Month: October 2007

One of the key failures, according to Allen, is that we try to educate people to think like ourselves. Roland Allen says:

We educate our converts to think, as we, accustomed to a long-established and highly-organized church, naturally think, that none but duly appointed ministers may preach.We dread the possible mistakes of individual zeal. The result is that our converts hesitate to speak of religion to others. They throw the responsibility upon the licensed evangelist and ‘the mission’. They do not feel any responsibility themselves to evangelize the world. Their mouths are closed. Here and there, of course, we find a man so full of the Spirit of the Lord that he cannot hold his peace, but he is a comparatively rare exception (Roland Allen, Missionary Methods: St. Paul’s or Ours? Grand Rapid, MI: Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1962, p. 94).

Various China watchers have said that the best thing that happened in China was Mao. The missionaries had to leave and could no longer control who would preach and who would not preach. They no longer had control over how to organize Christ’s church. The Holy Spirit took over and began to use all and every fiery soul that wanted to speak in His Name. If you haven’t read the book The Heavenly Man by Brother Yun (with Paul Hattaway) you really need to read it. God’s work is incredible. We just must make sure that we don’t get in the way of His work. And I know from experience that “getting in the way” is really easy to do.

Comments?

Joel

I went fishing with a cell leader in my church family yesterday.  He and his wife have been leading a cell for five years or so.  In the last six years, he has started a family (they now have three children) and a business.  Needless to say, life has been full.  Their cell members include about thirty people including children (if everybody turns out for the gathering).  They are working with their network pastor concerning multiplication.  The cell is made up of couples in their twenties and thirties– so it’s a young couples’ cell for the most part.

In the context of cell life, the couple leading this cell have been through a whole array of emotions throughout the years.  Excitement… confusion…feeling alone…joy…feeling bonded with others…and more.  I guess that’s part of cell leadership, eh?  Concerning his cell, my fishing buddy made it clear to me:  “Rob, we are a family.  We are together because we want to do life together.  We don’t choose to journey alone.”  Now hearing that warms any cell pastor’s heart, correct?

As we were driving back from the Guadalupe River, he asked me, “Do you know what our cell is doing now?”  I said, “Tell me.”  He responded, “We do something different at each gathering over a five week period.  The first week, we discuss the message on Sunday and go through the outline.  The second week of the month we pray…for the whole gathering.  The third week we discuss the message on Sunday and go through the outline.  The fourth week, we have game night.  The fifth week, we have short movie night (Example:  Rob Bell DVD) and discussion.”

Maybe this idea is for you…maybe not.  Possibly, a variation of such an idea would be ideal for your cell.  Personally, I like the freedom that the network pastor has given to this cell and others.  Don’t you think it’s time for the cell movement in North America to…try some new things?…to bless creative means of coming together?… and more.

A final question:   Is it necessary for a cell to do the same thing week in and week out in the actual cell meeting? 

This cell seems to be fishing with quite a nice net!  By the way, this cell leader guy caught the biggest fish and the most fish yesterday at the river.  But, I didn’t get skunked. 

Would love to receive your comments!

by Rob Campbell

www.cypresscreekchurch.com

I’ve been trying to share nuggets of truth from the writings of Roland Allen. I hope you’re still with me! Sometimes we get in the way of Christ’s work. I often use the illustration in my seminars of a cell leader “getting sick on purpose” in order to allow another member of the group to lead the cell. The idea is to get out of the way and allow others to sprout and grow.

In studying the life of Paul the apostle, Roland Allen reminds us that Paul made himself dispensable. That is, he made sure that the congregations were not depending on him–rather that they were depending on the Holy Spirit. Allen says:

We are not indispensible. The church is Christ’s church. Paradoxical as it may seem, I think that it is quite possible that the shortness of his stay [in the churches he planted] may have conduced in no small measure to St Paul’s success. And this is a truism. There’s a grave danger in thinking that we have to plant the church, when in fact, God must plant it. He’s the one that makes it work. There is something in the presence of a great teacher that sometimes tends to prevent smaller men from realizing themselves. They more readily feel their responsibility, they more easily and successfully exert their powers, when they see that, unless they come forward, nothing will be done. By leaving them quickly St Paul gave the local leaders opportunity to take their proper place, and forced the church to realize that it could not depend upon him, but must depend upon its own resources (Roland Allen, Missionary Methods: St. Paul’s or Ours? Grand Rapid, MI: Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1962, p. 93).

I’m not sure how this will look in your situation and ministry. On a cell member level, it means being willing to participate under the guidance of the Holy Spirit (don’t expect the cell leadership team to do everything). On the cell leader level, it means raising up other leaders to replace you. On a pastoral level it means planting new churches. I’ve seen various examples of pastors who clung to power, trying to control those under them (often in the name of trying to grow a mega-church). Their leaders ended up departing in discouragement. God wants to give us a larger picture of His desire to extend His church throughout the world.

Comments?
Joel

I believe that God is calling His church back to simplicity. We have a tendency to over complicate cell church ministry. Cell church ministry is simple. Paul practiced such simplicity when he planted churches in the first century.  

We’ve been talking a lot lately about Roland Allen’s analysis of St. Paul’s missionary methods versus our own. Allen concludes that Paul didn’t leave his newly formed congregations with a whole lot. They had baptism, the Lord’s supper, and mutual edification. Allen says, “And yet is is possible that it was precisely the simplicity and brevity of the teaching which constituted its strength. There is a very grave danger in importing complete systems of worship and theology” Roland Allen, Missionary Methods: St. Paul’s or Ours? (Grand Rapid, MI: Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1962), p. 90.

Have we become too formalized and complicated in the cell church movement? Allen says, “A man does not need to know much to lay hold on Christ. St Paul began with simplicity and brevity. Yet in doing this he ran grave risks. It is characteristic of St. Paul that he had such faith in Christ and the Holy Spirit indwelling in the church that he did not shrink from risks. Even when the Galatians fell prey to the Judaizers legalism, we don’t sense that Paul tried to change his method of church planting” (p. 91)

Can we easily err in the cell church with our complicated systems and structures? I believe that we can. I sense that God is calling us to go back to simplicity and keep the structure workable. Here are the essentials:

• Cell
• Celebration (for children as well!)
• Training
• Coaching

We can learn loads from St. Paul about organic church planting and keeping it simple.

Comments?

Joel

By Steve Cordle

 

Recently my wife and I were blessed to be able to attend a marriage seminar sponsored by a national ministry. (If you haven’t gone to one, do yourself a favor and go; you deserve it!)

For two and a half days we took in high-quality teaching about the principles of a Christ-centered marriage. Truthfully, very little of the material was new to me. As a pastor, I had taught most of the principles myself. In fact, I could fill in most of the outline blanks before the speaker started! When I looked ahead at the discussion questions, they appeared fine, but particularly novel.

While the sessions were good, do you know when the sessions got most interesting? When my wife and I sat down to work through the application material. Those questions which looked fairly ordinary on paper became the launching point for significant and vital conversations. And over the last couple of weeks, those conversations have prompted me to be even more intentional about showing love to Linda. In other words, they produced life change.

In our churches, people can hear a good biblical message and look over some questions about it. In fact, sometimes they can say, “I’ve heard that already, how about something deeper?” But it is in the application — the doing — that the lives truly change.

How do your groups help people apply the Bible? Share your experience with us!