A Blog for the Church

Yesterday we began looking at how house churches are different from small groups.  Today’s post will be building on some concepts and content introduced in that post, so if you haven’t already read, please click here to check it out.

For the most part, yesterday was set-up for today’s post.  In order to demonstrate how house churches are different than small groups, we first have to know why small groups exist and the shortcomings they bring with them.  So let’s take some of the points made about small groups and see how house churches deal with those.

Unlike Small Groups, House Churches Eliminate the Need for a Supplement

Whereas a small group acts as the communal/deep supplement to the otherwise individual/shallow church structure, the house church structure has, at its core, community and depth in mind.

It is somewhat humorous that churches can acknowledge their own inability to offer what they know their members really need, but are completely unwilling to do anything about changing their primary structure, which reinforces the problem.  Instead they add on an additional program…which reinforces the problem.  It’s a vicious cycle.

House churches communicate depth and community as core values, and the structure itself reinforces that message.  Even better, the structure of a house church excels where both normal church and small groups fall short.  They find their identity in each other – without small groups, normal church has no plan of attack to address the depth/communal needs of the members.  And without normal church, small groups lack both direction and a pool from which to draw participants.

House churches take the best of both worlds and merge them into a singular, united, better whole.

Unlike Small Groups, A House Church Community Creates the Product and Is the Product

As we pointed out yesterday, small groups function with the community serving as the means to the end of consuming a pre-defined product.  In a house church, however, it is the community that creates the product – out of their shared experience, insight, and mutual submission to one another – and it is the community that is the product.

This is not just a matter of semantics.  It is a matter of a structure defined by priorities.

Studies should be developed and birthed out of the community itself given their shared experience.  This should be common practice, but it is not.  Instead, we rely on someone else’s ability (usually, some professional somewhere) to develop something we can interact with.  But since it was not birthed out of our own experience, any such interaction can only happen on a surface level.

House churches are uniquely suited to do this better than both small groups and normal churches precisely because of the fact that those who lead any studies that happen have their own lives intertwined with the others in the church.  As a result, every study is relevant to the lives of those participating.  More importantly, it makes every study relevant to every person.  Unlike small groups that draw participants from a certain niche, house churches must define how each study will apply to the lives of every member; regardless of their interests or hobbies.

In that way, the study remains dependant on the community at all times.

And, most importantly, the community is the study, the community is the end goal.  It is not as if we gather around (like in a normal church or small group) to hear a sermon preached or go through a lesson.  We gather because the point is to actually be the Body of Christ.  That simply cannot happen from the distance of a sermon or boxed-up study kit.  That’s why we have to leave that building/structure.

Unlike Small Groups, House Churches Include Gifts

And because there is no need for a supplement and because the community both creates and is the product, gifts can flourish.  When a member becomes an integral part of what is happening at a gathering, their gifts emerge.

But the right structure has to be there.  It is not enough for us to remain in our current structures that value individuality, produce shallowness, and elevate some gifts over others and say that we want other things to happen.  The structure itself, not just our desires, has to change.  As long as our church structure is able to function with the majority of members being passive and the gifts of a few carrying the service, there is no need for the other members of the Body to use or even identify their gifts.

That is what makes house churches so unique: they are not like typical churches and not like typical small groups.  They are wholly different and, yet, not altogether unfamiliar.  And the whole Body participates because the whole Body is needed.  Gifts are recognized and developed only when the need for them is present.

Participate: If you were starting a church today and wanted community/depth to be core values, how would you design the structure?

Engage: Do you know someone who would disagree with what has been written or do you disagree with what has been written?  Join the discussion using the comment function on this article and pull your friends/church leaders in.

Own: Do you know what your gifts are and, if so, are you using them?  If not, schedule an appointment with your pastor and explore with him/her how that can change.

What might be another strength that house churches have that a normal church/small group may not?