I really like the model you have laid out here… actually, this is exactly what our Elders started praying about doing 3 months ago… We are still praying, and will do so until we are in unity of agreement that this is what God would have us do… But, it is encouraging to hear that you have been lead to go this way.

Most churches members dress like the world, frequent the same places, as the world, that they have lost their testimony’s impact in reaching the lost.

Brother Greg, Brother Bill, that’s why we need REVIVAL, which would lead ultimately to a Spiritual Awakening.

Paul W. Foltz

That’s why I changed my tagline to “Exploring the freedom and simplicity of relational Christianity” several months ago. It’s not about meetings and programs, but a deepening relationship with God and with one another that brings maturity and new life as we journey together.

Recently, I heard someone express the basic essence of Christian living this way (substituting my own surname), “Asking me where I go to church is like asking me where I go to Lollar. It doesn’t make sense, because I am a Lollar and that identity goes with me everywhere I go.” We ARE the church: we don’t GO to church.

Here’s a great article on A typical week “outside the box” of organized religion.

To answer your last question, I would say that much of what we do (within the institutional church) is a distraction from the main task before us. God’s people become spectators instead of participants. It doesn’t have to be this way and many traditional congregations are discovering fresh new ways to reinvent themselves for the sake of their community. Our church here has moved to one service on Sunday morning and we are placing more emphasis on meeting together during the week in one another’s homes. Eventually, we hope to become known as a network of home-based congregations with a weekly celebration, rather than a program-based church that has home Bible studies.

Ok… but only because I feel like you are trying to teach me something here

If it were no longer an option for me to attend an organized church within my community, I am sure I would worship with my family on Sundays… and spend much of my newly found free time sharing the Gospel with those in my community and inviting them to come to my home for bible study and worship with my family on Sunday mornings… at which time as soon as anyone takes me up on it we have an underground or house church (where two or more are gathered…)

I guess I would be more of a missionary in my community if there were no organized church… Wow, now that is confession I was not expecting to make.

So Bill, can it be true that an organized church can lead to less sharing of the Gospel in a community?

Of course you’re qualified to answer! You’ve read the Bible, haven’t you? You’re a follower of Jesus! C’mon, what do you think it might look like in the Panhandle of Florida? If you no longer had to “go to church” every Sunday and you could divert all that extra time (previously spent attending endless “church” meetings) to being salt and light in the community…

It may soon happen in our Country.
America hates Christ and Christians.
The Church then will go underground, but it will be stronger then she is today.

You ask “So what do you think someone’s walk with God would look like outside the institutional church?”

That is a great question, and one I am not in any way qualified to answer… I think we would need to look to those brothers and sisters living in countries where the institutional church is banned for our answer… say like China.

I do however know this; there would be no “Accidental Christians”… one would by necessity have to pursue their faith “Intentionally”.

Grace Always,

Members of the early church sold everything, possessed nothing, used the funds to meet one another’s needs.

We in reality possess nothing. God owns it all.
We only use what He lets us use.

Paul W. Foltz

James 1 25-27 is a good picture of the Church to me.

So what do you think someone’s “walk with God” would look like outside the institutional church? Have you ever thought seriously about it? I have asked this question in various ways over the past couple of years and, so far, no one has really taken up the challenge to answer it.