The question once more: "How is a small group different from a house church?"
See the excellent comments in the last couple of days around the idea that a small group is often just a weekly meeting whereas house church in Scripture is seen as family. This leads to Marty's question which is about leadership...
"...how is leading a small group different from leading a house church?"
As a starting place, let me suggest that if
Church = family
Then, it follows that
Leaders = parents
What do you think? Can we say that the leaders of a house church should function as spiritual moms and dads? Is this supported by Scripture? What does it feel like to talk this way?
John
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I like the concept of parents. It remains very relational and organic...and it reminds me of the language in the New Testament (God = Father) (Paul describes himself as a "mother" to his churches).
ReplyDeleteHowever, I've been wondering about power and leadership and how it becomes consolidated over time. We all know parents who abuse their power, (hopefully not as many as there are parents who love and nurture their kids).
Lately, I've been thinking about rotating leadership. Much like a V-Formation (skein) in migratory birds - the front bird get assaulted with major turbulence, and must rotate out with another bird every so often to fly faster and longer than they could alone!
What I love about this image is that EVERY bird knows which direction they need to go. There is no leader/parent bird...except the "instinct" in all of them to fly north. When one gets tired, the others know exactly what to do, and help him out of the most dangerous position to find a place of rest in the back of the flock.
My own pushbacks...
Is this irresponsible to the "youngest" in the family? How can a family "rotate" parenthood? ...and wouldn't we as a church have to be GOING somewhere? (as in, some churches are sitting on their duffs!)
I'd love to think this concept through a bit with you all.
You might like the description of "V-Formation" from Wikipedia:
ReplyDelete"The V formation greatly boosts the efficiency and range of flying birds, particularly over long migratory routes. All the birds except the first fly in the upwash from the wingtip vortices of the bird ahead. The upwash assists each bird in supporting its own weight in flight, in the same way a glider can climb or maintain height indefinitely in rising air. In a V formation of 25 members, each bird can achieve a reduction of induced drag by up to 65% and as a result increase their range by 71%[1]. The birds flying at the tips and at the front are rotated in a timely cyclical fashion to spread flight fatigue equally among the flock members. The formation also makes communication easier and allows the birds to maintain visual contact with each other."
Mark, you have been so faithful to engage these conversations! Thank you.
ReplyDeleteI find that the more I think about the concept of "leaders = parents", the more riches I find. For instance...
Clearly, we are talking about healthy, wise parents here. Which leads us to think about what that means. What are the characteristics of a healthy parent (church leader)? One of the central concepts is that they have a servant's heart. They are committed to the success of the people they are caring for. Misuse of parental "power" is just bad parenting. Same is true for church leadership.
Another mark of wise parents is that they think developmentally. At different stages, children are ready for different tasks. A five year old might be ready to learn the alphabet but they aren't ready to drive a car. The same would be true for rotating leadership in a church - some may be ready for it and some not.
The general rule for good parenting/leading is - never do anything for your kids that they are capable of doing for themselves. That leads a parent to continually ask - Where are they right now? What are they ready for? What would be too much?
Like Mark, I sense dangers in pressing the parent idea too far. I think church leadership at its best is a very subtle thing. The entire concept of leadership has been spoiled for many of us because we immediately think of positional, hierarchical, even oppressive leadership.
ReplyDeleteBut that's not the way it's meant to be in the body of Christ. We hear people talk about 'taking authority' or 'taking the lead', but true authority cannot be taken. Instead, authority must be given. And it must be given not just from above but also from below.
Paul says everyone should bring something to the meeting - a word, a prayer, a song, a picture, a tongue, an interpretation, a Bible reading, a prophecy, healing, a kind word, a thoughtful action, a hug. Add more of your own!
So there's no leader in the sense of 'Now we'll sing, now we'll pray, all sit for the teaching'. The Holy Spirit himself leads through each one.
There will always be elders of course. They may not be easy to identify because they will take part in the same way as everyone else. But the moment there's a problem or some uncertainty guess who everyone will naturally turn to? It will be a man or woman with experience, wisdom, and a gentle heart full of love. Every group has one or more people like that.
Of course, if church = family it will involve much more than meetings. But everything we do together as a group will be guided and governed in the same way. All will initiate, all will take part, and elder(s) will be there to turn to or will occasionally intervene when necessary. If things are going well such interventions will be very rare.
Good parenting is like eldering, the experience of years allows parents to nurture their kids. The ultimate objective is for them to become self-sufficient adults and go on to raise families of their own. Good parents often do less for their children than the children wish - because they want them to become competent and independent. If we are to see ourselves as spiritual parents we need to understand that we haven't fully succeeded unless we have grandchildren, and great-grandchildren - not just teenagers wearing bibs!
John! You said the same things as me, but you said them more clearly :-) Our comments crossed en route, I wrote mine before I saw yours!
ReplyDeleteI love the agreement we have. The function of a parent is to raise up future parents.
I have a few thoughts without much cohesion.
ReplyDeleteI asked a man a couple of days ago that I have been impressed to equip, "Do you have a spiritual father?" His response, "The question makes me feel uneasy because Jesus says call no man father." My response was that Paul considers many of those he leads as his children. There is healthy parenting and unhealthy parenting.
Also from Timothy, it is interesting the correlation between raising healthy families and leading healthy churches.
I have been listening to some sermons by Bill Johnson. He was speaking about 5-fold ministry stuff. A part of his discussion was to say brothers compete, fathers/sons rarely do. Parents want to see their children succeed and exceed their success. Don't know how far to take this analogy. Healthy siblings probably want what's best for one another.
I was wondering in light of the 5-fold ministry if that is where some of the V-Formation comes into play. Different roles are needed and so people step up according to the bodies need. We honor the gifts of our members in their contextual and situational leadership.
Overall, a parenting model makes more sense than anything else to me. I have found fruit as we step into this direction and language.
I tend to lean in the direction that leaders do equal parents. Inevitably some within a church are going to be more spiritually mature. Just like any situation in life there are always going to people people with more experience. Now if we think of church as a family as just a metaphor for our church and we start to try to parent i think there are some dangers there. But what if our church really becomes our family. I have been struck lately with the sense that our Church really is a family. The love i have for them and they for each other is at a depth that goes beyond metaphor. It is reality. With this foundation of love there really isn't much room for abuse of power. I mean power isn't even an issue. My question is How much are we allowing and how do we allow this foundation of Love to permeate what it means to be Church (Family)? One possible answer comes from a spiritual father of mine Kent Smith. That is that "The pathway to intimacy is mutual self-disclosure."
ReplyDeleteAustin, I love your comment that "With this foundation of love there really isn't much room for abuse of power. I mean power isn't even an issue." I think that's exactly right!
ReplyDeleteParents who love their children want nothing more than to help them grow up into maturity. The last thing they want is to exercise authority for it's own sake. They give their children as much freedom as is appropriate to their level of maturity. On the other hand, they also are willing to take leadership when it is needed. I like the phrase that wise parents lead as little as possible but as much as necessary.