Scene 1, in which I consider the impact to the group with whom we meet of formally calling ourselves a “church”, the notion of which struck each of us differently.

…in thinking about how other people have started missional communities or ‘new kind of church’ or whathaveyou, I realized something which I jotted down for myself like this:

*The old way to start a church*
Get together with some friends, and have them come around your house every week. Decide together that you want to be a church, appoint one of you as the leader or pastor, continue meeting regularly. Bring more people in to join you, move your meetings to Sunday morning. Organize more. Decide you’re too big for your house and get yourself a building. Voila.

*The new way to start a church*
Get together with some friends, and meet regularly. Share your lives with each other. Listen to Jesus together. See what happens.

Scene 2, in which I expand on my thought, “Perhaps it’s easier to just say that we are what we are; let’s keep being what we are and see what we become.” by noting the following:

Once more, I think we could just say heck, we are what we are:

We are a “Faith-Family” who are pursuing Jesus together and trying to learn what it is to be missional people, to be his disciples in a postmodern world. Some of us participate in organized local churches and some do not. All of us are in the caravan together as journeymates, seeking “the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God.”

In fact, come to think of it, the whole passage describes exactly what as a group we are:

By faith [each of us] obeyed when [we were] called to go out to a place that [we were] to receive as an inheritance. And [we] went out, not knowing where [we were] going. By faith [we[ went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with [our family and journeymates], heirs with [us] of the same promise. For [we are] looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God.

Called to journey together. Simple.