One of the definitions I heard of a Fresh Expression was something that had the"potential to become a mature expression of church"We'll discuss this together hopefully on April 17th, but in the meantime I'd like to hear your views on this.
Is SofaChurch currently operating as church?
In what ways is it / isn't it?
If it isn't a church, should it be?
12 comments:
i think it depends on what you think church is.
if it's a place for us to support each other in the mess of our lives and to work out how jesus wants us to live, then sofachurch hopefully fits the bill for a lot of us.
some people feel that it's important for church to be a place to meet with believers from other generations - obviously sofachurch doesn't tick that box.
i suppose the bits we're missing at sofachurch are sung worship and prayer. in that way, perhaps it fits the description of a cell group more than a church?
i don't think church should be a place to seek out a high from anthem-y songs or to try to publicly demonstrate our holiness with fancy long prayers and raised hands.
but that's not to say that we should throw the baby out with the bathwater and avoid everything associated with more conventional church.
it's finding non-cringey ways of doing things that's the tricky bit, i think. i'd still like to visit church without walls to see how they handle the 'worship' side of things. (i know andy will say worship isn't about singing it's about how we live our lives and i totally agree)
i guess we should perhaps look at the original model for church in acts. it seemed to be about being a close community, sharing lives and belongings.
so perhaps more space to be honest with each other, to pray for each other and to let others know what we need would be good ways to move things on? though perhaps that sort of vulnerability can only happen when trust has built up, which takes time.
Yikes.... why is this site not recognising my google/blogger account? Sorry guys, having to post this anonymously again!!!!
Gosh, Susie, I really echo what you've written.
I think the 'conventional' church we have today is far removed from what was originally intended by Jesus and the early disciples too. However, it's great that we have a lot of choice these days: different 'styles' of church to meet a variety of needs.
'Sofachurch' I think is simply another of those 'styles' and seeking to meet the needs of those of us who are finding it increasingly difficult to reconcile what's currently offered with our own personal walk with Jesus and also contemporary society. It's very challenging though and subsequently I'm not sure everyone would feel particularly comfortable with it... its so much easier to be passive in a large congregation and to compartmentalise our christian lives!!
As to whether SofaChurch is in fact a 'church', it really depends on your 'definition'. In terms of it being an opportunity for like-minded folk to simply get together to discuss particular 'spiritual' issues, then it is. But somehow I still feel that there is something lacking. I'm not sure that it is singing though, although some may disagree. I think it has more to do with prayer, in whatever creative form this takes, actually within the meeting itself. Given that Sofachurch is seeking to explore 'fresh expressions' of BEING church I do think we are in very real danger of 'chucking the baby out with the bathwater'... the 'baby' being opportunities to simply enjoy followship with God together. God is always a very real presence at our meetings just think that maybe we miss out on the opportunity to actually 'include' Him more. Please please don't think that by saying this I'm suggesting that we should do something 'cringey' or 'religeous', I'm just very interested in exploring how we could do this in an inclusive, vital and creative way.
Any thoughts?
Jo
i totally agree with all you've said, jo. the challenge might be to find ways to include god more, as you say, but without making the group accessible only to believers. i like the fact that at present pretty much anyone could drop by and hopefully not feel excluded or that the group is scarily spiritual.
but i guess having said that, the majority of us are believers and we do want to let god be a very real part of our meetings. i think we'd hoped that was already happening through the caring friendships that have formed, but i think i agree with you, that we could make more opportunities to think 'god-wards' during our times together.
i wonder if we're so wary of doing anything that non-church people might find odd, that we've gone to the other extreme. we've also been a bit wary of using music, as we've both experienced what's felt like emotional manipulation through ballad-y worship songs.
i know andy's planning some alt. worship stuff soon, so perhaps this'll kick off more times where we can be more aware of god in meetings with us.
what ideas do you have, jo? how about you other guys?
Well... recently I have been thinking about ways of experiencing God through prayer in the everyday - in relationships, nature, family, art...
I always used to annoy people at traditional evangelical prayer meetings by criticising the format, where you all discuss what you are going to pray for, as if God wasn't listening yet (in a sound proof box a la the Generation Game perhaps). Then, when you had discussed everything, you invited God back and took turns to it all again in a slightly more refined voice, trying to remember to focus on God. A couple of times I did a quick survey, asking what percentage of the time spent praying were people actually 'focussed on God' as opposed to thinking about what you were going to say next, congratulating yourself on saying a nice prayer, thinking about other things... Most people said around 20% if I remember correctly, which made it a rather inefficient arrangement in my mind. I stopped going to such meetings around this time!
Recently I read a great book called 'Honest to God' (now in the SofaChurch library). It begins by asking where God is. People used to say above the clouds, but we now know through our aviation progress that he really isn't. So where is God? Further out into space? As our telescopes get better and better it doesn't seem likely we will find him.
When you think about it, it seems more likely that God is here, surrounding us, and in the world as a 'depth'. In the words of Mike Yaconelli, God is in the world, playing hide and seek with us. He is good at hiding, but he does cough now and then to give us a clue.
So when we pray, I wonder if shouldn't try to disengage from the world, and try and get into some artificially spiritual place. Instead we should try and engage with God here, in this world.
So... after that overlong diversion, how does this relate to SofaChurch?
I suppose that I have been letting people discover God in whatever we do, even though it might not be technically or overtly 'spiritual', and several have said that they have.
However, perhaps we need to do something, maybe at the beginning of each meeting (service?!) to explicitly recognise and acknowledge God's presence, rather than letting people find it for themselves. Possibly some kind of liturgy or reading, or something.. I run out of ideas there. I don't want it to be a simple 'opening in prayer', but still something that helps people recognise/remember that God is amongst us and thanks him for being there. We could possibly use the same words/music/video (or whatever form it takes) each week, or repeat them on a monthly cycle.
And maybe something at the end too as a kind of benediction. Though not something that symbolises the end of the 'spiritual bit', implying that all of the conversation that follows isn't spiritual...
Just my early thoughts.
I do love the fact SofaChurch is so welcoming and relaxed that literally anyone could drop by and feel accepted/included. But I quite agree that its really tricky trying to 'include' God more in meetings but at the same time try to be 'inclusive' to folk who may be new things. Though from experience I have found that non-church folk often have certain expectations of what they think should happen in 'church' and therefore are sometimes a bit unnerved when some things aren't included ie prayer, singing etc.
Yup, Andy your account of traditional prayer-type meetings is probably very true and certainly made me smile. Just like a lot of what 'traditionally' happens in church tho, I remain convinced that there has to be a better, less 'cringe-worthy' way of doing things. Somehow Christians seem to have reduced what is essentially an on-going chat with our Heavenly Father into something formal and at its worst even farcical!!
I am so looking forward to the alternative worship session you're planning in a few weeks time. This will be a wonderful opportunity to explore a variety of 'creative' expressions of prayer/worship. Maybe such ideas could then be incorporated into the weekly meetings, dependent on the theme/topic.
When I led the art session a few weeks ago, we began by having about 5 mins of 'preparation time' to help ourselves focus on God and to be open to Him to speak to us, putting aside any other concerns/distractions etc... we could do this in any way we wanted, being sensitive to the fact that others may want to do this in a different way to us! I even had post-its available so particular issues could be written down and literally 'stuck on the door'until later!! No one prayed out loud or anything, most just sat quietly with eyes closed... but it felt like we were really setting the evening aside to listen to what God was saying to us.
This was just a simple idea and seemed suited to the theme of the evening, but I'm sure there are lots and lots of 'creative' alternatives that could also be used to 'close' sessions too. Variety is the 'spice of life' after all... we could use music, videos, pictures, activities, poetry... all sorts!!
Isn't this what 'fresh expressions' is all about... exploring new ways of doing things? Afterall 'new wine' can't really be put into 'old wine skins'!!
But what do what other people think?
Ponderingly
Jo =)
Ok I'm owning up :) Having worked for a fresh expression of church, I think a few things are vital to this discussion:
- Are we a 'fresh expression' because we believe that by being more 'trendy' we will somehow connect with people who are looking for something they don't find in existing church?
- Are we as members of sofa church just fundamentally bored/fed up with what we 'get' from other churches (danger of consumerism...!) and want those needs met in sofa church?
- Are we genuinely wanting to reach out to people who might be spiritual & seeking after God but not relate to church... Or are we wanting something for ourselves that meets our needs?
I don't there is a right answer to any of these - it's just about defining where we are and as long as we are honest about why we are 'sofa church'
I use a bridge model, which is simplistic but might be helpful here...
In the 'Christendom' model 'us' Christians are on one side of the river; 'those heathens' are on the other side. We have a basic belief that 'they' should live like 'us'... So we shout across the river and invite them over: 'Come on, you want to live on our side... God's over here... come and find him... come and worship/meet God/live like we do' We don't cross the bridge - merely invite people over
In the 'evangelistic' model everyone's still on their sides, but this time we actually go over to the other side and talk with 'them'... But fundamentally we still believe it's better over 'our' side & our ultimate aim is to take people with us back over to 'our side' of the bridge...
In the 'Missio Dei' model (basically believing God is
already at work on the other side of the bridge), we go over, but don't intend to come back. This is incarnational... living on the other side of the bridge and staying there, working out what it means to follow God and worship him within that context...
You might be able to guess my bias (!) - but again I don't think it matters as much which model we relate to, as long as we're honest about which model we're following and what that looks like in the context of sofa church
On a personal note...
I have really enjoyed the laid-back atmosphere - I came to sofa church wanting to meet other laid back spiritually minded people and eventually make some friends as personally I have recently had to move on from a lot of existing friendships and networks... I love the way we seem to assume God is in everything (even in playdough!!) and I've never felt the need to do particular things to find him - he's everywhere...
PS: A random fact: Though religion is sometimes seen as a dirty word, I think we should have a religious outlook as a church... Religio is from the latin & literally means 'to re-connect' - at its best & simplest, 'religion' actually means trying to reconnect with God... and that says something to me about finding him in things (modern day prophets, films, playdough, conversations, teh kindness we show etc)
Blimey - I didn't mean to waffle on for so long ;)
Geoff (blonde/blue Geoff!)
Any chance of bumping this discussion to the top of the list, Andy? I was completely unaware it had had anything contributed to it...
Sorry to have not made last night; I had a long standing evening speaking engagement to the Wombourne and District Scientific Society on the Ancient Sites of Staffordshire - and given there were over 70 in attendance and was very well received it's a good job I did.
Back on 'the scene' soon ;o)
Tim
Hello Friends
On many of the postings throughout the sofa church site I see reference to sofa church wanting to be, and I quote: "different", and "alternative" to what you describe as the "conventional church."
Do you not accept that the New Testament prescribes how a local church should be established together with mode of worship and government?
If the answer to that is "No" then maybe someone would like to start a forum: "Is sofa church a cult?"
I'll reply properly later when I have a bit more time, but we are supported by and part of the Methodist Church. Not a cult.
Would you describe yourselves as part of the emerging / emergent church movement?
I guess so - I don't really know what the definition of these is. We class ourselves as a 'Fresh Expression' of church - this is a term used by the Anglican and Methodist Church. You can find out more at www.freshexpressions.org.uk.
Gunkle and mate: What sort of church do you go to, by the way?
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