House Churches & Institutional Churches, Part 7

The early church had elderships over entire cities, overseeing a single city-wide church meeting in numerous houses. The early churches met a congregation of the whole church at times, but the Roman government and Jewish authorities often made that impossible.

Now, if you’ve read the earlier posts in this series, you understand that the scripture hardly commands this form of organization. It’s in fact how the church appears to have been organized, but there’s no “thou shalt” command saying this is essential. And that fact means that the form of organization may well have been a cultural accommodation — a way of doing church driven by local culture, the local notion of “household,” and Roman law.

We must not use even sound exegesis to make law where no law has been made.

I’m much more persuaded that the lesson really is the necessity for community-wide unity rather than the necessity for house churches, as pointed out in earlier posts. There are some very important advantages to larger churches — institutional churches — that can’t be replicated by the house church. Ultimately, I figure we need to get over the notion that one form is inherently superior to the other, stop looking down our noses, and figure out how to work together.

And working together is, by far, the most important thing. Coordination, communication, a shared vision — these things allow separate churches to become the church in their city. Anything less is division, even if the churches agree on doctrine and even if they like each other. Until churches learn to work together as one, they are multiple bodies, not one body, and the model that is clearly given us is a single body of Christ.

(1Co 1:11-13 ESV)  11 For it has been reported to me by Chloe’s people that there is quarreling among you, my brothers.  12 What I mean is that each one of you says, “I follow Paul,” or “I follow Apollos,” or “I follow Cephas,” or “I follow Christ.”  13 Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?

But that requires leadership. We in the Churches of Christ have a deeply felt distrust of any sort of denominational hierarchy, and so we’ve run the opposite direction toward congregational autonomy and even isolation. That’s wrong, too.

But we aren’t alone. I once met with a Methodist preacher who was raising funds for a gym. I asked him why. He replied that the other Methodist churches in town had gyms and his church was losing members to them! Well, that’s not thinking in Kingdom terms. That’s the good ol’ American way of competing for customers. That’s consumer Christianity.

And we are so eaten up with consumerism that we rarely consider a citywide leadership structure. Now, we don’t know how the early church pulled this off. Jerusalem had thousands of Christians under a single eldership. How did the elders keep up with so many people, meeting in so many places? How did they insure proper doctrinal instruction? How did they check attendance? Did they take role? How would you count that many using Roman numerals?

Elders have essentially three tasks, reflected in their three titles —

* Doctrine and discipline (elders)

* Administrative oversight (overseers)

* Pastoral care (shepherds)

Pastoral care can only be done on a small scale. One man cannot keep up with a thousand members. A citywide eldership simply can’t do that. Rather, the leadership at a given house or institutional congregation must care for the flock there.

Administrative oversight is required at both levels. Someone has to manage the affairs of the congregation, but someone also has to manage the affairs of the citywide church. For example, a citywide church might need oversight of —

* Benevolence efforts, to make certain efforts aren’t duplicated and that all needs are met.

* Care for members. While most congregations have the resources to help their own members, at times multiple congregations have to pull together to have the resources needed — such as to help with the uninsured loss of a house.

* Disaster relief. Speaking from hard-won experience, tornadoes, hurricanes, and such require a standing committee able to gather resources and coordinate efforts.

* Citywide worship. If churches can do ministry together, then periodically they should worship together.

* Local missions. Why plant churches next door to someone else’s church plant? There are plenty of lost people to go around! Our ad hoc planting of churches means that some cities have several rivals church plants in one suburb and none in another. Coordination matters.

* Transformation of communities. If some churches decide to work in areas of deep poverty to transform lives, they should work together and not as rivals. Or work in separate parts of town. Competition is destructive to the gospel.

* Membership. Yep, not everyone gets to join the citywide church. While we don’t have to agree on fellowship halls, we do have to agree on Jesus. This is church, not the Rotary Club. It’s not enough to be friendly and willing to work. It’s all about faith in Jesus, and there is no room for compromise.

* Marriage. In my town, as is true in many towns, across denominational lines preachers refuse to marry a couple unless they go through pre-marital counseling.

* Sharing. If one church finds that a particular style of worship or particular form of mission is highly effective, they should share stories of success and train other congregations how to do the same thing.

None of these things would be impositions on a local congregation. None compels adherence to any doctrinal position beyond the bare minimum to be a part of the Kingdom. And yet these few things could dramatically change the impact of the church on a community. I mean, this could be huge.

This is not the creation of a hierarchy with authority to set doctrine or even to compel obedience. It’s just a means for Spirit-led people to coordinate and share with other Spirit-led people. Therefore, how the organization is created isn’t that important. What’s important is that it exists and that it answers to the congregations that it serves.