Discerning Small Churches
As someone who recently joined a small church a review of the book Why Join a Small Church caught my eye:
Benton’s piece de resistance is this circular argument: Unless solid Christian seek out, populate, and serve “little and very local” churches, the light of the gospel may go out in those areas. However, small churches can hold out the offer of the gospel in an authentic, small-scale way that bigger churches cannot: “Everyone needs to become a Christian and local churches are the God-ordained means of holding out the Word of life to the community.”
I think that sounds crazy. Why not say “Unless solid Christian seek out, populate, and serve mega churches, the light of the gospel may go out in those areas.” Just as true isn’t it? But it goes on and I see some balance:
You may be asking at this point, “Is it wrong to attend a large church?” Not usually, not always, and not necessarily. As Benton says, “To join a big thriving church is not always wrong, but it is frequently the easy option…how the devil would love to herd Christians into a few big city centre churches, getting them to travel miles from their communities and leaving vast tracts of our country with no viable witness for the gospel.”
I dig what he is saying. In fact I know some mega churches who specifically see that problem and are trying to avoid it. Then, in my opinion, the review just takes a nose dive:
Elsewhere, Jesus says, “Not everyone can receive this saying, but only those to whom it is given… Let the one who is able to receive this receive it.” These verses almost certainly apply to the conundrum of whether one ought to attend a small church or a large church.
Okay now this is just ridiculoous. These verses most certainly do not apply to what size church you should join. What Jesus is talking about is plain as day: Marriage and Divorce.
Sorry, I was wanting to post about this book because it looked interesting to me, but now I am just frustrated with the tossing around of Scripture in the review. Sheesh, come on Discerning Reader!
Read the rest of the review here.
January 16th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
Yea, ridiculous use of that verse. I do get the idea of the book. I pastor a small, young church in the suburbs and lose out on people who go into NYC to some of the great churches there. It can be annoying when we need some serious help to reach a very difficult population with the Gospel.
I don’t know anything about the book, but my experience is that mega-churches can become places for people to hide instead of fight the fight with in a solid local church with a solid local pastor (like me ;-)). There is no excuse for that.
Dude, you always get me commenting. I hardly ever comment. Good stuff.
January 16th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
Thanks Frank! On the other hand, I haven’t heard so much about small churches being a place to hide as well till I started sitting under the preaching at my small church! :)
Two of the churches that I’d love to visit are in NY: Redeemer and Epiphany. Oh, and Savior Community Church of course.
January 16th, 2009 at 4:54 pm
Dwayne,
Thanks for the publicity and recognition of this review. I certainly wasn’t expecting my review of a small booklet to engender such a visceral reaction. Thanks also for linking back to the review so that readers can make their own analysis of my review.
I am almost always ready to stand corrected, but I’m afraid I have to stand by my review in this case. In the first quote you have excerpted, I am simply reiterating Benton’s argument. I therefore attribute those thoughts entirely to Benton himself. Needless to say, he doesn’t elaborate much in a 64-page booklet. If the first quote is crazy, well, then John Benton is crazy.
However, I take full responsibility for the contents of the third quote. First, please note the qualifier “almost.” Second, I fully admit that the prima facie meaning intended by Christ applies to Marriage and Divorce. Yes, plain as day. However, you aren’t taking into account how Christ himself used Scripture. On this subject, I would recommend “Three Views on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament” from Zondervan’s Counterpoints series and “Let the Reader Understand” by Clayton & McCartney.
However, if your objection is founded upon the way I am using this passage to apply to matters of conscience and Spirit-leading, should I have instead used Romans 14:5? “Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind.” Would you object because the immediate context bears upon the Sabbath? Whichever verse I were to use, all I am saying is that God calls some to intentionally join a small church, and not others.
Other than that, I’m hard-pressed to know what lies behind your objection to my use of these verses in this context. Sadly, the good pastor’s comment in #1 is similarly lacking in helpfulness. If either of you can indeed be of further assistance, I would welcome it.
Blessings,
Mark@DR
January 16th, 2009 at 10:12 pm
It seems like the first point that was made could make some since but using that passage by no means gets anywhere close to the application applied. Your dead on.
January 16th, 2009 at 11:06 pm
Hey Mark,
Thank you for taking the time to provide such a thoughtful response. I am hoping I will have time to respond tomorrow and explain my objection. We’ve just gotten home (It’s 11pm here) and have a gathering tomorrow till noon though.
I did see your response a few hours ago on my phone on the way home from work and I have been thinking about it since then. I will at least take the time right now to say that I am wondering if my concern warranted a public blog post instead of a simple “Hey I saw this and was concerned about it” email to you.
I think if I had the same type of concern about a part of a sermon I heard preached I wouldn’t call everyone around afterward to share my concern with them. I’d ask the pastor if I could get a minute and share some of my thoughts.
Should I act the same online that I would in person? I think so. Bear with me here. I’m new to public writing… Hopefully tomorrow I can get back to you and again thank you for the interaction.
-Dwayne
January 17th, 2009 at 9:17 am
Hey Dude, long time no see. But I simply have to comment on this. After having lived and served in small churches all my life, I can see the author’s point. In a small church, as in some small groups, just being there means a commitment to what is happening there. You can’t get lost in the crowd. But a more balanced view would indicate that God works in both contexts.
I am disappointed by Scripture quote taken completely out of context. But don’t get hung up on the review- go to the original source.
Working in a small church can be very discouraging- there are so few human and financial resources. But God works in surprising ways in out of the way places. The OT would seem to indicate that! The subject is a big one, but I’ll stop there. Keep serving, keep thinking, keep writing!
Paul
January 17th, 2009 at 4:44 pm
I actually just finished writing the bellow and am adding this now. I apoligize for the length of this reply. It’s rather a stream of conscieceness that if I had the time I could cut it down to less then 25% of its current size, but I just don’t have that time today. I am hoping that if it took me 30 minutes to write it then someone who writes book reviews can probably read it in less then that!
Alright I’m back. Let’s get started.
With regards to the first quotation, if you are going to draw my attention to your “almost” then I must draw yours to my “sounds”. It “sounds” crazy to me that one would say small churches have an “edge” for presenting the gospel in an authentic and personal (small scale) way when compared to a large church. Now one possibility for this sounding crazy to me and not to you could be due to differing experiences that we have each had.
The first church that I was a part of as an adult consisted of 50-70 adults and children. In a church that small how could you hide or not serve? I mean I knew everyones name and what they did and so on and so forth. We happily attended there for almost 2 years before we left and shortly there after began attending Mars Hill. I can’t recall how large Mars Hill was at that time, but let’s just say it was a wee bit larger. It was not too long before we were invited to a small group (in Mars Hill language “small” meant of 30+ people.) In a matter of weeks I realized just how lacking the community was at our first church. These people were opening there lives and sharing sin and hope and walking together in life with each other. They were . . . a family. If I attempted to recount the ways that I have seen and heard the gospel shared in an authentic and small way at Mars Hill it would take far too long then I have today! I hope that helps to explain why I used the phrase “sounds crazy” with regards to the first quote.
As to your use of Christs words, you said that I am not “taking into account how Christ himself used Scripture” Are you really so sure of that? What if I am? What if I am also taking into account that you are not Christ though? I know that sounds, uh, harsh, but I’ll continue. I have not read either of those two books. Thank you for the recommendations. With regards to NT usage of OT passages I have noticed that they are, hm, peculiar at times. Sometimes the NT authors and speakers tell us that an OT passage has a meaning that left to myself, that is without the NT teaching, I would have never put together. They say this OT passage refers to this reality, this truth. I look at the OT passage, its context and I do not see exegetical grounds in the OT passage to support the NT assertion.
That being said though, I am persuaded in my spirit by the Spirit that the authors of the NT were men who were carried along by the Spirit and wrote with infallibility. How could this not be for the Scriptures are the Words of God and if they are wrong then God is wrong. May that never be said. So the NT authors seem to be giving teaching that goes beyond the sum of the Scriptures up to that point. In fact that is what they are doing. They are teaching things by the Spirit that had not yet been revealed. I believe this. I am not sure if this is part of the subject of those books, but those titles conjure these thoughts in me.
So the question is, if the NT authors and speakers could say an OT passage meant this or that without exegetical grounds in that passage then can we follow suit? I say no. The role of these men was to reveal the truth in Gods word by the revelation of the Spirit and our role is to follow it by the power of the Spirit. If we believe that a passages main point is X and we believe that X is in play in a given situated then I believe we are on the most solid ground to share and apply a passage to the person(s) in the situation. I believe that the farther we get away from the main point of a passage the weaker the ground is that we are on.
To use the example that you gave of Romans 14:5, the main point of the passage is not the Sabbath or a festival. Nor is the main point being a vegetarian or not as discussed in the preceding verse. Paul makes it clear that these are only examples as he continues to build his argument. The argument climaxes at verse 21 with “21 It is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble. 22 The faith that you have, keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves. 23 But whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats, because the eating is not from faith. For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.” Here Paul invokes the words “anything” and “whatever”. His teaching is not limited to the Sabbath of verse 15. The reason that I can say that with confidence is because Paul says it though. It is not by an unction of the Spirit that I say this section of Romans applies to what size church you choose. No, Pauls own argument shows that it applies to the “anything” and “whatever” of lifes decisions.
So I agree with you that the main point of this Romans passage is that each of us should be fully convinced in our own minds as to what “open handed” things God is particularly calling us to be “closed handed” about and that to resist this call and make actions not in good faith but against it is to sin. To apply that passage and its teaching to any situation where someones conscience is wavering or they are considering going against it is more then reasonable – The passage itself calls us to that. So, I like the idea of using the Romans passage because I think its main point is the point that you were making and therefore it is a great usage of the passage.
The ground for using the passage that you chose though seems much weaker, though possibly not baseless. Christs main point was that his teaching on divorce remarriage was a hard teaching and therefor hard to follow (God help us.) It seems as though you extracted out of it the principle that “there are some teachings that hard to follow” and then were meaning to apply that principles to someone who is called to go to a small church when they have desires to go to a large one. Ehh, I mean, I get it, but I just don’t think it’s the best usage of the passage. With that type of thinking you could of used almost any passage. For example when Peter was saying that he didn’t want Christ be crucified Jesus responded with “Get behind me Satan.” We could extract the principle that “When we resist Gods will God rebukes us” and then we could apply that passage as such Elsewhere, Jesus says “Get thee behind me Satan”. These verses almost certainly apply to the person who feels called to a small church and yet resists and goes to the local mega church.
Do you see what I am saying? You can do it, sure. I just don’t think it is the best way to handle Scripture.
Now all of that being said: I am more convinced then ever that 1) I agree with your short review! Some people are called to small churches and they are going against that call due to a desire to be comfortable or entertained and so forth. 2) I should have emailed you instead of making a blog post! 3) I should learn how to write more concisely!
Thank you again for the interaction. If you have further thoughts I would be more then happy to receive them. May Gods grace be on you and your family.
-Dwayne Forehand
January 19th, 2009 at 8:20 am
Dwayne, I’m not sure you’re replying specifically to my response or just giving a gut response to several of us. At any rate, I do think you show some good thoughts, particularly in interpreting the Biblical text. I sense a thread in your remarks that may put this discussion on a different plane. I’m not so sure the issue is small church vs. large church. I suspect it is community. Where do we experience community? Are we experiencing it? You are blessed many times over for having found it. So many are still searching. Frankly I’d never really seen it until I was in the group where I met you! Since then I have become a passionate defender and promoter of Christian community. Ironically, because of the radical individualism that has our culture in it’s claws, many (Christians) don’t even have a clue of what community and deep friendship really is. Larry Crabb’s book “Connecting” (Word, 1997) really made me thirsty for it. But it is not easily found- in either small or large churches.
January 19th, 2009 at 10:17 pm
Mark@DR,
Does Jesus’ saying “not everyone can accept this teaching” as applying to big church/small church invoke a comparison that big church equals divorce/remarriage adultery while small church equals marriage the way Jesus prescribes? If it doesn’t for you (what I suspect) then you could have been clearer about that. You made the good faith assumption that people would connect dots that some folks obviously didn’t connect. I connected them but your shortcut to application was a little too short. :) It’s not invoking 1 Timothy 5 to say stay-at-home dads are in sin by a long shot but you could have fleshed out that you were extrapolating a principle so you could demonstrate you’re not on ground as shaky as might first appear in how you apply the text.
January 20th, 2009 at 12:10 pm
Dwayne, Jeremiah, et al,
Thank you kindly for your sharpening comments. As the debate has progressed, I have sensed your Christian care and concern for those who read my review(s), and for our collective fidelity to the Scriptures.
Dwayne, I had really hoped to respond at length, but my wife had a new baby (our third) last week – returning to work this week has nixed those plans.
To be brief, today I will adjust my review so that the distracting usage of Christ’s words don’t appear. Neither will I use Romans 14:5, but will make myself clear in plain English. I do see the value in this and appreciate the arguments that you all have brought to bear.
Some trivia I omitted to include in my first comment concerns John Benton’s experience living in the UK, where many small towns and villages have only one church. My personal experience, having lived in the UK for 18 months, was similar. The gospel light can indeed be in danger of going out if small churches are not invested in by gospel-centered Christians.
Please always feel free to be in touch with me by emailing me at Discerning Reader: first initial + last name (Tubbs) [at] discerningreader.com.
Blessings, guys, and thanks for your concern to uphold the integrity of the Word of God.
Mark@DR
January 20th, 2009 at 12:13 pm
Ugh…two grammar/syntax mistakes in one medium-sized blog comment. My apologies.
Mark@DR
January 20th, 2009 at 12:17 pm
lol, According to a handful of my friends I may be the only one who found it all that distracting . . . :) Thank you so much for your gracious spirit.
Congratulations on the third!
-Dwayne
January 20th, 2009 at 12:47 pm
Hey Paul, I keep forgetting to respond to your comment. I miss you! I hope things are progressing well for you. I wish I had journaled my experience there as it seems to fade more and more each year. That experience definitely brought my expectations of community to a new level and made me hungry for it.
Though I have been blessed in many of my experiences, I have also found that community is often hard to find. The scary answer to it being hard to find, as I assume you have discovered, is the call to be the one to start it where you are at.
Do you have a blog or somewhere I can follow you?
-Dwayne
January 20th, 2009 at 3:28 pm
No Dwayne, I don’t have a blog. I prefer to keep a strong correspondence via e-mail (I’m still on Facebook but have serious concerns about privacy, etc. there.) Do you still have my e-mail address?
Back to the discussion… I think the most difficult part of community is being vulnerable. After being hurt by so many, you (this is an impersonal “you”) just don’t want to get hurt again. Community occurs only where there is safety. Keeping things safe is hard.
January 20th, 2009 at 3:33 pm
Mark’s observation about living the UK is tremendously significant. Understanding the context of the opinion changes things a great deal. Small town UK is vastly different than even small town Midwest, not to mention big city Seattle. In my travels in through the Midwest, I have seen many small churches boarded up or turned into antique shops or barns for hay. Part of that is major demographic changes, but another part is that many are willing to drive an hour or more to a megachurch to be served than to drive 5 miles to serve. It all depends on the context of your opinion. Still…God is working in both places.