Sure, institutional churches have great programs, services and staff. But have they produced mature disciples and a mature Body of Christ?

Isn’t this the nub of the matter?

No doubt, they can point to other measures of “success” – numbers, inspirational sermons, “decisions” made for Christ, feel good “worship” with great “worship” bands, buildings, etc.

But despite it all, are they actually making mature disciples and functioning as the mature Body of Christ?

On those key issues, studies and surveys by the Barna Group and the Pew Foundation vividly show that the traditional church in the West has been a dismal failure.

Conversely, in many places outside the West, local communities of believers are actually succeeding at making disciples and functioning as the dynamic Body of Christ.

How?

By embracing a much simpler, relational, and participatory way of being the multi-gifted, multi-part, and multi-functional Body of Christ – through ministry one to another for the mutual building up of each other – just as the New Testament commands.

Why hasn’t the West generally done the same, causing it to fall behind?

Because the institutional church in the West has not been faithful to Biblical mandates but instead has organized itself around:

▪ One gifted man and his monopolizing, monologue “sermons” delivered each Sunday morning;

▪ During podium-controlled, staged meetings before rows upon rows of spectator “attendees;”

▪ With any other ministry likewise dominated by “professional” clergy;

▪ Organized into position-centric, institutional hierarchies;

▪ Requiring resource-sucking infrastructure, staff and buildings.

The tide is slowly turning, however, and the days of “Churchianity” in the West finally seem to be starting to fade.

Instead, God is birthing a renewed longing to actually be the church – the beautiful, multifaceted, multi-gifted, relational and participatory Body of Christ where we build each other up in the Lord through ministry one to another.

Often, believers meet simply – without staff, cost or overhead – in homes and other places where life and relationships naturally occur.

If it hasn’t happened with you yet, be open to the Lord burning out of you the old ways of thinking, based on post-Biblical human traditions and presumptions …

So you can be part of what He’s doing when it begins in your own hometown too.

Who knows? Maybe God is preparing you to also open your own life and home, like my wife and I have, to be a spark that helps make it happen in your own locale too.