who don’t and can’t make it work in their own lives and home towns, however …

Seem most inclined, regrettably, to write books and blogs – and travel around – telling everyone else how to.

Unfortunately, great has been the wreckage they’ve caused.

Such “organic church” writers and “itinerants” peddle what they themselves don’t do, under a plethora of misleading titles and slogans like:

“Beyond Evangelical,” “Deeper Life” and now “Insurgence” (Frank Viola); “Subversive” and “Red Letter Christians” (Keith Giles); House2House and Apostolic “Workers” (Milt Rodriguez, Jon Zens and Felicity Dale); “Viral Jesus” (Ross Rohde); and “Houses That Change The World” (Wolfgang Simson).

When it comes to them and their mutual promotion networks, be discerning …

Because you can’t get to authentic from phony.

Nor can you get there with their general distain for God’s plenary authority of Scripture as His written Word …

Or their competing, trans-Biblical existential ideologies.

Please hear me:

For the health of God’s people, it’s time for those of us who are actually making simple, participatory churches work in our own lives and home towns – through a firm commitment to the apostolic foundation already laid in Scripture as God’s authoritative written Word – to begin looking towards each other for mutual encouragement.

If we refuse to be discerning and instead continue to look to – and promote – those who peddle other agendas, pretenses and ideologies …

Then their persistent pattern of failed lives and failed churches will continue to be a hindrance to our own churches and what God wants to do among us.

Their bad fruit and inability to make their own books work in their own lives and home towns – or consistently and sustainably anywhere else – should be a clear warning which we all heed …

No matter how deceptively charming and misleadingly enticing they otherwise may seem.

Healthy churches and healthy lives deserve no less.