Key Purposes of a Local 3-D Church

The past three blog posts have briefly outlined some general characteristics of three kinds of local church groups and church gatherings. What if you and your friends wanted to start from scratch and nurture a Church Encounter of the 3rd/3-D Kind?  What if you felt led to want to be part of establishing an Experimental Prototype Church of Tomorrow–an EPChOT?

One  place to start would be to consider what should be some of the Key Purposes of such a local group.  Here is a suggested list of eight Key Purposes. Obviously this isn’t a comprehensive list, but it addresses some of the most critical characteristics of an EPChOT.

A healthy, biblically-based local congregation of believers should be striving to:

1. Establish its members in sound biblical understanding
2. Equip and encourage maturing Christians to use all their natural and spiritual gifts
3. Provide a nurturing environment for new babes in Christ
4. Provide and promote outlets for the natural and spiritual gifts of all members
5. Spread the Gospel both locally and beyond
6. Minister to the spiritual and physical needs of the local community
7. Reproduce itself through evangelism and discipleship, establishing new congregations as possible
8. Educate and train the leaders for the Church of Tomorrow

You might want to consider whether you are currently involved in a local setting in which these goals are part of the group’s Prime Directive. If not… why not?

Church Encounters of 3 Kinds: The 3rd Kind

In a Church Encounter of the 3rd/3-D Kind, your experience of “what church is” is being a personal, active, vibrant part of creating a spiritual family environment in which everyone, from children to senior citizens, participates personally in building one another up and reaching out to the world with the Good News of Jesus Christ.

There could still be a lecture at a gathering each week, but it wouldn’t be virtually the only content in the gathering. Instead, there would be contributions by others of all ages in numerous ways.

And you would do everything in your power to get together more than for two hours once or twice a week.

For those not living close enough to easily meet multiple times a week, this might mean AT LEAST getting together for much of the day on the day of the primary weekly gathering for a variety of activities.

It would include eating together as often as possible, and using the time to minister to one another, pray for one another, and plan joint projects with one another.

For those who primarily live in close proximity to one another, especially with their own “church building,” it would mean getting together numerous times during the week for a variety of social, educational, evangelistic, and spiritual activities and projects.

And it would mean that everyone would be using all of modern technology available to them to keep in regular contact with others within the fellowship circle in other ways, such as texting and talking on phones, exchanging email, participating on Facebook.

Church Encounters of 3 Kinds: The 2nd Kind

Your experience of “what church is” is primarily a two-dimensional experience—being a spectator at a weekly meeting—but in a more entertaining setting.

The primary focus of the meeting is still a lecture, but it is a more engaging lecture, which may contain lively descriptions and stories, and appeal both to the emotions and the intellect. The topic will often not be doctrinal, but Christian Daily Living.

The music will be more contemporary in style, and may reflect emotions of the song writer ABOUT his relationship to God. There may even be an interactive session, in which you may have an opportunity to briefly give your opinion about some topic or scripture under discussion.

Your interactions with most of the people in the group are still only brief encounters after the service, or after a similar meeting later in the week.

If the church is involved in any outreaches of evangelism or charity, they will be initiated and organized by the few in leadership positions, with volunteers solicited to assist them.

Church Encounters of 3 Kinds: the 1st Kind

In a Church Encounter of the 1st Kind, your experience of “what church is” is essentially a one dimensional experience–being a spectator in a boring setting once a week.

You are part of a church gathering in which you and almost everyone else are only spectators—and what you spectate is a dry, boring lecture about a dry, doctrinal topic. The only time you participate is to sing a few songs that are in an archaic musical style, have no emotional element, and almost entirely emphasize intellectual descriptions of some aspect of God.

You directly interact with only a few people in the group, and then only for a short period after the meeting, and perhaps at one other similar meeting later in the week that is dubbed  a “Bible study” instead of a “service.”  And your interactions with most of the congregation are primarily of the “how ya doin’?” sort where you exchange pleasantries about your jobs or families, or perhaps opinions of a recent news story.

The only “outreach” by the church, if any exists at all, will be done formally by the few in leadership positions.

There is nothing holy or  particularly biblical AT ALL about this style of service. People who have been part of a one-dimensional church for their whole lives, and who insist we MUST  always do what we’ve always done, are not  preserving the holy, they are embalming the dead but treating it as if it is alive.

What we need to preserve are the PRINCIPLES of the Bible, and present them afresh in every generation … becoming all things to all people in all times, as Paul did.

Ignoring a key

Research has shown that church fellowship groups that combine their efforts into active outreaches in evangelism and community service experience more unity and less bickering. Such active groups also have an atmosphere at their gatherings that becomes more and more warm, upbeat, positive, energetic, and forward looking. Both adults and youth often comment that their active participation in such efforts have been life-changing.  Yet most typical church groups have  NO such outreaches! What a shame.

http://youall.com/3dchurch/problems.html

The Amish Model?

How can people be satisfied with Church… including music, order of services, dry sermons with no use of modern multi media and so on … being the same as the last 200 years, when they’d go nuts in any other part of their life it there had been no change … just like the Amish??

There is nothing holy or biblical AT ALL about a certain “style” of service, so they aren’t preserving the holy, they are embalming the dead and showing it as if it is alive. What we need to preserve are the TRUTHS and the PRINCIPLES of the Bible, and present them afresh every generation … all things to all people in all times, as Paul did.

What Church should be like

In 1988 my husband, daughter, and I visited EPCOT Center in Florida for the first time. I’d enjoyed visits to California’s Disneyland and Disney’s Florida Magic Kingdom several times, but something about Epcot took those experiences to a new level.

All the time I was there, and for an extended period after returning home, I found myself feeling refreshed, inspired, exhilarated, edified. I found myself contemplating the wonders of God’s creation in ways I never had before, and appreciating with new eyes the gifts He had given to mankind by which they could also create magnificent experiences to delight the heart and stimulate the mind.

In later years we took our best friends to Epcot, and the rest of Disney World, to share the experience with them.  And still later we were delighted to take our grandchildren. Every time we went, I still experienced the same magical effect I had on my first visit, and was even more refreshed by seeing it have the same effect on my guests.

It is only in recent years that it has dawned on me that those feelings of refreshment, inspiration, exhilaration, and edification are precisely what I should be feeling week in and week out year around when gathering with others for worship and learning about God… what “church” should be like.

The Power of Spiritual Nostalgia

Why do you suppose so many folks expect new TV shows every season, new movies in the theater, new Billboard Hits … but when it comes to church, they expect it to be EXACTLY like it was 150 years ago??

Going first

While I was making plans for the launch of this blog and its related website, a friend sent me the link to Stuff Christians Like blog. I really took to heart the first thing I read there:

“There are going to be people that don’t like this site. Part of the risk of “going first” is that you create a target for people to fire at, but you know what? By going first with your story, with your faith and your hope, you also create a lighthouse. You also create a neon sign that says, “Jesus is here. Jesus is real. Jesus loves laughter. Jesus loves you.”

And that’s what I hope you and me and a lot of other people with blogs keep doing.”

http://stufffchristianslike.blogspot.com/2009/03/502-confessing-safe-sins.html

I’m willing to take the chance, if it means others may catch the vision I have and want to be part of bringing it to reality.

Pam

Hello world!

Welcome to the home of the Experimental Prototype Church of Tomorrow–EPChOT.

You won’t even need red and blue glasses to see the 3-D future we envision!