I offer these stories not to make us feel guilty. Nor am I suggesting that we go do what they are doing. It is simply to offer inspiration, especially to those who have dreams of their own and need this kind of encouragement to get them on their way.
STORY #1
The Church of the Saviour is another example of prophetic imagination. Their visions and imaginings are too numerous to catalogue here. But I will try from memory to recount the beginnings of Jubilee housing. Their story is told in “The New Community” by Elizabeth O’Connor. The only copy I know of is in the library at Steinbach Bible College. In the early 70’s some members of the “Church of the Saviour” went to protest peacefully against the Vietnam war. In 73 the war came to an end. Over the next year they prayed about how the Lord would lead them to some significant ministry. The news began covering the poverty in their city. Moved by the deplorable conditions of these people, they met to discuss what they could do. Their first step was to go and check out an apartment building. A lady trained and got her real estate licence. She went to check one out and came back saying that it was worse than they had imagined. The garbage was piled two stories high in the stairwell. There were holes in the walls in the hallway as well as urine all over them. The apartments were the same. There were rats running everywhere as well as cock roaches. There was no electricity or heating. The apartments in the top floor were full of pails to catch the water from the leaking roofs. The residents did not want her to tell the authorities lest they come and condemn the building, forcing them to leave. When she came back with the reports they had a brainstorming session of what to do. One person said, “Let’s go and clean it up for them.” Someone else pointed out that if they did that the owners would only raise the rent and the poor people would have no where to go. As they batted around ideas a brave soul said, “Why don’t we just buy the building and fix it up ourselves and then charge them what they can afford.” “We don’t have that kind of money,” someone else said. Then a lady said that she had a banker friend who had a heart for the poor and that she would talk to him. Through him they secured a loan for two apartment buildings. Over the next two years they slowly transformed the apartments into attractive living quarters charging the people what they could afford. I visited the Church of the Saviour,” in1996 and believe you me they do quality work. Oh yes when they purchased the buildings they were slapped with over 900 code violation.

This is something we laugh about or at least think is cute. Whenever our children bring home a form for camp or something else there is usually a place that says HOME CHURCH _______________ Since our church meets in a home we simply fill in that blank with YES

We are back in the deep freeze. -24 C in good old Southern Manitoba
I would like to comment on a blog posted by Leighton Tebay. Leighton is very thoughtful in his blogs and I enjoy reading his thoughts. Today he talked about Orthodoxy. He feels that this is not the way we should go. I totally agree with him. I believe we most certainly need a reformation. The reformation I believe we need is found in these two quotes from a man I have come to respect because of the way he has lived out what he believes. That is Gordon Cosby of the “Church of the Saviour” in Washington D.C.
Cosby (who is now 84) loves the church deeply so any criticism is well thought out.

“If men and women today began by the thousands experiencing the depths of Jesus Christ in a transforming way, there would simply be no place for their expression of experience to fit into the present-day straitjackets of Christianity. Protestant or Catholic, neither one is structured to contain a mass of devoted people who long for spiritual depth. We are structured towards infancy.”
Gordon Cosby, Co-founder, The Church of the Saviour

And………….
I believe that the only hope of the world is the existence of Christian communities which are completely authentic” (Gordon Cosby)

Furthermore

We will commit ourselves to an intensive love effort with a few people. We will be committed to smallness. Large numbers tend almost inevitably toward depersonalization and institutionalism, toward a lessening of commitment. So we resist the temptation of numbers and the power that comes through numbers.
I believe that what Cosby says and what Leighton suggests is the reformation we need to go towards. This is what Leighton says.

The church will be relevant when it delivers a message and walks in a power that changes people’s lives. Nothing is more relevant than redemption, healing and sincere community. Leighton Tebay ( http://www.theheresy.com/)

We desperately need new structures. The home church may provide an answer but meeting in houses is no solution if the only thing we’re interested is meeting informally. Being a church that is indeed transformational will not be the easier road to travel. Internet community is fine but it simply isn’t incarnational living but we can use it to encourage one another in our walk. This is a call for people to consider leaving institutional “church” for small groups (no more than 15 to 20 adults and as small as two or three gathered in His name) of people who are committed to a different agenda. Let us network together for encouragement as we seek the inward journey of getting to know Christ and the joy that is found in him. Let the agenda be the one anothers. In new and fresh ways let us remember the orphan, the widow, the single mom or dad, the hungry, the thirsty, the poor. Let us be living stones who are connected to the chief cornerstone Jesus. Drop me a line and let me know about your journey zuzu@mts.com

“Do you ever wonder just what God requires
You think He’s just an errand boy to satisfy your wandering desires”
Bob Dylan in the song “When you gonna wake up” on “Slow train Comin’”

Sometimes I treat God that way. I live in Southern Manitoba. This is somewhat of a bible belt. I have very little faith that things will change around here. That is from organized church to a more relational reality. In no way am I a numbers person but I keep telling God that it would be nice if He sent us more friends to be with on this journey. I think I should be more thankful for those that God has given us. There are 5 of us in our home group. We are scattered. Not so easy to pop in on one another. We have another group from Sprague we are networking with. Often (at least once a week) I hear of another group considering home fellowship……….. But I am impatient. I want it to happen now. That is when I get to thinking that God isn’t coming through for me. Then I start treating Him like an errand boy. “Come on God, Get on board with the plan.” I am very well aware, (deep inside) that if this thing grew quickly there would be more problems then we would know how to handle. We would be back to dealing with quantity rather than quality. But I want some measure of success. After all there are people out there looking on and many of those measure success by the numbers you have in your group. To have only 5 after a year and a half is somewhat…..mmmm un-American. But you know what……. I would not trade our group and the experience of getting to know each other for another way. The meals we share together are really precious to me. It combines the common touch with intimacy. Laughter and seriousness. We can solve most of the world’s problems way before dessert and find that we have to solve them all over again the following week. And the sense of wonder that I feel when we intentionally remember Jesus with wine or juice and bread is still as fresh as when we first did it. It is neat to see the way we are drawing close to one another and the way we are being transformed to the Jesus way. Then there is the giving aspect. There is such a freedom now to use our financial resources almost exclusively for the widow, the orphan, the needy and the poor…… the persecuted Christians. We can partner with people who go to different churches and build a home for someone 10,000 miles away. There will be a time when we will support a person who will do apostolic work here in Southern Manitoba. I am also excited that our group can change direction when we feel lead to. Almost immediately. This kind of freedom is so foreign to most of us. The change from “going to church” to “being the church” is truly becoming real. Since we don’t have a church service to attend we don’t feel the need to try to get people to come to our church service. We pray for one another………………
So in saying all this, I am going to say that I do not believe in HOUSE CHURCH. I get excited about small groups of people learning day by day to love each other to encourage one another to good works.
So Lord forgive me when I treat you like my servant. You are the great God…. Able to raise up and tear down. You have fashioned the universe with delicate precision. You opened the Red Sea. You walked on water. Raised Lazarus from the dead. Calmed the raging sea. Raised Jesus from the dead.

This is the first verse to a song I wrote about 15 years ago.

Heaven stood in silence
As they watched Him go
No trumpet sound of glory
No cheering throngs below
Born to a humble woman
In a stable dark and dim
They hardly noticed Him

He gave up His home in glory
To come down to earth
He gave up the powers He knew
He came to serve
Not to be served
Have this attitude in yourself which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the image of man.