REIMAGINING CHURCH: by Frank Viola (David C. Cook Publishers).

Frank Viola is a creative guy. He writes well too. And in his latest book, he is free from the shackles of having to write things others insisted he include in the book Pagan Christianity, so if we want a close glimpse of the constructive project (rather than the deconstruction of the paradigm of what he calls the institutional church which was one of the main aims of Pagan Christianity), Reimagining Church is the right place to start. There are certain aspects of what I will call traditional churches that make Frank break out in a rash--- hierarchial structures for example, with which he contrasts organic churches where any one can speak any time they feel led to do so, and there are no traditional leadership structures. The claim is that Christ is being the head of the gathering or meeting, and so human heads are not required.

Frank left traditional churches in 1988 and set out on a journey to find, and help create more organic churches, free from the encumbrances of traditional leadership structures, free from liturgy (instead spontaneity is seen as a spiritual sign of being organic). He simply professed boredom with traditional worship, saw it as too leader dominated, and too often a performance. And so he set off on his quest seeking what he viewed as a more perfect representation of what he took to be the NT model of what church was supposed to look like. He describes very straightforwardly how he reimagines how the church ought to be-- organic in its construction; relational in its functioning; scriptural in its form (aha! it has a form); Christocentric in its operation; Trinitarian in its shape; communitarian in its lifestyle; nonelitist in its attitude; and nonsectarian in its expression. (p. 26). Now thats a tall order. Lets see how he develops these ideas and blueprints for the 21rst century church.

At this juncture, I want to make a disclaimer and lay some of my own cards on the table for all to see. I have no problems with what I would call close fellowship, really treating one another as brothers and sisters in Christ. I have no problems with people exercising their spiritual gifts, including in worship and in fellowship meetings. Joyful exuberant worship and fellowship is great. I have no desire to quench the Spirit. What I do have a problem with is how much of the NT ecclesiology one has to either ignore, deny, or reinterpret to come to the conclusion that organic body life is THE model that the early church followed and that we ought to follow. I also have a problem with those who have a problem inherently with the notion of hierarchial leadership structures, because in fact such structures are Biblical not merely in the OT, but in the NT as well, as documents like the Pastoral Epistles and Acts make clear.

And so I want to say up front, small gatherings in homes like Frank describes are not in themselves a problem, though even in those kinds of meetings some Euthychuss of this world can fall asleep, or even become crashing bores during them! All too often boredom you see is not caused by dead worship services but by a state of mind of a person who lacks imagination including imagination about art, and liturgy, and stain glassed windows and robes, and crosses, and candles and organs and string instruments and people actually trained in what they are doing musically and otherwise as they help worship to happen in authentic and traditional ways. But I digress.

What I am going to stress in what follows is that the body metaphor is only one of the many metaphors used to describe the church in the NT (the temple and the bride being two others), and it was not meant to be taken literally, or for that matter organically. Indeed, the function of the body metaphor in 1 Cor. 12 is not to uphold a vision of organic church, but to oppose the divisions and factions and fissures in the Corinthian congregation by stressing that all the body parts are crucial and essential, and no one can say to another member of the body I have no need of you. In other words, the metaphor doesnt describe a mode of worship or a way of doing a fellowship meeting or an organic way of doing church, it describes a way of treating ones fellow body members with love and respect whether you are meeting together or not. Nor does the metaphor itself describe at all what Christs role might or might not be when the meeting is held in a home. In fact, Christ is not even said to be the head of the body in 1 Cor.12! The issue there is the relationship between the members, not the relationship between Christ and the members. That comes later in Colossians and serves a very different purpose. More on this shortly.

On pp. 27-28 Frank gives us his paraphrase of Martin Luther Kings famous I have a Dream speech. Basically it states his wish for a more organic and spontaneous church where everyone is actively engaged and sharing their gifts. I am sure he meant no offense but I am equally sure that many African Americans would have problems with turning a speech about social justice and opposition to racism into an ode to a specific sort spiritual concept of church life, especially when what is envisioned is rather different from the black religious and black church experience in various ways.

On p. 31 we have an interesting quotation from one T. Austin Sparks, which reflects the usual exaggerations about how spontaneously pneumatic all early church life was and how all knowledge and understanding of the Bible comes from the Holy Spirit. Sparks is quoted as saying We cannot obtain anything in our New Testament as the result of human study, research, or reason. Its all the Holy Spirits revelation Everything [in the early church] then was the free and spontaneous movement of the Holy Spirit. I honestly dont know why Frank would use such a quote when he knows perfectly well that at both ends it is false. Frank is a diligent student of the NT. He knows we need to use all the powers God has given us, and all diligence to understand the Word of God, and of course in addition to this we especially need the illumination of the Spirit, indeed the latter is the most essential thing. It is not however by any means the only essential thing. Frank is not an anti-intellectual, but you would never know it from this quote.

It reminds me of the student who came up to class one day frustrated and said I dont know why I need to do all this research, and writing and studying of the NT. Why I can just get up into the pulpit and the Spirit will give me utterance. I rejoind: Yes, you can do this, but it is a shame you are not giving the Holy Spirit more to work with. And on the second pointNo, everything in the early church was not all the free and spontaneous movement of the Spirit. Often it involved the will, and hard work of ordinary mortals, such as Paul when he sought to make the collection for the poor in Jerusalem. Often it involved setting up a order of deacons or elders or even widows to perform certain tasks.

On p. 32, Frank allows there are many images of the church, which he then claims are all living entities. This is not quite true. A field, for example, is not inherently a living entity. Dirt has no life without seeds and water. And while the temple imagery in 1 Peter does indeed refer to living stones, what Frank fails to note is that this is an hierarchial image of church. Buildings have structures, just as the church has organization and structures. It is quite impossible to make a hard and fast distinction between an organism and an organization, even when the subject is the church. And more to the point, the NT writers dont want us to make that sort of mistake either.

On this same page, Frank makes a dramatic contrast between organic church life naturally produced when a group has encountered Jesus Christ in reality (external ecclesiastical props being unnecessary) and the DNA of the church is free to work without hinderance. He seems to think that by contrast the modern institutional church operates on the same organizational principles that run corporate America. (p. 32). This is a grotesque exaggeration of the facts. Frankly, most traditional churches would have been shut down long ago if they were businesses! And most are certainly not run purely on some sort of business model. I have pastored six traditional Methodist Churches, and served in numerous others, and not a one of them could be characterized in this way. Decisions are made after much prayer, often involving whole church meetings, discussions, long prayer sessions and then further reflections. I dont know many businesses in America that make decisions that way. Are there some churches that have sold their souls to a business model? Perhaps so. But in the hundreds I have preached and taught in around the world, I have never found one that truly fits that caricature.One of the foundational principles for Franks approach to church life is that the Trinity itself is a sort of blueprint or model of unity in the midst of relationships for church life (N.B. he seems to think Gen. 1.26 is a reference to the Trinity, but in fact most OT scholars would tell you that this is probably God discussing matters with his courtthe angels. The Trinity does not show up as a concept until the NT era, and for a very good reason. The Son was not revealed before the Incarnation. The Hebrew who wrote Gen. 1.26 would have been stunned to discover that he was referring to the Trinity! No, he would reply, it refers to Yahweh and his retinue, his court see e.g. Isaiah 6).

Now part of the major premises of Frank about the Trinity, is that there is no hierarchy, even a functional hierarchy in the Godhead itself. So for example on p. 35 we hear about the mutual submission of all members of the Trinity to each other. But in fact this is not quite true. We hear a good deal about the submission of the Son to the Father, and of the Spirit to the Son and the Father, but nothing at all about the submission of the Father to either the Spirit or the Son. It is always the Fathers will about which Jesus prays, and teaches his disciples to pray, and it is the Fathers will to which he himself submits.

And actually this is not simply a temporary expedient during the life of Jesus on earth when he once walked amongst us. Indeed 1 Cor. 15 says quite clearly that when Christ returns, his task will be to subject all things to the Father. Listen carefully to what Paul then says about what happens at the end of the process of subjecting all thingsNow when it says that everything has been put under Him [i.e. Christ] it is clear that this does not include God [the Father] himself who put everything under Christ. When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to God [the Father] who put everything under him, so that God [the Father] may be all in all. That is, even at the eschaton, and the end of all human history, the Son will be submitting himself and all things back under the rule of the Father. Now this submission of the Son to the Father is not an ontological one, it is a functional hierarchy we are talking about here. If then we accept the premise of Frank and others that the Trinity provides the blueprint or pattern for how the church should be viewed, ordered, structured, then we would naturally expect the church to have a functional hierarchy. If its good enough for Jesus, it should be fine for us as church as well. But there is more.

Frank goes on to say The church is the organic extension of the triune God. It was conceived in Christ before time (Ephes. 1.4-5) and born on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2.1ff.). (p. 35). There are several serious theological problems with this sort of assertion: 1) it violates the Creator creature distinction the Bible insists on from first to last. The church is not a natural or organic extension of God on earth! To the contrary the church is a distinct entity, like a bride, that God has chosen to unite himself to, through spiritual relationship and koinonia. This is a very different matter indeed. Any idea of church that suggests that any group of human beings is simply the natural extension of God on earth has badly misunderstood what Paul and others are talking about. 2), Ephes. 1.4-5 is not about the conception of the church pre-temporally. All of the Greek here is clear enough that what the author is talking about is happening to and in Christ not to and in us the church. It was Christ himself who was chosen before the foundations of the world to be our savior. We, as church didnt existent then. These things are only true of believers by extension because NOW (not then) we are in Christ. You do have to exist before you can be in Christ, and no human being existed before Adam.

Frank goes on to say that the church possesses the very same life that God himself possesses. This also is not quite accurate. God has eternal lifehe has always been and always will be. We however, through a process called the new birth obtain everlasting life--- life that begins at a particular point in time, and goes on infinitely into the future. God has his eternal life quite naturally. We obtain everlasting life as a gift from God. There are then clear differences here. To this we must add that when God gives us everlasting life, had he truly given us exactly what he has, we would have had no need for either the Holy Spirit or anyone else to indwell us, fill us, revivify us again and again and so on. We would have been divinized, which we arent. It was the voice of the snake which promised you shall be as gods, not the voice of God. This is not Christian theology, but it certainly is Mormon theology. What being partakers of the divine nature means (2 Pet. 1.4) is that we are given spiritual union with the one who has such a nature, and it transforms us, not into God or gods, but into true and godly human beings. It doesnt make us the natural extension of God on earth either, though I have met some church folk who think they are Gods gift to humanity.

Franks disconnect here appears to be between the notion of hierarchy and the notion of equality. He cant seem to imagine the two going together either in the Godhead, or in proper church community. He states for example, that while Jesus was on earth he simply voluntarily submitted to the Father. While I grant that he certainly did do this, it wasnt just pro tempore, or during the period of time while he was on earth. 1 Cor. 15 is equally clear that he will do so again once the kingdoms of this world become the kingdom of God, and all evil and enemies are placed under his feet.

So here is where I stress that ontological equality, and functional subordination have always been and always will be compatible, and the blueprint Godhead provides us with a reason to expect that in the church there will be a hierarchial pattern of ordering things. I would hasten to add that it does NOT lead us to expect that this pattern will involve a gender hierarchy. No, it will involve a leader and follower, shepherd and sheep, pastor and congregation, apostle and co-workers hierarchy--- something Frank wants to avoid at all costs, seeing it as either inorganic or simply fallen human structures.

Alas, however, it is the divine design, mirroring the functional subordination that indeed has and does exist in the Trinity. When the Bible says honor thy father (and mother), it never conceives of a day when somehow the son ever ceases to be a son, ceases to owe respect to the father, ceases to be ordered under the father in these ways. There will always be an ordering in that relation and so a hierarchy. Likewise, there never comes a day when the only begotten Son becomes the Father, or somehow the Father changes roles and becomes the only begotten Son. Equality and indeed mutual love and respect do not in any way necessarily rule out an ordering of relationships, or even functional subordination in such relationships either in the Godhead, or in Christian community. I am afraid that what has affected and infected this discussion is secular notions of equality that assume that equal must mean the same in all respects, or the same in all functions. But this is not what the Bible either says or suggests.

Pt. II

The hermeneutics of Frank Viola are interesting, and contra what some might think, Frank is not interested in playing first century Bible land. Listen to what he says: But as I shall argue in this book, the New Testament contains no such blueprint for church practice. Neither does it contain a set of rules and regulations for Christians to follow. (p. 37). I take it that he means normative rules about church praxis, I am sure he is not denying there are imperatives in the NT that Christians must follow. What Frank seeks to do then is sift the NT trying to decide which practices mentioned in the NT are merely descriptive (they used to do it that way) and which are prescriptive (we all ought to keep doing that, and doing it that way). He further explains that he means that some things we find in the NT are merely culturally relevant practices (headcoverings perhaps), some reflect the unchanging nature and identity of the church (p. 39). Now this is interesting. On the basis of what criteria does one decide that X is transcultural, but Y is culturally bound, X reflects the very DNA of the church in all generations, but Y, not so much?

Frank works through four models for doing church, three of which he sees as not really viable, the fourth of which he is a strong advocate. They are : 1) Biblical blueprintism; 2) cultural adaptability; 3) postchurch Christianity; 4) Organic expression. Frank is well aware that 1) does not work, not least because the first century church as depicted in the NT is full of flaws. Anyone want to pastor First Church Laodicea? I didnt think so. He is also rightly wary of over-contextualization which results in becoming indistinguishable from the larger culture, accommodating to the values and intellectual climate djour. But Franks strongest and most pointed (and I would add, most telling) critique is of some of the emerging/emergent folks ideas about church. Listen to what he says:After critiquing the notion that spontaneous social interaction or personal friendships are what being church means without the need to belong to an identifiable community that meets regularly for prayer, worship, fellowship etc. he adds

Such a concept is disconnected with what we find in the NT. The first century churches were locatable, identifiable, visitable, communities that met regularly in a particular locale [about all of which he is right on target]. To this he adds the postchurch paradigm appears to be an expression of the contemporary desire for intimacy without commitment. (p. 40). I would say that the organic church model has arisen in part in response to the deep desire for intimacy in Christ with ones fellow believers, especially in the wake of the decline and brokenness of the physical family and alienation from the larger cultures forms of doing community. In this regard both the organic model and the postchurch model are responding to the same felt needs and serve in part as a form of compensation for inadequate family life or cultural life. T his is what the sociologists would say about the rise of this recent phenomenon, and they are surely partly right, though this is not the whole story. What I find rather amazing in the 4 paradigms listed here is nowhere is the traditional church model listed, which is neither 1) 2) 3) or 4). Perhaps Frank thought he critiqued that enough in his previous book.

Frank is not arguing that churches have no form or structure. Rather he maintains they should emerge from within the active life of the church community, not be imposed from without. Honestly I dont think many of us would disagree with this. But this is how it works--- the Holy Spirit gifts different persons differently. Not all have the gift of prophecy, not all have the gift of teaching, not all have the gift of administration/steering/ leading, not all have the gift of preaching and so on. The hand of the body has a different function than the foot, to use the body analogy. What this means is, the body of Christ must discern who has which gifts, since all have one or more such gifts, and stimulate not stifle the use of these gifts. And it is true, too often the traditional church has not adequately done this. But it is quite false to suggest that the body of Christ is simply interchangeable parts with each person equally gifted to do all tasks. This is frankly a bad misreading of the Pauline letters.

On p. 41 Frank would have us believe that the headship of Christ replaces all human headship in the church. Never mind that this is not what the NT says or suggests, beginning with Jesus himself who appointed the twelve and then later commissioned all the apostles, both men and women, to lead the church of the resurrection. Never mind that Jesus told Peter that he would build his church on the properly confessing Peter, and give him the keys to the kingdom, as the representative of the community as a whole (cf. Mt. 16 and 18). Never mind that the Pastorals tell us that even in the 60s apostles were appointing their co-workers to appoint elders and deacons hither and yon in the local church, and there was not a distinction made between itinerant leaders (who could be paid) and local leaders (who according to Gal. 6 should also be paid). But we will say more of this in due course.

Also on p. 41, Frank says that the permanent DNA of the church involves: 1) expressing the headship of Christ in his church as opposed to expressing the headship of a human being. This however is a false contrast, since Jesus himself set up certain human beings to be heads over, and indeed even judges of the twelve tribes of Israel. Christs headship is expressed in the local church not apart from human leadership, but rather through it. 2) the true church will always encourage the every-member functioning of the body. This is true, but the question is how and when. There are times and places where it is appropriate to allow everyone to share. There are other times and places, for example during the celebration of the Lords Supper, where it is not appropriate for all to share spontaneously. The bad guy in this discussion continues to be what Frank calls dead tradition or lifeless rituals. It is a shame that he hasnt experienced lively rituals and living tradition which strengthens the faithful. He needs to come to worship in Estes Chapel at Asbury Seminary sometime.

3) The true church will always map to the theology that is contained in the NT, giving it visible expression on the earth; 4) It will always be grounded in the fellowship of the Triune God. Few would object in principle to these last two mandates, but the question is, what do they entail and imply. The rightness or wrongness of such dictates depend on their fleshing out. His model of church is a loving, egalitarian, reciprocal, cooperative, nonhierarchical community (p. 41). He right about most of that, but especially wrong about the last point, and I would add once more egalitarianism is not in any way at odds with functional hierarchy. Obviously authentic Christian community involves familial love, devotion of members to one another, the centrality of Christ, the innate desire to gather together for worship and fellowship and the desire to form intimate relationships in Christ (see p. 45). To this Frank insists we must addopen participatory gatherings and the impulse to share Christ with a fallen world. These additions are unobjectionable, but open participatory gatherings is not how worship is described in the NT, except when it went wrong in Corinth and Paul had to correct it. There is a time and a place for such gatherings, but worship is not frankly the time for everybody share now. Worship is supposed to be theocentric, God-centered and should not be confused with fellowship and sharing with one another. We will deal with how Frank attempts to get around this distinction between koinonia and doxology in a bit. But let me be clear, in Franks paradigm the chief function of a normal church meeting is edification, rather than worship and glorification of God (see pp. 49-53), this is certainly where I would most disagree, not because there isnt a place for church meetings which have as their primary function edification. Of course there isthose are called fellowship meetings, not worship meetings. And of course the problem with inviting strangers to the kind of intimate fellowship meetings is precisely the problem Paul is correcting in Corinth in 1 Cor. 14. Strangers and the uninitiated will say Christians are out of their minds. Strangers cannot participate in that sort of meeting because they are not yet in Christ. And so, in an odd twist of things, church meetings in Franks paradigm are not open and participatory at all, if by that we mean open to all comers, Christian or not.

Frank sets up a paradigm of four different types of meetings in the early church: 1) apostolic meetings where apostles preached to an interactive audience. Their goal was to plant a church from scratch or to encourage an existing one (pp. 49-50). Frank admits that in such a meeting the apostle does most of the ministry, but then quickly adds that these sorts of meetings are never permanent (p. 50). Now one has to say that this conclusion stands at odds with church history in various ways, including NT history. We have long standing historical traditions that James stayed put in Jerusalem permanently, and once Peter left, became the head of that church. Indeed, as the records from Papias and others show, the leadership was passed down within the holy family in the first century in this church (see the work by Richard Bauckham on Jude and the Relatives of Jesus). And it is a very odd thing to call Paul merely an itinerant when in fact Acts tells us he planted himself in Ephesus for two and half years, and stayed long after the church there was well established. Not only so, but he appointed people like Priscilla and Aquila his co-workers to be leaders there and elsewhere. O yes there was a leadership structure in Pauline churches, and yes, it was appointed top down, not bottom up.

2) Evangelistic meetings are the second category of meetings, and Frank would include preaching in the synagogue and the marketplace. Evangelistic meetings were designed to plant a new church orbuild an existing one. (p. 50). Whatever Pauls goals may have been, he never ever so far as we can tell, held an evangelistic meeting in a synagogue! What he did was participate in the synagogue worship services throughout the Roman empire! That is, he continued to take part in Jewish worship which involved prayers, preaching, reading of scripture and the like, just as the apostles continued to worship in the temple in Jerusalem as well. There is now a very fine book talking about how much the early church, especially in its Jewish Christian forms took over from the synagogue, including its elder structure. The reader wanting to see the overlap between Jewish and early Christian worship and structure should read From Synagogue to Church by James Burtchaell (Cambridge U. Press).

3) Decision making meetings. Here Frank sites Acts 15, the church council meeting. He stresses the chief feature of this meeting is that everyone participated in the decision making process (p. 50). Thats true. But its one thing to confer, another thing to conclude, and even Peter and Paul were only conferring in this meeting. The person who concluded and wrote up the Decree was James, in consultation with the other elders in the Jerusalem Church and in consultation with the Holy Spirit as well of course. The point is, we did not have a democratic vote at this meeting, and a decision was not taken by the body as a whole. Rather the leadership made a decision after conferring and hearing out one and all.

4) Church Meetings. Here Frank is arguing that these meetings did not involve preaching, based again on his reading especially of 1 Corinthians. What is totally missing in this analysis is the function that Pauls letter was meant to have in such a meeting! The letter was not for private consumption of individual Christians one by one. It was to be dramatically read out in the church meeting as the apostolic voice preaching to the congregation through a surrogate appointed by Paula Timothy or a Titus. So, even in Corinth, there was proclamation of Gods Word in the church meeting by an apostolic delegate whenever possible. We could of course also point to the long standing church meeting in Troas where Paul goes and preaches, and Euthychus falls out of the window. Was this somehow a different kind of meeting than category 4)? Probably not. The Christians meetings, especially when a majority of those present were Jews and God-fearers were not purely pneumatic in structure. They looked more like a synagogue worship service in various regards. What is entirely missing in the fourfold paradigm is a proper worship service in which the whole service, prayers, singing, offerings, etc. with the exception of the preaching, is theocentric in character, not anthropocentric. Now I am not suggesting that Franks church meetings do not involve elements and aspects of worship, of course they do. However, by not having worship meetings in addition to fellowship meetings doxology is inadequately focused on. This, perhaps more than anything else is my primary concern about the organic model Frank is advocating. It neglects worship and the proper task of preaching to Christians who so desperately need it in an age of Biblical illiteracy. It also ignores that we have creeds, and liturgies and hymn fragments already embedded in our NT which were used in Christian meetings in the first century. No one who has read the Didache could doubt that this is so, and for that matter the NT says so as well.

What about texts like Heb. 10.24-25? Dont they suggest that the primary purpose of church meetings is edification? Well in fact no they dont. Hebrews is a sermon, based on a string of OT texts. It is not a letter at all, except in the sense that it was sent from a distance, and the author expected in this oral culture for this letter to be rhetorically and aptly and dramatically read out as a sermon to the whole congregation. He mentions in passing at Heb, 10.24-25 that the audience ought also, in addition to listening to this sermon, to edify one another. He does not even say that it must be done in the church meeting when this sermon was dramatically performed. Edification is necessary, but Hebrews only mentions it in passing! Heb. 3.13-14 certainly does exhort us to exhort one another, but nothing is said about this happening in the church meeting and corporately, indeed the whole phrase one another implies one person exhorting another person in its primary sense, not one exhorting everybody else. And we could debate how much private exhortation of a sinful Christians particular problems should happen in the corporate meeting. Jesus says that if a brother has something against you, one goes to them in private, and if they wont listen then one takes others with you. This is not an action meant for corporate worship or even an every member fellowship meeting. My point is simple. You cannot assume that the one anothering described here and elsewhere in the NT is all or mainly or usually to transpire in a church meeting. Indeed, there is good reason to think otherwise in various cases.And I might add 1 John is likewise such a sermon that was meant to be read out dramatically, as is James. And James makes clear that Christian meetings should allow strangers to come and share in them, and that at least these Jewish Christian meetings functioned much like synagogue meetings. Notice that the Holy Spirit is hardly mentioned in James. 1 Corinthians is an example of correcting over-pneumatic approaches, not encouraging them. What Paul allows for a time, being a smart pastor (consider the issue of baptism for the dead), is not necessarily what he prefers. Indeed, he is in the process of steering the audience in a different direction from their preferred practice. It is a serious mistake to make what is said, especially what is said in passing and by way of correction, in 1 Corinthians the model for organic church.

On p. 55 Frank gets to the theological nub of the matter the most startling characteristic of the early church meeting was the absence of any human officiation. Jesus Christ led the gatherings by the medium of the Holy Spirit through the believing community. Somehow human leadership is seen as necessarily getting in the way of Christ leading the meeting. Now, I grant that sometimes human leadership can indeed get in Gods way. Of course that is true. But if one reads the whole drama of salvation history including in both the OT times, God was always setting apart particular persons for leading Gods peoplea Moses, an Elijah, the apostles, the elders, the deacons and so on. It cannot then be true that the selection of some to be human leaders and others not to be is somehow an unbiblical or unchristian notion. And one must askWhat exactly is meant by Jesus Christ is leading the meeting? By this does one mean that the Spirit inspires some to speak words of wisdom or words of knowledge or prophetic words in some Christian meetings? If that is all that is meant, that is unobjectionable. If however what one means is that church members speak as Jesus, that is seriously problematic. Jesus speaks for himself, in the Gospels, and after the ascension he continues to speak for himself through visions. But what even the apostles never claimed is that they were speaking as Jesus. They claimed they were inspired by the Spirit to speak the truth for God. That is a very different matter. The danger of blurring the line between Christ speaking and a Christian speaking is always a serious one. The very reason Paul wants the prophetic words of prophets weighed and sifted, as he suggests in both Romans and 1 Corinthians, is because they may well be 80% Spirit inspired, but 20% human additives. They must be sifted and weighed, and in any case the Spirit is not Christ, and Christ is not the Spirit and the human Christian is neither, of course.

Here in Kentucky we have the last remnants of the 19th century Shakers, or shaking Quakers as they were earlier known. If you read their history, and in particular the history of their leader Mother Ann, one of the delusions she had was that she was the incarnation of the Holy Spirit on earth, and that she spoke as the Holy Spirit. This is rather like Rev. Moon when he claimed to speak as the second coming of Jesus. So, I must stress once moreit is human beings speaking in church, and we trust God is using them, inspiring them in what they say, but we are warned to sift their words with good reason. There can be no sifting if Jesus is speaking directly to us--- only obeying. Even Christian prophets speak even under the inspiration of the Spirit not as Jesus or as the Father or as the Spirit, but for them. There is a big difference.

On p. 59 we hear that the body of Christ, is Christ in corporate expression, and on p. 60 we are told that the divine function of church meetings is so Christ can manifest himself in his fullness. While this is interesting language it overlooks that the very point of the body metaphor is to make clear that the body is not the head, it is simply connected to the head. The body of Christ is not Christ, who happens to be bodily in heaven. The fact that Paul uses language somewhat loosely in this sermon to stress the connection between the head and the body should not be over-pressed. And what exactly does it mean for Christ to express himself in his fullness in a church meeting?

Beginning with p. 60ff. we get a clearer glimpse of what Frank means by Christ manifesting himself in his fullness, and we learn why it is such a urgent matter for him that everybody participate in such a meeting. If that doesnt happen then Christ is not fully manifested, and the body is not fully edified. Here we are dealing with a profound confusion between Christ who is simply the head of the body, and the congregation who is the body. The body is not the head, and the body is frankly NOT Christ. Frank puts it this way He is assembled in our midst. (p. 60some assembly required, apparently). Now this is most peculiar language. Christ is not in need of being assembled! His presence is no less present when it is not everyone who speaks in a church meeting. Nor is it true that the only way that Christ can be properly expressed is if every member of a church freely supplies that aspect of the Lord that he or she received. (p. 60). Again this is once more to confuse the head with the body. The body belongs to the Lord, but it is not the Lord. And perhaps we have forgotten Christs promise that wherever two or more are gathered there I am also. Notice the ALSO, in such a saying. Christ is not the body, he is coming to be with the body. I am all for lively body life, but not for delusions of grandeur. The other thing that concerns me about this is that it is too Christomonistic rather than properly Trinitarian. Jesus, more often than not, pointed away from himself and to the Father during his earthly ministry and through his teachings. He taught his disciples to pray to God as Abba, and we are told that one day the kingdom will be returned to the Father. Real Trinitarian worship involves coming to the Father through Jesus the Son in the power of the Spirit. It is not Christomonistic. On p. 61 Frank stresses that Christian church meetings centered on Christ and every word shed light on Him. Now from my reading of the NT, I would suggest this is false. I quite agree that Christ is the main subject of early Christian witness and focus. Its not however all about him. It is often about other things. I can for example imagine a church meeting based on the homily of James. Jesus is barely mentioned at all in this sermon, and that is just fine. There were probably many early Christian meetings which were not specifically dwelling on Jesus especially the Jewish Christian ones. I suppose in a broad sense one could argue that even when Christ was not mentioned what did happen in such a meeting shed light on Him, but it would appear Frank means more than this. Two of the undercurrents in this book are a dislike for what is called elitism, and the notion of a clergy class of religious authorities who speak for the Lord. There is a resistance to the notion that we need such specialists or especially trained persons in the body of Christ. I disagree, and actually it has nothing to do with elitism, it has to do with some being given more gifts and talents than others, just as in the parable of the talents, and what follows thereafter is the need for good stewardship of all that is given. While God can even speak to his people through Balaams donkey, there is a reason why we hear in the Scriptures that studying the Word of God (in the original languages) is important, and is a way to be found approved. Frank seems to have confidence that schooling and special training can be bypassed since Christ can speak directly through any member of his body.

I must say that when I have gone to such charismatic meetings, what is more often than not expressed is not some new revelation from Jesus in person, but simply words of comfort or exhortation or spiritual insight which I would call words of knowledge etc. Its not Jesus speaking personally, its spiritual insight into someones life prompted by the Holy Spirit, and very much ad hoc, and having an immediacy and a definite shelf life to it. And sometimes, as well it is of such a generic sort that one wonders why the Holy Spirit was being redundant. And sometimes one wonders in some cases whether it even came from the Holy Spirit at all, rather than some other spirit. This is why the NT writer said we must test the spirits, and the utterances claiming to be from God. In other words, I see no NT evidence at all that at any genuine church meeting we must allow or assume that everyone is or will be speaking, or that they should do so. Nor do I see any evidence that if everyone is not speaking, Christ is not properly or fully manifested. When Paul preached to the Christian Ephesian elders, he was basically the only person who did so on that occasion, but I would not want to be the person who suggests that Christ was not fully manifested then and there. The reaction of the elders suggests otherwise.

On p. 63 we have another of the exaggerations which a prophetic figure is too often prone to. There were many more of these in Pagan Christianity, but they are not absent in its sequel. Frank says the early Christians were clergyless [not if by that we mean without human leaders], liturgyless [this is false as many of the NT studies on the creedal and hymnal and the Lords Supper liturgy (see 1 Cor. 11) will attest], programless and ritualless. Well, no on all four points in fact. Baptism and the Lords Supper are indeed rituals and have always had liturgies. In the case of the earliest stages of the Lords Supper the liturgy was indebted to the Passover liturgy.

On pp. 67-68 Frank wants to make a distinction between Christs headship as in relationship to the corporate body of Christ, and Christs lordship as in relationship to the individual. This distinction does not work at either end of the equation, exegetically. On the one had we have the reference to Christ being the head of the man (or possibly the husband) in 1 Cor. 11, and on the other had we have the many references to Christ being Lord over all persons, all beings, all the church, and not just over individuals. He is right however to critique the rampant individualism of the modern church and its failure to see the necessity of corporate fellowship and worship and witness and authentic community. Here lies one of the real positive correctives in this book for Western Christian culture.

One of the more important portions of this book is the glimpses we actually get of what happens in an organic meeting as described by Frank on pp. 69-71. I would encourage you to read this. I see nothing objectionable in this, and various things to praise. It is good for ordinary Christians to be empowered to speak and share and home meetings are a good place to do this, as they are less intimidating. Frank notes as well that planning was involved, and so it was not purely spontaneous after all. He speaks of people getting together two by two and praying and preparing. Those who spoke, spoke on the theme of spiritual water or rivers, one prompting the other, and hopefully the Spirit prompting them all. Frank freely admits that some meetings are far from glorious or even adequate. But what is beautiful about this is not that it is leaderless, for in fact whoever first stood up and spoke took the lead and others were prompted to leap in and share. What is good about this is that the saints shared openly and from their hearts. And here is where I say that home meetings in institutional churches often function identically to this. They are not substitutes for larger corporate gatherings for worship, but they are certainly necessary supplements thereto. The difference is, Franks movement thinks church must be small and intimate in all its fellowship and worship gatherings. I disagree. Indeed, as Francis Asbury once said, the larger the mass, the greater the tidal wave of Spirit movement, and the more it becomes visible and obvious to all present. This need not be confined to just evangelistic meetings. Big can be beautiful when it comes to church, but so is small, and both are often necessary for normal spiritual life.

The discussion of the Lords Supper begins well enough by describing some of the symbolism of the bread and wine and its theological overtones. I quite agree that the earliest Christians took the Lords Supper, at least in some of their meetings, in the context of a real meal. I dont agree that every meal shared by a group of Christians included the Lords Supper and was limited to the breaking of one loaf of bread. The breaking of the single loaf is grounded in the Passover ritual practice and is a continuation of that practice. In other words, the context is a meal, but the sharing of the Lords Supper is a special portion or aspect of that meal. What Paul in fact says in 1 Cor. 11 is that the Lords Supper should be shared whenever they all come together. But there were various house churches in Corinth and nearby Cenchreae and it is clear enough that not every church meeting involved this ritual. Some scholars would in fact say that the Lords Supper is not mentioned at all in the summaries about the earliest Christian meetings in Acts 2 and 4. The phrase through the breaking of the bread, may or may not be a sacramental allusion. Of course the other issue here is, is there something sacramental about the Lords Supper that would not be true of an ordinary meal, and the answer to this is yes. Paul does not give a warning in regard to an ordinary meal about partaking in an unworthy manner and being divinely judged for doing so. Paul gives that warning for not discerning the body when one shares in the Lords Supper (see at length my book on the Lords SupperMaking a Meal of It). I quite agree with all the complaints in this chapter about the trivializing of this sacrament ( Frank humorously calls what usually happens the Saviors sampler, the Nazarene Niblet, the Lords Appetizerp. 76). What I dont agree with is that there is no distinction between what is going on in the Lords Supper and what is going on in the larger context of the shared meal. The latter is just a fellowship meal. The former is more than that even when it is done in the context of the latter. And this brings up a key point. In the Passover, the Passover elements were distinguishable from a normal full meal and had special symbolic significance. The same is true of the Lords Supper, which in turn means that the size of the portion is not important. It is the meaning of the portion, as the Lords Supper can satisfy even in small quantities. It is a means of grace, not a means of getting full!

Frank is quite right that the Lords Supper is a covenant meal. He is wrong however that what happened at the last supper was simply the inaugural Lords Supper (p. 77). No, the last supper had Passover dimensions not carried over into the Lords Supper (e.g. the bitter herbs Jesus dipped his bread in with Judas). As 1 Cor. 11 makes perfectly clear the Lords Supper involves the recitation of what happened to Jesus on the night of the last supper. This was not an original part of that last supper meal itself. In other words, when Paul recited on the night when our Lord was betrayed, he took bread..he is reciting the common liturgy which had developed in the early church to commemorate that covenant making moment. As Paul says, he is passing on the tradition which had been passed on to him ( 1 Cor. 11.23). When he says for I received from the Lord he is using the technical Jewish language for passing on a tradition. He means it ultimately goes back to Jesus and what he said. He does not mean that he literally heard it from the horses mouth. This is Jewish traditioning language and we see it again in 1 Cor. 15 when Paul talks about the tradition in regard to the death, burial, resurrection, and appearances of Jesus. In other words, Paul had no problems with passing along church traditions--- and neither should we.

Frank stresses the joyful aspect of the feast, and suggests it is not a time for focusing on sorrow for our sins. Not a single word is said here about Pauls stern warning about what happens when we take the meal in a manner that is unworthy without discerning the body of Christ. And here is where I say that simply amalgamating the Lords Supper as the beginning and ending acts of an ordinary meal does the Lords Supper insufficient credit. I am happy that the meal context is being preserved. I am not happy that the sacramental character of the Lords Supper is not being honored with proper contrition for sin before partaking of the Lords Supper and a particular focusing on the death of Jesus himself. There is a place for having a more solemn portion of an otherwise joyful feast. The Lords Supper needs to be taken in a worthy manner, not merely as just another part of a fellowship meal. I agree with Frank that the Lords Supper is a spiritual reality (p. 79), indeed I would want to say that the Lords is especially spiritually present in the partaking of this meal. All the more reason to do it with respect and repentance.

There is an odd several paragraphs in this chapter about how the Lords Supper mirrors what is going on in the Trinity, as if the Son was consuming the Father and vice versa. This is yet another example of over-pressing the language of abiding and the like which describe metaphorically the spiritual connection between the Father and the Son. The Lords supper is not a picture of what is happening in the Trinity. It is a picture of a historical event, what happened on Golgotha, not what always happens in the Godhead. This is what comes of over relying on suggestions of Stan Grenz and others about how church life mirrors the life in the Trinity, which can be greatly exaggerated. God has no need of food of any kind and the Son while he may have been consumed with the work of the Lord, was not consumed by the Lord. One of the major claims made in Pagan Christianity was that Christian meetings were always in homes for the first 300 years of church history. I am not going to belabor this, since I dealt with the faulty history in the posts on the former Viola book, but it needs to be said once morethis is false on several scores. First of all, Christians met in homes, synagogues, the Temple, down by the riverside, in caves and elsewhere in the first century. They met in buildings and outside of buildings. The exaltation of the home to the exclusion of all the other meeting places is a mistake, and historically false. Secondly, we have clear archaeological evidence now in regard to houses being altered into church buildings already in the second century in the house of Peter in Capernaum (indeed, this may have transpired beginning in the first century), and we have further evidence of church structures in Jordan, and in Rome, some in the catacombs from before the third century A.D. Purpose built buildings for church purposes are not some mandated against by the NT, nor is there anything particularly holy about meeting in homes, nor does the NT mandate that practice. When you are an illicit religion in the Roman Empire where such religions are suspect and often persecuted, it is not a surprise that meetings were in private places. The social context affects this whole matter and discussion.

Frank suggests that when the church got too big to meet in just one place, they then simply multiplied and met in multiple houses. This is partially true, but it hardly explains the Pauline exhortation to the several house churches in Corinth whenever you all come together . That had to be possible, perhaps in yard of a Christian villa. I have looked at large villas excavated in Corinth, and there are various of them where one could meet on the grounds and have several hundred people present. The truth is, we have no idea how large early Christian gatherings could get and did get, and we have no right to assume that the limit would be the limits of the size of a villa dining area, or dining area plus atrium for example. But here we come to a major bump in the road for the Viola thesis. You cant have ever member sharing if 300 show up, unless you are prepared to go on for hours and hours and hours. And yes, it is true, some of the personalness and personality of a small group meeting is lost in a larger group. Some small group experts say 12 is the magic number beyond which true intimacy begins to get lost. I see no mandate of any kind in the NT suggesting we have to all meet always in such small groups or that that should be seen as the norm for a church meeting. Frankly there is nothing quite like hearing 300 hearty souls singing in unison And Can it Be in Estes Chapel, and yes the acoustics help. There is strength in numbers, and praise is multiplied exponentially in larger groups. Hooray for larger church worship services, for yeah verily they too comport with the NT witness. They are more obvious lights to the world and cities set on a hill.

Frank gives us the short list of the pluses of how churches in homes do a good job of being church: 1) the home testifies that Gods people are his house. This is a fair enough point. Frank is forgetting however that Judaism was a legal religion in the first century, and Christianity was not. It did not have permission to erect religious buildings, so it met in other peoples buildingssynagogues, the temple, the Hall of Tyrannus, and in homes, and out in the open of course. Meeting in homes was making a virtue of a necessity. And he is wrong in addition about the persecution in Jerusalem. The favor of the people was short-lived. Within a decade Peter and John and James Zebedee were incarcerated as church leaders. James was executed, and Peter ended up fleeing elsewhere. Indeed so great was the persecution of Christians in Jerusalem that Luke says this is what largely prompted the mission to Samaria and Galilee (see e.g. Acts 7-8).

2) The home is the natural setting for one anothering. Well actually its a good setting for that, but it can also be done almost anywhere, including out in the open, on the job during a meal break, and so on. 3) The home represents the humility of Christ. He has a point about the problems with the edifice complex amongst Christians and the cost of upkeep. However the down side of simply meeting in homes is that it suggests that nothing special, nothing holy, nothing exceptional is going on here. It suggests a casual attitude toward worship and fellowship. It suggests I dont really need to make an effort to give God my best when we worship or fellowshipIll just sing a chorus of just as I am even if I am a slob, and go ahead and go to this meeting. It is one thing to go and eat with sinners and tax collectors in their domain. It is another to set up a place to meet the Lord in holiness, even if it is in homes. There is nothing casual or ordinary about meeting God in person. The venue and the vehicle can help suggest the specialness of the occasion. God isnt interested in sinners simply being themselves at home in church. It expects them to become their best selves, giving their very best to God and his service, and the home setting honestly doesnt encourage this as well as some other settings.

4) The home reflects the family nature of church. This is a good point, perhaps the best point and reason for meeting in homes. I do not think we can say here that the early Christians met in homes because it reflected the unique nature of the early church. We simply do not know there was any element of conscious choice about this matter, much less the elaborate theology that Frank is enunciating to justify this as the normative practice. And really there is no empirical data to support generalizations like Most contemporary Christians attend church as remote spectators, not as active participants (p. 91). My response beHow do we know this? Furthermore, this has not been my experience. It sounds like before 1988 Frank only attended dead traditional churches. Its a great pity. 5) The home models spiritual authenticity. Well, it can do so, but since more Christian marriages end in divorce than endure, they more often model human brokenness, infidelity, rebellion of children, and a host of other sorts of family soap operas. Imagine what happens when a little church group meets in the home of a dying marriage, and is unable to stop the process, ending in taking sides with one spouse or the other. This is the other end of the spectrum of what is described in Acts 2 and 4, and this leads to another point. For whatever reason, small house churches seem more subject to schism (as they were in Corinth) than larger churches that meet outside of homes. This is not what Frank means when it talks about house churches multiplying. What I am talking about is not multiplication but rather ungodly division. This is the curse of low church Protestantism in general, and house churches are not immune to it either. Ironically in part this is because of a lack of good local leadership, and also due to bad ecclesiology.

I agree with Frank entirely that where one meets affects how one meets, and how one feels about the meeting. The building shapes us, not merely vice versa. John Wesley understood perfectly well the value of small group meetings in homes. He called them class and band meetings. They were essential for accountability confession of sins, prayer and the like. He did not however make the mistake of thinking that such a venue is inherently the best place for all church activities to transpire, or that the NT Christians suggested that it was. It was rather a both/and matter, and my position would be we need both small and larger church meetings. Not an either/ or situation. The sociology of size helps the church at both ends of the spectrum. I am far more likely to feel that I am part of the body of Christ universal if I meet with a large group of diverse Christians, many of whom are not of my race, my nation, my class group, my education, and so on. Build the ark big enough and you can rescue all sorts of critters two by two, so they can come in from the judging rain. I frankly think that a sanctuary does a better job of conveying sanctuary as a spiritual and religious idea than a home which has no altar at all, indeed has no religious symbols to speak of.

Frank is utterly convinced that the normative meeting place for the early church was the home. (p. 94). Honestly that is mistaking description for prescription especially on the basis of Acts. I agree that Christians probably more often met in homes than not in the NT era. There were specific social reasons and practical necessities for this. I see no ecclesiology of place attached to the home to the exclusion of other venues in the NT.

Pt. III

I must confess that Chapter Five is my favorite chapter of this book. I find myself both edified and helped by this chapter. Frank is right that the use of family language and house language dominates the discussion and the metaphorical language about the character of the early church. And like Frank, I think the NT writers are talking about a spiritual reality, not merely a sociological and social paradigm, such as fictive kinship. One caution needs to be interjected at this juncture, namely the ancient family looked very little like the modern one. It was an extended family to start with, and the household included slaves, hence their presence in the NT household codes. Thus, what ancients meant by family is not quite what we mean today.

Frank gives us six descriptors of what it means for the church to be a family and act appropriately like one: 1) members take care of each other. I quite agree this is important. I have seen this happen in large and small churches, and I have seen it not happen even in tiny churches. Size is not the issue here, compassion and motivation and conviction is. Frank complains that too many traditional churches use the business model to envision themselves. Honestly I dont know many who do this at least consciously, but sometimes there is pressure from church members to run it more like a business. This needs to be resisted. 2) members spend time together and not just at church times and places. Thats a no brainer. 3) members show one another affection. This one is both a promise and problem. The good side is one may feel received and accepted. The problem side however is huge. Over 30% of all women in churches have been abused by men before they reached adulthood, many by their own parents or siblings. Many of these wounded women should not be subjected to unwanted touch, particularly by members of the opposite sex. The problem of sexual abuse, sexual harassment and the like in the church is a serious one. And encouraging no professional personal boundaries between members of a church is often dangerous in a world full of abused and dysfunctional people. Let me be clear. I am not saying one should give up on hugs or the like. But there needs to be a good deal more consciousness raising in the church about these sorts of things, and about the dangers of intimacy, whether spiritual in character or otherwise. One more word of warning. The boundary line between ones sexuality and ones spirituality is often a thin one and the two things can be confused. People who are passionate in category A tend to be the same in B, and one bleeds over into the other. In other wordsa call for affection needs to be tempered with a call to guard ones heart, analyze ones motives and behavior, and the like. 4) Families Grow. Well yes they do, they also shrink when kids leave home and persons die. This analogy with the church can only be pressed so far. The point is that churches are supposed to be growing, and sheep shift is not church growth! 5) the members share responsibility. This can take a lot of forms, and need not include everyone speaking at every church meeting. There are a thousand tasks that the saints should be equipped to do. 6) the members reflect the Triune God in their relationships, abiding in one another and self-sacrificially loving and serving one another. The language of abiding in Johns Gospel is quite interesting. Literally what Jesus says is keep on abiding in me and I will abide in you. There is a matter of effort at abiding in Christ, and it comes with a promise. The analogy is drawn between Christs relationship with the Father and the disciples relationship with Christ. Of course this parallel is not a perfect or exhaustive one, but in regard to the giving and receiving of love and self-sacrificial service, there is an appropriate analogy. What is interesting however is that the parallel is not between how the Trinity relates to each other, but simply the Son and the Father, and the disciples and Christ. And both of these are in relationships of subordination to the one above them. The Son submits to the Father and his will, as the disciples to do Christ and his will. In other words, mutual sharing and loving neither rules out hierarchy nor necessarily implies it, but they are certainly compatible. A better family example would be parent and child. The child most certainly is in a hierarchial relationship with the parent and the household codes make clear this involves both submission and obedience. Does this make the child somehow less of a person than the parent? Of course not because the subordination is only functional, not ontological. Again, I must stress the functional subordination of the Son to the Father finds its analogy in similar relationships between human beings, parents and children. There is no evidence at all that the heavenly Father is in submission to the Son or ever in a subordinate role in relationship to the Son. The submission is not mutual in the Trinity.

Frank goes on to stress that the interactive and participatory model of church is what we are striving for. This would entail a stress on the group rather than the individual. In other words signs like accent on the individual have no place in the church. The corporate identity as family comes first, and ones physical family and individual identity come thereafter. Frank has a right to be outraged when a church does not take care of its own, and sees to all its members needs. Paul says the same thing in Gal. 6. And sadly seeing an uber-wealthy traditional church fail entirely to take care of its own poor members was the last straw for Frank with the traditional church. I would simply say that a church should not be evaluated on the basis of its worst behavior or worst member. Thats unfair. But I do understand Franks frustration.

Chapter Six beginning on p. 117 spells out in some detail what church unity ought to look like. Frank stresses that all Christians in a particular town are part of the household of God in that place, and presumably the body of Christ in that place. In my hometown of Charlotte that would mean close to 900,000 Christians in that one locale. Thats a big household to say the least. Frank also stresses that whomever God has accepted as his own, we should accept as our fellow Christians. I quite agree with this. Membership in a particular local church is not the same thing as being a member of the body of Christ. People have been accepted by God because they have repented and trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ (p. 119). There are then some theological preconditions to membership in Christs body, and if a particular local church asks more in order to join its fellowship, Frank calls this sectarianism. In other words, Frank is in favor of minimal requirements for recognizing someone is a Christian and a part of the body of Christ. I think I am in basic agreement with this. He does not discuss whether young children are considered provisional members of the church or covenant community or not. In my view, Paul says they are in 1 Cor. 7they are holy or set apart for God even without a profession of faith. I do agree as well that visitors are not part of the body of Christ, they are just visitors and as such they are welcome.

Frank offers an historical rationale for why today instead of their being a church in a locale, there are various different denominational and not-denominational churches. He believes that we should trace this splitting or division back to the imposition of a clergy laity distinction in the church in the third century and thereafter. The problem with this analysis is twofold. Firstly while there wasnt a clergy/laity distinction in the earliest church there was a hierarchial leader/follower distinction throughout the whole period. This then cannot be the cause of the rupture. Secondly, it was the Protestant Reformation which spawned the rise of the modern notion of Denominationalism, and indeed it did not spawn it immediately, but it rose to prominence in the last 3 centuries. Before Luther, there were various churches who all saw themselves as the one and only true church (Catholics, various sorts of Orthodox Churches, and so on). Some of these churches still think that way. In my view they are certainly wrong, and sectarian in their approach to this matter. All true Christians everywhere are the church, and part of the worldwide body of Christ. And no denomination has a stranglehold on the truth either.

I find the Bob illustration (about a layman who has teaching gifts but is told must pursue clergy training to be allowed to do it) on pp. 122-23 very odd. I dont know any traditional church that requires clerical training for someone to be allowed to teach in that church. This is simply false. Indeed, most of the teachers in the churches I have worked with were lay people. I was the only trained pastor of the bunch, and the fault line between teacher and non-teacher did not fall along the line clergy/laity. This is equally true in most Baptist, Lutheran, Presbyterian, UCC, Episcopalian and other traditional churches. Clerical orders are not required to be a teacher. Even here at Asbury Seminary, many of our faculty are not ordained pastors. So the notion that ordination requirements prevents someone from teaching, or even preaching in church, is false at least within most contexts in mainline Protestantism. These churches would not need to be asked What about Bob?

Frank then critiques attempts at unity through better organization or ecumenical efforts at mergers etc. I would say that I am happy with whatever helps remove barriers to fellowship and shared service in Christ. Unity is not merely a spiritual connection. It has a social dimension as well. There can indeed be organizational impediments to unity, but there can also be organizational ways to help foster that unity as well. Even if Frank wants to call this holding hands over the fence without taking down the fence, he is able to see this as a good thing (p. 125). Frank then calls for the abolition of denominationalism.

I would like to inject a word of caution about this. Christians of course do not all agree on many, many things. What having different denominations does is actually allowing church growth to continue along various trajectories without spending all ones time adjudicating disputes and differences. What denominations do is allow people to fellowship with other like minded believers and to live in peace. It is not perfect or ideal, but were we to abolish the various different denominations, short of the eschaton it would likely lead to more internecine warfare between Christians and an even more horrible witness to the world.

While legal separation with some cooperation is not as good as marriage, it beats divorce or even worse fraternal war twenty ways to Christmas. I personally happen to be glad to fellowship and worship with any and all other true Christians around the world. I have participated in all kinds of worship and fellowship meetings. Ive even preached in the one Baptist Church in Moscow which even Stahlin couldnt close down, and saw the babooshkas (grannies) who placed their bodies on the line to keep that church open. They are my sisters in Christ who stood tall against atheistic communism. But it is good for me and for them that I am not a part of their denomination, otherwise I would be constantly arguing with them about allowing women to do ministry not merely become martyrs! My goal is to be a world Christian in love with the whole body of Christ, however short of the return of Christ, I am realistic enough to think that the fences are not all going to come down, nor likely should they since we all remain fallen persons with inadequate theologies and inadequate charity. Frank is right that using the litmus test of doctrinal purity for creating unity in fact only leads to more sectarianism and church splits. It divides rather than adds to the unity. He adds I can imagine all the Christians who specialized in perfect doctrine passing out after they discovered who made it into the kingdom. Angels will be running around all over the place with smelling salts to wake them up! (p. 128). Aint it the truth!

On the other hand I am stunned by statements like During the NT era, each church was completely unified. All the believers in a specific locale lived as members of one family. (p. 129). Actually this is to paint to ideal a picture of the early church. It is perfectly clear that there are divisions in the Roman church between Gentile Christians and Jewish Christians and they dont all meet together, and they certainly were not all unified. Indeed, Romans is a discourse written to help unified that factious bunch, just as 1 Corinthians is, in a different sense. And it is telling that he never speaks of the church in Rome in Romans. And further more, there were both Pauline and Johannine churches in Ephesus which were not unified (see Paul Trebilcos fine work on Ephesus and the churches there). I enjoyed the remarkable story of overcoming denominational differences to form one fellowship meeting together on pp. 132-33, showing it is indeed possible. The lion can lie down by the lamb without thinking about lamb chops sometimes. And I think basically Frank is right unity in Christ comes by focusing on what we share in common in Christ. The word koinonia actually does not mean fellowship. Fellowship is the result of koinonia. What it means is a deliberate sharing or participating in common with someone in something. This indeed can create unity if we all are singing In Christ Alone together.

In Chapter Seven Frank asks the tough questionWhat is Gods eternal purpose in creating human beings? Frank suggests that the answer to this question can most clearly be glimpsed in places like Ephesians and Colossians. Salvation was not the original reason God created human beings in the first place. I would add that healing and salvation are actually only the means, only a redemption and recovery program to the eternal end,which is the proper worship of God and fellowship in Christ. Frank suggests that we examine closely Gen. 1-2 and Rev. 21-22 if we want to see Gods eternal purposes for humankind quite apart from the Fall, both before it and after it. Gods purpose was to create a human community that lived in unity and acted unto God, and not unto and for themselves (p. 143). Frank also says that Gen. 1.26 refers to the deliberations within the Trinity, but this is quite unlikely. The Trinity had not yet been revealed to humankind when Genesis was written and early Jews were right to see this as a reference to God and his heavenly court. And what follows from this is that the reference to let us make God in our image involves not just the image of God, but also in the image of angels. This is why for example the Psalmist says we are but a little lower or less than angels, and why angels in Gen. 6 tried to mate with humans, and why Jesus says that in the eschaton we will be like angels. Unfortunately for Franks theologizing here, this is not a story about the replication of life in the Trinity in the life of a human community.

The communion in the Godhead, says Frank, should be mirrored in the koinonia in human community, and at least on this point, I think Frank is on the right track. But in fact image bearing for Christians does not look like the Trinity. It looks like bearing the image of Christ himself specifically. This is what Paul speaks of when he talks in Rom. 8 about being conformed to the image of the Son. This is why Christians are called to cross bearing, and to their own death and resurrection. Death and resurrection is not a pattern that reflects the inner life of the Trinity, it reflects the particular story of Christ, and indeed of Christ on earth. So again, we need to be careful to note over-read the Scriptural evidence. It isnt the story of the inner life of the Trinity that is replicated in the pattern of the story of Christians, even of Christians in community. But I agree whole-heartedly that we were created for a love relationship with God and with eachthat is why the great commandments involve loving God with whole heart and neighbor as self. The commandments reflect the eternal purpose and intent. And as for ruling the earth, and Gods desire to do that, that is a call for us to be stewards and lovers of Gods greater creation.

Sometimes poetry and poetic image can go too far. On p. 145 Frank draws an analogy saying that just as Eve was in Adam before God created her, so the church was in Christ before the foundations of the world. The Father put his Son into a deep sleep on a hill at Calvary. Then in his resurrection, He released the woman onto the earthand her name is ekklesia. This is problematic on several fronts. Firstly, Eve was not some sort of incubus or fetus in Adam. No, Eve was constructed out of Adams parts and did not exist in Adam before then. Sorry, but this is too much of stretching of the story. Secondly, the bride did not exist before the foundations of the world in Christ. Only Christ existed, and the bride was not in Him in that sort of sense. And furthermore it was not the resurrection which caused the church to emerge. Technically speaking that did not and could not come about until Pentecost when the Spirit gave birth to the church. So the analogy doesnt work on either end of the deal. Frank gets full marks for creative thinking, but in the end, its bad exegesis. Frank however is right on target in saying that God is not just interested in new persons, he is interested in a new heaven and a new earth, since the latter was also affected by the Fall. In short God wants a human family, a diversity in unity sort of like the Trinity, and his purpose was to have a love relationship with such a human family from before all time. Frank prefers to put it this way: God wants a bride to marry, a house to dwell in, a family to enjoy, and a visible body through which to express Himself. (p. 147). For some this will sound far too close to Mormon theology about God needing a body and a family etc. And there is the further problem that the church is not the bride of God the Father, but rather the bride of Christ, who after all was once a human being and then a glorified human being. It is Christ the glorified God-man whose bride we are, and not the Trinitys or the Fathers. And for the record, God does not need us to have a physical extension. He has that in the Incarnate and then glorified Christ. It must be doubtful then that we should see the church as the extension of God on earth. Rather it is a community in spiritual union with Christ. This is a different paradigm.

I quite agree that a needs based approach to church (and preaching) misses the chief purpose of the church, which is to love God and enjoy and worship Him forever. This is why Revelation is the most worship focused book in the canonthat is where we are headed. Not caught up in small group one anothering, but in something even grandercaught up in love, wonder and praise of our God, looking not to the things which are seen, such as each other, but fixing our eyes on the things which are unseen, namely God about which we now have conviction and assurance (Heb. 11.1).

The church, when at its best, is only in a very limited sense mirroring the life within the Trinity. It is not chiefly supposed to be inwardly focused on itself. Besides its task to worship God, most often it is called to bear the image of Christ alone in the world. In other words after the doxological task and image, the missional image to the world is primary, the life in community image is secondary, if we are talking about the mission of the church. The Great Commission is about the mission. The true community is the product of the mission. The early church was a missionary movement which also did nurture. The church today is a nurture entity which has a mission function or committee. This is an analysis as applicable to the house church movement as it is to the mainline churches, sadly. It is not the goal and purpose of the community of Christ to simply enjoy each others company and focus inwardly on themselves and their koinonia.

Chapter 8 begins with the old canard that tries to make a hard and fast distinction between function and office, or between function and position. This is a false distinction in the church for the very good reason that functions regularly and continually exercised are de facto positions or offices in the church. And indeed the theology of gifting in the NT comes with a theology of charisma, by which I do not mean the modern notion of charismatic personality, but the idea of an ongoing grace gift, given to a particular person. I agree that ministries should be exercised on the basis of the grace and gifts given to a person. I also agree that God gives gifts to all persons in the Body, and calls all to some form of ministry. It is then correct to say that there is not a clergy/laity distinction in the NT. What there is however is a leader/follower, or teacher/disciple, or elder/children distinction in the NT, and yes this involve hierarchy. Not everyone is called and graced and gifted to be a teacher, and so on. I want to stress that these distinctions did not arise out of nowhere in the second century church or in succeeding generations. They existed at the very beginning of church history. What I am stressing is that passages like 1 Cor. 12 certainly do make clear that such roles are Spirit equipped and Spirit given and so in that sense, they are organic, to use Franks terms. The Spirit however decides who gets which gifts, and no one has them all, and no one is without some gift, and no the gifts do not simply rotate around in the church on a given day. In other words, the Spirit is concerned about our assuming our proper God-gifted roles, the Spirit is not simply interested in functions regardless of who performs them. One of the main flaws in the whole organic non-hierarchial model is that it leave quite out of the picture the fact that the Bible is replete with examples of persons, both in the OT and in the NT, particular persons called and gifted for specific tasks or functions. From Abraham to Moses to Samuel to David to John the Baptist to Jesus to the apostles to their co-workers to elders and deacons, God doesnt call functions, he calls specific persons to do specific tasks, and he equips them thereto.

Frank on p. 155 points to the fact that Jesus is making a distinction between his model of leadership and the worlds notions in Mt. 20.25-28/para. He is absolutely right about this. We are not however exchanging a hierarchial model of leadership for a non-hierarchial model. Servant leadership is still leadership. It is simply exercised differently than it is done in the world, or at least it should be. And of course in this same passage Jesus models servant leadership (see also Mk. 10.45). Domination and power plays from above are the worlds model. Service and sacrifice is Jesus model, and so Jesus rebukes James and John because they conceived of leadership in a worldly way. It should be notice however that Jesus was later to say to these same persons that they would at the eschaton sit on thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel. This most certainly is a model of leadership from above that is hierarchial. What happens though when this model of leadership is faithfully carried out is that the pyramid is invertedChristian leaders lead from below, they lift others up by getting beneath them in the pecking order of things and serving them. Like a weight lifter who, instead of trying to stand and clean and jerk the weight over his head, instead lies down and pushes the weight up from underneath, this is the way Christian leadership is supposed to work. The leader becomes like a servant, but this explains his model of leadership, his modus operandi, not whether he is leading by example or not. There is a difference between leading by the example of humble service and lording it over a group of people. This is the contrast Jesus makes in these sorts of passages. You will notice that this did not prevent Jesus from teaching, preaching, healing and sending out the 12 two by two to do the same, as leaders in training. Jesus did not train all of his disciples to be leaders, because all were not called by him to do so. And lest we think that power does not somehow work in a top down mode in the Kingdom, look at a text like John 20. Jesus breathes on his 12 and says receive the Spirit, in preparation for their doing what Jesus has called and now gifted them to do. They receive their power and authority from on high, not from a vote of a congregation, or a suggestion of a fellow church member or the like. The kingdom of God is indeed a hierarchial notion. It not only has a king, Jesus, it also has his agents, shaliach as they are called in Hebrew, apostles, prophets, teachers etc. So lets be clearmodern business or military models of leadership are not the source of the hierarchial models the church uses when it comes to leadership--- the Bible, including the NT is. Authority is not just based on godly character, meekness and a willingness to serve, though all those things are necessary. It is based on whom God has called, gifted, empowered to serve in a particular manner perhaps specific roles and functions. Function does not merely follow character. There are plenty of Christians of good character who are simply not called to leadership, or as Paul calls is, steering, administration, oversight. It is certainly true that Jesus strongly interjects some checks and balances so that arrogance and pride and self-serving behavior will not be allowed to be the impetus in Christian leadership. For one thing, he stresses that we should avoid encouraging people to call us by fancy titles. We need to take a more humble approach to leadership. Self-exaltation rather than self-sacrifice is not to be the manner in which we lead (see Mt. 23.8-12). But leadership by gifted and called persons we still need and require, not merely the leadership of Christ in heaven, but the leadership which he exercises through his anointed and appoint agents, both male and female, on earth.

If I were to probe the presuppositions Frank has about Christian leadership, one of the sine qua nons for him seems to be the idea that the concept of the priesthood of all believers implies a notion in which all Christians can assume all leadership functions at one time or another. The problem with this notion is severalfold. If we look at the places where the language of the priesthood of all believers appears in the NT (e.g. in 1 Peter, in Revelation) the author in question is not even talking about leadership in those passages. Two things are going: 1) a denial that we any longer have a need for a specific class of human beings called priests. Why? Because Jesus paid it all, and the role of the priest is to offer sacrifices for others to God. But Jesus, our high priest has accomplished this task once and for all as Hebrews says, and we need not have it repeated, replicated, or redramatized. We are done with temples, priests, and sacrifices on the earth in that sort of literal sense. This has not morphed into a notion that instead of just a few humans being priests, now every believer is a priest in this sense. That would simply be expanding the gene pool of human priesthoods to everyone. This we do not find in the NT. For example, when leaders are named, described, or their roles are mentioned the roles mentioned are things like apostle, prophet, elder, deacon, teacher, evangelist, BUT NEVER PRIEST. Why not? Because the priesthood of Christ has done away with that sort of human priesthood altogether. 2) What then are Peter and John and others referring to when they talk about the priesthood of all believers? The answer is simple. Every Christian has an obligation to offer themselves up as living sacrifices to God (see Rom. 12), and offer up the sacrifices of prayer, praise, thanksgiving so often referred to in the NT. That is, every Christian is his own priest in these matters, and no one else can perform those tasks for you. No one can worship God for you. No one can dedicate you to be totally sold out to God for you. YOU must do that yourself. This has nothing whatsoever to do with leadership functions, it has to do with our total dedication to and worship of God. All of use, especially when we gather together are called to offer up prayers and praise and thanksgiving to God. This is not supposed to be the performance of the few on behalf of the couch potatoes for Jesus. Nor when it comes to responding to Gods call to give yourself wholly to God should you ever say here I am Lord, take my brother/sister. Only you can present yourself as a living sacrifice. In short, the priesthood of all believers concept is used to reconfigure the way we look out our spiritual lives and duties and the call to worship God. It tells us nothing about who is or isnt gifted to be an apostle or a prophet or a teacher, and the like.

Frank (pp. 160-65) wants to insist that the problem is not just with a few self-seeking pastors. The problem is inherent to the whole pastor/clergy system. So the solution is ditch the system. He is right that sometimes, egocentric and yet insecure pastors instead of enabling the congregations gifts, makes himself indispensible to the congregations lifestyle and in fact disables the congregations gifts. This however is an example of pastors behaving badly, not an inherent flaw with having pastors in the first place. Let me give an example.

I used to attend an 8 a.m. Missouri Synod Lutheran service in Charlotte N.C. Now one would be hard-pressed to find a more conservative and traditional, and indeed male dominated denomination in those days. And yet something remarkable happened during the charismatic renewal movement in the 60s and 70s. The pastor became a charismatic, and so did his congregation! Did they then jettison the rituals, liturgy and clergy system in order to let the Spirit flow and have all members in ministry? Not at all, but things did change. That 8 a.m. service became an hour and half long (or longer). The liturgy became a sung liturgy with folk instruments. A time in the middle of the worship service was set aside for anyone to give a word of witness, share an exhortation, share a spiritual gift or experience. There was speaking in tongues, and even more beautiful singing in tongues. And there would always also be a powerful expository sermon, and we would all take the eucharist together every Sunday with joy and gladness, leaving the buildin