In New Testament times, the “church” in Ephesus was a series of house churches in which thousands were members, meeting 30 or less to a house, under a single eldership.
We aren’t given just how this worked, but we know Jesus would have wept at the sight of churches having closer ties to churches in other communities and nations than in their own communities, having separate and competing agendas–where brothers and sisters in Christ who go to churches a block apart don’t even know the other is a Christian.
Imagine if all the churches in your town got together quarterly and coordinated a single effort to convert and heal your community, to care for the needy and lost as a single body.
Imagine that the churches all studied the word together and shared ideas among one another rather than mainly among those already predisposed to agree.
Imagine a community where the Christians rise up and tell their leaders to forget about the disputes of the Reformation and talk instead about the mission of God on earth today.
Imagine quarterly communion taken by all churches together in a local coliseum.
Imagine love-feasts taken monthly by all churches in the same neighborhood together–a gigantic covered-dish supper across congregational and denominational lines because Christians love each too much to let titles and organizations keep them apart.
Imagine churches merging across denominational lines.
Imagine churches refusing to compete with other churches in the same town, because they see themselves as manifestations of the very same church.
Imagine a community where volunteers from all churches go on missions together and feed the poor at home together, where ministers and leaders train together and pray together for the very same things.
This, to me, is a post-denominational world. And it’s achievable. But only if the ordinary, pew-sitting Christian insists on it.
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