Re-Wilding The Church

The early Church was just like Jesus. Wild, untameable, riotous, dangerous, daring, and glory-filled! Shadows healed the sick. Miracles exploded like dynamite. World leaders were confronted, apostles were jailed, angels conducted hostage-release miracles, and it seemed a viral mission movement more than a club devoted to coffee and jumble sales!

They met in private homes, catacombs, and remote places when persecuted, and borrowed public spaces when safer. But it was a missionary movement first and foremost, spreading the Gospel passionately down the straight Roman roads of the empire.

This genesis era of the Church was a time of glory and guts. Of might and martyrdom. Of the “Go” that Christ left ringing in their ears at the Great Commission, propelling them across land and sea with missionary urgency.

But several hundred years later, Christianity became legalized by Rome and things began to change. Most notably, we started to build buildings.

The Rise of Church Buildings

Now, I love a beautiful church building. I sit in ancient chapels and soaring cathedrals to pray regularly. I love to travel like a pilgrim to great sites with stunning buildings and awesome history. But I am also aware that the rise of church buildings 1700 years ago changed us—and not always for the better.

Seventeen centuries on from the early blazing genesis of the Church, and our core essential gatherings have shifted from prayer meetings, apostolic teaching, and moves of the Spirit where “each one had” something to bring, to more formalized worship, led by elevated clergy, where believers now listen and observe rather than participate and prophesy.

The sacred body of Christ has slowly swapped the sense that they themselves were sacred temples, and for many it has become about sacred buildings. As the first missionary movement waned, church attenders replaced missionaries. Two-tier religion became the norm. The priests talked, prayed, ministered. The people listened, attended, went home.

I know there’s more nuance to all this than the brief, broad brushstrokes I’m painting. But if you were to take a 2000-year glance at the church from our origins to the present day, there is no doubt we have been affected by the shift from missionary movement to building-centric methodologies.

But something new is arising during this Divine Reset transition. Churches are popping up in homes. The concept of micro-churches is exploding. There’s a longing in many that no longer want to sing the songs, listen to the platform, and go back home. People want to actually “do the stuff” of miracles and mission, as Wimber always used to say.

Since 2020, some are purposefully walking away from the structures, programmes, duties, and drains of a Sunday morning congregation in a building—with all its setting up and taking down, musicians to find, technical equipment to operate, children’s workers and attractional departments (everything from top-notch coffee to manned creche facilities)—and are instead simplifying their spiritual expression. A home, or a coffee shop. Some friends. A mission. A little food. A Bible. That’s it. Let’s go reach some people!

Can you feel how that is appealing to people more passionate about mission than administration?

In these smaller settings, discipleship is natural and relational. Preaching becomes dialogue instead of a monologue, as questions can be asked, perspectives shared, stories told. The delight is that everyone is known. Voices are heard. Names recognised. Backstories taken into account. It’s personal.

Some might say there’s a danger that a rise of inexperienced leaders “sharing” thoughts, instead of thorough apostolic teaching (which the disciples were evidently devoted to—Acts 2:42), could increase the opportunity for deception or deviation. And I agree.

That’s why some are blending a larger gathered church model, with meetings on a Sunday alternating between a church building and members’ homes. This reaps some of the benefits of both models and loses some of the draining aspects of either model—especially weekly large services with all their volunteer staffing, concert-style worship and planning.

Some larger churches now only meet in a large setting once a month or fortnightly. Homes and even online resources are becoming the new tool in the church leader’s toolbox.

Of course, the digital tools we were forced to embrace through the lockdowns of 2020–2021 mean even older Christians have become used to gathering on YouTube, Zoom, or learning through a phone app or online course. Many large churches have started “E-Congregations”—home groups around the world, connected to the apostolic teaching or flow of a large church or apostle.

“Churches” are popping up in gyms, coffee shops, businesses, schools, and universities.

It would seem that the pivot point that was 2020—with all its turbulence—has given the Body of Christ a kind of mid-life crisis, and some are changing their methods, hoping for a wave of harvest, a loss of complexity, and a new depth of community.

A new day is bubbling up all around us. How will you respond to this new day?

An extract for The Divine Reset & Beyond: Order Your Copy HERE.

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