Preaching
I’ve made the point that the Greek verb kerusso, normally translated into English as ‘preach,’ never appears in the New Testament in connection with gatherings of disciples. And, after much study to the best of my knowledge, that is the truth.
While that fact is significant, two others make me seriously question our practice of preaching.
1. What we think of as preaching in the church today is not what preaching was in the New Testament. From my experience, the most usual direct object of the verb preach in the church today is, ‘sermon.’ When you preach or listen to a sermon, you are not approximating anything that the early church did. There was nothing close to the sermon in early Christian worship. In fact, based on only brief study, the sermon was an innovation of the 12th century. As far as I know, the Christian community functioned for much more than 1,000 years without a single sermon.
What you do when you preach today isn’t what Bible people did when they preached.
2. There are ways of communicating truth that are far more similar to the way Jesus taught than what we do in our churches. I’m not as much against preaching as I am in favor of employing communication strategies that were good enough for Jesus and the first Christians.
Many years ago, when I took homiletics, passing reverence was paid to Jesus as a rabbi whose teachings are as relevant 2,000 years after He spoke them as they were in His own day. Then, the professor proceeded to map out a model of communication that could not possibly have been more foreign to how Jesus taught. How insane! Can you imagine someone 2,000 years in the future grooving on what you preached last Sunday?
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Other than the fact that the preaching of sermons, as we currently define them, settled quickly into church tradition, why do we defend the practice?
posted by bill Sloat at 8:21 AM
40 Comments:
Bill - what are the texts that you see as speaking directly to the gatherings or early Christians? 1 Corinthians; 1 Timothy. Any other major references?
M,
I think that Acts 19:9b speaks to some of the Christian gatherings in Ephesus. Acts 20:20 also gives something of a picture of Paul's interactions with Ephesian gatherings. (The word for preach there is not kerusso.)
Acts 20:7-8ff is the only description of a Christian gathering that I know of in the New Testament. First Corinthians 11-14 treats what went on in those gatherings in the context of what were the practices in the churches of God.
bill,
i'm afraid you're going to find somewhat of a contrarian in me, asking lots of questions and raising lots of objections. but i want you to know that i say these things in order to test the soundness of what you say, and am open to being swayed by solid Scriptural arguments. that being said...
in acts 20:20, paul's farewell address to the ephesians, he says he "did not shrink back from declaring (anangello) to you anything that was profitable", and in v.27, "declaring (anangello) the whole counsel of God." now, i'm a little new to greek, but aren't these verbs related to messanger (angellos), and the message they would give, which would generally be a monologue? what is your understanding of what paul means in those verses, if it is not at all similar to preaching?
Bill - Acts 20:9 proves your whole hypothesis wrong (half smiling) "Paul talked on and on." :-)
I agree that proclamation was probably very different, but it seems like there was proclamation/teaching in Christian gatherings not only completely equal contribution from all gathered. The Acts 19 and 20 references you mention indicate this in my understanding.
Would you agree that preaching the Gospel (evangelizo) can take several different forms biblically but certainly can include public proclamation? If I recall you accept this but relegate it to evangelistic proclamation, not in gatherings of disciples.
Jesus seemed to use both monologue teaching/proclamation as well as Socratic dialogue.
I think that we do have issues because we have turned proclamation into a nice speach instead of focusing on communicating the truth of the gospel and all it's implications through whatever means best communicate it.
In general response to the major question of the post, I hold onto public proclamation because it bears fruit.
Your mention that kerusso never occurs in connection with a gathering as a case against it is a fallacy in my opinion for two reasons: 1. There are so few references to Christian gatherings to be adequate to give us a full picutre. 2. The acts 20 passage seems to indicate an extended monologue from Paul that would approximate preaching of some type, even though it uses another word that could be translated teach or declare (or preach in some translations.)
I'm going to back up and just be a little philosophical here...
First, I cannot help but wonder if there are so few exhaustive descriptions of Christian gatherings in the New Testament in part because the Lord knew we would have to contextualize to be effective, and so chose not to inundate us with descriptive passages we would take as prescriptive. (Just wonderin'...)
Second, I think it is virtually impossible to ascertain just what the preaching of the Word was like from the short references we have in the NT.
Third, I think, Bill, this is where you can make restorationism too rigid. Would not our Lord want us to discern what forms of communication would be most effective among the people of the time and place in which we live? I am not arguing that everything about modern preaching is good (that's why in our upcoming Church Planter Training School we are going to talk about preaching, which most CP training leaves alone). There is much I don't care for in modern preaching. What I'm suggesting is that prayerful discernment of effective communication strategies is better than trying to mimic Paul and the early Christians.
When we worship in 'new testament style', I don't see it as mimic-ing what Paul was doing. I see it as allowing the Spirit to move more- to guide the worship. I wouldn't do things NT style just to be authentic, to be able to point to the Bible and say, "Hey, we do it by the BOOK, see there? See it? Eh? We are sooo following scripture."
The purpose of NT style worship is to open up to the Spirit. Its about allowing Spiritual change- not just worship style issues. Following the Bible in a legalistic manner is pretty much like following the Old Law. The reason behind following Paul's instructions for orderly worship should be Spiritual reasons- for spiritual growth and change.
Many would say that a good preacher giving a good message can do that- inspire change. But what about the change the Holy Spirit wants to bring? If there is no room for Him in service- gotta stick to a schedule, gotta stick to what is printed in our bulletin, don't want to do anything out-of-sorts, spirit-led or not, it might scare people, make 'em squirm in their seats...we've shut Him out.
The NT worship style allows for that movement of the Spirit, whatever He wants communicated, through whoever He decides will be most effective at communicating it. Worship is for the Lord. Our job is to make sure it doesn't become a circus, and that's about it.
But I don't have a big ol' degree from a preacher school, so I could just be spoutin' off. ;)
Prophet Gr(many r's)l:
Good thoughts - thanks for sharing them.
In my thinking there is a difference between having something 'planned' and demanding that we stick to it rigidly.
I think we must to always sensitive and flexible to the Spirit's leading, but as others point out, the Spirit can be involved in planning as well as we seek out His direction.
I was a part of a worship gathering recently that there we many people who shared powerfully. I had 'planned' a short message that I ended up scrapping because I sensed that God had spoken what He intended to through the body.
fran,
i like your thought on the lack of gathering narratives. i've heard it said that the NT can be thought of as a "missionary handbook", and i think it's for reasons like that. it fits in any culture, any age.
prophet grrrrrrrl,
i can see where you're coming from, desiring not to be legalistic, caring more about forms than about the heart, and i think that's a good thing about which to be concerned. i agree we are often far too rigid, making "church" into a spectator sport.
one thing to remember, is that the same Spirit Who we want to be active in our lives and gatherings, also wrote the Book which we want to follow. the Spirit can and does lead all the time: in preparation, through His Word, through spontaneous and planned use of His gifts. He works through impromptu prophesying and through well-thought-out sermons. i agree with dan m., we must be sensitive to His leading, seeking to honor Him in all our ways. and part of that is following His Book.
The first time I met Gary I had been asked to pray at a Ministerial Association service. Oddly, they asked me to pray for the media.
Gary was sickened a bit when he saw me pull out my written prayer.
But then he was impressed and moved by the sincerity and depth of the prayer.
I could never have prayed such a prayer without preparation. Prayers are not something I usually write out, but there are many cases that preparation could bring a much stronger interaction with the Spirit.
Most generations of people are not good at impromptu interaction.
Fran,
I think, Bill, this is where you can make restorationism too rigid.
I study Restorationist movements very seriously and I know the danger that they present. I know that healthy restorationism is one baby step away from legalism. For me, it is not about what early disciples did as much as it is about:
1. The theology of the church that underlay early church practice.
I seek to practice nothing primitive that I don't find a compelling theological reason for. I don't practice modern day preaching, for instance, because, in my opinion, it eviscerates the priesthood of all believers.
2. What the Holy Spirit blessed.
The theology behind the preaching that I've been listening to since the days that I could recite the whole Apostles' Creed before I could read is this: in the church, there is a clergy-class endorsed and empowered to handle truth and a laity able only to consume it.
As far as I know, none of us reject the Spiritual Gifts of prophecy, or of the word of knowledge or of the word of wisdom or of teaching--all of which appear to have been practiced normatively in early Christian gatherings. But, everyone here that I know of except Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrl Prophet and me have a practice of the doctrine of church that prohibits these gifts from being practiced--unless as a part of a pre-arranged schedule in a 'worship service'--and presented by someone a CGGC Conference has credentialed.
In the New Testament, the Spirit blessed several kinds of communication of truth--most of it was believed to have come directly from the Lord. I believe that the Spirit still does offer those blessings to those who will receive them.
7 'r's, fellas. The sound the prophecy makes in my gut, before I get a chance to speak it in my timid, freaked out way. ;) Thanks for letting me butt in the convo.
Bill -
"everyone here that I know of except Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrl Prophet and me have a practice of the doctrine of church that prohibits these gifts from being practiced--unless as a part of a pre-arranged schedule in a 'worship service'--and presented by someone a CGGC Conference has credentialed."
How do I prohibit this? I would never silence anyone because they were not credentialed or it was at an unplanned time in a worship gathering.
If either of you attended Fairview Bethel, you would be free to share a word at any point you felt led to.
I very much appreciate the point of practice that is linked to theology. I think that some of our practices can lend themselves to a clergy distinction, but what I think is that this is not necessarily so. Thank you for challenging us to think more deeply about this though.
The truth is that nobody in our local church is that impressed by me. I am not in a different class than other believers.
When I teach or preach, we open God's Word and proclaim it's truth. It's the Word that has authority over the entirety of the body (myself and everybody else equally).
We have a long way to go in so many areas, but I think that 'traditional' church can be much healthier and open than you seem to think it can.
Bill,
Without clearly defining "modern day preaching", your point is difficult to respond to. Not all modern day preaching is identical. If by that phrase you mean sermons in general, we have examples of sermons in the New Testament. No one is arguing with your point about openness to the Spirit in worship gatherings, and since you don't worship in my church, I'd appreciate you not lumping us all together (everyone except you and prophet G,etc.).
Neither does a church having sermons automatically mean they have a Christendom clergy-class mentality.
I like the essence of the points you are making, but you are also making some unwarranted assumptions.
M and Fran,
Sorry for speaking out of turn and for offending you.
I can only say that I personally am not familiar with any other CGGC congregation that, with intentionality and openness, welcomes the extemporaneous speaking of words of revelation, knowledge, prophecy, instruction and interpreted tongues (1 Cor. 14:6).
I'd be overjoyed to stand corrected, believe me I would.
no offense taken here. I know our worship gatherings are still 'traditional.' are not not like yours, bill. I was just saying that people are free to be led by the Spirit to edify the body if they are so led. It does happen - and more and more so. No tongues yet though. That will rock the boat some ;-)
Things are no always so black and white as the prophet sees them. I think trajectory is important too. Where a body is and what they are open to / where they are heading are both considerations in my opinion.
Bill,
In our church people sometimes share a word they believe God has given them-- sometimes it is a general word for the body, and sometimes it is the Lord saying that there is someone there who needs to deal with a particular thing, or something the Lord wants that person to know. For me, with my more charismatic background, this is not unusual.
To Dan's trajectory point, we do not see this done as freely as we eventually will, but we are on the way.
BTW, you did not offend me, but prophets sometimes paint things all one way, which is effective for making a point, but may not be the way it is with everyone (which reminds me of the time my wife informed me that I should stop using the words 'always' and 'never' in our arguments:-)
Good point about trajectory. It is an issue in which prophets have no insight. We suffer here because of it.
Fran,
I believe that you understand who prophets are and what they do as well as anyone. That gives you context. I try always to, as Paul says, "speak the truth in love." But, in Him, I'm given such a broad brush to paint with and only stark hues in my pallet. It seems that details and nuance come from the A, S & T parts of APEST. But, then, that's what 1 Corinthians 12 says, eh?
walt,
in acts 20:20, paul's farewell address to the ephesians, he says he "did not shrink back from declaring (anangello) to you anything that was profitable", and in v.27, "declaring (anangello) the whole counsel of God." now, i'm a little new to greek, but aren't these verbs related to messanger (angellos), and the message they would give, which would generally be a monologue? what is your understanding of what paul means in those verses, if it is not at all similar to preaching?
I'm still breaking down the exact use of the word myself. I'm sure that it implies a monologue, though I suspect a brief one. And, early in my study of the word, I'm guessing that it might be an equivalent within the believing community of what preaching was outside of the believing community and to the 'gentiles,' to whom preaching was done. I see nothing in the word that suggests the presentation of anything that resembles the modern sermon.
But, that's just a guess. I'm still learning myself.
bill - not sure if you already have elsewhere, but please give what you consider to be the charactaristics of a 'modern sermon' is that we can know what we are talking about.
M,
Good point.
I have two frames of reference.
1. The model of sermon preaching that I was taught in seminary that was still being taught when I was on staff at Winebrenner: Expositional, Text-Oriented proclamation of the word rooted in the Historico-grammatical interpretation of the Bible.
2. What I hear when I hear people preach sermons today which is pretty much what I was taught.
While sermons have been around in Christendom for about 800 years, this model is very modern. I'm no authority, but I'd guess it's less than 100 years old. It has its roots, as far as I can tell, in the Fundamentalists' reaction to higher biblical criticism. You've probably noticed that what Winebrenner and even Forney called a sermon is not what you were taught in seminary or what you might expect to hear in a typical American Protestant pulpit today.
bill,
on the note of expository preaching, i'm interested in your thoughts on the Letter to the Hebrews, which the author describes as a "brief word of exhortation", though it takes just shy of an hour to read at a normal speaking pace. it seems to me that the book in general is thematic, showing how Jesus is better than everything (e.g. the old law, the old priesthood, the old sacrifices), but it does take sections of the OT and exposit them (e.g. Psalm 95:7-11 for most of ch. 3-4). i'm eager to hear your thoughts.
walt,
I'm not certain what you are asking me about Hebrews. Clearly it is topical and there are points at which it treats Old Testament passages in an expositional manner.
Does the Book of Hebrews justify the practice of the PREACHING of THE SERMON by the PASTOR (AKA Priestly mediator) as a regular feature of a well-planned-in-advance, carefully-orchestrated WORSHIP SERVICE?
In my opinion, no.
One of the modes of communication described as a common element of early meetings of disciples is the 'word of instruction,' literally, teaching. I think that the exposing of the meaning of a text is one legitimate form of teaching. (1 Cor. 14:6 & 26) I strongly suspect that the careful treatment of Old Testament texts was often a part of New Testament gatherings...
...but it was not a sermon.
bill,
i think the words "sermon" and "preaching" in your mind implies a lot of things it doesn't for the rest of us. your last comment, with all the caps, shows that.
i think others have been asking for this as well, but what does it mean in your mind that the exposition of Scripture in a church gathering is "not a sermon"? and what makes up this evil thing that you call a sermon?
This conversation has continued to be interesting and thought provoking.
One aspect that seems to have come for the fore is to what degree - if any - worship gatherings were (and should be now) planned or completely spontaneous.
It seems to me that there is a difference between being 100% planned and inflexible and having some plan that is flexible.
Bill uses extreme (although certainly common enough examples) that make the contrast seem most stark. I'm not sure that inflexibly planned and 100% spontaneous are not the only two choices.
Gang,
I'm thinking of starting another thread to try to do a better job of defining what I'm talking about.
For now, just let me say that the sermon is a child of Christendom. Without Christendom you could not take for granted the preaching of sermons by a priestly mediator to a group of laity. There is no such concept in early Christian gatherings in which all disciples were saints, all had spiritual gifts and where it was understood that every follower of Jesus was a member, as Peter describes it, of a royal priesthood and when it was understood that, when saints gathered, everyone had a hymn or a teaching, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation.
In the early community of saints that someone would feel entitled to 'preach' at/to the rest of the community would be foreign--and I suspect--offensive.
M,
Regarding spontaneous v. planned:
I think the culture of the gatherings in the early days was different. It was based in different values and expectations and a different theology of the church.
You are, quite understandably, asking questions from our own gathering culture. However, to grasp an answer, you'll probably have to realize that the truth of what early gatherings were can't be grasped by imposing 21st century American Protestant defaults on early believers.
Winebrenner was correct in saying that to establish churches on the New Testament plan "will require another great reformation." We can't look into our own culture as the end all be all and get good answers to these questions.
It seems a lot of discussion has lately centered around what happens in our worship gatherings. Sometimes I wonder if we're missing the point. I mean, it just doesn't seem like Jesus said all that much (or anything) about what to do, or how to do, our worship gatherings (who should preach, how it should be done, what kind of songs to sing, etc.). Could it be that Jesus doesn't really give a hoot? I kind of think those are things centered in Christendom thinking.
Sure there are places in Scripture where people did give some points of order. But what if that's all they were - points of order? Like, "Well, if you can't figure out how to get along, here are some suggestions."
I guess when I think of having churches operating on the "NT Plan" I don't think that means how we organize our worship gatherings. I think Jesus and the writers of the NT were much more concerned with how we LIVED OUR LIVES. How do we treat others, how do we get along, how do we deal with people on the streets or at work or in line at Walmart, what do we do when we mess up... Those sorts of things.
I know relationships are a dirty word around here, but I think we're missing the point by nitpicking how we organize our worship services. Or maybe I'm missing the point.
I have not been following the discussion closely this past month due to pastoral responsibilities, but I reacquainted myself with this thread this morning. I don't have anything new to add at this point except to affirm the most recent comment by Dan. LIVING OUR LIVES AS LIVING SACRIFICES according to Romans 12.1-2 is the definition or measure of acceptable worship, as I understand it. - Steve Dunn
Dan H,
The reason I think that Jesus probably does give a hoot about how we conduct ourselves when we gather is that I am convinced that what we do when we gather is based on a corrupted view of the church. (I know that you all probably think that to say that our view of the church is corrupt is an extreme hyperbole. But, it is what I see when I read Scripture.)
Jesus sent us into the world to disciple everyone. There is no suggestion in anything I can see in what Jesus taught that would lead to the sort of church we have made for ourselves in which some disciples serve in a priestly role and others do not. Most of what I see us doing that I believe is corrupt has the pastor/priest in a central role and places the majority of His disciples in the role of consuming the religious products and services generated by the priestly mediators between Jesus and His present day disciples.
I think He gives a serious hoot about that.
Also, do a New Testament English language word study of the 'worship.' Our notion of worship is entirely disconnected from the New Testament concept. Gatherings of believers are NEVER called worship. In fact, most appearances of the word in the New Testament comport either with false worship or Old Testament acts. More than 1/4 of the appearances of the word are in the
Book of Revelation and are eschatological. The notion that we gather to worship is one of the most gross corruptions of New Testament discipleship accomplished by the Christendom model of church.
dan h.,
i thank God for you, your insight, your sharp words, and the heart that i believe they come from. thanks for making sure we don't lose the forest for the trees.
i agree with bill, that we do need to think about these things, not so much in the specific per se, but as the outcropping of a larger mindset and heartset that is not in line with Jesus' calling to be His Body, with all members functioning together.
to put it allegorically, even the stomach, which we might view as the most consumeristic of our organs, produces acids that dissolve food so that the intestine can absorb it into our bloodstream. it is necessary that all parts be doing their work, not just sitting and listening like bumps on a log. and i think our lack of "being on mission" is another outcropping of this consumeristic rot.
bill,
i agree with your general statements in your last comment. i think if we came to terms, and perhaps distinguished what you call a sermon and preaching, from what a prophet might do in a church, then we'll really get going.
on your last point, i may be nitpicking, but just to be clear: the apostles and NT church would not have disagreed that we come together to worship. they would have strongly fought against the notion that that is the only place/time we worship, as they viewed all of life as worship, with no sacred/secular divide, no temple (as we are the temples of the Living God) and no priests or sacrifices, as Jesus fulfills both of these roles perfectly. agreed?
Dan H...
Thanks for the good reminder. I happen to be of the mind that we should ask some philosophical questions about our gatherings, but I think remembering the ends Jesus is after should prevent us from getting too nitpicky about things. I suspect Jesus gave little directive about things like gatherings in part because he knew we would create legalisms out of it, rather than just asking how we can do the good things in a good way.
Bill...
I'm not sure that having shepherds preach or teachers teach, or the fact that some of them may do it as their full time gig, necessarily makes them priestly mediators. I agree that there ARE many pastors who function in mediator-like fashion and so undercut the participation of everyone's gifts, but I think you need to actually define more specifically when a preacher steps over that line, because I don't think he does so merely by giving a teaching, particularly if that is HIS gift.
I guess I just also think that if we are holding to good principles (including body participation), there is freedom in the Lord in how we do our gatherings (and our teaching). If he had wanted us to have all the exact details of how to do it, would there not be some prescriptive teaching in the NT on this, and not just a few scant descriptive ones?
I like/ agree with Fran's last post.
It seems like bill's view is 'the medium is the message'. I.e. The sermon / prayer necessitates a priestly mediator role. My view currently is that it can but not necessarily. I deeply appriciate bill bringing this to my/our attention because it is not something I have thought deeply and often enough about previously.
It would be interesting to survey - informally or otherwise - several members of the body and ask what they perceive the sermon to be.
this may seem strange, but i think i'm with bill on this, if i'm understanding him correctly. i think we haven't come to terms, which tends to be a big problem in conversations like these.
i don't think bill is condemning monologue or teaching in general, but a homily stereotype which is prevalent in american churches and is rooted in certain things we all disagree with, like a distinction of "super-christian" clergy over laity or some such thing, a la the romish church. i think we understood what bill means, we'd all be much closer to agreement.
I don't disagree with Bill on the "corruption" of the clergy/laity divide. But I think Fran spoke to that way better than I did.
But what I was trying to get at is that so much of this seems to be tied into the institution of the church. Like, if we don't reform the institution then there is no hope. I think Jesus worked on a completely different level that was NOT dependent upon the institution.
Not that the institutional church is necessarily all wrong, or all bad, but that reforming it is not the answer. The kingdom can come about through, within, or without it. If that makes any sense.
But Walt may be right. We might all be agreeing. To be honest, it's hard for me to tell.
i think if we came to terms, and perhaps distinguished what you call a sermon and preaching...
I promise to try to define again. But, gang, try to live in the CGGC Mission Statement for a moment. Think nothing but New Testament. Remember that to be who we envision ourselves will require the total trashing of the Reformation--which put the sermon on steroids and HGH.
Think about the notion of the priestly mediator, as the central aspect of worship, presenting three points and a poem or the rigorous exposition of a biblical text followed by an obligatory altar call. Now, impose that on the descriptions of New Testament gatherings. Does not the word 'oxymoron' begin to enter your mind?
According to Paul it was normal and ACCEPTABLE for one person in a New Testament gathering of disciples to interupt another person offering a prophecy or a teaching or a word of knowledge or word of wisdom. When that happened the first person was simply to stop and continue when the second person was finished. According to Paul, to do this was orderly worship.
Now, in our gathering culture in which our pastors/priests are taught in seminary to spend as much as 25 hours in preparation of the sermon, insert those standards of biblical propriety. Figure out how the sermon presented by the Protestant priest fits in.
I don't think that any of you will understand what I'm saying until you attempt to take the New Testament as the baseline, forget Christendom's traditions. In the days of John Winebrenner they had no place and, since 2008, they have no place in the CGGC.
I did not write the CGGC Mission Statement. I didn't say that to accomplish this will require another great Reformation. I'm not sure that even I would have been bold enough to create that view of our Mission. But, for now at least, that is the mission that unites us.
i don't think bill is condemning monologue or teaching in general, but a homily stereotype which is prevalent in american churches and is rooted in certain things we all disagree with, like a distinction of "super-christian" clergy over laity or some such thing, a la the romish church. - walt
I love it when someone says what I mean better than I do.
Friends,
One thread that is percolating in my prophet's heart will have the title, "Losing the Mission in the Method." Doing taht is a chronic sin of shepherd/priests when the institution puts them in apostolic roles and makes the 'Directors,' a role not found in the New Testament.
For example: Nowhere does Jesus or the Spirit command Christians to plant churches. Planting churches was one method early disciples adopted to achieve the mission. The Lord commands us to go and make disciples of all nations. But, we trash the actual mission and take up one method of achieving it, i.e., church planting. Then we make the method the mission and lose the Mission. Therefore, we are failing to make disciples. In fact, recent threads here reveal we don't even have a definition for a disciple.
This substituting of method for mission may be today's church's greatest failing and sin. (We will always do that as long as we are an institution with shepherds in the role of directing it.)
I believe that the discussion on this thread has followed that familiar bunny trail. It focuses on method, not on mission.
I've said many times that I believe that there is a profound theology of Church that bears fruit in the way that early believers conducted themselves when they gathered. There is a profound theology of how Christ's Body naturally functions that resulted in the speaking of words of teaching and prophecy and wisdom and knowledge and revelation and even tongues, but not the preaching of sermons in early gatherings of disciples.
Do you get it that TONGUES was a natural and accepted part of early gatherings and that preaching was not!? Think about what big-picture truths that suggests. Tongues, not sermons, fit in the early church! Go figure!
This thread is not about methods. It's about the foundational mission and theology of the church. It about what fruit will be born if the New Testament vision of church reappears.
I acknowledge the possibility that all that I'm saying may be wrong. But, I think I have achieved to a small degree the ability to see the New Testament as baseline. Perhaps I can do that more easily because of my extensive training in the discipline of history--something that should be stressed in Bodies that adopt the 'New Testament plan.'
In the CGGC we have a Mission Statement. It requires all good CGGCers to commit themselves to taking the New Testament as our baseline and developing ministry around that baseline. Packed into the historical context of the Mission Statement is the conviction that the Reformation failed and that a new one is required.
Please understand that it is an indisputable fact that the Reformation elevated the sermon. It defined the priests role as the preacher of the sermon. (Part of our problem, perhaps, is that Winebrenner didn't get that and that he was, perhaps more than anything else, a preacher of sermons.)
What I hope to talk about is not the method but the mission behind the method.
This is where I'm struggling, Bill: If in fact it is the mission that matters (which is the only thing I think I've heard consensus on in this conversation so far), then why are you insisting that one glimpse (ala I Cor 14) into a New Testament gathering defines the method? I still believe in contextualization, by which I mean that within certain good principles (including body ministry in the gathering), there is freedom to embrace various nuances in our methodology.
I AGREE with the principle you are extolling from First Corinthians 14, but at least by my definition, some of the words being given there would qualify as "preaching". Again, I think you have left the definition of priestly mediation in preaching too vague.
Maybe I'm not getting this hard line distinction you are making because LifeSpring does not function like a typical reformation-protestant church. No, people don't interrupt the sermon, but they are often invited to participate verbally in it (questions and comments), and often a person will share a word God is bringing forth at some other point in the service. Maybe I've been away from the more extreme examples for too long.
To Dan's point, I think the church should reflect the kingdom in the best ways, but we should be wary of thinking that if we get the church just right, that will do it.
Fran,
Good observations and questions.
Please understand that, while 1 Corinthians 11-14 is an important source for my understanding of New Testament plan worship, it is not the only place I go in the New Testament for authority.
I promise, when I have the time to concentrate, to do some more defining of terms but, let me say this:
I know that the meaning of words change. This is not the first century and we don't live in the Roman Empire and we are not writing these posts in Koine Greek. The early church's vocabulary about the manner in which truth was communicated in the Body was much more precise than is ours. There is a sense in which we today use the verb preach generically to describe anything that is said with authority in what we now call a 'worship service.'
One point that I'm trying to make consistently is that there was never a time in early Christian gatherings when someone functioning in the community as a "pastor," preached as a priestly mediator between the Lord and the common people, the unwashed laity in the gathering. Preaching today normally means--in terms that will make many uncomfortable--the pastor/priest of the congregational serving as a mediator between God and man preaching to a lower class of Christian.
When I use the term preaching, that is a core part of my definition of the term.
While this understanding is deeply rooted in CGGC practice today, I think is violates the notion that Jesus commissioned us to make disciples and that all people. All followers of Jesus were thought of as disciples and saints. I think that Peter's contention that we all are members of a royal priesthood is consistent with the church Jesus launched into the world. All that I can see in the New Testament tells me that, when disciples gathered, they understood that all present were priests.
And, when preaching, as I define it, takes place a very important New Testament teaching is debased.
In that sense, what I'm writing is about mission. It's about forming a community of priests on mission.
Fran,
Maybe I'm not getting this hard line distinction you are making because LifeSpring does not function like a typical reformation-protestant church. No, people don't interrupt the sermon, but they are often invited to participate verbally in it (questions and comments), and often a person will share a word God is bringing forth at some other point in the service. Maybe I've been away from the more extreme examples for too long.
Having never been at LifeSpring, I suspect that you serve more in the role of an apostle than priestly mediator. I suspect that there's not a lot of consumerism in the LifeSpring culture. My sense is that it abounds in most CGGC congregations. Knowing you as well as I do, what happens in the entirely of your ministry is much closer to the New Testament plan than what takes place here at Faith.
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