Digging Again

I am digging again. I am back into reading stuff I was reading 2 and 3 years ago, before I got sidetracked by a huge trash heap that had looked like an answer to my search but which almost swallowed me alive. Alas, never take the easy road. That should have been my perpetual motto. Before that diversion, which brought me as close to spiritual death as I have ever been, I had a 10 year detour in mediocrity. Alas, I find myself digging back over 20 years to something which nourished for a few short years.

I began reading the OOZE site again and following links. I found Simple Church at http://www.simplechurch.co.uk/
Lots of interesting stuff there. Small, intimate, service (mission) oriented, simple... that is the spritual community for which I yearn. I felt that 20 plus years ago with the Elderly Care Mission Group I was in back in Ipswich. Probably the greatest time of spiritual growth for me. And we actually accomplished something outside ourselves too..something for others... a 32 unit elderly congregate housing project. The vision for that mission came from Church of the Savior in Washington DC. Small groups formed around both inward and outward missions. IBC in Ipswich was an imperfect implementation for sure, but it was radical non-the-less.

Spiritual mini-movments, is what Barna (in his new book Revolution) calls these smallish trends where people experience tremendous growth. He also says that when people who have experienced this try to bring it back, into their local churches (to which they desire to remain faithful) they are told not to try to introduce foreign elements into the church agenda. Imagine that!! Yup.... been there done that; except in my case it was met with: Oh, yes..wonderful...bring it on...we want to unleash you... and so I invested a tremendous amount of energy over several years and along with others, developed a mini-movement of sorts, within our local church. Then the church leaders got nasty. This was clearly NOT on their agenda. Among other things, it didn't fit with the single point leadership structure they were simultaneously putting in place (under the table). Got to keep the ole boys in thier leadership roles. It also wasn't safe nor controlled. Oh well, water over the dam. Barna could have saved me a lot of trouble if he had come out with his findings a couple of years ago. If I had beleived him. Ha! Guess I should have known it was too good to be true.

So, I have no idea where this is leading me. I will continue to search. I know I am drawn to the emerging church stuff and the simple church stuff and the missional basis of "church" and that I think the current "modern" model of the local church (based on modification of the Roman church) is hogwash and quite unlikely to be at all effective within the next 25 - 50 years. Thanks to Barna for the recent validation.

Well, I continue forward, eyes on the path yet gazing ahead to the horizons.