Day 23

Topic: Partnering with a local church

Title: Little & Large

 

Truth Verse: Acts 20:20 You know that I have not hesitated to preach anything that  would be helpful

to you but have taught you publicly and from house to house.

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Truth Story: We inherited a lovely garden which encouraged the visits of a variety of birds. We often

see robin red breasts, sparrows, pigeons and magpies. We see increased visits, if we only remember

to restock the nut bag which hangs on our tree. To date all the birds that have visited have had two

wings! I have however, seen birds who have had injured wings. They can survive for a time, but usually

not long if with a damaged wing.  Cats are also regular visitors to our garden stalking the garden in

search of their next dinner. Any one-winged bird would certainly be their vulnerable prey.

 

Truth Unpacked: The scriptures are clear that, as at the birth of the church in Acts 2 every day they

continued to meet in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad

and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favour of all the people. One wing was public or

corporate temple courts and the other wing was smaller and highly relational, in their homes.  In his book ‘The Second Reformation’ Bill Beckham argues that for centuries the church only had one wing – meetings in large settings, and this was disastrous. “The Two Winged Church that had soared high in the heavens was now for all practical purposes one-winged. Now with only one wing, just lifting off the ground required tremendous energy and effort. And if the church did manage to become airborne, it was prone to fly in circles, lose its sense of direction, and not fly very far from its take off point.  Spending more and more time in the safety and comfort of its habitat, it grew contented with an

earthbound existence.”  The great news is that many churches today have successfully restored “Little and Large” – home, cell, connect or life groups being Little; without doing away with the Large corporate expression of meeting together as a congregation.

Phil Potter, in his book ‘The Challenge of Cell Church,” has an A to E outline which embodies the values and vision of such missional groups.

 

·         All involved

·         Becoming Disciples

·         Creating Community

·         Doing Evangelism

·         Encountering God

 

Prayer: Lord, inspire us to consider how best we would create small group communities of friendship that would permeate society with Your love, light and grace. Amen.